René came to check on the chapel because there was a solid presence of living people.
There was talk of a possible escape route. She thought there was a possibility that Ghislain was secretly in the mix.
Although she did not remember doing it in the battle with Ghislain, somehow there was a large hole at the entrance.
When she entered through the hole, she found that the survivors were in the middle of evacuating through a passageway.
The undead troops, who had lost contact with her after the dubious transmission that “the Commander of the Second Order had arrived”, were scattered on the floor in the form of remnants.
The survivors were gathered at the far end of the chapel, a step higher.
There were knights in armor, servants of the castle, Bertil, a one-armed knight with a magic artifact, and a figure covered in ribbons that she had seen before.
Catherine, a girl in red, covered in ribbons, as she had seen some time before. She was staring at René, her hands clasped together in prayer. For René, she was not someone she wanted to see very often.
René decided to make quick work of the matter.
“Where is Ghislain? If you answer honestly, I will overlook you, okay?”
It was a trick.
She had already killed too many people tonight. René was tired of killing. She needed a break.
She was not in the mood for needless slaughter in a situation where the majority of the population was already dead, unless the killing was necessary for operational reasons.
However, if they realized that, the prestige of the “Rose Princess of Hellrage” would be at stake. So, she made it sound like she was going to make a deal with them.
René’s words were enough to make the people fearful. Even those who were trying to get into the passageway instinctively cowered rather than run away, and they couldn’t move.
She wanted to taste their fear, but … it was better not to use the power of “Emotional Perception” here and now. If Ghislain caught on, it would be dangerous.
“…He’s not here.”
Bertil, who seemed undeterred among those who seemed unable to even open their mouths, answered.
They hadn’t seen each other since the royal capital, but to René, he was like half an insider.
Was he unconcerned because he was sure he wouldn’t be killed? … No, this man seemed superficially unconcerned, no matter whether the situation was dangerous or not.
“Really? Didn’t he disguise himself and blend in or something? Did anyone come running in?”
“The only people who came were the knights of Earl Keely.”
Indeed, the knights who had just blocked the invasion of Bloodsuckers on the walls of the castle were now surrounding Catherine.
The knights looked exhausted, but they were still drawing their swords to protect Catherine.
“There, knights. Come forward. I’ll check to see if there are any disguised Ghislains among you.”
Where did the disguised Ghislain go?
For example, if he captured one of the knights, killed or ate him, and took his armor and put it on him, he could sneak away with the knights.
There were many magic items and spells that could change one’s appearance, and he could possibly have the power to transform into the person he had eaten.
The knights looked at each other. They were probably wondering how to respond to the situation.
They knew they could not win. The Earl and his family had been defeated in front of their eyes.
But it was natural for them to wonder whether it was right to comply with the demand.
“Wait!”
In the midst of all that, Catherine raised her voice.
She did not call out to the knights, but to René.
–… What are you doing?
René was a little scared.
Suddenly, René remembered a game she had played in her previous life.
She had memories of not daring to clear the sub-events that had tragic endings, stopping the event progression before the characters became unhappy and leaving it at that.
She wanted her relationship with Catherine to be like that.
“Young lady!?”
“Please stand down!”
The knights tried to hold Catherine back, but she pushed them away and advanced.
Catherine was trembling. She came toward René, hugging her trembling self.
“René. Please reply to me sometime. …W-will you be my friend?”
Catherine said something strange.
Looking straight at Renée with ashen and crimson eyes.
“What are you talking about?”
“Don’t play dumb with me! You know what I said! I didn’t say those words to Iris, I said them to a girl I thought I got to know just a little bit better during our nightly chats! I only found out later that it was really you, not Iris!”
After all, Catherine had noticed. She knew that the Iris she had met that day was René.
Even so, René didn’t understand how she could know that and then say, “Let’s be friends”.
“I’m sorry I goofed around as a … lady. René, would you like to enlighten me about you as well? It must be … hard for you to continue to hold on to what you feel unhappy about all by yourself.”
Catherine’s tone of voice was not so heavy as to be called “love”, but was imbued with the care and tenderness of a friend.
It was like she had forgotten that the girl in front of her, René, had already killed many people, was planning to do so again, and was about to destroy Ciel-Terra at that very moment.
