Prologue
-Execution Site-
Gasps of shock and disbelief echoed across the huge execution venue.
“Reporting! When Squad 2 arrived at site, they discovered that the location of the wanted bandit had already been ambushed, 50 died from poisoning, the shed they were occupying was in the midst of burning. 10 people were burnt alive, 59 people were then discovered half a mile away from the burning base slaughtered.” The man paused for a second to glance at the small figure who was standing on the execution ground before uncomfortably continuing with his report,
“15 people were gruesomely dismembered.” The gasps of disbelief were then filled with shouts of anger and disgust!
“This child ruthlessly slaughtered 109 people in a cruel way. Although they were a group of wanted criminals who were to be captured in for execution, this barbarous child more or less deserves the same fate! An inhumane devil needs to be put down immediately!” The accused child was held down by 2 humongous imperial soldiers at the bottom of the execution venue.The trial was in a private hearing and was not opened to the public. This trial will decide whether she can be let free or not.
Most of the people present were soldiers who protect the country’s law and safety. 2 attendees were esteemed figures who were ordered to attend the hearing to ensure nothing wrong happens. Normally something of this occurrence would require a lot of higher ranking authorities to judge, but the nation had a huge crisis to attend to and therefore this matter had to be solved by the common people.
“W-why was there a child there in the first place!”
“Judging from how over 100 people died from this child alone, she must be a foreign agent!”
“Indeed! I had heard our neighboring country was grooming children as secret agents!”
People were whispering left and right. They did not know what to do with the little girl who looked like she was under the age of 10. They were confused as to where she popped up from. The biggest concern were the hundred criminals she slaughtered and why she was at the bandits hideout. No one should know where it was! It took the imperial army a long time before finding the location! So where did she come from!
The imperial army had sent out orders to re-capture the bandit group that had recently broken out of prison. The bandits that escaped were recently captured by a neighboring country and upon discovery the group was a division of a huge criminal group but before they could find more out, they had already escaped and fled to this country. The location where the bandits had been hiding was coincidentally found through civilian reports. It had been an abandoned location, therefore people were suspicious seeing a strange group of people heading there.
Who would have thought, the criminals everyone thought were some-what-of-a irrelevant group of bandits had been smuggling in narcotic drugs into the country. The order was to capture the criminals to find out more about the bigger group behind them before executing them, but before they could do any of that, they were all killed, by this young girl who from who knows where came from.
Meanwhile the girl who was being held down was on the verge of passing out. Ever since the mass killing, she had been in and out of consciousness. Her whole head was ringing from being beaten mercilessly. Plus the people around her were so loud she couldn’t find the right timing to explain her side of the story.
Moreover her wounds were starting to open up again. When the soldiers threw her into prison they did little to none to treat her wounds. Next thing she knew, she was already kneeling in front of audiences she had never seen before.
Gulping down blood wanting to rush out, she could feel her heart thumping fiercely, due to how ridiculous the situation was. She thought she was going to die chivalrously, but who would have thought it was going to be death by execution! It was ridiculous!
‘Curses! Am I going to die again? If this was a novel, people wouldn’t even bother reading this!’
‘Haa…’
“Men! Why don’t we let this young child have a chance to speak!” A man who kept quiet until now spoke out silencing everyone in the dome. He was one of the esteemed figures who was asked to take part in this trial. Although what he heard sounded cruel, the eyes of the young child was telling him otherwise.
The young girl heard this and felt a sense of hope! She thought she was going to die without being given a chance to defend herself.
‘CHANCE! Whoever it was deserves to be praised!’
“Well
.
.
.”
———————————————–
Before the execution
-Dungeon Cell-
Being thrown into the dungeon while mentally and physically exhausted made her once again recall the things of the past. She had momentarily forgotten that she at one point lived in a similar environment when she was at this age…
She used to have another life.
Before being re:born, she was working in the entertainment industry. Doing everything from modeling, to acting. But on her 15th year anniversary, she was murdered by a beautifully crafted ice sculpture meant to commemorate her anniversary.
