Chapter 185
“Ugh…”
Ishuel let out a low groan, clutching his head.
The dizzying vertigo and headache made it hard for him to come to his senses easily.
Only after moaning for a while could he finally regain his composure.
Blinking to clear his blurred vision, Ishuel furrowed his brows.
Before him stretched a massive chessboard.
On the endlessly sprawling board, chess pieces the size of people were scattered haphazardly.
Between the obstructing chess pieces lay flowers, toys, dolls, cakes, cookies, and the like, strewn about.
As he stepped forward to get a closer look, a squeak sounded from underfoot.
A rubber doll that squeaked when squeezed lay at his feet.
The place was decorated like a child’s room, yet oddly eerie objects occupied spots here and there.
Things like dessert knives with edges sharp enough to gleam blue, or armies of heavily armed soldier dolls neatly arrayed.
Especially unsettling was the black castle shimmering like a mirage in the distance.
The castle with its pitch-black roof was unmistakably the Serpent’s Castle located in the eastern Black Forest.
Ishuel quickly realized where this bizarre space was.
“The witch’s illusion realm.”
He said it aloud on purpose, but it still didn’t feel real.
He had heard plenty about Lichesia’s illusion realm.
However, there were quite a few differences from the various descriptions he had encountered.
He’d heard about toys and dolls being present, but they were supposed to be all broken.
For some reason, the toys and dolls in Ishuel’s view were all perfectly intact.
And to see the Serpent’s Castle of all things…
He couldn’t fathom the reason.
More importantly, why had he ended up in the witch Lichesia’s illusion realm?
Ishuel gripped his still faintly throbbing head and retraced the events up to now.
Basilian had allied with Hailon and resolved to end everything at the emperor’s birthday banquet.
They had completed all preparations and divided roles among themselves.
Karha was in charge of the capital’s security forces and the imperial knights, ensuring no external reinforcements appeared at the banquet hall, while Ishuel was set to seal off the banquet hall and the entire palace with magic.
Belzeon and Kierne were to monitor the situation, coordinate, and respond organically.
The goal was to expose all of the Holy King’s atrocities in the banquet hall and subdue him.
However, contrary to expectations, the Holy King showed up right on the first day of the birthday banquet.
They had assumed he would only appear on the last day if at all, so the plan was drastically revised.
Though the difficulty had increased a bit, it was still within manageable bounds.
That is, if the Holy King hadn’t summoned demons.
The sudden demon assault threw all plans into disarray.
Far from subduing the Holy King, they were in a position where they had to hope to escape the palace alive.
Previously, in the Holy Empire, his young sibling had purified demons using fairy powers.
But now, with most of her strength lost, he couldn’t rely on that.
They decided to temporarily halt all plans and focus entirely on exterminating the demons.
“…”
The last thing he saw was flowers overwhelming his vision.
And then he awoke here, in the witch’s illusion realm.
Ishuel kept glancing around, but there was no sign of anyone else.
In the eerily silent space, only the sound of a music box played.
As Ishuel focused on the music, deep wrinkles formed between his brows.
It was the lullaby that Kierne would sing haphazardly whenever he pleased.
That song was the only memory left to their mother, discovered in the Black Forest, after forgetting everything else.
She would say someone had sung it to her in a gentle voice, and she’d smile happily whenever she sang it.
He had inquired about the song’s origin back then, but only learned that it wasn’t known on the continent.
A music box playing a song that only the men of the Basilian family would know.
It was while he was glaring at the music box in indescribable strangeness.
Bang!
Fireworks exploded in the middle of the illusion realm.
Startled by the noise in the quiet space, Ishuel whirled around in surprise.
Amid the falling colorful paper, petals, and glitter, flowers bloomed.
In the midst of various flowers mingling and bursting forth, a large pink bud appeared.
The sizable bud slowly unfurled.
Inside the fully opened blossom stood a woman.
She had an appearance so dazzling it left one momentarily stunned.
She wore a voluminous pink dress adorned with frills, ribbons, and flowers galore.
The fabric trailing long behind the dress shifted from pink to white toward the hem.
Blue butterflies attached to the dress shimmered like accessories, fluttering their wings gently.
Each time the butterflies waved their wings, her golden hair also swayed ethereally.
Uniquely, she was hugging a rabbit doll dressed in the exact same outfit as her.
“…The witch?”
It was the master of the illusion realm, the witch Lichesia.
But something was off.
Her eyes weren’t red.
They were a tender, vibrant pink like flowers just budding in early spring.
Eyes that were terribly familiar to Ishuel.
The same color as his young sibling, Cheshire.
The rabbit doll in the witch’s hand was familiar too.
Though dressed differently, with those dumb button eyes, drooping ears, and stubby cotton feet, it was undoubtedly the doll Cheshire had.
Why did the witch have eyes the same color as Cheshire’s, and why was she holding Cheshire’s doll?
As he stared at the witch in confusion, she slowly lifted her head.
It wasn’t toward Ishuel.
She looked at the sky of the illusion realm.
Following the witch, Ishuel looked up at the sky and swallowed dryly.
It seemed like all the world’s ill omens had gathered to form it.
The sky, distorted into a bizarre vortex shape, writhed grotesquely with black and red colors twisting together.
It was a revulsion that stirred human instincts.
Just like the demons of the Black Forest.
It was when he unconsciously covered his lips with the back of his hand against the rising nausea.
The witch, gazing at the sky, extended one hand.
A ornate axe materialized in the air and settled into her grasp.
The witch gripped the large axe and swung it horizontally with elegance.
It was like the conducting of an orchestra with an axe.
Along the broad horizontal arc, large and small flowers bloomed profusely and then faded.
Petals swirled as the sky melted like paint.
The reality veiled by another layer of illusion was revealed.
“Kieeeek!”
A chilling scream that raised goosebumps all over tore through the surroundings.
Beyond the melting sky, demons appeared.
Loathsomely clustered demons filled the entire sky endlessly.
The mass of demons, letting out horrific shrieks, began falling from the sky to the ground like meteors.
The cascading black demons seemed poised to dye the entire illusion realm pitch black at any moment.
Ishuel swallowed a curse and prepared his magic.
All sorts of thoughts flashed through his mind.
The most urgent one was singular.
Cheshire, my little sibling?
The child he had brought along, promising to protect her.
In her powerless state, she’d be easy prey for the demons.
He had heard she was with Kierne, but he couldn’t suppress the anxious feeling.
However, as Ishuel urgently gathered his mana, his face soon turned blank.
The witch, who had been staring fixedly at the pouring demons, stamped her foot.
As her pink-shoed foot lightly touched the ground, a thudding vibration shook the surroundings.
At the same time, enormous flowers bloomed from all directions.
Thorny vines grew between the flowers, extending rapidly toward the demons.
The sharp thorny vines ensnared the demons.
The witch lightly pushed off the ground and soared into the air.
Butterflies and flowers followed her.
The witch swung her axe at the demons bound by the stems.
The moment the witch’s axe struck.
The demons burst with a pop, turning into white petals and vanishing.
Just like when Cheshire had purified demons.
Ishuel murmured blankly.
“…Cheshire.”
