RAMHM Chapter 104

A Flower Blooming in Despair

Perhaps thinking it was all a dream would feel more real than this.

Rhodness rejected the voice that clawed mercilessly through his mind, more than Bardenaldo's disheveled appearance or face—this man now indistinguishable from a madman.

His lips moved several times, but no sound emerged.

Bardenaldo, who'd finally let everything spill out recklessly, could only pant with heaving breaths, struggling to catch up with his own agitation.

Their silence suffocated each other.

"Yield—how ridiculous. Even without Mother's will, would you have been loyal to me?"

In the end, the one who couldn't bear the silence was Bardenaldo, who'd been agitated all along.

"...I loved you, Brother, so naturally I would have followed you."

Rhodness stood there blankly like someone clubbed over the head, then answered mechanically.

His head spun dizzyingly, but somehow he wanted to wrap that chaos in an opaque membrane and seal it away.

Either way, Bardenaldo would become sovereign someday—he told himself repeatedly that having such thoughts about himself wasn't wrong.

He forced his creaking neck to shake, trying desperately to erase the words he'd just heard. He decided to focus only on the scene unfolding before his eyes.

"...Were the missing women incidents your doing, Brother? Even the disappearances in the north—Grand Duke Novian Trovika's territory... Did you commit those crimes freely because it was the Grand Duke's domain? Why in God's name do you have Adrienne's corpse?"

Bardenaldo, who'd been sneering, lost his words momentarily at Rhodness's answer that he would have followed out of love, then his eyebrows drooped.

"Ah, Rhoan. I told you it wasn't my doing. Look at their wretched state! Those gutter rats framing your brother!"

In truth, no one had framed Crown Prince Bardenaldo.

It was only Bardenaldo himself—unable to stand upright in his own shame—who, unable to bear the anxiety when Rhodness didn't immediately kneel before him, spewed words recklessly.

"That insolent, insolent uncle orchestrated everything. No—his mistress orchestrated it all! How could Uncle have entered this place? Without that woman, could he have even come near here?"

Plausible excuses echoed through the damp, humid basement, but Rhodness's face only grew colder.

"Yes, that woman is the problem. Bliea Acacia—that dissolute woman is the problem!"

Only Bardenaldo's face flushed increasingly red.

"Rhoan, Rhoan, my brother. My beloved little brother. Are you making that expression because I scolded you a little earlier? We've been together for so many years. We've fought side by side for so long. I'm sorry. I—I was intoxicated by drugs... drunk on alcohol... Doris must have drugged me! That damned..."

Rhodness's gaze, deeply sunken, swept not over Bardenaldo but over the room filled with beautiful objects and corpses.

Novian glaring at Bardenaldo as if to kill him. Adrienne's glass coffin, dirtied by someone's sweat. And... Adrienne herself, standing behind it, watching him.

Seeing Adrienne hidden behind the glass coffin, words he'd buried and buried and buried again suddenly surfaced.

"...Do you hate me?"

The mouth that had been frantically offering excuses—that Novian Trovika had orchestrated everything, that his mistress had helped—froze as if turned to ice.

"Ha, you still say such things... even seeing all this... if you don't trust me..."

"I heard everything."

Rhodness's eyes wavered desperately, seeking an answer. The moment he saw Adrienne's corpse and Adrienne herself—Rhodness could no longer pretend he hadn't heard those words.

"I heard... everything."

'...he's the little brother I hate most in the world.'

Even if everyone in the world avoided and hated him, the unshakeable belief that his brother at least would love him—that voice shattered it completely.

His listlessly hanging hands clenched into fists so tight blood couldn't flow.

Bardenaldo stared at him, looking like a drowned rat.

No one could even breathe easily. Even without an outburst of rage, anyone could feel how profound Rhodness's shock was.

Bardenaldo closed his eyes tightly, then opened them. The Rhodness standing before him felt unfamiliar.

No matter who framed him, no matter what accusations flew—

That belief in Bliea Acacia. Strangely, blindingly absolute faith.

That faith was tattooed directly into his wavering red eyes.

From Bardenaldo's mouth—which had been picking up any words in agitation—a sigh mixed with resignation escaped unconsciously.

Countless indescribable emotions swam through his deep blue eyes before vanishing.

"...I tried to love you."

A voice so calm and low it seemed impossible it came from someone agitated just moments before—it cut through the silence.

Rhodness's face gradually bleached of emotion, growing paler.

"But who in this world..."

The voice that had begun calmly grew quieter over time until it became almost a whisper.

"...could love a child as ominous as you?"

And with that whisper as the final word, Rhodness became completely alone in this world.

Rhodness looked down at the Crown Prince with an expression like someone pierced through the heart by an invisible longsword.

A silence of entirely different dimension from before filled the space completely.

Soon, thick teardrops that even Rhodness himself didn't notice fell onto his face—drop, drop.

Ah.

My chest tore with agony.

If only blood wasn't about to burst from my mouth, I could tell Bardenaldo to shut up!

