I was carried by Cassius, flanked by Adel and Valerie. We rushed out of the Palace, my body limp in Cassius's arms.
I tried to maintain my consciousness, fighting the encroaching darkness.
After we exited the Palace gates, chaos erupted. We couldn't find the carriage.
"Where is our carriage??" Valerie shouted, scanning the courtyard.
Through my blurry vision, I saw Adel storm up to one of the guards. She grabbed him by the collar, demanding answers. I didn't hear what the guard said, but it made Adel furious.
CRACK.
She punched the stone wall right beside the guard's head. Dust and debris rained down. The guard turned pale, terrified.
Suddenly, out of nowhere, a horse galloped toward us.
I squinted. It was the Crown Prince, riding alone, his face etched with concern. He reached out toward us...
But before he arrived, the world tilted.
I lost my vision. I fell into unconsciousness.
….
It was pitch black.
But it wasn't silent.
There were whispers. Thousands of them. I was surrounded by voices I had never heard before, a cacophony of murmurs echoing in the void.
Fall... fall...
I was swallowed by the whispers. It felt like I was physically falling, plunging deep into a pit of darkness. I fell until I hit the bottom.
I tried to stand up. I looked around.
"This is different from the Dianoia I experienced before," I whispered, my voice trembling. "What is going on? And what are those voices?"
It was a blank void. But the whispering persisted, swirling around me like smoke.
I started walking, trying to escape the noise. I walked aimlessly until, in the distance, I saw a glimpse of light. It looked like the glow of a chandelier.
I walked toward it. As I got closer, the light revealed something lying on the ground.
My heart stopped.
"WHAT HAPPENED TO YOU TWO?" I screamed.
Aurelio and Ophelia were lying on the ground. Blood trickled from their mouths, staining their clothes.
Aurelio slowly lifted his trembling right hand. He pointed a finger directly at me.
"It.. was... yo.. u… Sis.. ter…" he rasped.
"What are you talking about, Aurelio?"
Instantly, a vision flashed in front of me. I saw what happened.
It was in the garden of my home. Aurelio was training with his sword; Ophelia was playing nearby. They were exhausted. I brought them tea.
But I had put something in it.
They drank. Immediately, they coughed, choking, and fell to the ground. The vision shifted—I saw the servants in the kitchen being executed for treason and poisoning, blamed for my crime.
"It is a lie…" I shook my head violently. "There is no way I am doing that."
Suddenly, another light appeared to my right. I turned away from the twins and walked toward it.
I saw a body lying on the ground. I recognized the dress immediately.
"MOTHER!!!"
I ran to her. She was lying face down. I fell to my knees.
"What has happened to you, Mother?"
She turned her head slowly, looking at me with betrayal in her dying eyes.
"What… have.. I... done.. to .. you,. . Aurelia? Th.at ma..kes you do some..thing li..ke this.."
Just like with the twins, the vision showed me holding the knife. I was the one who stabbed her in the back. I saw another innocent servant being dragged away to execution for the murder.
Another light appeared. My heart ached so much I thought it would burst.
I walked toward the light.
"FATHER!!"
He lay there too, lifeless.
Suddenly, the bodies of Mother and the twins moved. They appeared beside me. More lights flickered on, surrounding me in a circle of horror.
Under each light lay a body.
Adel. Lady Octavi. Martia. Livia. Lady Clara.
Everyone who had ties to me. Everyone I cared about.
"THIS IS NOT TRUE!! THIS IS NOT TRUE!!!" I screamed, covering my ears.
I realized something.
"THE BOOK???? ALL OF THIS IS NOT WRITTEN IN THE BOOK! SO IT SHOULDN'T BE TRUE AT ALL!!"
Suddenly, all the bodies vanished. The lights extinguished.
"MY LADY!!"
A recognizable voice echoed from the darkness.
"Huh???" I spun around. "Gena? Is that you?? Where are you??"
"I don't have time to tell you that, but listen to me carefully," Gena's voice urged. "What you have seen in this space? It is neither a future nor real. You do not kill all the people around you in the future. So control your heart… like I said to you earlier… Prepare your heart."
"Then what is all of this?"
"It is Nona's effort," Gena explained hurriedly. "She has already awakened from her eternal sleep because of you, My Lady... These past seven years, she ordered her Paragons to start moving. One of them was the one who twisted some of it from the book to your life."
"So everything was set up for me? And wait… you said 'one of them'. How many of these Paragons are there?"
"Myself doesn't know about it… but I know one of th—"
Suddenly, her voice cut off.
Clap. Clap. Clap.
The sound of slow, rhythmic clapping echoed from behind me.
I turned around.
A figure emerged from the shadows.
It was a tall woman, towering almost twice my height. She had long white hair like mine, skin as pale as snow, and wore robes of white and blue. A blue tiara rested on her head.
I looked closely at her eyes. They were blue, but her pupils were white—unnatural, divine.
She walked slowly toward me.
I stood up, defiant. "YOU!!! WHO ARE YOU!!"
"The one you bothered," she said, her voice smooth as silk but cold as ice. "You bothered my sleep."
Suddenly, magnificent wings unfurled from her back. The right wing was pure white; the left wing was deep blue.
"Your sleep?? SO YOU ARE NONA... That Gena and Delia were talking about..."
"Gena and Delia????" She tilted her head, amused. "So that is their names as humans…"
She turned her head slightly back. "Nice to meet you, Delia."
