Chapter 480: Ask Her Why [Bonus - ]

Chapter 480: Chapter 480: Ask Her Why [Bonus Chapter]

Chapter 480 – Ask Her Why [Bonus Chapter]

Ask Seraphim why. Ask her why she had done what she had done.

Ask her why she had given Theophane the ability to kill her if she came to love her profoundly and deeply. Ask her why, and Seraphim Hood would not be able to give a satisfactory answer.

She didn’t know.

Yet the moment she had officially done it, and even gone as far as kissing Theophane – feeling her soft lips, her heartbeat quickening dramatically, her body trembling frailly beneath her scarred arms – the Princess somehow knew she had been lying to herself all this time.

’Love,’ she whispered in her mind, her lips still pressed against Theophane’s. ’Do I also want to be loved?’

That question rang painfully inside her chest. And her god, the Lord of Death, echoed inside her mind.

[Don’t be surprised, my dear.] The Usurper spoke with such love and care that no one would ever believe it came from him. [It is natural human instinct to seek to be loved, and to love in return. But what you have done is dangerous, my dear. You have given your life to someone else. Someone who has every right to wish for your death.]

’Are you angry with me, Lord of Death?’

[I have never been angry at any of my descendants, no matter what they have done.]

’You love us, don’t you? But then why are you doing all of this? Why are you entertaining Domada Hood in his attempt to destroy our bloodline?’

[Because I love you.]

’Then maybe you understand me, Lord of Death.’ Seraphim broke the kiss and smiled, looking at Theophane’s dazed face. ’Maybe you are right, and I want to be loved. Or maybe not. I don’t know, and I don’t care. However, I do know one thing...’

The Princess of Hood grasped Theophane’s chin, and her smile widened.

’...if someday you stretch your deathly hand towards me, then I want it to be on my own terms. I want to die under the blade of my own choosing.’

[And you have chosen the Forbidden Seer.]

’Yes.’

[Why?]

’I enjoy torturing her. But I also admit,’ Seraphim chuckled softly, ’she makes me want to possess her.’

[Oh,] Vorn exclaimed, then whispered, [Go on, then. Make the Forbidden kneel before you. And if a day comes when you appear in my Kingdom...]

Vorn’s voice shrank to a whisper.

[...I shall welcome you just as I have welcomed your forefathers. With the highest honor, above all the dead.]

’Nepotism at its finest.’

[And I dare anyone to say anything about it.]

And with that, the Lord of Death’s presence disappeared, and Seraphim blinked, growing more aware of her surroundings.

"Why?" Theophane’s voice reached her then, the girl looking at her with eyes wet with tears. "Why did you have to do this? Why are you going so far?"

Seraphim leaned close to her ear and whispered with a bloody grin, "I am giving you the power to kill me. If you succeed, you will be able to get back at Cassius in the most painful way. Aren’t you happy?"

"But the conditions..."

"Yes." Her voice grew even fainter. "You must love me, Theophane. Not just any love. But one that will consume your entire being. The kind of love my nephew, Cassius, held for Isolde."

Theophane’s lips trembled as she realized the atrocity behind all of this.

To someone who had never been loved for who she was, but only because she was beautiful; to someone who had never loved anyone in her whole life... asking her to kill the person she finally came to love would be the cruelest thing the world could ever do to her.

Yet there were many reasons, so many of them, for Theophane to kill Seraphim, and she just couldn’t ignore the hatred that had been inside her since her Fate was killed.

Her head and heart were aching, and the pain — the agony — was enough to make her weep at that point, feeling so ridiculously helpless.

’It’s always like this,’ Theophane sobbed in front of Seraphim and Sea. ’Always! Always! My Fate was killed. My sister abandoned me. Men and women alike want me for my body. The gods want to use me for my perverted nephew. The man I swore revenge against is getting farther and farther beyond my reach, becoming someone I can hardly dream of approaching without risking my life. My Fate powers are practically useless against him when his goddess is literally the Goddess of Fate and Secrecy. And now... and now...’

