"Your Highness, please… enough of this."
Seiryu once again begged, his voice tight with concern as he watched the Empress force food down her throat.
Inside the Empress's private bedchamber, Ceres sat slouched over the table, surrounded by half-eaten dishes. Her hands trembled as she forced another spoonful into her already swollen mouth. Her eyes were red, her face pale, and her stomach visibly bloated.
She was clearly on the verge of vomiting, but she kept eating.
"No!!! I need to do this! I can't have this body!" Ceres shouted through a mouthful, her voice cracking. "I need to gain weight! I need to be ugly again!"
Aurelian had ordered the palace staff to vacate the Empress Palace entirely, transferring them to the Emperor's side. No one outside this circle was allowed to see what was happening to their Empress. Not like this.
She had been unstable for days. Locked inside her chambers, surrounded by junk food, devouring everything in sight. Her once meticulous image was gone. Her gowns were stained. Her eyes, hollow.
And now, they could only watch from the open doorway, powerless. Even Tuf, hidden behind the wall, dared not step into her view.
Inside, Ceres continued to eat like a woman possessed.
"She's not well," Arwen whispered from the shadows. "This isn't just grief. It's terror."
"You won't gain weight, Your Highness," Seiryu said quietly. "You possess the Holy Beast's vigor because of our bond. No matter what you eat, your body will not change. Even if you consume everything in this palace."
"Then we need to unbind!" Ceres wailed, slamming her hands down. Her tears fell again, hot and unrelenting. "We have to!"
Seiryu flinched. His eyes dimmed.
"You truly wish to unbind from me?" he whispered. "Am I so useless to you… that you would cast me aside like this?"
He took a breath, struggling to keep his composure.
"If I lose my master, I will wander endlessly. Forgotten. Empty. Without even a name."
Ceres's hands flew to her face, sobs shaking her shoulders as she broke down completely.
"You don't understand…" she whispered through her palms.
"Then make me understand," Seiryu said gently. "Let me serve you, just once more, before you sever our bond. Before I forget who I am."
She hiccupped, broken and breathless. Then slowly, she raised her tear-streaked face to look at him, eyes full of dread.
"He will kill you…" she said.
Her voice was soft, but final.
"You and your siblings. The other Holy Beasts."
Seiryu blinked, confused. "Your Highness… Holy Beasts cannot be killed."
"But he can kill you." Ceres's voice shook. "He can kill anything."
"Who?"
"The Demon Lord," she said, trembling.
Gasps echoed from behind the wall.
Tuf froze.
Aurelian's body tensed.
Even Legion and Arwen, listening silently in the corridor beyond, went still.
Ceres looked at nothing, staring far into a vision only she could see.
"He wanted me," she murmured. "He kept asking me if I remembered him… if I remembered us. He wanted me to go with him."
Her voice cracked.
"But I said no."
She clasped her arms around herself, shaking violently.
"And then… he killed everyone."
Her voice became a whisper. Lifeless. Hollow.
"Every living being in Solmara… died."
She raised her eyes. "From the smallest ant to the deepest sea… Everyone died. And I was left alone."
Seiryu stood frozen.
"I saw it. With my own foresight," she said, voice rising in panic. "And I can't let it happen. That's why I endured everything. All of it."
Her voice began to crack again, the anguish spilling from her lips like blood from a wound.
"All the humiliation. All the laughter. The insults. The beatings. The defilement. I endured twenty years of hell, just to make sure the Demon Lord would never come looking for me."
She looked down at her trembling hands.
"I made myself ugly… because he was after this face. I chose to live unloved. Unwanted. Mocked. Because I knew what would happen if I didn't."
Tears streamed freely now.
"I was destined to die at one hundred and one. But in that timeline… there was no one else. Just rocks. Dead lands. Corpses. And me."
Her voice dropped to a whisper.
"All the mana in Solmara pooled into my body and made me immortal. I couldn't die. I couldn't even die. I lived on… in silence. In madness. Alone."
Seiryu knelt at the foot of the chair and gently wiped the tears from Ceres's face.
"Your Highness," he said softly, "the future seen through Foresight can still be changed."
But Ceres only shook her head, slowly, hopelessly.
"I've seen every version of that future, Seiryu," she whispered. "No matter where I go, no matter what I do… it always ends the same. First, the Holy Beasts awaken. Then I turn twenty-three. Then the Demon Lord finds me. And then, " her voice cracked, "everyone dies. And I'm alone again."
She drew a shaky breath. "The only version where that didn't happen… was when I was ugly. Fat. Unwanted. Unloved. That's the only path I saw that didn't lead to that destruction. I couldn't see a future past twenty-four, which only means one thing, I must have died before it could happen."
She sniffled, fresh tears trailing down her cheeks.
"And now that he's found me… that future is coming again. I can't live through it. I've already endured too much just to make sure that ending never comes."
