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My jaw ached from clenching my teeth so tightly.
My footsteps thundered across the wooden floor as though I intended to stomp straight through it.
Ordinarily, I would have clicked my tongue and let his antics pass.
Today, every step only fed the fury coiling through my nerves.
How dare he come here?
Who ever welcomed him into this house?
Trembling with rage, I flung the paper sliding door open.
An utterly absurd sight greeted me.
Occupying the mattress spread before the folding screen, the Devil lounged as though he had been expecting me.
“You think you’ll bring the roof down stomping around like that?”
As if this were his own home, he lay lazily on his side atop the silk bedding, propping his chin on one hand.
Judging by the healthy sheen of his bronze skin, he had clearly spent his time eating and drinking to his heart’s content at some pleasure house.
His long crimson hair spilled carelessly over his shoulders, revealing only part of his handsome face.
The corners of his lips curled upward in lazy mockery.
His scarlet tongue slowly swept across them.
Sharp canine teeth flashed briefly before disappearing again.
Beneath heavy brows, crimson eyes gleamed with unmistakable amusement.
Like a predator toying with prey it was too full to bother eating.
“…”
It was nothing new for him to treat my anger as insignificant.
Yet today, I glared at him with bloodshot eyes as I clenched my fists.
The deeper my nails dug into my palms, the sharper the pain became.
And the sharper the pain…
The more my anger grew.
Perhaps he sensed that something about me was different.
His gaze slowly traveled over my body.
It lingered on my trembling fists.
Then his expression twisted into open ridicule.
“With that scrawny body?
Think you could even wring a chicken’s neck?”
“…”
Perhaps my murderous glare had finally become irritating.
The Devil rose to his feet.
Standing well over eight feet tall, his body was built entirely of rock-like muscle.
While reclining, he merely seemed large.
Standing before me, however…
His immense frame radiated overwhelming pressure.
Instinctively, I wanted to step back.
I forced my feet to stay where they were.
His robe hung open, exposing a chest and abdomen carved with deep ridges of muscle.
The thin trousers he wore clung to his legs with every movement, outlining thighs thick and gnarled like the roots of ancient trees.
He stopped only when the heat radiating from his body reached my skin.
For a man whose favorite pastime was bathing in other people’s blood…
His bronze skin remained smooth and flawless.
Not a single scar.
How effortlessly he killed others…
Yet he had never allowed so much as a scratch upon himself.
Before I could dwell on the contradiction, he seized my wrist.
He lifted my clenched fist as though displaying it for inspection.
“What’s the point of laying out silk bedding?
You’ve never even brought a woman in here.
With a body this frail…
Can you even perform as a man?”
I resisted.
The difference in strength was overwhelming.
Though he shook me effortlessly, I refused to give him the satisfaction of seeing me yield.
Keeping my glare fixed upon him despite the dizziness, I answered through clenched teeth.
“There’s no reason I couldn’t.”
“You?
Perform as a man?”
He let out a disbelieving laugh.
One eyebrow arched as though he had just heard the greatest joke imaginable.
“Quit lying.
How could the likes of you?”
Just as I despised the Devil…
The Devil never regarded me as a man.
Not when Father first brought me to the battlefield.
Not when I formally entered government service.
No matter how much I matured or fulfilled my duties…
He refused to acknowledge me as a grown man.
Look at him.
Even now, he wore the expression of someone who had never once imagined I might have shared a bed with a woman.
“If you can manage it…
There’s no reason I couldn’t.”
“You shouldn’t be able to.
You—”
The Devil raised his chin, still sneering as though watching some insignificant insect overstep its place.
But the words stopped there.
The smug confidence gradually disappeared from his face when I failed to react as expected.
For someone usually too simple-minded to distinguish between what should and should not be said…
He suddenly found himself speechless.
Even he seemed unsure what he had been about to say.
“You…
You…”
The sight filled me with both satisfaction…
And disgust.
I had no idea what about my chastity had rendered the Devil so utterly witless.
But in moments like this…
When cruelty became possible…
I found myself smiling.
My eyes curved into crescents.
There was malice in that smile.
For days I had barely slept.
My frayed nerves quivered like strings plucked upon a geomungo.
Yet the thought of driving the Devil into a corner filled me with enough pleasure that mockery spilled from my lips as lightly as birdsong.
“I finally understand why you haunt the pleasure houses as though they were your own home.
Women are gentle.
Their skin is soft.
Their embrace…”
I smiled coldly.
“…warm and welcoming.
The nights pass so quickly that dawn always arrives before you realize it.”
Ordinarily…
I never would have provoked him like this.
What was the point of arguing with a beast that merely happened to speak human language?
Ignoring him had always been the wiser choice.
Avoiding him altogether, wiser still.
But that dream…
That prophecy…
Would not allow me to remain sane.
The rebellion consuming the Hyeop Empire.
The Red Devil severing His Majesty’s head.
My own helpless struggles inside the underground prison.
Even now…
I could not determine whether those vivid memories were merely an empty nightmare…
Or a vision of the future.
The morning after awakening from it, I had rushed to the Imperial Palace as soon as dawn broke.
The palace had been peaceful.
His Majesty had been healthy.
Though I had requested an audience without warning, he welcomed me with the same gentle smile as always.
Standing beneath the sunlight in the palace garden, hands clasped behind his back…
He smiled at me.
Whole.
Alive.
The relief I felt in that moment could not be described.
It was only a dream.
Nothing more than a terrible nightmare.
Reality was different.
His Majesty possessed unquestioned imperial authority.
His officials remained loyal.
The people prospered.
The Hyeop Empire stood in an age of peace unlike any before it.
No one understood that better than I did.
After all…
I was His Majesty’s strategist.
And yet…
Why was simply remaining sane becoming more difficult with each passing day?
“…So you’ve done it.”
At some point, the Red Devil had stopped muttering to himself.
He stared directly at me.
“So.
You know how now.
Meaning you could do it all along.”
He was not speaking to me.
He seemed to be talking to himself, his thoughts impossible to read.
Then, suddenly…
Our eyes met.
“Ghk—!”
He yanked my wrist so violently I thought my arm had been torn from its socket.
When my senses caught up, his face was only inches from mine.
Our noses nearly touched.
“Who?”
“L-Let go of me…”
“Who was it?
How many?
Where?
Was it good?
How many times did you come?”
At that distance, I could clearly see his crimson irises.
And within them…
Thin black vertical pupils.
His eyes were astonishingly clear.
Transparent.
Every emotion burned openly inside them.
His questions buzzed relentlessly beside my ears.
But I scarcely heard them.
Because I had realized something.
Without the slightest doubt…
The Devil was agitated.
Exactly as he had been in the underground prison.
Exactly as he had looked while throwing His Majesty’s severed head before me.
The man glaring down at me now…
Was identical to the man from my dream.
The Red Devil beheading His Majesty had not simply been a dream.
This monster…
Was fully capable of killing His Majesty at any moment.
Only circumstance had stayed his hand.
If the opportunity arose…
He would murder the Emperor without hesitation.
If that were true…
Could I still dismiss it as nothing more than a dream?
What would become of my Emperor?
And I…
What was I supposed to do?
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Read : Crow's Golden Fragment
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