Tears streamed down her face, turning her beauty into a miserable, tear-stained mess. She clutched Seraphim’s arms desperately, like someone hanging over the edge of a cliff, clinging to a piece of ragged cloth even while knowing it could tear at any moment, and slowly lifted her head to stare at the woman through her blurred eyes.

’...And now I’m trapped in this situation with his very aunt, Seraphim Hood, whom my own heart has betrayed me by daring to feel attracted to! Ah. Ah. Ah. Ahhhh!!’

Theophane suddenly began to go through an episode, anxiety and depression rushing back through her whole being, tightening her chest and stopping her from breathing.

"Oh?" Seraphim noticed Theophane’s heavy breathing, and her mind immediately went back years: to when she was young, and Dantes regularly went through episodes of anxiety and fear.

Her mother, Morenna, always managed to calm her down by...

SLAP!

Seraphim slapped Theophane’s cheek, loud and searing. Theophane immediately regained a sliver of her bearings as the pain sent an electric jolt to her brain, stopping her overthinking and her replaying of everything wrong in her life, which was almost all of it.

The White Witch stared at the Princess blankly, surprised by the strike, tears still streaming.

"Get your bearings, girl," Seraphim said sharply. "I have no interest in making a broken toy love me."

"I am... your toy?" Her voice was a croak.

"You don’t want to be?" Seraphim grinned slowly. "Then make me love you, darling. You can do that, can’t you? You have done so with so many beings. Reassure me, you don’t lack the confidence, right?"

"You... you are different," Theophane coughed, her face covered in tears. "But... why me?"

"Because I want you," the princess said, looking at Sea, who was watching with crossed arms. "And I also want you, Sea."

"A harem," Sea said with an amused smirk. "That’s what you want, princess."

"Why not?" she replied. "You get to have two women. Theophane gets to have you for her purposes, as long as they don’t concern my family. And I get to have my little Theophane, and you, my dear Sea."

"Oh, what do they call it?" Sea said, then cocked his head with a smile. "Win-Win?"

Seraphim laughed. "Exactly." Then she turned her attention back to Theophane and said, "Leave Cassius out of your damn mind. Focus on me, Theophane. Focus everything you have on me, and I will lend you a hand in any matter that doesn’t involve harming or hindering Cassius in any way. I can help you with the Stormblessed, for I can see, from your situation at the academy, that you are not very fond of them."

"Same with me," Sea said, drinking his wine. "My sister is always with Cassius. Harming him means harming her." His eyes narrowed. "I can’t allow that. I still haven’t forgotten how you put her in danger with the museum."

"So... I must give up?" Theophane muttered. "I must accept dying just like that?"

"How so?"

"I don’t have a Fate," the White Witch confessed for the first time ever. "My Fate was stolen by Cassius’s goddess. Without a Fate, I cannot step into the Third Rank. If I do, I will die. And if I don’t rank up, I will die of old age sooner rather than later. And all of that because of something a goddess imposed on me? Why me?"

"Ah," Seraphim exclaimed, blinking. She was taken aback for a heartbeat. But then her mind, the one that had made her the Revolutionary Queen who almost overturned the whole Kingdom, flashed with a light of understanding. "So the problem is that you don’t have a Fate? Only that?"

"Only that?" Theophane hissed, looking at Seraphim with flaring wrath. "Only that, you say??"

"First, lower your voice, girl," Seraphim said. "Second, yes, only a Fate. Now tell me, Theophane, what do you do when you can’t cook but still need to eat?"

"What—!"

"Don’t make me repeat myself." Her voice turned cold.

The White Witch clenched her jaw, then reluctantly replied, "If I can’t cook, then I’ll buy food."

"And what if you don’t have the money to buy it?"

"Then I’ll steal it," Theophane replied matter-of-factly, only for her expression to freeze the moment the words left her mouth.

Seraphim smirked devilishly, and behind her, Sea wore an equally wicked smile.

"If you don’t have a Fate, lovely Theophane..." Sea Wealth began, his voice almost teasing.

And the Princess of Hood finished, her voice dripping with the temptation of a succubus.

"...then you simply need to steal the Fates of others, my dear."

—End of Chapter 480—