Seiryu's brows furrowed in desperation. "Your Highness… the Demon Lord won't hurt you. Tuf said it himself. He wouldn't, "
"He didn't hurt me," she interrupted, her voice cold. "Not physically. He just killed everyone else, including himself."
A tense silence filled the room as Ceres stared blankly at the floor.
"Even in the version where I went with him… I pretended to remember him. I pretended to love him. It still ended the same. I don't want to wander alone again. I don't want to be the only one left behind."
She clenched her fists.
"I won't waste everything I've endured, all the pain, all the humiliation, all the years I sacrificed, just to end up in that nightmare."
"I understand now, Your Highness," Seiryu said softly, kneeling closer. "Thank you for telling me. Thank you for trusting me."
He glanced at the half-eaten food across the table and the raw grief that still clung to her like chains.
"But even if you eat all the food in Aquilonis, you'll never return to the form you used to have. Not while our bond exists. Still… you are not alone. I'm here. We're all here. And we love you. We'll do everything we can to stop this fate from happening."
Ceres gave a bitter, broken laugh as fresh tears slid down her cheeks.
"Love? The only person who ever truly loved me is already gone. The only one who was kind to me, who treated me with dignity and respect, is dead."
Seiryu had no response.
A long silence followed, thick and suffocating.
After some time, he gently coaxed her to drink water. Her body was drained, her spirit even more so. Exhausted, she only managed a faint nod.
Seiryu picked her up carefully and laid her down on the bed, his movements tender and deliberate. He tapped her shoulder gently, soothing her until she finally slipped into sleep.
Once he was certain she was resting, he waved his hand and used his magic to clean the table and floor, clearing the mess of food. Then, quietly, he exited the room.
"I know you all heard that," Seiryu said grimly, his gaze stopped on Tuf.
"There is something deeply wrong with the Empress, for her to think like this. Could this be what she saw in the Dream Spell?"
"It could be," Aurelian replied, concern tightening his jaw.
Tuf remained silent, frozen. The words "he killed everyone" echoed in his mind like a curse. His heart twisted at the thought that Ceres believed his father could be capable of such a thing.
"…I don't think so," Legion interrupted, frowning. The others turned to him.
"We agreed to share every piece of information we have," Legion began.
He exhaled slowly.
"Before the Empress revealed her powers, back when she first arrived in Aquilonis, when everyone still laughed at her, Delphine and I… we'd often hear her talking to herself."
He looked at the others.
"She probably thought no one was around. But we heard her. Whispering to herself. Telling herself to endure."
Legion's voice dropped to a hush.
"She always said… everything would end before her twenty-fourth birthday."
Legion continued, his voice low but steady.
"And if we really think about it… the personality the Empress is showing right now, it was the same as the first Princess of Vaelundis we all knew. Easily frightened. Always wanting to be alone. I've thought about it before... as if another personality took over her body in the past. That the woman we've been serving these past few months… wasn't really her. But I dismissed the thought. It seemed impossible."
Aurelian frowned. "So she didn't tell you?"
"Tell me what?" Legion asked.
"That she's not the first princess of Vaelundis. That she came from another world." Aurelian answered calmly.
"What?" Legion's eyes widened, disbelief washing over his face. "That's not possible, Duke. She is the first princess of Vaelundis. Her personality may have changed, but she is the Empress. We saw how her physical body changed after eating the Malvera fruit."
"Yes. Her body is the princess," Aurelian clarified. "But the soul inside that body? It isn't. She told me herself, the night before Tuf arrived. She admitted it to me. She is not Ceres Evadne Valeria."
"Her real name is Ceres Evadne Monteverde," Tuf added solemnly, confirming Aurelian's words with a nod.
Legion instinctively stepped back, stunned. Arwen stood frozen, unable to comprehend what she just heard.
"You knew about this too, Seiryu?" Legion asked, eyes narrowing.
"Yes. But the Empress never told me. Only the Panther did," Seiryu replied honestly.
"Does Delphine know?" Legion's voice cracked with frustration. "Am I the only one who didn't know the truth?"
"I don't think Delphine knows," Aurelian said gently. "She only told me because I asked her. And because if you think about it… her change in personality was too drastic. Even if she claimed she was hiding her abilities, that she allowed the world to mock her, it didn't make sense."
Aurelian looked up, eyes filled with conflict.
"Because the Empress I admired… she's not the type to let people step on her. She's not someone who would stay silent and do nothing. She always retaliates in one way or another. I felt it in my bones, that this woman… she was different from the first princess. And now… I'm certain of it. The soul in that body… is still the Empress we love. But she's acting like the original princess."
Silence fell over the group.
Legion looked down, fists clenched. Because Aurelian was right.
He had felt it, too, that the first Empress he served was different from the one he had fallen in love with. The signs had always been there, the knowledge of otherworldly things, the creation of salt, the strange futuristic language and inventions, and most of all… that faraway look in her eyes, as if longing for something unreachable. Something lost.
