Chapter 116: You, Are My Male Lead
“Male lead?”
Rast stood at the edge of the cliff as well, silently watching the words written across the dusky sky alongside the girl beside him.
「Mm, male lead.」
The queen with icy blue hair nodded firmly.
「Just like in that fairy tale, the boy who dreams of becoming a knight meets the Plague Witch, who brings calamity—」
「They meet, get to know each other, and grow close...」
「And then, fall in love.」
Her writing sped up once again, the rise and fall of her fingertips sketching something like a musical score.
「Actually, in the beginning, I was a bit puzzled. Why would you, Rast, reject my blessing... and not let me use my power to make you eternal like Anna?」
「But now, I think I understand a little.」
Helen turned her head, gazing at the royal city sprawled across the earth in the distance.
「Those foreign outsiders in the royal city... none of them have ever received my blessing.」
「Their lives are short, they are plagued by sickness, they gradually grow old and die, just like...」
The icy blue characters in the sky paused slightly.
“Like what?” Rast asked.
「Like butterflies in a glass dome—beautiful, yet fragile and fleeting.」
「Like morning dew, vanishing in an instant.」
Butterflies in a glass dome.
Rast hadn’t expected Helen to use such a metaphor.
Even though it had only been a month, this emotionally reserved queen who disliked socializing seemed to have undergone a qualitative leap in communication.
And yet, the metaphor was fitting.
Rast couldn’t help but recall a childhood biology assignment from his past life, where fat silkworms and mulberry leaves were placed in paper boxes for students to observe and record their growth in a journal.
So, over the course of a month—
He had recorded how the silkworms grew larger, spun white silk to cocoon themselves, transformed into moths, emerged, and finally died clinging to the sides of the box.
A trivial month-long assignment for schoolchildren was, for the moths, a whole lifetime.
And perhaps, in the eyes of Queen Helen of the Underworld—who wielded the authority of the 「Death God」 and lived nearly eternally—Rast and the other refugees, all unblessed humans, were no different from those moths, dying the moment they slipped up.
「But...」
Helen’s writing suddenly wavered.
「On the faces of those outsiders, I saw smiles I had never seen before.」
「Smiles of happiness that I never saw on Anna, or on the faces of my blessed handmaidens and citizens.」
A trace of confusion flickered in her violet eyes: 「Rast, you weren’t wrong.」
「Birth, growth, aging, and death... experiencing joy, anger, sorrow, and partings—these are all beautiful things unique to the short and fragile existence of humans.」
「What I once thought was a blessing—the gift of eternity to my people... is in truth not a blessing, but a curse, stripping them of that beauty.」
「Turning living humans into specimens.」
「Lifelike on the outside, but long dead within—mere illusions of the past.」
「So in the eyes of the world, my very existence must be a mistake.」
「Because whether it’s the word ‘justice,’ or the morality that defines it, they were created solely for humans.」
「Just like in Chronicles of the Silver Wings, the Plague Witch who brings calamity and death by birth... is someone the Church of Light, symbolizing justice, must eradicate.」
In the setting sun, the girl’s eyes drooped slightly, like a cat that had done something wrong.
But soon, Helen raised her head again, those violet eyes staring straight at Rast.
「And what you represent, Rast, is justice.」
「The 『Shoreguards』, right?」
「Although the memory is a little hazy, I still remember my mother once mentioning that name.」
「An organization devoted solely to the continuation of human civilization, just like the Church of Light in Chronicles of the Silver Wings, the righteous ones who hunt witches.」
Rast was slightly stunned as he read the words forming in the air.
He hadn’t expected Her Majesty the Queen to have already sensed the existence of the Shoreguards, as well as his own identity and the inevitable conflict between them.
Yet despite this, her violet eyes remained unchanged from the past month—carrying the same gentle trust and closeness.
“So, aren’t you afraid of me, a 『Shoreguard』?”
Rast asked softly, “Just like the Plague Witch in the story, who was harmed by the divine light of the six-winged Seraph of the Church.”
「No, not afraid.」
Helen shook her head vigorously.
「Because in my heart, Rast, you are not the Church’s six-winged Seraph. You are the male lead who dreams of becoming a knight.」
「And just like the fairy tale said, even a knight from the Church and a witch hunted by them can find a way to understand each other.」
Her eyes reflected the blood-red sunset in the dusky sky.
「So, can you tell me?」
「About yourself, Rast. About your past.」
“My past?”
Staring at the glowing ice-blue words and those curious, pleading eyes turned toward him—
Rast silently calculated the time in his mind.
Realizing there was still some time before the expected moment, he nodded slightly.
He walked to the edge of the cliff and sat down, gazing at the city faintly visible in the twilight, sprawled across the earth.
He began to speak softly.
“In truth, my past isn’t worth mentioning.”
“Just a story about someone trapped in desperation, struggling desperately not to lose himself…”
...
Reality, Secret Tower, beside the Epoch Tombstone.
The projection on the scrying screen rippled like water.
It reflected the two of them sitting side by side on the cliff, conversing in the dusk like silhouettes.
“Didn’t expect it. Little Xiya actually figured it all out.”
