It was right after the sixteenth engagement with Amanecere.

Standing in the middle of the border, nineteen-year-old Sion realized something was terribly wrong amidst the surging chaos.

“Ah, aagh…!”

As the curse lifted and he became aware of his wounds, Sion buried his head in the ground and wailed.

“Calm down and breathe.”

At that moment, someone lifted Sion up and forcibly opened his mouth. Then they supported his chin so he could breathe.

Sion looked at the person who had lifted him up, gasping for breath. It was a tall man wearing a black hood.

“Who are you…?”

In response to Sion’s question, the man pulled back his hood.

And Sion felt pain that made him feel like he was about to collapse again.

“What, you…”

“Sion Laurel.”

The man said with a faint smile.

But Sion couldn’t tell if those words were addressing him or answering his question.

Because the face of that man revealed under the sky was identical to his own.

To Sion, who was speechless from shock, the man quietly added.

“I am you. From a little later.”

The man’s voice speaking those words was gentle and soft. So Sion felt another intense aversion.

Sion doesn’t speak like that. Pretending to be kind, pretending to be a good person, was far from his personality.

Sion reflexively pushed away the man’s hand on his shoulder. Then with a wandering gaze, he examined the man’s appearance piece by piece.

He was half a span taller than Sion. His shoulders were broader and his facial features sharper. Unlike Sion, who was still a boy, he was a full-fledged young man. He really was Sion from “a little later”.

However, unlike Sion with his brilliant golden hair, the man’s hair, which fell to his waist, was white as the moon.

When Sion glared at the man’s white hair, he stroked his long hair and said,

“It’s nothing. This happened when I traveled through time.”

Sion felt overwhelmed once again at the man’s casual explanation.

It felt completely unreal.

Am I going crazy? Or am I having a nightmare? Is a demon playing tricks?

If none of those, if you really are me who came back in time… did you come to help me?

While he was thinking blankly, the man said to Sion,

“You must be confused since the curse just lifted.”

“Curse?”

“The irreversible curse cast by your birth father. It started the day you came to the border.”

The man informed Sion in a casually gentle voice.

Of the shallow underside of the glorious Laurel, of the true purpose of Count Laurel.

The boy, faced with the truth without any preparation, stood blankly trying to understand the man’s words.

But his heart reacted before his head. The heartbeat trapped inside his ribcage was now pounding throughout his entire body.

A surge of anger overtook the boy. His molars and fists clenched tightly, and blood gushed anew from the wounds all over his body.

When Sion tried to dash off somewhere, the man grabbed him.

“Calm down, don’t open your wounds.”

“Let go!”

“Listen to me first. We don’t have much time.”

“I’ll kill them all!”

Sion Laurel was born a prince. So he wore a heavy crown to become an emperor, but he learned, tattered and torn, that it was not a crown but a sign for a living sacrifice.

The proud boy raged rather than hide his wretchedness. He felt like he would crumble right away if he didn’t pour out his hatred on those who had deceived and violated him.

As Sion vented his passion like that, the man watching said,

“If you want to kill them, go ahead. Your birth father or half-brother, it won’t be a big problem.”

The man’s voice making the assertion was gentle. So Sion, who had been screaming, rather froze suddenly.

Does saying it won’t be a big problem mean he’s already killed them?

At the chilling assumption, Sion forgot his murderous intent and stared blankly at the man.

He was still smiling as if he were a kind person. But looking closely, that expression was terribly awkward. His smile seemed like a bizarre, floating lie more than a mask.

The moment he realized this, his head cooled and a chilling sensation brushed his nape.

“…Why did you come to find me?”

Sion somehow felt that this man was a very different being from himself.

Nevertheless, there was a hint of trust. If you really are me, then you must be on my side.

Sion waited for the man’s answer, trying hard to believe this.

“I have a favor to ask you.”

At last, the man said.

“Protect Ibi.”

And so Sion became dazed once again.

.

.

.

Five years after Sion Laurel, betrayed by his family and the world, was also betrayed by himself.

Thanks to that, Sion, who painfully learned how terrible a person he was, was just breathing through another day to fulfill his duty.

Dozens of red dragons in formation crossed the sky of eastern Bis.

They were the daughters of Tardes carrying Sion and the border watchers.

The border watchers can put reins and saddles on the daughters of Tardes. This was their privilege in facing the world’s enemies, and so the watchers were the only group that could freely travel between Bis and Tienda.

Flying straight east from Tienda, the eastern mountain range appeared before Sion and the watchers.

The Tardes Hall is inside that mountain range, and beyond that range lies the eastern border where Amanecere has made its lair.

‘I’ll inspect the border. Alone.’

As they neared the hall, Sion signaled to Moren following behind.

Moren understood his superior’s intention and led the watchers. And Sion broke away from the formation and headed alone towards the eastern mountains.

