Chapter 10
“Th-that line wasn’t in the script, Your Highness…!”
Watching the situation unfold from a distance, Terdeo stared down at the script in shock.
It was the script he had prepared in advance—everything His Highness was supposed to say when meeting Lady Ellopez.
Why would you suddenly confess?!
At Sier’s unexpected move, Terdeo fidgeted restlessly, like a puppy desperate to go to the bathroom.
‘Should I knock him out and drag him away right now?’
If Lady Ellopez rejected him on the spot, His Highness would surely suffer for days.
Why would you confess without any preparation?!
Terdeo glared at Sier with eyes full of resentment—
without forgetting to watch Tian’s expression at the same time.
“I never once intended to use you.”
“……”
“That’s why I asked Lady Arvid for help as well. I was sincere. I had no intention of using you or your family.”
With Sier driving the final nail in, making it impossible even to knock him out and drag him away, Terdeo collapsed onto the ground.
“It’s over now…”
At this point, all he could do was pray that Lady Ellopez would accept His Highness.
He quickly dropped to his knees and began muttering fervently.
“Please, please, please… merciful Lady Ellopez, please pity me and accept His Highness’s confession.”
The moment his desperate prayer ended, his hope shattered.
Tian turned and ran from the spot.
Sier reached out urgently to stop her, but it was already too late.
His eyes were empty, as if his soul had left his body.
Watching Sier stand there in a daze, Terdeo hurried after Tian—
clinging to even the faintest shred of hope.
‘It’s not over yet.’
The ever-composed Lady Ellopez had clearly been shaken when she heard His Highness’s confession.
So it wasn’t over—
“This is insane.”
“……”
…Nope. It’s over.
Hearing Tian mutter a quiet curse, Terdeo shook his head with a heavy expression.
We’re screwed.
***
After hearing the completely unexpected confession, I went straight back to the Ellopez estate.
I never imagined he liked me.
I didn’t think the confession was a lie.
His ears had been bright red when he said it.
‘This is driving me crazy.’
I’ve received plenty of confessions in my life.
But I had never been this flustered before.
To be precise, it wasn’t the confession itself that shocked me.
“…The woman Sier Persent loved… was it me?”
That thought flashed through my mind—
the “dead woman Sier Persent secretly loved” described in the original novel.
She appeared immediately after Tian Ellopez’s death.
Using the excuse of being Leila’s fiancé, he helped her get revenge…
“Unbelievable.”
Once I assumed that, everything suddenly made sense.
With such a ridiculous hypothesis taking shape in my head, there was no way I could focus on his confession.
“So what am I supposed to do about this…?”
To sum it up—
Sier Persent, the only ally who could help Leila in the future.
For him to become the person he was in the original story, the woman he loved had to die.
And that woman happened to be me.
Which meant—
“I have to die for Sier Persent to help Leila?”
With the engagement already on the verge of being broken off, if Tian Ellopez’s death was missing from the relationship between Sier and Leila, there would be no reason for him to help the heroine.
If my guess was right, the only reason Sier helped Leila in the original story was because Tian Ellopez had died.
Even then, though he was called an ally, Sier wasn’t much help.
By the time he tried to support her, Leila had already fallen into despair after realizing Tian’s death.
That didn’t mean his help wasn’t necessary.
I had already changed too many things.
The original story was warped.
That meant new variables would inevitably appear, and there was no way I could prevent them all in advance.
So I needed contingency plans—for when something unexpected happened.
Sier Persent was one of those plans.
‘He’ll help… since he was her fiancé.’
—that kind of naive thinking needed to be thrown away.
What the male leads wanted wasn’t world domination or destruction.
It was Leila.
Unless someone paid close attention, everything would be dismissed as a simple love dispute.
Imprisonment?
A tragic situation?
I knew how horrific things would become because I’d read the original story.
But to everyone else, it would just look like the tale of an unchaste saintess adored by too many men.
An unmarried noble lady.
Worse, the Empire’s saintess is entangled in scandal.
No one would step in to help.
Even if she had once been engaged.
‘They’d probably just think breaking off the engagement was a good thing.’
My head throbbed as the weight of it all crashed down on me, and I knocked my forehead lightly against the wall.
“Sier Persent… likes me…?”
As if organizing my thoughts, I murmured it out loud, and the image of his awkward confession surfaced again.
Pure sincerity, without a trace of deception.
“…Crazy.”
Even though I needed to come up with another plan now that one path had completely collapsed, Sier Persent kept lingering in my mind.
It was his fault—for being a prince and yet constantly looking like he was about to cry.
‘Why does he have to look so pretty when he cries…!’
Blaming him unfairly, I hit my forehead against the wall one more time.
***
Ragged breaths spilled from between pale lips.
Leila stared in terror at the sword lying on the floor.
‘Tian’
She squeezed her eyes shut and denied it.
No. It can’t be.
It must not be.
She forced herself to believe that—and opened her eyes.
Nothing had changed.
A single sword lay on the floor, as if mocking her.
Something purple was embedded in the scabbard like an ornament.
Her legs wouldn’t support her.
Leila crawled across the floor, trembling.
She barely managed to pick it up with shaking hands—
only to drop it again moments later.
‘Ah… ah…’
The once-clear, sky-blue eyes grew dull.
Tears overflowed, streaming endlessly down her trembling cheeks.
‘No! Don’t… don’t!’
It was an eye.
At first glance, it looked like an amethyst—beautiful, mysterious purple eyes.
In the Present Empire, there was only one family with purple eyes.
And the person most likely to own those eyes was Tian Ellopez—
Leila’s one and only closest friend.
‘Why… why…!’
Clutching the sword to her chest, Leila screamed.
Her voice, sharp enough to tear apart, was filled with despair.
This couldn’t be happening. It must not be happening.
‘Because of me… Tian…’
She would rather die herself than let Tian die.
To lose her magic, and then her life, because of her…
If only her magic hadn’t been taken.
If only she hadn’t stayed away from the battlefield just to protect her—
She wouldn’t have died like this.
‘I’m… I’m sorry, Tian… this… this is all my fault…’
She was someone who should never have died.
Unlike herself, she was strong and righteous—someone who would have saved countless people.
‘Hahahahaha! Ahahahaha!’
A chilling laugh echoed through the underground space.
Leila’s face, laughing uncontrollably, was completely broken.
“Aaah! Hk—huff… huff…!”
Leila woke from the nightmare in a convulsion, gasping for breath.
She reached shakily toward the calendar on the table.
“Imperial Year 1459.”
Seeing the year, her breathing slowly calmed.
Wiping the tears from her cheeks with her sleeve, Leila sat on the bed.
“My lady! Did you have another nightmare?”
A maid rushed in, eyes wide with alarm.
Leila smiled gently at her.
“…Yes.”
“You’ve been having them often lately. I’ll bring you some warm honey water!”
“Okay. Thank you.”
Once the maid left, Leila’s smile vanished.
A strange light flickered in her clear blue eyes.
Her hand clenched tightly into the bed.
The white sheets twisted under her grip.
“In this life… I will protect you, Tian. I won’t let you die for me. Never. Not ever.”
