RAMHM Chapter 105

If This Is the Final Moment

My entire body ached as though I'd been beaten, but strangely, breathing came far easier than before I'd died. What hurt wasn't my body—it was my heart.

"...Have you ever loved me at all?"

Rhodness's trembling voice carried clearly through the glass barrier.

No one seemed to have noticed I'd reclaimed my body.

Bardenaldo stood with his back to me, his shoulder blades quivering as he forced out his answer to Rhodness's question with all his strength.

"No. Not even once."

That f*cking bastard.

I pressed my reclaimed hands against the glass coffin lid. Just a little pressure and it would open.

Every word spilling from Bardenaldo's mouth made me want to chew it up and spit it out with my saliva—I had to fight the urge.

No. First priority: shutting that damned mouth.

Rhodness, who'd devoted his entire life to the Crown Prince, would find it nearly impossible to simply end his brother's life. It would be tantamount to denying everything he'd ever been.

'Then shouldn't I be the one to help him?'

The realization that I'd returned to my original body left me utterly disoriented.

Had my soul temporarily escaped Bliea's body—which had lost so much blood and nearly died at the Crown Prince's hands—and slipped into my nearby corpse?

Or perhaps my fierce attachment to this life was what kept me tethered to my original form?

It was an absurd hypothesis, but I was desperate.

Because this moment—right now—might be my last, even though I should already be dead.

"I already told you, but you still haven't grasped reality. How could I possibly love someone like you?"

Then perhaps this was my final chance from God—to eliminate Bardenaldo, the person Rhodness couldn't bring himself to kill, my true enemy.

A chance to accomplish in Adrienne's body what I'd failed to achieve in life!

'Not the pawns I struck at before, but the real enemy who killed me...'

My eyes had already turned toward Rhodness.

His face slowly crumbling like a carefully built dam breaking apart with each word from Bardenaldo.

Yet still clenching his jaw to keep sobs from escaping, his hand pressed tight against Bliea's side.

If this is my last moment in this life.

'Rhodness, to you...'

And then my trembling gaze moved past Bliea's body lying deathlike on the floor, toward the dagger I'd left in front of the glass coffin.

The space he'd guarded for more countless years than he could count on both hands—now on the verge of exposure to outsiders—had driven the Crown Prince beyond sanity.

"If Adrienne Pirreta had seen your eyes, she could never have loved you. I guarantee it. You must be dying to ask her. But how can you ask the dead?"

"..."

"I'll answer for her. Adrienne wouldn't have loved you. If she'd seen your eyes, if she'd known you were that ominous prince, she wouldn't have given you the time of day, let alone met your gaze properly. So the closest thing you have to someone who loves you is me, Rhoan. Come... hurry..."

Let's clear away these sewer rats and go above ground.

Bardenaldo whispered to Rhodness like a reaper crawling up from the darkest shadows of his own heart.

Rhodness had long since lost his mind from the moment Adrienne collapsed and her breath became faint as death.

Only the instant he'd shouted for a doctor had he existed in reality.

Rhodness was trapped in a world containing only himself, Bardenaldo, and Adrienne cradled in his arms, screaming soundlessly.

All those past days when he'd achieved unparalleled prowess no one could touch—shattered into pieces, trampled, scattered like grains of sand.

He stared at Bardenaldo, whose face was frantic to wound him, babbling words that didn't even reach his ears.

Ah.

Why did that day suddenly surface now?

The final day of Empress Letina's funeral.

The distant sound of people laughing and chattering, utterly indifferent to his crumbling heart.

Those dark hours when he'd killed and killed again the pathetic thought that he wished someone would just pull him to his feet, wished someone would hold him and say it was okay to cry.

'Help me.'

That day when he'd fled because he couldn't say those two words to anyone—why did it suddenly rise up like a nightmare from yesterday?

"The woman you're holding isn't Adrienne or anything. She was merely Uncle's plaything. So abandon your pointless attachment and hurry upstairs to stop irrelevant people from entering this place, Rhodness. That's your sovereign's command."

His patience reaching its limit, Bardenaldo urged him with a face sharp as a blade.

The sight of Rhodness looking pitiful as a dog abandoned by its master had begun twisting Bardenaldo's insides violently.

"Will you ignore Mother's will? Are you going to let people in and drive your brother into disgrace? It's Father's birthday celebration, of all days. When they come, I'm sorry, but I'll have no choice but to point to you with this hand!"

Bardenaldo sneered at Rhodness's wavering the moment he mentioned their mother's will.

He whispered that he was the only person in this entire world who cared for Rhodness.

To firmly remind him of his place, standing in the center of hell just as when people first turned away from him.

