Chapter 223 : Chapter 223
Chapter : 223
Iris suddenly felt bored.
‘This is not fun.’
Golden expanded in scale with each passing day.
Once called one of the Ten Great Merchant Groups, Golden had already become the greatest merchant group in the Empire and the largest driving force behind the flow of the imperial economy.
As the sponsor of treason and the one that shouldered the Empire’s debt, Golden had now become an entity that even the Emperor of the Empire could not easily touch.
And yet, far from being filled, Iris’s emptiness only grew endlessly larger.
Her relationship with Mordin could no longer stir any emotion in her.
What on earth had gone wrong?
She had thought that because she was broken, she could no longer interact with a whole person. So she broke Mordegar.
Mordin had been broken successfully. The child who had once trembled because he had killed a person now watched with indifferent eyes no matter how many people Iris killed.
I thought this would be enough. Was my hypothesis wrong?
“Evan Lisitoel.”
Meeting Evan at the Imperial Palace had been pure coincidence.
She was not unaware of Evan’s news.
Rather, it would be closer to say that she could not possibly have been unaware.
The fact that the lady of the prestigious Lisitoel Count Family was a commoner—and among commoners, a former mercenary who could be called one of the lowest lives—had shaken the Empire.
But that love of the century did not last long.
After giving birth, the Countess grew weaker by the day and eventually died. Even with the help of the Empire’s greatest healing mage, Evan Lisitoel lost his wife.
When Iris learned of that fact, she felt something strange. At the same time, she became curious.
Could you truly not hate the son who took your wife away from you?
The answer came soon enough.
Evan Lisitoel raised his son with the utmost devotion. Though even that did not last long.
“What is it?”
At the young age of five, that son suffered from an unknown illness and fell into a coma.
In truth, it was no different from death.
Was there any meaning in a life prolonged only by magic barely keeping him breathing?
She could not understand it. She truly could not understand Evan Lisitoel.
‘Does something change when one has a child?’
If one gained something called a son, if one gained a family one could truly understand, would something change?
But it did not for me.
It felt as though she had come face to face with a question that had no answer.
“It is nothing. I only wanted to tell you to stay strong.”
Iris whispered as though reciting the words and leisurely passed Evan by.
If I create a son, will I be able to understand that feeling?
Iris put that decision into action on a thoroughly impulsive whim.
Although she could have taken in a child from an ordinary household as her adopted son, the reason she went out of her way to visit a prison was some kind of instinct.
There was also a vague expectation that if she went there, she might be able to encounter something she had long awaited.
Lerwon, whom she met in prison, was truly wonderful.
It was as though the heavens had personally prepared him for Iris, who had wished to create a suitable son.
“He committed familicide and was imprisoned.”
He committed familicide at a younger age than I did.
She grew interested.
“How vicious was it?”
“It seems he hacked the bodies apart again and again. His own parents, at that! What a horrifying child!”
The guard raised his voice as if shuddering.
But that cry only stirred Iris’s interest further.
“I like him.”
“Pardon…??”
Leaving the bewildered guard behind, Iris personally bent down.
In the black eyes of the child who met her gaze, deep-rooted despair had taken hold.
Looking at him, she suddenly felt that he resembled her.
“Are you in hell right now?”
No answer came back.
But the answer was sufficient, and Iris burst into laughter loud enough to shake the prison.
Ah, what should I do? I like him so much.
She was certain that if it was ‘this,’ then it could become precious family to Iris, who had been broken so thoroughly.
“Child.”
The same kind. An understander. If this became family, then surely Iris’s life could become a little more enjoyable.
“Would you become my adopted son?”
From that day onward, Lerwon became another Viden, and her family.
---
One day, not long after he had been adopted, Lerwon ran away.
At the escape she had more or less intended, Iris even felt rather apathetic.
Did he truly think that if he escaped, he could run away? It was almost laughable.
Lerwon returned.
Tormenting Lerwon, who seemed to have lost all will, was not particularly enjoyable.
She thought she was beginning to grow tired of it.
Is it because I am broken, and I can no longer enjoy anything? If so, am I not living, but dying?
It was then that Theo Lisitoel appeared, and yes, he was truly a masterpiece.
Information whose source could not be identified, and the bold course of action that followed it. All of it was enough to stir Iris’s interest.
That was why, when Lerwon dared to try to pull Theo out of Iris’s grasp, she was enraged. She had even thought that Lerwon would no longer be necessary in the future.
If I had known I would lose you like that, I would not have done it.
“Haha.”
It was a belated regret.
There would be many chances to reclaim Lerwon in the future.
But as time passed, Lerwon would only grow farther from the Lerwon Iris knew.
Theo Lisitoel had ruined Iris’s son. In the end, he had fixed Lerwon Viden.
“No.”
That alone could not be allowed.
Lerwon had to remain ‘Lerwon Viden’ forever.
