Chapter 11 · A Birthday Party of Blood II

At first, not even screams burst out.

Before they could make a sound, their breath was cut short, and hot blood soaked the floor of the banquet hall.

Those who stood at the forefront of the tragedy were none other than the imperial guards.

The very men who had sworn eternal loyalty to the empire and the imperial house.

The tips of the blades they had promised to protect with their lives now came down without hesitation upon their masters.

“It’s a rebellion! Run!”

“The imperial guards have risen up!”

Gilded chairs toppled over, and crystal glasses shattered with a bursting sound.

Nobles in splendid ceremonial robes forgot all dignity and threw themselves toward the exits.

Meanwhile, the guards slowly surrounded the imperial seats, tightening the encirclement.

In their empty eyes, neither awareness nor judgment could be found.

Even as blood splattered across their faces and screams tore at their eardrums, they swung their swords without hesitation.

Like intricately designed clockwork dolls, they advanced, driven by an invisible hand, fulfilling only the purpose of slaughter.

Isadel froze, still holding the wine glass.

Her mind screamed that she had to run, but her limbs would not move as if paralyzed.

‘A coup, that can’t be…’

The scene before her eyes did not feel real at all.

Somewhere flames rose, and acrid smoke blurred her vision, and the metallic smell of blood piercing her nose made her breath catch.

Isadel drew a trembling breath and looked at her father.

“F… Father…”

But the call that barely escaped her lips was hopelessly buried beneath the guard’s blade.

Slash!

The emperor’s head, severed in a single stroke, rolled helplessly across the marble floor.

Thud. Thud. Thud.

Three friction sounds that were almost light.

The head bounced several times across the marble and wandered before finally coming to a stop.

The massive body collapsed a beat later.

The fountain that surged from the severed neck stained the floor dark red.

“Your Majesty!”

“Father!”

The empress ran forward with a shriek, but her scream was cruelly cut short by a blade that pierced her from behind.

The five princes standing beside her were also cut down one after another.

One called for his mother with a scream, another fell with a plea for mercy hanging on his lips.

Her family fell one by one before her eyes.

Isadel stood frozen in place, unable to say a single word.

It was strange.

The screams that should have burst out, the tears that should have poured—none came, as if they had dried up.

She felt no fear, no anger, not even sorrow.

As if watching a play through a transparent glass wall, she merely stared blankly at the sight of her entire family being massacred.

‘Ah… is it my turn next?’

Before the thought of running away could surface, resignation toward the approaching death came first.

She had never dreamed she would die so vainly.

Now all she could do was sit on the cold floor and wait for the blade that would strike her neck.

Above her unfocused eyes, the blood-red scene slowly rose.

Just as she was about to accept the approaching death, dazed and lost.

Grab!

Someone seized Isadel’s wrist and roughly pulled her up.

His neatly combed black-brown hair was thoroughly disheveled, and dark red stains were splattered here and there on his once-pristine ceremonial robes.

“What are you doing, Isadel!”

Heigan urgently pulled at her hand.

“Run, now!”

* * *

The two fled the banquet hall, clutching each other’s hands like lifelines.

Click, clack, click.

The sound of Isadel’s heels echoed sharply through the corridor.

But even that sounded muffled to her ears, as if she were submerged underwater.

Isadel looked down at her dress, soiled with blood and dust.

The elegant ivory silk had become ragged like a battlefield banner before she knew it.

‘It was new…’

For a thought born in the face of death, it was terribly trivial.

“Isadel, are you listening?”

Heigan’s voice burrowed into her muffled ears.

“It’s a coup! We have to leave this place right now before the Hwa-in swarm in!”

“……”

“Let’s leave the capital and flee to Brecen first. If that fails, we can cross the border and seek asylum in Noasil!”

Noasil was a kingdom bordering the Rastain Empire to the south, where his eldest sister was queen.

But that was not the issue.

‘Flee.’

At that cowardly, wretched word, Isadel’s steps suddenly halted.

The urgency that had been burning hot cooled coldly in an instant.