Just like that, before she realized what was going on, she was already clutching her head that was bleeding non stop in a dark ice storage room.
It was an empty death..
Her life was always empty and dying wouldn’t make a difference– was what she thought. She was a person who was diagnosed with Alexthymia.
Being stripped off emotions everyone had isolated her from the world. She wanted emotions and therefore went into the entertainment industry and failed terribly as a child actress.
But she persisted.
Every minute, every day, and every year that passed by she became more and more successful.
Everyone praised her talent. Everyone loved her for her characters connected to them emotionally.
15 years went by, but she was still the same.
Empty.
The only thing she picked up was her talent in acting.
Therefore it didn’t matter if she died.
‘So why am I here?’ That was something she herself could never figure out but was also something that was thrown into the back of her head.
———————————————–
The Beginning of a new story
The first time she opened her eyes after being murdered, she found herself staring into the abyss. It seemed to be the universe but concurrently seemed to amount to emptiness.
She was only able to stare ahead at the abyss and for who knows how long after, was able to blink.
Slowly starting from her left ear to her right ear, bell chimes became audible.
Soon after was she able to pick up her sense of smell, smelling fresh herbs?
For what seemed like eternity soon ended as she was able to make small movements starting from her feet up. With cool like sensations warping around her body followed by a warm sensation.
With the ability to move, she walked as if she was possessed.
Walked into the abysses to what seemed like a small dot of light. Not minding that below her was nothing but black. Though, upon reaching closer the small dot took the shape of a book laying in the dark.
The book looked like it was covered in static and not meant to be touched. She grabbed the book and forcefully opened it even though, what was static soon turned into a small flame burning her hands.
Her burning hands jolted her mind awake, and also made it bright enough to read what was written in the familiar looking book. It was a book she knows she’s seen before but can not recall.
On the blank page, the only word written was,
‘Promissum’
Latin for Promise.
Crash–!
Thundering crash loudly roared behind her shaking up the abyss and falling apart, with streaks of light shining through.
“B–“
‘Huh?’
The girl heard a small sound but it wasn’t audible as everything was crashing and being destroyed. The darkness was cracking and was being sucked away at a rapid force.
Forcing the girl to crouch down until everything became still. The first sight that greeted her after the storm was a dazzling bright world which made her flinch from how bright the light was. It was exactly like her filming set. Completely white. Except for the fact that she was surrounded by stoned statues.
She thought she died. She did die and was preparing to go to the underworld. But why was it so complicated?
‘The gods are playing a terrible joke’
‘…..’
‘…?…’
But nothing happened.
Since nothing was happening she carefully and slowly stood up from her position expecting some changes.
“Miss!!”
As sudden as it came, a voice that sounded far away was heard.
“Knock-knock, A little princess was dancing happily in the beautiful forest at the Valley of Voeia-“
A random singing voice echoed in the white world. It was the same voice that said Miss.
She couldn’t help but think this was all a bad dream. Her dreams were always random and this seemed to be one of them. Maybe she did survive, was in a coma and just couldn’t wake up. How else would this make any sense? But the singing continued on.
“The princess swayed and swirled, everywhere she danced flowers bloomed. The loveable princess everyone admires”
SQUEAK- !!
“It’s time–“
A female voice lurked up behind her, whispering into her ears. The singing voice she had heard sounded dreamy, but the voice right beside her felt too real! She had completely let her guard down thinking it was all a dream.
Seeing a shadow overlapping her own shadow made her heartbeat skip, gripping her hands. The girl could do nothing but tense up.
“But then one day, some O’ld child got jealous of her beauty, pushed her from behind, and the beautiful princess fell into-“
She felt a bad premonition, listening to the singing voice and surely it did happen. The voice behind her finished off the song.
“Eternal darkness”
The girl from being startled hence mustered up her courage to turn around. But what she uncovered was not what she had expected and it wasn’t something worth overthinking.
What was standing in front of her was..her.
‘Ah.. Was this how I looked when I died?’
