Chapter 84
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Chapter 84
It was a place I had only heard of in stories.
The Illusion Realm—a domain created by fairies through incomprehensible power.
Though woven from illusion, what transpired here was undeniably real.
There were tales that those entranced by the Illusion Realm's phantasms could never return to the waking world.
But Itar cared not.
He would have gladly remained trapped here for eternity.
In this grotesque Chessboard brimming with shattered and broken toys and dolls.
"Gasp, pant—this place, the Fairy Queen's Illusion Realm...!"
The manifestation of the Illusion Realm meant Lichesia was here as well.
Itar, trembling with unbridled excitement and panting like a hound, suddenly felt excruciating agony.
"Aaaahhh!"
The pristine white chains that had vanished upon entering the Illusion Realm now constricted his body once more.
Far more violently than before.
Itar glared through the pain, trembling.
That damned Heretic Inquisitor had entered the Illusion Realm alongside him.
'Curse it. The Fairy Queen only invited me!'
When I made contact with the butterfly, I was bound by that bastard's strange chains.
Because of that, I was dragged into the Illusion Realm with him.
As I thrashed against the chains, a melodious voice echoed through the void.
"Fresh prey has come to visit?"
Dozens of flowers bloomed from nothingness.
The fairy who appeared alongside the blossoms sat cross-legged atop a mound of flowers, axe in hand.
"Ah, Fairy Queen...!"
Seeing her after so long, I felt tears spring to my eyes—she was breathtakingly beautiful.
The moment my gaze met her ruby-red eyes, sharp and feline like a cat's, I lost all sense of self.
She laughed softly as she watched the entranced Itar.
Her laughter set her lustrous golden hair dancing gently.
My legs gave way, and I collapsed to my knees.
I could not bear the overwhelming rapture.
Yet those eyes I thought would hold only me turned elsewhere.
"...Why did you come here, Hailon?"
Lichesia asked, her gaze fixed upon the Heretic Inquisitor.
The Heretic Inquisitor, who had remained silent until now, spoke for the first time.
"Have I come somewhere I shouldn't?"
"You've come somewhere you weren't invited."
Lichesia seemed equally unprepared for the Heretic Inquisitor's entry into the Illusion Realm.
She had anticipated using her infamous carnivorous flowers to tear his head clean off.
Yet the atmosphere between the Heretic Inquisitor and the fairy felt strangely peculiar.
"...Me?"
"Yes, you."
After exchanging a brief but somehow subtle conversation, they stared at each other intently.
A thick, viscous emotion dripped from their gazes, intertwining like vines.
In that moment, Itar was a perfect outsider.
Unable to bear the feeling of exclusion, he cried out.
"My lady!"
She smiled brightly while caressing her axe.
Having successfully captured her attention, Itar shouted.
"Please marry me! No matter who you are or what you do to me, I love you. I will serve you eternally."
At his passionate confession of love, Lichesia burst into laughter.
After laughing joyfully for a while, she swung her axe.
In the blink of an eye, Lichesia was right before him.
Itar gazed at her in a daze.
Her face was far too dangerous to behold up close.
"How perfectly convenient."
She smiled wickedly while observing Itar as he gasped for breath.
"Making contact with a demon woman, attempting to assault the Heretic Inquisitor's Mansion...."
Speaking as if singing, she turned to the Heretic Inquisitor and uttered something unbelievable.
"Isn't this more than enough to throw him into the Holy Empire's Heretic Inquisition, Hailon?"
***
Hailon entering the Illusion Realm was an unforeseen situation.
Since he was bound by the sacred relic—the Chain of Condemnation—he must have been dragged along with it.
It was not a bad turn of events.
Chesa's plan was to throw Itar into the Heretic Inquisition and keep him locked away until the Pure Child Prayer Ceremony.
The reason Hailon had dragged Itar to the Heretic Inquisition before but failed to conduct a proper interrogation was that Itar had committed no actual crime.
At most, his only offense was pursuing a demon woman, and he had barely made any real contact with her.
So Chesa decided to fabricate charges for him.
"Watch carefully, Hailon."
I extended my hand.
To carve a massive hunter's mark across Itar's chest.
"Since he's entered the Illusion Realm and I'll be marking him thoroughly with my seal, make sure to lock him away as a heretic...."
Just as my fingertips were about to touch Itar's chest.
"Stop."
Chesa flinched in surprise at the firm grip twisting her wrist.
"Don't do it."
The sharp, cutting words felt unfamiliar.
As she hesitated, he turned her around.
Facing each other, Hailon glared at her with cold eyes.
"Do you mark just anyone?"
"...What?"
I marked anyone and everyone.
Prey marks like these—I'd been stamping them out endlessly, scattering them far and wide.
Hailon had witnessed all the marks I left behind.
Yet suddenly he was stopping me as though I were committing some gravely sacred act.
"Don't lay a hand on that one. Feed him to your flowers instead."
With that, he swung the chain at his own discretion, driving Itar into the heap of flowers where I'd been sitting moments before.
Itar screamed.
His upper body buried in the blooms, only his lower half thrashing in the air.
I watched the thorny mass creep forward, inching toward swallowing him whole.
His legs convulsed from the sharp, piercing pain of the spines.
But swallowed by the flowers as he was, even his screams fell silent now.
Since I hadn't ordered him killed, his head merely rested at the flower's mouth—but still.
Trapped in absolute darkness where nothing could be heard or seen, it could hardly be called a pleasant experience.
"...Excuse me. Heretic Inquisitor?"
I found it absurd—the way he casually wielded a carnivorous flower in someone else's Illusion Realm.
Hailon paid no mind.
Instead, with a sharp metallic sound, he bound the chain tightly around my wrist.
Linking his arm to mine.
Startled by this behavior, so unlike his usual manner, I looked up at him.
His blue eyes appeared as cold as ever.
Yet that was merely how they seemed.
He gazed down at me at an angle and spoke.
"I will help you."
"...?"
"Until your safety is completely assured, I will hide you in my mansion. If you tell me who is pursuing you right now..."
It was strange—Hailon speaking at such length and with such speed, so unlike himself.
I rebuked him quietly.
"You can't help me."
"...."
"If you want to help, drag that one to the Heretic Inquisition and beat him until he weeps."
With evidence of entering the Illusion Realm plus a succubus mark, it would be easy to definitively label him a heretic—but since he refused, foaming at the mouth, there was nothing to be done.
Hailon stared at me in silence for a long while.
"Lichesia."
His low voice pronounced the succubus's name with an almost chilling precision.
"Am I no longer your prey?"
I couldn't answer readily.
The memory of lying beside him on that bed, of the words we'd spoken, rose unbidden.
"We were never anything at all."
"If anything, I would be her prey. Your mother was the predator, after all."
Hailon seemed unaware that Chesa regarded him with particular affection.
So I found myself wanting something slightly—very slightly—different from our current dynamic.
Something more evolved than mere prey.
Uncertain what that something was, I hesitated in silence for a moment, though my pause was interpreted in an entirely different light.
As though our connection had already ended.
"Both beginning and end rest in your hands alone."
The voice murmured low, carrying an inexplicable dampness to it.
Ripples spread slowly across eyes that had been serene and crystalline blue.
Slow but violent waves.
Something deep within him was transforming.
Chesa stared at the sight, transfixed.
Then, without thinking, I whispered his name.
"Hailon...."
For a moment, I thought his wavering eyes were beautiful.
And when I came to my senses.
Our lips were touching.
Brought to you by Valir Scans! To support our team and enjoy the latest releases, please read directly on our official site: valirscans.org