It was unexpected. It would be fine if she were hostile, but she never thought she would say this.
“Why …! Why are you stepping in with such brazenness!? Haven’t you heard yet!? I killed your family!?”
René was quite seriously irritated.
She confronts Catherine with her own deeds, as if to slap back the hand that was extended to her.
Someone who was close to her…, taken away from her, never to return.
In short, it was a matter of ‘loneliness’. In the sense of filling it, it might have been the same whether it was a mother or a friend.
For René, it was a wound that she did not want to be touched the most.
Turning her back on her own salvation, René decided to walk the path of revenge.
But that did not stop it from hurting and being painful.
If René felt sympathy for the desert wanderer by offering him a mirage oasis of salvation, it would be unforgivable. It was an empty and vicious temptation that shook René as an avenger.
But Catherine was not even surprised by René’s words.
“I already heard that…”
“Eh!?”
René couldn’t believe her ears for once.
“I’ve never thought so hardly of anyone before, … like my blood is boiling and …I want to grab you, yank you out, and throw you in the fire…”
Was it the result of her education and pride as a young lady? Her tone was quiet.
But it trembled and had a fiery anger mixed in it.
By relying too much on the power of “Emotion Detection”, René had neglected to read people’s emotions without it.
Once she became aware of it, it was obvious.
Erratic breathing. Clenched teeth. A slamming gaze.
Catherine was shaking, not from fear, but from anger.
“But if I hate you and fight you, … I am weak, and I will die. I have neither the strength to wield a sword nor the talent for magic, so I will die. I will only be one … of the many people you will kill. Then … I can’t …”
Catherine gripped her left arm with her right hand. Tightly, strongly.
The nails, manicured and polished, penetrated the soft skin.
The red blood flowed over the white skin and dripped from the fingertips, but still tightly, strongly.
“That’s why, I …! I don’t want to hate you, but I believe myself that I want to save you! So I …!”
At that moment, Catherine might have tried to offer her hand as if to ask for a handshake.
In the end, Catherine couldn’t give her hand.
Whether she didn’t want to point her bloodied hand at René, or whether she was too busy holding back her anger and hatred, remained unclear.
“Please, can you tell me about yourself? Let’s … be friends, René. That’s all I can … do for you…”
Catherine said, making a smile as best she could.
René thought those words contained it all.
The will to stop René, to save René, to defeat René, to punish René, to forgive René. It might have been a mourning for her father, it might have been a sense of duty as the daughter of a lord, or it might have been the result of her judgment of right and wrong as a human being.
Trying to hold more wishes than she could hold in her small hands, the young and helpless Catherine could only say, “Let’s be friends.”
René was shocked like a direct hit from a cannon.
She was unable to move.
Catherine was trying to be compassionate while hating and angry.
She wanted to recognize René as a mere girl, even if René as the “Rose Princess of Hellrage” was not.
That was what René’s heart would have wanted.
It was the form of “salvation” that she had left behind in exchange for her vow of revenge.
But.
Rather than being happy or sad, René was terrified.
As if cowering in the face of a powerful force.
The “Rose Princess of Hellrage” had become just a little girl.
–Why? As she says, Catherine has neither the power to wield a sword nor the talent for magic. And yet…
The image of a certain rescuer who turned on René because of his feelings.
It overlapped with Catherine.
–Now and here …! I feel like I absolutely have to kill her …!
What could Catherine do without the strength to fight, without even mourning her father?
She didn’t know. But this was a solid premonition.
With her spirituality, she could do something.
She would be a threat to René. She would be a great wall.
Then she should be plucked out.
No matter how much she wanted to spare her, she had to be taken out.
Before she, Catherine, could achieve maturity, she had to be …!!
It was at that moment.
It was a devilish coincidence.
An alarm went off in René’s head. The worst kind of interruption. One that could never, ever, ever be ignored at any cost.
“This is… no way!”
It was an immediate decision.
René abandoned the situation.
She didn’t care about Catherine or Ghislain.
It was a … trivial matter compared to the incident that had been relayed.
René abandoned her body.
The shed body fell as the corpse of a decapitated girl, Meri.
René, now in the form of a soul only, left Terra Kaine in full speed flight.
“René!?”
Leaving behind Catherine’s voice, who seemed perplexed.
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