“…Let go of me.”

“We have to go, Isadel!”

“I said let go!”

When Isadel roughly shook off his hand, Heigan turned back with a bewildered look.

“Isadel, what’s wrong…”

“…I’m not going.”

“What? What are you saying right now!”

“Hah…”

Isadel pulled out the diamond pin caught in her hair and threw it to the floor.

She was tired.

Of this day that had collapsed breathlessly, of this corridor she was running through desperately to survive.

Everything was suffocatingly unbearable.

“Why should I run?”

“Isadel…”

“Why should I have to run?!”

“You’re asking because you don’t know?”

“I am the princess of this nation.

I will live in the imperial palace and die here.”

At Isadel’s stubborn declaration, Heigan seized her shoulders and shook her roughly.

“Why are you doing this, Isadel. Please come to your senses!

If you stay here, you’ll die. You’ll die without a doubt!”

How could she be so foolish after witnessing her family being butchered before her eyes?

Heigan could not possibly understand her sudden stubbornness.

Isadel stared blankly at Heigan, then murmured low.

“Then I’ll die. So what.”

Even if the imperial palace burned to ashes and the Rastain Empire vanished into history, she did not care.

Rather than fleeing cowardly and clinging to a wretched life, she would rather stay here and meet an end befitting a princess.

Even if it was a miserable death atop the ashes.

“Rather than running away shamefully, it’s better to die here.”

Just as Heigan was about to desperately try to persuade her, the Bromian ducal family’s retainers rushed in from the end of the corridor.

“Young master! You must flee! The western gate is on the verge of being breached!”

The ashen-faced retainers pulled at him, but Heigan stubbornly shook them off and held on to Isadel.

“Are you serious, Isadel? You really mean to die here?”

“……”

“Answer me! Is it really all right for you to die here?!”

Isadel looked into Heigan’s desperately wavering eyes and forced a smile.

Then she unfastened the emerald necklace around her neck and pressed it into his palm.

It was the last token proving her existence, and the last gift she would leave him.

“I’m sorry.”

That was the final farewell.

Isadel slowly slipped her hand out from between Heigan’s fingers.

Even at his sorrowful calls clutching at her, she did not look back in the end.

And she turned her steps back toward the banquet hall reeking of blood.

* * *

The banquet hall she returned to had been transformed into utter chaos.

Rising flames devoured the ceiling murals and heated the air, and corpses lay everywhere.

Her father’s head rolling beside the collapsed throne, Hildwin’s golden hem turned brown with soaked blood, and the five princes fallen tangled together.

Isadel stood still in the middle of the hall and looked around.

Everything felt like a terrible nightmare.

It seemed that if she closed her eyes and opened them, everything would return to where it belonged.

Only the chill of the marble rising through her bare feet cruelly reminded her that this was no dream.

“Keuk… kuh…”

A hollow laugh leaked out through the acrid smoke.

Clutching her chest, Isadel exhaled like a beast roaring.

Was this truly the end… Was Rastain truly collapsing like this?

Had she known her life would end so vainly, she would not have struggled so desperately to live.

Beyond the unceasing laughter, a hot liquid—whether tears or blood—ran down her cheeks.

It was then that the massive chandelier crashed from the ceiling with a sharp bursting sound.

Bang!

The impact knocked Isadel off balance and sent her to the floor.

“Ugh…”

Perhaps because she had struck her head hard against the marble, her vision flashed white.

Before she could even let out a painful groan, flames and smoke invaded the air.

Just as her breath was failing at death’s threshold, a man emerged through the hellish inferno.

Just before her consciousness went dark, what appeared in Isadel’s vision was clearly the illusion of golden hair she seemed to have seen somewhere before.

With that, her consciousness was completely cut off.

Soon only the low sound of debris burning settled over the banquet hall.

The man stopped before Isadel and looked down at her for a long while.

And as if reciting a congratulatory address he had prepared for a long time, he whispered in a cold yet tender voice.

“Happy birthday, Isadel.”