In the Dean Silver’s subdimensional warehouse, the stock of dried fish snacks had run out, leaving no snacks to eat. So all attention was focused on the screen.
When Queen Helen of the Underworld bluntly exposed all the coincidences, not just Rast—
Even the Dean Silver and Ophelia, watching the livestream from beyond the world’s barrier, were a bit taken aback.
They feared that the sweet romantic comedy between two people alone might suddenly shift into a slaughter fest with the Underworld Queen butchering all betrayers like some dark spin-off of Days in Paradise.
But the way things played out surprised both dean and ferret.
“What’s strange is... even knowing everything was a staged illusion, this queen didn’t seem to have any resistance at all?”
The Dean Silver swished its fluffy tail. “If it were me, and I found out someone dared to write my life’s script and interfere, I’d flip the table and raise hell.”
“With the lazy salted-fish look you’ve got going right now, that kind of talk really doesn’t suit you.”
Ophelia’s cool voice echoed from nearby.
“It’s not strange,” she said, watching the girl with icy blue hair on the screen. “Queen Helen of the Underworld and Akxia are the same person. It’s just that some of her memories were temporarily suppressed by the Nightworld.”
“Even so, Akxia’s subconscious desire to help Rast still remained in her soul, so she never harbored any intent to hurt him.”
“Besides—setting all that aside, why would the Queen of the Underworld even want to resist?”
A subtle light shimmered in Ophelia’s wine-red eyes.
“Even if it’s clearly false flattery, praise about youth and beauty can still delight an aging noblewoman...”
“Even the most corny, over-the-top sweet talk can still steal the heart of someone starved for affection.”
“To a queen who had never seen the outside world, this month-long fantasy was a pink, dreamlike journey, filled with so many of her firsts—memories deeply engraved in her soul, irreplaceable no matter how many storms she endures.”
“Just like those wealthy merchants and noble lords who, after achieving greatness, never forget the senior they met in their youth.”
“That’s the unreasonable power of someone’s ‘first love’—like white moonlight.”
Ophelia paused briefly. “Even if it was all a lie, no one can deny how beautiful this journey was.”
“It’s a memory that, no matter what happens in the future, not even fate or the gods can take away. One that will never fade.”
“That alone... is enough.”
The Dean Silver glanced sideways at Ophelia.
Still just a little underage brat, yet so skilled at reading people’s hearts...
No wonder the nobles of the imperial capital were wary of this second princess.
At this rate, once she grew up, even the heirs of those noble houses might start crying at night when they heard her name.
This was precisely why the Dean Silver feared her.
So young, yet already this cunning—completely unlike her older sister’s purity.
“Say, aren’t you the least bit worried?”
The dean’s tail flicked. “Just now, Little Xiya’s words clearly named that guy as the male lead of her story… That’s basically a confession!”
“And from a queen no less, one close to legendary rank.”
“She knows everything about his background and intentions, knows it’s all fake and scripted... and still confessed.”
“Add to that the fairy tale from Chronicles of the Silver Wings, where their roles match perfectly as fated male and female leads—it’s like destiny itself has spoken.”
“In that case, wouldn’t any normal guy feel moved?”
Peeking at Ophelia’s expression, the dean felt a creeping sense of unease. “I’m really starting to think… Little Tina might get her heart broken.”
But to its surprise—
The Second Princess, known for her obsessive sister complex, showed no emotional shift in her wine-red eyes.
She simply kept watching the screen, calm as ever. “It’s fine. I trust my brother-in-law’s character.”
“He’s like a machine—pushing toward the goal in his heart, ignoring all distractions. He won’t be swayed by the scenery along the road.”
“Didn’t you say that to me before, Snow Ferret? Why are you doubting now?”
“I…”
The dean froze, clearly caught off guard by the counter.
After a long pause, it finally muttered, “But… as long as it’s beautiful enough, when a lie is repeated ten thousand times, it can become truth…”
Even the hardest heart should melt in the face of such beauty… Right?
“No, Snow Ferret.”
Ophelia shook her head, cutting the dean off.
“A lie repeated ten thousand times will still never become truth.”
“And anyone fooled by such a lie… deep down, they were always lost.”
“They never had unwavering belief—never had a conviction they’d fight for to the end.”
She stared at the boy on the screen, sitting on the cliff, his silhouette outlined by the golden dusk.
A faint, unnatural flush appeared on her doll-like face.
“I should’ve realized sooner.”
“Someone like my sister—who never wavers under outside doubt, who always remains true to herself…”
“The person she chooses to change for could never be just a pretty face with sweet words.”
“If Rast really were the ordinary, mediocre guy you say he is, then he wouldn’t be worthy of being my brother-in-law.”
Ophelia took a deep breath, and the blush on her fair face slowly faded.
Her gaze toward the screen gradually calmed as well.
“What I’m more curious about is actually this—『Shoreguards』.”
“Rast’s codename within the academy, that secret organization from the Sixth Epoch devoted to humanity’s survival, the one that defined the word ‘justice’...”
“What connection does 『Shoreguards』 have with the 『Gravekeepers』?”
“And what became of the Shoreguards’ fate?”
“Were they buried along with the end of the Sixth Epoch—”
“Or... do they still survive today?”