Chapter 92

Sian was wrapped in complex emotions. By this point, even Revenant herself must have realized that surrendering and accepting punishment would be the easier path for her, but her obsession with dragons was so strange and deep that even that seemed not to matter to her.

Where had it all begun, really?

Sian had never once desired to be a dragon’s master. Revenant had condemned this as the hypocrisy of one who possessed what she wanted, but conversely, in Sian’s eyes, her greed appeared rather like madness.

That greed led Revenant to target Sian’s black dragon, rapidly souring their relationship. Yet watching her act like a moth to flame, despite knowing the deep and terrible swamp before her, stirred a strange sympathy in Sian.

“Stop it, Reva.”

Sian spoke, but Revenant seemed not to hear.

“Stop what? You hypocrite! What would you know!”

Revenant glared at Sian, gripping her sword tightly as if preparing for another attack.

“I thought you’d understand me since we were in the same situation, but you deceived me while having everything as a dragon master.”

Sian gave a mirthless laugh.

“Why do you think being a dragon master means having everything? A dragon is just a dragon! I—!”

“That’s why you’re stupid. If there were people saying the black dragon was ominous, you could have just swept them all away.”

Revenant cut off Sian’s words with a cold sneer, glaring at Luna the black dragon.

“Having power but not using it, pretending not to have much when you have plenty – that’s deception against those who have nothing. How would you know a life crawling like a worm, only serving dragon masters?”

“So you’d kill them all if you can’t have them?”

“Better to be a hunter than lick their feet.”

Thoroughly twisted.

Carl frowned as he watched Revenant direct hate-filled eyes at the Dragon King. Her incomprehensible hatred for dragons ran deep and dark – to one who didn’t know the situation, it might seem Revenant was the one who had been killed, not the Dragon King.

“…However.”

The red dragon burned with magic threateningly, as if about to attack Revenant at any moment. Revenant, who had been glaring at it, smoothed her hardened expression and changed her stance.

“Right. Nothing’s more important than my life after all.”

As if giving up, she lowered her sword.

“I surrender.”

Then she threw her weapons down on the ground one by one. Carl, Sian, and even Hendrick all showed suspicious eyes for a moment at this sudden change.

“…Are you sincere?”

Carl narrowed his eyes, pointing his sword at Revenant. With a faint smile, she looked once at the red Dragon King as if exhausted, then pulled out one more small dagger from her ankle and threw it.

“That’s all my weapons, Your Highness. Better to accept execution than die the same way I butchered the Dragon King.”

When Hendrick nodded at her words, soldiers who had been lined up behind rushed forward to surround Revenant. While some soldiers aimed their spears, several rushed to bind her wrists.

“Could I say one thing to that Lady over there?”

“After you’re bound.”

Carl was cautious of Revenant’s attempt to call Sian just before her wrists were bound. Revenant twisted her lips in a bitter smile and willingly offered her wrists to the soldiers.

“Listen to me now, Sian. Considering our past friendship, could you at least do that much?”

Sian frowned. All weapons were discarded, and her wrists were bound. Though she knew Revenant could do nothing now, an uncomfortable feeling wrapped around Sian like a warning.

“I have nothing I want to hear from you.”

“How cruel. We shared hardships for years.”

“Now you bring that up?”

She had slandered the black dragon and threatened with a sword to its neck, intending to kill. Sian glared, remembering all those actions, but Revenant only smiled bitterly.

“It’s true I felt betrayed when I learned you were a dragon master, unlike me. But it’s also true that I cared for you more than a real sister. Why else would I have taught you swordsmanship and given you a name?”

Sian pressed her lips tight at Revenant’s words.

After being cruelly abandoned by her parents as someone who would bring calamity to the Empire, it was Revenant who had guided Sian when she knew neither where to go nor how to survive.

Though they eventually parted ways due to different desires and near-obsessive wishes, Sian felt strange about her memories with her that had marked her childhood.

“That day we saw Idelin. If we hadn’t been excited about going to see the famous prince that day, perhaps this day would never have come. Now that things have turned out this way, I regret that day most of all.”

“…”

“Revealing that you were the black dragon’s master was an unavoidable choice. Once things had started, I needed to survive too.”

Revenant wore an expression Sian had never seen before. Sian barely suppressed a groan at her expression, like a tangled thread of complex emotions – regret, remorse, sadness, and even longing.

Could she truly be regretting it? If genuine, Sian felt somehow pitiful for her, swept up in greed for something she couldn’t possess.

“I’m sorry. And the days I spent with you were quite enjoyable. Could I hug you once? Like when we were close as real sisters.”

Sian hesitated. Though she felt sympathy for Revenant’s words that sensed the end, the sudden change in attitude was too suspicious.

Revenant watched Sian’s hesitation with a bitter face, not rushing her. Carl debated whether to stop Sian if she approached Revenant out of final sympathy.

Just as Carl decided he should intervene, the Dragon King, who had been quietly watching while emanating red magic, folded their wings tightly and crouched.

“Really, until the end you…”

Revenant, who had been waiting patiently for Sian’s answer, smiled bitterly at her immobility. The red dragon, who had perceived the change in air flow faster than anyone, raised their magic like flames.

Revenant’s eyes, which had been watching Sian, suddenly transformed with killing intent.

“…Hypocrite.”

‘Sian!’

What—? In the moment Sian frowned at Luna’s warning cry of danger, Revenant clenched her lips and kicked off with all her might.

KWANG!

An explosion different from dragon’s breath erupted, sending up red flames and black smoke in an instant of tremendous light.

The explosion lasted only a moment. The red flash that filled their vision before they could even reflexively close their eyes was impossible to comprehend.

Sian realized she had curled up tightly only when she heard the flames burning. The unexpected explosion had startled her so much that her heart felt like it was convulsing.

Her ears, having taken the full blast, felt muffled. It was quite a while before surrounding sounds began to reach her.

Without any particular order, those who survived the explosion raised their heads with faces ashen like fire remnants to look at where Revenant had been.

There was no trace of her, who had been looking at Sian with bitter eyes while her hands were bound. The ground was deeply cratered by the explosion’s impact, raising only gray dust.

Ha, Sian let out a laugh of disbelief.

The silence, accompanied by ringing ears from the blast, was strangely bitter.

If she had approached to hug her out of sympathy, she would have met the same fate as Revenant, inevitably caught in the powerful explosion.

Of course. It had seemed strange that someone who had shown such intense hostility would suddenly change, even when facing death.

What a terrible woman…