Chapter 74
Testimony that he and Arzeletta were forever bound—a mark that would never fade or be forgotten.
Theogrim turned his body. He approached the center of his white room, the table on which sacred objects were placed for prayer.
A radial sculpture, the symbol of Impellias, had been set atop it.
Theogrim’s hand slowly stroked the marble sculpture no one dared to touch, and soon, he carefully lifted it.
Beneath the symbolic sculpture of God, a small compartment hidden like a drawer was revealed.
Theogrim reached inside. It was an immature bulb.
As he held the reddish bulb up to the sunlight, Theogrim’s lips parted slightly.
This was the result of his unceasing research since arriving at the castle—not a single day had gone by without progress.
“Like maggots that feed on corpses. Right?”
Recalling Daphne’s voice, Theogrim nodded inwardly. It truly did resemble that.
Daphne was a clever young lady.
This bulb that Theogrim had cultivated by infiltrating the heart of Impellias and studying it firsthand would, just as Daphne said, consume the most rotten and vulnerable flesh of humankind.
And so, Daphne and he would each obtain what they desired.
It wouldn’t be long now.
“Arzeletta.”
Theogrim, who had set down the bulb, picked up the object lying beside it. His touch became more cautious.
It looked like a piece of finely crafted glass, and even the slightest shift in angle caused it to reflect indescribably beautiful light depending on the way it caught the sun.
It was a fragment of Arzeletta’s wing—one that he had severed with his own hands and even burned the roots of, so it would never grow again.
The very thing Arzeletta herself could not keep, Theogrim had secretly taken into his possession and held onto for a long time.
“Just wait a little longer.”
He whispered lowly as he shone the light against Arzeletta’s wing fragment. His voice was gentle, as if she were standing right before him.
“You’ll soon be free.”
Over the transparent shard of wing, Arzeletta’s smiling face appeared to overlap with it. Theogrim recalled the dress Daphne had been wearing just earlier.
If Arzeletta were to wear it, she would look like a goddess.
“…It won’t be long now.”
Theogrim murmured quietly to himself. His solitary figure cast a long shadow behind him.
The deep backlight obscured the scar etched across the man’s back from view.
Coo, coo, coo.
As Arzeletta approached, the beasts inside the pen rushed toward her. Arzeletta offered the plump grains in her hands with a faint smile.
She diligently fed the black crow, dropping the feed into its beak. It was a beautiful black crow, with feathers as dark as her hair.
It was already evening. Crimson-tinged sunlight streamed through the small windows of the slaughterhouse in long beams. It was similar to the light of the torches carried by the townspeople the night before—hot, fierce, and red.
Someone approached behind Arzeletta, who was gently stroking the bird. It was Yoseph.
“The beasts follow you, Arzeletta.”
“……”
“How can that be?”
Arzeletta slowly tilted her head. It was something she herself could not understand.
To lock a beast in the slaughterhouse, where it would soon meet death, was cruel. What’s more, all these animals had watched as Arzeletta cut the throats of their own kind.
‘I’m sorry.’
Every time, even the silent tears that flowed from her eyes.
It was Arzeletta who was pitied. The animals who were to meet death at her hands loved her. Even she did not know why.
“Arzeletta.”
Yoseph called her gently. Arzeletta barely met his gaze, only briefly, then turned her head back toward the bird. It was the smallest of acknowledgments.
In a slightly hoarse voice, Yoseph continued.
“I’m sorry.”
“……”
“I’m sorry… for making you go through that.”
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