Just as even anxiety began to rise within her, ‘that man’ finally came to her.
That man knew as much as Theo, no, perhaps even more than Theo.
And that man, filled with endless malice toward the world, who had finally told Iris the truth of 〈Lapis Academy〉 and this world, told her a way to reclaim Lerwon.
Everything, even the Curse of Ouroboros.
《So, did you get what you wanted?》
After facing Theo, she finally decided to curse herself.
If that man existed to ruin everything, then Theo Lisitoel surely existed to set everything right.
And among the things Theo would set right, Lerwon Viden would surely be included.
What she wanted was an answer to her question.
If she became a heretic, then everything Iris had built until now would inevitably collapse.
Even if she burned all of it down, would Iris obtain power? Would she finally possess the power to curse even a god?
“Well.”
It was an evasive answer.
But both the man and Iris knew.
Iris would reclaim Lerwon.
That process would surely be more enjoyable and raucous than anything else.
“I think I will be able to enjoy it.”
That was enough.
But what came to mind along with those words was not the plan the man had proposed to Iris, but a single word that clung to her persistently.
Iris forced it away.
“Would that not be enough?”
After all, enjoyment did not require a reason.
At least, that was what she thought.
---
Family, family, family!
A horrible existence that clung to Iris’s ankle like a leech, damnably holding her back!
《Truly?》
“Shut up.”
Iris muttered.
She could not understand why she was so obsessed with the two letters that formed the word family.
《When in truth, you love family more than anyone.》
“Shut up!”
Iris’s eyes flushed bright red.
Tears welled.
Blood-red tears rolled down her cheeks.
《You broke this way because you could not even receive your family’s love.》
“I told you to shut up!”
Iris raised her voice with all her strength.
The exhausted little ones looked at Iris with puzzled eyes.
Noticing those gazes, Iris broke into a choking laugh.
“Ah.”
How miserable.
What a filthy, miserable life.
She had never had the right to shed tears from the beginning, yet she felt as though tears might fall.
“Nuna.”
At the question that seemed to urge her answer, Iris felt as though she could not breathe.
But everything was already broken. Even if she answered that question, would anything change?
Iris slowly blinked.
《There is no way anything would change.》
There was nothing that could change now.
Lerwon, too, would eventually arrive at the same end as Iris.
She had acted while hoping for that, and yet, strangely, Lerwon’s smile at the final moment kept lingering like an afterglow, disturbing her wish.
She was not afraid of being resented.
If anything, she welcomed that to a certain extent.
“I—”
Because she was a monster made of greed and obsession.
Because she knew no way to exist except by swallowing the resentment of those she had trampled.
It seemed as though it had never once hurt or tormented her, and yet it felt so painful now.
《But it is far too late.》
Yes, it is far too late.
I have walked too far to turn back, and I have already ruined far too many things.
A monster beyond any means of salvation.
That was the name of Iris Viden, and her end.
That undeniable truth hurt terribly.
《You only wanted to be loved.》
Love, love, love.
How could such a heavy and terrifying word exist?
A monster with a tragic past. How terribly cliched and dull.
Iris let out a dry laugh.
She did not want to attach excuses for all her evil deeds to something like an unfortunate past.
An evil person who might ordinarily have grown into someone merely somewhat twisted had simply become a horrible evil beyond salvation.
That was all there was to the story.
《Do you not feel wronged?》
If she said she did not feel wronged, that would be a blatant lie.
Perhaps because every happy future she might have grasped, by some one-in-a-million chance, had been ruined.
At that moment, Iris’s gaze sharpened beyond compare.
“Shut up.”
I am evil.
Even as she stained both hands with blood to crawl up desperately from the bottom, Iris had never once hesitated to commit evil.
She had no regret for that.
In the end, Iris had clawed her way up to a position no one could dare covet, and now all that remained was to fall from there.
There was no clumsy regret in that.
“If you intended to swallow me now, you are too late.”
Iris sneered at the endless whispers of Ouroboros ringing in her ears.
If it had thought she would fall for such worthless temptation, then that alone was unbearably unpleasant.
“Mordin.”
Iris stood straight and looked at Mordin.
Not Mordegar, but Mordin.
At that form of address, Mordin’s eyes wavered.
Foolish thing. Did you truly think you could stop me when you are shaken by something as trivial as a name?
“I will not stop.”
Evil deeds were a thing of inertia.
Having once lost the method to stop, Iris could no longer halt them by her own will.
Surely Mordin knew the one and only method.
He was foolish, but he was not stupid. If there was a method, she had already told it to him.
She faced Mordin’s cold face.
This pathetic peddling of misfortune ended here. Iris looked straight at Mordin and spoke.
“It will only end when I die.”
Mordin knew that as well.
“I know.”
Mordin looked back at Iris.
As he faced her, a faint laugh, somehow close to a sob, slipped out.