The ‘her’ in front of her was wearing a beautiful blue dress that glistens with light. It was a dress crafted to celebrate her 15th anniversary with her company and fans. Prior to the celebratory event she was told to go to the cellar to confirm things, but before she knew it, she was already hit and left in the cold room; bleeding to death.
She thought the person that spoke to her was suspicious because the voice sounded terribly hoarse. But thinking again her voice was most likely damaged in the cold cellar. It was after all set to below 0 degrees.
It wasn’t worth feeling uneasy over. The person bleeding in front of her was just herself. The weird statues were also gone.
“Anxious?”
‘… anxious?’
“….” The girl was momentarily stunned, she had alexithymia but was just anxious! It seemed like getting hit in the head was the cure! The downside was, she was most likely.. Dead.
‘Ah…’
Knowing what the girl was thinking, her bloody self couldn’t help but chuckle. The scene itself looked creepy, a person with her head cracked open was smiling. But it was a smile the girl had never once seen in her life. For the first time, it looked genuine.
“It’s time I go back”
Her dead self slightly breathed out before taking a step back.
“Thank you”
The girl stared into the desolate eyes of her dead self who was slowly disintegrating into the air, but before she could process anything she was jolted awake.
———————————————–
“Ah, the miss has awoken!”
“How adorable, her eyes are just like the Duke and Eldest sir! Too bad her younger twin sister is still asleep!”
“Shh! Don’t be to loud!”
‘Twins?’ The girl couldn’t see beyond her. Everything was misty and blurry but she could hear people whispering. She wanted to move but her body was not cooperating, it felt like her body was being pushed down by a great force.
She couldn’t help thinking that her nerves were completely dead.
The conversation she had also just heard was difficult to dissect. She did not have a single living relative, and most importantly, didn’t she just die?She even bid farewell to her bloody self! Her whole family including herself was 100% dead. Gone! Where in the living earth would a younger sister come from!
Blahhh!
And that was the end and the beginning of a new story…
———————————————–
Execution Site
Being reduced to a weak physical and mental state to the point of being close to death again gave her nostalgia. She couldn’t help but dream about the far distant memories she pushed to the back of her head.
What execution?
She absolutely cannot die now! Again?!
‘NO WAY!’ The little girl was thankful she finally got a chance to talk but she was feeling muddle headed and dizzy because of all the blood she was losing. She was truly on the verge of passing out and to stop or at least postpone her execution she knew what to do, it was just she had no strength to do so.
“Child? What’s wrong? Go on?”
The man who gave her the opportunity to talk spoke out once again.
“Eu…-Kughk-“
“What? Say it louder” The guard by her side kicked her forward threatening her to speak up. But what he got instead was a handful of bloody coughs.
“Hey! Get down and listen to what she’s saying!”
The guard who imposed the threat on the child ordered the younger guard to get closer to the child to listen to what she was saying.
Rolling his eyes in his mind, he followed his order lazily, just to stare at the little girl in horror before really slowly getting back up again. Feeling like he just died a thousand times over.
“What did she say!”
“… Eugene”
“What?”
The young guard truly felt like his life was going to be over.
‘What the heck. It was my first day on the job! Why!!!’ He glanced down at the young girl who was staring at him with eyes that seemed to swallow his soul as a whole. Quickly swallowing his dry throat, closing his eyes, and gripping his hands he shouted like it was the end of the world!
It truly was going to be the end of the world!
“REPEATING AND REPORTING!”
The important crisis the country was dealing with and had no more than 2 high ranking figures to judge the trial was right here under their noses! The blessed Paladin of Xenperia. The missing twin daughter of the house of Veria! Whom every single person in the country had been looking for!
“HOUSE OF VERIA!
Miss Eugeneia Valerie La Veria
has been found!!”
His loud voice echoed and punched into the soul of stunned soldiers. Sure enough their souls left their bodies and they died a thousand deaths inside. Especially the guard who kicked an esteemed noble. The blessed twin of Xenperia!
Hell is awaiting.