Crossing the mountains, an unbelievable black realm appeared.

That vast territory had no sense of space or reality. It was just bizarre, as if a piece of the night sky had been cut out and spread on the ground. It also looked like the world had been torn and its backside exposed.

This place, beyond human understanding and cognition, was the border where Amanecere lurked.

Sion landed on that ground with his partner, the daughter of Tardes. The feeling of stepping on the ground was similar to crushing charcoal with his feet.

The nature of this land has not yet been revealed. But Sion knew alone.

Because that man, whom he never wanted to accept as his future self, had taught him this as well.

‘A curse that imprisons Amanecere.’

The identity of this black realm was a curse imprisoning the mad dragon.

Not content with driving Amanecere mad, Noche, the source of the curse, was keeping that dragon confined in such a mold.

But this curse will disappear in the not-too-distant future.

According to that man’s words, that is.

.

.

.

“Protect Ibi.”

“Ibi…?”

“The person who will save me, no. You.”

The man said to Sion, who was repeating the unfamiliar name. Then he added,

“So she will become your everything.”

At those words, Sion froze once again.

He stared blankly at the face that was similar yet different from his own, then asked in a very hoarse voice.

“Is she a woman?”

The man nodded at Sion’s question. So Sion, blinking like a fool, unknowingly raised his voice.

“You came all this way for just that? For one woman?”

“Watch your words.”

As Sion was questioning in disbelief, an invisible pressure slammed him down.

“It’s not just one. Don’t say it like that.”

The man’s warning was calm and gentle. But Sion could fully feel the ferocity lurking behind it.

He felt suffocated, but Sion didn’t back down. He felt like he would go crazy with resentment if he just silently agreed.

“If not just one, then what, are women that scarce?”

At Sion’s words spoken in anger, the man smiled and slapped Sion’s cheek. Not content with that, he easily subdued Sion’s counterattack and mercilessly trampled him.

“Is this your first time? Being put in your place.”

The man asked Sion, who was crawling on the ground. When Sion glared at him, gritting his teeth, he added with a laugh in his voice.

“Actually, I’ve never experienced it either.”

He looked very satisfied that he could beat himself up.

“You crazy bastard…”

Sion, kicked by the man, coughed dryly and ground his teeth. But the man didn’t get angry, and that drove Sion even crazier.

He had just realized that he was Laurel’s sacrificial lamb, thoroughly used by his birth father and family.

Thanks to that, he was already on the edge, and in the midst of this, the man who came to him, my future self, tells me to protect a woman. Mentioning a name I don’t even know.

Sion found this fact unbearably disappointing. He hated himself to death for thinking of that woman first instead of himself.

You should think of me first. Even if the whole world turns its back, you, only you!

Sion wanted to cry out like this. But the moment he saw the man’s emotionless eyes, all words disappeared in his mouth.

That man had not a shred of affection for Sion. Not even sympathy or interest, let alone affection. He just seemed heartless and emotionless, as if he had come only for his own business.

“If you can’t understand, just think of it as a debt. If you really need a reason to act.”

The man said to Sion, who had an expression like his heart had been cut.

“If I hadn’t come here, you would have become exactly like me. You don’t want that, right?”

At those words, Sion forced a smile. It was a deeply twisted sneer.

Sion barely understood. That this madman was a different being from himself. That this too should rightfully be counted as a debt. That it’s absolutely not a loss if he can separate himself from that thing.

“So what do you want me to do?”

“Take care of Ibi. Live with her, cherish her, and treat her well. And protect her.”

Sion, who had been grinding his teeth fiercely, contorted his face even more at the man’s tender nonsense.

Then the man smiled faintly and kicked the pitch-black ground lightly.

“You don’t know what this is, right?”

He didn’t. The identity of this black realm had been unknown for the past 300 years.

But the man casually revealed the reality of that long-standing secret.

“This is a curse. To imprison Amanecere. The fallen Amanecere sleeps for a month because of the curse placed on this land.”

“How do you know that?”

“Because I saw it.”

The man spoke calmly as ever. In that very voice, he foretold the end.

“This will soon disappear. Then Amanecere will escape from here, and after that, nothing can stop it. I killed it many times, but it stubbornly revived and ruined everything. That mad dragon.”

A chilling madness was condensed in the man’s voice as he spoke, pretending to be calm. So Sion’s heart chilled once again.

Both the words that Amanecere would be freed from the east and that the man had killed Amanecere were equally shocking and hard to believe.

But what made Sion shudder now was a completely different part.

“…Why are you telling me this now?”

The order is strange. Shouldn’t you usually tell this first? To prepare because the mad dragon will be freed in the near future.

As Sion looked on with doubt, the man smiled and answered.

“Because such a thing shouldn’t rampage in the world where Ibi lives.”

At the man’s kind words, Sion felt like crying.