Rhodness dropped tears with a face that didn't even know he was crying. I couldn't bear how desperately I wanted to embrace him.

His face—grief, rage, resentment all gathered and pressed down tightly—was like a firmly locked iron door.

It hurt to watch. Like seeing myself the day I'd confronted Novian's betrayal.

The desire to comfort Rhodness wrapped around my entire body.

But my chest had been too hot since earlier. The burning heat was agonizing, as if someone pressed a brand against it.

Novian, who'd been concentrating all his attention on me regardless of what they said, stepped closer and reached out his hand.

I avoided his desperate gaze. Fortunately, Novian stopped short and couldn't even approach near the glass coffin.

I pressed my blood-soaked hand against my burning chest.

What burned wasn't my chest—it was the plump pendant.

I set down the dagger I'd hidden against my body briefly and grasped the pendant.

The moment I touched the necklace, my palm burned as if on fire. Simultaneously, a green light visible only from very close proximity leaked between the closed pendant halves.

Novian stared at the light-emitting pendant as if he'd forgotten to breathe.

I'd stopped breathing too.

A powerful premonition surged up instantly like bile.

An absurd premonition that I—that I could open this glass coffin that would never open.

Even though opening the coffin wouldn't accomplish anything.

I placed my heated hand on the glass coffin. Half was my will, but half wasn't.

Like a magnet, some invisible force seemed to pull my hand and attach it to the glass coffin.

Under the glass dome, from the thick stone slab with its deep green tint that supported my corpse, light gradually emanated.

That light was so faint it looked at first glance like polished stone catching the illumination briefly growing paler, but I knew distinctly it was no ordinary phenomenon.

Because the sensation of light beginning from the necklace and flowing through my veins was vivid.

A sensation that felt scorching hot one moment, then instantly freezing the next—it circulated through my entire body along my blood vessels, then seemed to escape outside my body.

Simultaneously, I heard the sound of the glass coffin unlocking—click. The lid hadn't opened, but I heard that faint noise exactly like turning a key in a keyhole.

And at the same time, something unbelievable happened.

My vision looking down at Adrienne's corpse began spinning wildly.

Then—blackout.

Nothing visible. For a moment I almost asked if someone had turned off the lights in this room.

Nausea surged insanely.

Stuffy, humid air suddenly began filling my lungs. I realized I'd had my eyes closed and snapped them open.

My field of vision had changed completely from before.

Novian's face filled with shock as he reached toward me again, and Bliea Acacia's body collapsing like shed skin before my eyes.

'Am I dead? Even in Bliea's body?'

"Adrienne, Adrienne!"

Novian rushed forward frantically and caught Bliea's collapsing body, clutching her as he sank down. Blood pooled thick at her side.

Bardenaldo's voice—which had been muttering complaints about Bliea and Novian continuously—cut off abruptly—snap.

Because Rhodness had sprinted forward like lightning and seized Bliea's body from Novian's arms.

Rhodness dropped to his knees with a jaw-cracking thud, cradling Bliea's body like an infant, pressing his own hand against her side where blood still oozed out.

Novian, pushed aside, crawled desperately trying to reach her somehow.

"No... no..."

"Well, I said she looked like she was dying soon."

"No, Adrienne..."

"That woman isn't Adrienne, Rhoan. Everyone here has gone mad."

Bardenaldo—the most insane bastard here—laughed weakly watching the men clutching Bliea Acacia while calling my name.

"Well, no matter. They're both dead people anyway."

Rhodness began grinding his teeth—gnash, gnash. He held his finger beneath Bliea's nose to check for breathing, but his face quickly paled.

The body I'd left behind was no longer breathing, it seemed. Then—had I become a ghost?

Like that vision I'd seen while hovering near death, had I become an existence unable to embrace Rhodness's shoulders no matter how much he suffered?

"Call a physician! Call a physician!"

Rhodness shouted toward the underground stairs in a voice louder than I'd ever heard. Soon, sounds of movement came from far up the stairs, then faded.

In that moment, the Crown Prince's face lost all color.

"This is insane..."

Bardenaldo hastily shouted for them not to obey the Second Prince's command, but no sounds of movement returned.

Rhodness—wounds from Bardenaldo not yet healed—glared at Bardenaldo while cradling Bliea's body.

His face looked ready to snap completely if one more word was spoken.

"Over a mere woman, you'd betray your own brother..."

If only I could shut that bastard's mouth, I'd do anything.

As rage boiled up, my hand moved forward involuntarily.

"...?"

Ah.

The hand I'd raised thoughtlessly was real.

I wasn't some ghost floating around as a spirit.

Simultaneously, the flower petals covering my body fell to the floor—plop, plop. Pale, slender hands entered my vision distinctly.

"Ah..."

Tears surged up instantly—overwhelming.

The faint voice emerging from my parched throat wasn't Bliea's voice I'd always heard.

"Ahh—."

It was my voice. Adrienne's voice.

Only then did I understand.

I hadn't lost even Bliea's body to become a floating ghost.

'I found my body!'

I had reclaimed Adrienne's body.