Chapter 95
Once the knot was secured, there was nothing more to do. The two of them simply stared at each other in silence. What had begun like an accident had ended just as abruptly in something far more serious. Ragnar, wearing his usual stoic expression, reached out and lightly touched the knot tied at Arzeletta’s shoulder. He had no idea what someone was supposed to say in situations like this—of course he didn’t.
“…I’ll take you back. You must be scared.”
Scared of what, though? With the dead already vanquished, the most terrifying presence for Arzeletta might now be him. Ragnar stood, trying not to sigh as the thought crossed his mind.
But just as he was about to move, her voice stopped him.
“Um…”
He turned to look at her. She was still holding on to him, as if she had something left to say. Her lips parted hesitantly, trembling slightly. Ragnar knew exactly how those lips felt—how soft they were, how sweet they had tasted.
“My Lord… did you and I commit a sin?”
Ragnar inhaled sharply. She always looked like she didn’t understand anything, yet somehow she always struck the most vulnerable points.
“Is something like this… really a sin?”
She was looking up at him, waiting for an answer as though his words might be gospel. He stood there, feeling completely helpless.
Ragnar had never learned how to make excuses. He didn’t know how to avoid questions, or how to lie. Those things had simply never been part of who he was.
“…Perhaps.”
She didn’t respond.
“It might be.”
His voice was hoarse. He hadn’t forced himself on her physically, but that didn’t mean he hadn’t crossed the line. He had already committed the act—in his heart, with his will.
“My Lord, you stand above the law. And I’m someone even the gods have abandoned. Could people like us even be capable of sin?”
She asked quietly, and Ragnar found that he had no words to offer in return.
“…You protected me, my Lord.”
He remained silent.
“And I’m already someone who’s cursed.”
Arzeletta’s voice dropped into a whisper. It was soft, barely a breath, but there was a strange sweetness to it.
Ragnar kept his face as composed as ever, but his mind was spinning. It was like being drunk—disoriented and unsteady.
Then, slowly, Arzeletta gathered her long black hair and pulled it forward, letting it fall over her chest. She turned slightly, just enough for him to see her back.
“Look, my Lord.”
Through the small opening in her clothes, the terrible burn scars on her back were visible. Ragnar’s brow furrowed again. The shadow behind this woman—who looked like she could have descended from the heavens—was pure curse.
“I’m already ugly,” she said. “And my hands… they’ve already been dirtied.”
“…….”
“Even God turns His back on me. So, I’ll bear today’s sin.”
Ragnar knelt before her. He lifted her chin, that delicate jaw of the woman who looked up at him with eyes that sparkled.
“Ah…!”
Their lips met again.
He couldn’t endure it any longer.
Ragnar’s hand swept across Arzeletta’s back. Her slender body trembled once more in his arms from the pain where his touch passed. He drank her in again, and again.
This desire, in this moment, was undeniably Ragnar’s own sin.
Arzeletta closed her eyes. Clinging to the man now dressed once again in his uniform, receiving his kiss, she looked like a saintess granted divine revelation.
The soul of a holy knight who had rejected everything outside the path of God was, in this moment, irreversibly changed.
He faced the sin he had committed.
“My… Lord…”
With just the gentle touch that swept across his uniform, he crumbled.
Swallowing the whisper that called to him like a fragrant breeze, Ragnar made a vow.
That he would carry this sin to the end.
“Then how… am I supposed to live?”
“Damn it.”
“What other way is there for me to live, besides this?”
“Damn it!”
Exion raked his red hair with both hands as he shot up from the bed.
It was the middle of the night. His heart was unreasonably unsettled. It felt as though something was happening somewhere—something ominous.
No, it was probably just a feeling. He was just trying to blame his insomnia on something else.
Still, he needed even the flimsiest excuse—like saying it felt ominous—because otherwise, he couldn’t make sense of himself.
“Damn it…”
It had become painfully clear over the past few nights that the reason for this relentless insomnia was one woman.
Exion couldn’t shake the feeling that he had missed something.
Whether it was a person, a chance, or something material—he couldn’t quite name it.
“I can’t marry anyone anyway.”
Discussion
0 CommentsNo comments yet.