"Wait," Tuf interrupted suddenly, a glimmer of realization flashing in his eyes. "You're saying… she's always acted like this? Like the woman inside that chamber right now? Like a completely different personality?"
Both men nodded slowly.
"You didn't know?" Seiryu asked, surprised.
"I knew her soul was bound to that body," Tuf replied, brows furrowed. "But I assumed she'd already been inhabiting it for a long time. When exactly did you first notice the change in her personality?"
"Second week after the late Emperor's death," Legion answered without hesitation. "Only Delphine and I were there to witness the change."
Tuf stiffened.
"What are you thinking, Panther?" Seiryu asked, watching him closely.
"I think… she thinks she is the First Princess of Vaelundis."
Aurelian's eyes narrowed. "What?"
Tuf's voice dropped, dark and heavy with fear. "That vision she had, it must've been real. But maybe it wasn't her who saw it. Maybe it was the First Princess."
"She must have seen something in that Dream Spell. Something that broke her."
His voice cracked.
"And now her mind is trying to protect her. It's making her forget. Forget everything. And what's left… are the memories of the original soul that once lived in that body."
Ceres Monteverde, the soul they loved, was still inside.
But the one walking and trembling behind that door… was not her.
Not anymore.
While the men outside the chamber continued speculating and sharing their theories on what caused the Empress's sudden change, no one noticed, nor felt, the silent arrival of a stranger inside her room.
A young woman now stood at the center of the chamber. She bore an uncanny resemblance to the sleeping Empress, same delicate features, same haunting presence, but her long black hair made her stand apart.
Her brows furrowed as her gaze swept across the opulent room.
"What the fuck," she muttered, blinking. "Am I in the Château de Chambord? Why the hell would that scamming angel send me here?"
She walked toward the veranda, her steps graceful yet sharp with tension. Her eyes scanned the palace grounds with swift familiarity.
"The palace looks like Château de Chambord, but… different." She narrowed her eyes. She'd been to the Château many times, she preferred its quiet majesty over the chaos of Versailles. But this place, though strikingly similar in grandeur, felt… magical. As if something ancient thrummed through its very walls.
"Who are you?"
The woman turned around sharply.
Her breath caught when she saw the Empress, awake, standing, staring directly at her. Not through her. But at her.
Like she saw her.
Truly saw her.
Eyes wide, the stranger looked around herself in disbelief, then pointed at her chest. "You… you can see me?"
"Yes," Ceres answered, her brows drawing together. There was something deeply unsettling, yet profoundly familiar about the woman. She didn't know her, not really, but the warmth in her chest said otherwise. A kind of aching familiarity she couldn't explain.
The woman stared at her, transfixed. Then, slowly, she raised a hand to cover her mouth, as if trying to contain something overwhelming.
"Ceres?" she whispered, unsure.
"Yes," Ceres replied. Her tone sharpened, wary. "I'll ask again, who are you? Tell me before I scream."
"I'm…" The woman lowered her hand, eyes gleaming with emotion. "I'm Evadne. Evadne Persephone Monteverde."
Ceres blinked. The name meant nothing to her, yet something in her spine tingled at the sound of it.
"I don't know you," she said tightly. "How did you get inside this room? I didn't give you permission. No one can enter here unless I allow it, Seiryu said so himself."
The woman flinched slightly at the name. "Seiryu? The Seiryu, the Holy Beast? He's been awakened?"
"Yes," Ceres replied.
Evadne exhaled shakily. "So I really am in Solmara," she whispered to herself. "This… this isn't Château de Chambord. I'm not on Earth."
"Earth? Château de Chambord?" Ceres frowned deeper. "I don't know what those words mean. This is Solmara, in the Kingdom of Aquilonis. You are standing inside the Empress's Palace. In my bedchamber."
Evadne went still, turning again to look at the room with new eyes. Every carving, every shimmer of mana etched into the walls.
"I don't know if you'll believe me," she began, her voice hesitant, fragile with truth. "But I… I used to be Ceres Evadne Valeria. The First Princess of Vaelundis. Empress of Aquilonis."
Ceres's eyes narrowed sharply. "Are you mocking me?" she asked coldly. "I am Ceres Evadne Valeria. First Princess of Vaelundis. Empress of Aquilonis."
The two women stared at each other.
For a moment, time itself seemed to still.
Evadne's lips parted, then closed again.
Because she wasn't expecting this.
She had expected to see her old self.
But instead… someone else was looking back at her. Someone who felt like her, but wasn't.
And more than anything, she hadn't expected the woman to see her.
Because this was supposed to be just a memory.
A memory she herself had no recollection of.
And yet, here they both stood.
Looking at each other.
Two souls, bound to one name.
One body.
One fate.