"That woman is fated to die like Adrienne Pirreta anyway! My survival to become Emperor is Mother's cause and yours! If you don't go out there and stop them from bursting in, I'll have no choice but to say you did all this for our cause. No matter how much you resent me or resent Uncle... who would believe the words of a problem child like..."

But Bardenaldo couldn't continue.

A strange wrongness crashed over him like a tidal wave from behind.

Thunk—!

Bardenaldo's vision swam briefly from the pain ambushing his shoulder blade.

When he turned with his trembling body to look back, his eyes went round as saucers—wider than they'd ever been in his life.

Honey-sweet golden hair, pale face, and vividly shining pale green eyes.

A woman with clenched teeth who'd driven a dagger into his shoulder blade with her slender hand.

"Just shut that mouth. Please."

Dead Adrienne Pirreta stood before him with bloodshot eyes.

He definitely screamed, but no sound came out. He couldn't produce any sound from his gaping mouth, eyes bulging.

"You... perverted... bastard..."

"This... this can't be...!"

At the sight of Adrienne Pirreta's figure standing with the opened glass coffin behind her, Bardenaldo felt even the fine hairs by his ears standing on end.

Consumed by terror, the delayed pain from his back finally burst forth and brought him crashing to the cold floor.

Bringing up even Empress Letina so cowardly!

I'd briefly debated whether to bash the Crown Prince's skull first for trying to manipulate Rhodness to the bitter end.

But I pushed open the glass coffin lid and grabbed the dagger first.

The thought that this might truly be my final chance wrapped around my mind.

I'd brought this dagger thinking I might stab Novian Trovika—I never imagined I'd end up pointing it at the Crown Prince.

When I picked up the dagger and steadied my briefly spinning vision, the first person my eyes met was Novian, who stood near Rhodness.

The moment he saw me emerging from the opened glass coffin, his expression looked like his breath had stopped.

I slid my gaze past Bardenaldo's shoulder toward Rhodness.

Rhodness had his jaw clenched, simultaneously suppressing rage, contempt, sorrow, and sobs.

His face resembled a warrior in patient endurance, yet ironically evoked the face of Rhodness's boyhood I'd never seen—someone desperately in need of help.

I gathered all my strength and plunged the dagger into Bardenaldo's shoulder blade as he barked nonsense like a dog.

The sensation of slicing through wet flesh, the sharp blade tip catching on hard bone—it transmitted directly to my palm.

Ah. I did it.

A strange euphoria surged through my entire body like waves.

Rhodness stood frozen with a face drained of all blood, staring at the scene without blinking once.

His gaze and mine tangled loosely as he laid down Bliea's body and rose in a daze.

My heart felt like it was tearing.

Whatever the reason, I'd wounded his brother Bardenaldo—Rhodness might hate me for it.

But, but...

'This might be my last time with Rhodness.'

I moved toward Rhodness with stumbling, urgent steps, still unable to blink.

His face looked like he'd forgotten how to breathe.

I firmly stepped on Bardenaldo, who'd collapsed forward from the unexpected attack.

Then I cupped Rhodness's wounded cheeks in both hands.

"Ad... Adrienne...?"

"Bardenaldo—that bastard was completely wrong."

Ah.

It felt like dry grains of sand scattering from my throat, but this was definitely Adrienne's... my original voice.

Tears—whether illusion or reality—surged up and streamed down both cheeks.

"Twenty-year-old Adrienne would have looked at your eyes and definitely said this."

If this miraculous moment was a revelation to pour out my last remaining strength and die...

"So beautiful, An."

I whispered with my forehead pressed against Rhodness's, who stood frozen, unable to think of anything but repeating my name.

"Like the sun on a cloudless day. Like sunset caressing the deep sea."

Words I'd always wanted to say.

I felt Rhodness's firm cheeks beneath my palms, growing wet and trembling simultaneously.

"I like you, An."

I pressed down with all my strength on Bardenaldo's writhing back and rose on tiptoe.

I gazed directly into Rhodness's wavering eyes as if binding them tight, then closed my eyes like bidding farewell to the world.

And finally, I pressed my wet lips against those lips I'd always coveted.

Rough and parched but hotter than anything—that sensation enveloped my entire lips and rapidly warmed my body.

I bit his lower lip like the sweetest fruit in the world and kissed him more deeply as he stood frozen, unable to think of responding.

Because this was a kiss as the complete Adrienne Pirreta, no matter how many tears fell from my eyes, I wasn't sad.

Ah, what a brilliant ending this was.

The sense of crisis that this might be the end—perhaps for someone as selfish as me, it was a blessing.

Rage and joy mixed into fireworks, exploding simultaneously above my head—this sensation was nothing less than selfish Adrienne's most perfect finale.

Even though this body had been dead.

Even though my heart had surely stopped, it pounded inside my head, making my ears ring.