She threw something from her right hand toward me.
It was Delia.
Delia crashed to the ground. She was covered in bruises; her clothes were torn, and her feathered wings were broken and scattered.
I immediately ran to her. "Are you alright, Delia?"
"I… am… al.. right… My.. Lady.." she groaned.
"What an interesting thing!" Nona laughed lightly. "You call a mortal with the honorific 'My Lady'."
Nona circled us like a predator. "But you abandoned me. Hiks hiks. You chose a mortal over me… Even though I kept caring for you… and your worthless friend, 'Gena'.... still you keep following her path."
She stopped circling. She walked toward us, reached down, grabbed Delia by her hair, and lifted her off the ground effortlessly.
"Tell me! Delia… What have I done to you? That makes you like this.."
In response, Delia gathered her strength and spat directly in Nona's face.
Nona dropped her. She wiped the spit from her cheek calmly.
"You are really following her path. I am very sad. Hiks hiks."
"WHAT DO YOU WANT, NONA?" I shouted.
"What do I want?? HA HA HA HA HA." She laughed hysterically. "Perhaps you are an idiot? Or those imbeciles didn't tell you. I want a good rest, and sleep, where everything follows the flow of fate. But you… you… are the problem of that flow."
"And why did you show all of that?"
"Show all of what??"
"The death of people around me."
"Ha ha ha. Perhaps you know your own fate from the book, but… the one who knows the fate better than anyone else is ME. So what happens if what I showed you was real? If your fate is to die, shall I bring that fate to you? You cannot run from that fate in my sight…"
She walked toward me. She raised her hand, and a blinding light gathered in her palm, aimed right at me.
"You are in my sight right now… it is so impulsive to erase your existence right now…"
I squeezed my eyes shut, bracing for the end.
But nothing happened.
I opened my eyes. She had lowered her hand.
"But still," Nona sighed. "I have the dignity of a Goddess in this world. I will not interfere with the problems of mortals directly. Let mortals kill other mortals, and let Goddesses kill other Goddesses. Is that right, Delia?"
She smiled cruelly. "Slowly, I love that name, Delia, more than Delios."
Delia struggled to lift her head. "Scr.. ew… you.. No.. na!"
Nona walked toward Delia. I immediately stepped in front of Delia, spreading my arms.
"STEP ASIDE, MORTAL!!"
"I will not let you hurt her anymore."
"Fine… I will spare that useless one for you… Perhaps you already got the two people from the Twelve Keys, and those three children you took, but… that is not the end of all things. The end of these things will be your death. And you….."
She turned and began to walk away.
I stood up and shouted at her back.
"AINUR NALA!!"
She stopped dead.
She turned her head around slowly. Her expression twisted into pure rage.
"WHAT DID YOU SAY?"
"Ain–"
Whoosh.
She dashed at me. Before I could blink, her hand was around my neck, lifting me off the ground.
I grabbed her wrist, kicking my legs, trying to breathe.
"Don't you ever speak that name again in front of me!!" she hissed.
I choked out the words. "So… yo.. u… kn… ow… thi.. s… name.."
She threw me aside like a ragdoll.
I hit the ground hard, gasping for air. I saw her feet stop in front of me. She leaned down, her face inches from mine.
"Where do you know that name?" she demanded.
I didn't answer.
"Let's change it. Did you see her appearance?"
Again, I stayed silent.
Her face frowned deeper. She stood up abruptly, frustrated. She turned her gaze to Delia.
She walked toward her.
"I believe she was the one who showed you that appearance??"
She crouched down, grabbed Delia's hair again, and yanked her head back.
"Did you show her about that appearance?"
Delia, battered and broken, didn't answer. She just glared defiantly and spat in Nona's face again.
Nona wiped her face slowly. She threw Delia's head down.
She stood up.
Suddenly, the air changed.
I felt a primal fear wash over me. The more I looked at Nona, the more terrified I became.
Mist began to swirl around us. The pressure in the air grew heavy, suffocating.
Nona changed.
Her white and blue robes turned to pitch black and blood red. Her white hair turned jet black. Her blue eyes ignited into glowing red orbs. Her wings turned black as night.
A black circle appeared behind her back, with a sword emblem in the center. She smiled—a mischievous, cruel smile that was far scarier than anything I had ever seen.
I saw Delia's lips moving. I couldn't hear the whole sentence, but I caught three words.
"WHO ARE YOU?"
Four black swords materialized in the air above Delia, pointing down.
"Like I said," Nona whispered, her voice distorted. "Mortals kill other mortals. Goddesses kill other Goddesses."
Her smile widened. Her red eyes glowed brighter.
"So long…"
Snap.
She snapped her fingers.
Thwack. Thwack. Thwack. Thwack.
At once, all four swords plunged into Delia's torso.
Delia coughed up a massive amount of blood. Her fingers twitched feebly.
Nona watched. "Still moving?"
Four more black swords appeared.
Thwack. Thwack.
I watched in horror as two swords pierced her neck and two pierced her skull.
Delia stopped moving.
A dark circle appeared on the ground around Delia's corpse. From the circle, a giant door emerged. It creaked open.
From the abyss below, hundreds of black hands reached up. They grabbed Delia's body and pulled her down into the darkness.
The door slammed shut. The circle vanished.
Nona reverted to her normal appearance.
She turned and walked toward me. The closer she got, the more I trembled, paralyzed by the execution I had just witnessed.
I closed my eyes.
...