The Death-Chosen Daughter Chapter 11
Only agonizing wails remained in the hall.
Nyssa was on the verge of fainting from the pain. Her gaze, twisted by the torment, finally swept toward Caelum, who was kneeling nearby like a living corpse.
This was her final lifeline.
“Caelum…” Nyssa crawled toward him, spitting up blood mixed with pus, trying to put on a pitiful facade. “I truly didn’t know anything about the ledger. I am innocent. My sister has gone mad. Save me…”
“Are we not… are our souls not bound?”
“You can’t just watch me die…”
She reached out, trying to grab the edge of Caelum’s moon-white robes.
Before she could touch him, Caelum lunged forward, kicking her viciously in the chest and sending her flying.
He didn’t use any magic, but he used every ounce of his physical strength.
Nyssa slammed into a distant stone pillar like a broken ragdoll, vomiting a massive mouthful of black blood.
Everyone was stunned.
Caelum slowly stood up. He turned his head to look at Nyssa. His handsome face was now crawling with violent veins and absolute hatred.
How could he possibly be fooled again?
During these past five days, in order to uncover what exactly Elowen had suffered before her death, he had not hesitated to violate royal taboos. He used forbidden soul-searching magic to forcefully drain the memories of Nyssa’s personal maid. And just moments ago, with the last of his own blood, he had finally shattered the malicious seal Nyssa placed upon the crystal.
“You’re innocent?” Caelum’s voice rasped like grinding sandpaper. “Then let me show everyone exactly how innocent you are!”
He abruptly pulled the newly unsealed memory crystal from his robes and crushed it.
The memories transformed into a massive projection, hovering in the middle of the hall.
The scene displayed was what had truly happened in my room that day.
Everyone clearly saw how Nyssa, under the guise of delivering medicine, deliberately knocked over the unblended Dawnlight Purification Potion.
They clearly saw her throw herself to the ground, feigning innocence.
And they saw even more clearly how she waited until no one was looking to smear my black blood on her fingers, secretly wiping it onto the Sacred Bough of the World Tree enshrined in the corner.
Then, the Caelum in the projection rushed in.
The scene that followed plunged the entire hall into a deathly silence. Even the sound of breathing ceased.
The Caelum in the vision was a brute, bereft of reason.
He pinned my frail body down, ignoring my desperate pleas, and personally poured the entire bottle of boiling, soul-tearing purification potion directly into my festering collarbone wounds.
In the projection, my body convulsed in agony, my throat tearing with inhuman shrieks as black blood gushed from my lips.
Yet Caelum simply picked Nyssa up and turned to leave.
And the moment he turned his back, Nyssa, resting on his shoulder, looked back at me as I lay dying and offered a smug, cold
sneer.
The projection ended..
Only heavy, ragged breathing remained in the halb All the nobles stared at Nyssa as though looking at a monster. This was a viciousness that shattered the elves’ very sense of decency.
“No! It’s fake! That wasn’t me…” Nyssa shook her head desperately, trying to deny what they had all seen.
But no one paid her any attention.
Caelum stood rooted to the spot, staring blankly at the space where the projection had just faded. He said nothing.
That was the sin he had planted with his own hands. Every frame of that memory was a dull knife, slowly and repeatedly carving
into his heart.
For this venomous monster, he had tortured to death the girl who had given her life to protect him.
The weight of his regret pierced him like ten thousand arrows, obliterating his sanity.
An incredibly cold sound of metal leaving its sheath echoed through the hall.
At some point, Caelum had drawn the silver moon longsword, the sacred symbol of the elven royal inheritance.
He walked toward Nyssa, step by step.
Nyssa scrambled backward frantically in the blood. “Your Highness! Your Highness, calm down!”
Without a second of hesitation, Caelum struck with a backhand swing, driving the blade straight through Nyssa’s shoulder.
The longsword pinned her securely to the stone floor. It avoided her vitals but brought about absolute, excruciating pain.
Yet Caelum didn’t even spare her a second glance.
He turned around, letting go of the bloody hilt, and dropped to his knees at the bottom of my stairs.
Tears cascaded from those ever-proud eyes without warning.
“I’m sorry… Elowen… I am so sorry…”
I had never seen him look so pathetic.
He looked up, calling my name hoarsely, syllable by syllable.
“I was blind… I deserve to die… I didn’t know she was so vicious. I didn’t know how much it hurt you…”
“Let me repay my debt with my heart. Please, will you let me?”
He raised a hand, pressing his fingertips to his chest, directly over his beating elven core.
“If I do this… will you look at me again?”
