Time of the Blind Beast - Chapter 116

When I hear an apology, I feel like I have the right to resent him. Perhaps what I really needed was someone to carry this burden for me, someone I could freely blame.

But looking back, one of the main culprits who caused all this was me. When thoughts chase one another in circles and arrive at this conclusion, self-loathing only grows larger. In the end, I am devoured by the beast I created myself.

When I told him there was no need to atone, when I told him not to apologize, when I confessed that everything I had lost was something I never deserved in the first place, that it was only natural for it to happen—that was not consolation for him.

It was self-mockery aimed at myself.

Even when my aimless heart turned toward this man, I had to discipline myself to think I had no right to resent him.

I don’t understand. Why did you forgive? How could you forgive?

When you hated so much.

When you so desperately wanted revenge.

“If I didn’t, you would disappear from the world…”

After staring at the question she had thrown at him for a while, Ezekiel opened his mouth. His voice was unbearably heavy, as if he were carrying all the emotions of the world at once.

“That terrified me more, Lisanne. Having once lived in a world where you existed, I couldn’t bear the thought of living again in a world where you were gone.”

He simply chose the easier path because he wanted to live with Lisanne, because love outweighed hate. It was simple.

“Lisanne, even now, when you fall asleep, I check your breathing first. To make sure you are really breathing safely, to see if you’re not having a terrible dream. Whenever you are out of my sight, I feel like I’m going crazy from anxiety. Even when you are with people I can trust, I still feel the same. The truth is, I don’t want to step aside. I want to keep watching you.”

That feeling still remained intact in Ezekiel. That was why he could neither understand nor agree with Lisanne’s claim that the people they loved no longer remained in this world.

“But then where, and how, am I supposed to send you?”

His voice was low and calm, making it sound even more desolate.

Lisanne shook her head slightly, as if brushing away the afterimages lingering in her ears.

I cannot live with dignity here.

He was a great man who forgave the woman who blinded him and accepted her with a generous heart, but because of that, she had to become the woman whose life was altered by clinging to the generosity and tolerance of the man who covered up her crimes.

Each time he defied his father’s opposition, each time he carved out what little time he had to personally care for her and devote his efforts to her alone, it only became worse.

No one ever asked for her opinion.

They said it was a blessing that her death sentence had been pardoned, that she should think of it as compensation since she could now live her life in splendor, that she should be happy because the most sought-after man in Astrie loved her. They expected her to endure these indescribable feelings.

But if she had already paid for her sins in the detention camp, and if she had to keep enduring something here too, then what difference was there between this mansion and the camp?

She was too tired for that.

I am too tired.

As Lisanne quietly moved her lips to repeat this to herself, she realized Ezekiel’s gaze was following the motion of her lips. Though he couldn’t manage long and complex sentences, he was able to read short ones.

But if you say you’ll save me, forgive me, take responsibility for me, and love me… if you say you’ll do everything, then even if I feel ashamed and miserable, do I not have the right to say I don’t want it? Just because I’m not perfect?

Lisanne looked down at the words she had written and buried her face in one hand.

Having such thoughts makes me feel like such a bad person…

At last, she understood the reason why she had to part with this man.

There was a reason she had to run away from here.

Because here, every hour, every moment, she was forced to face her lowest self. Because she was buried in raw shame so unbearable she could hardly endure it. Because Ezekiel, who constantly reminded her of it, became unbearable.

I want to protect myself.

She kept losing her ‘self.’

If she stayed in this mansion, if she stayed with this man, she could not wholly remain herself.

Please let me keep my dignity.

She needed a right.

The right to break up, for the sake of her dignity.

The right to part with dignity.

***

It’s not for you, Major. It’s for me.

If Lisanne had made Ezekiel the subject of the breakup, he would have rejected it outright. The breakup could never have been a choice for his sake.

But Lisanne confessed bluntly that it was a choice for herself. She gave him no chance to deny it.

He wanted to keep her by his side, to spend his life making amends. He wanted her to live happily. Out of guilt and remorse for nearly killing the woman he loved with his own hands, Lisanne had become someone he absolutely had to take responsibility for.

But if by his side Lisanne only felt shame and misery, then what was he supposed to do? If his very existence was wounding her, then what on earth…

I don’t understand. Why did you forgive? How could you forgive?

That was a cry only someone who had already walked the path of atonement could make.

Lisanne had poured all her strength into taking care of him, desperately so. And in the final moment, she chose to be the one quietly taken away.

Because it was atonement she carried out on her own, without his consent, and she wanted to respect his will to seize his enemy and repay them in kind.

She even feared that if the truth about ‘Rose’ were revealed, he might fall into conflict, so she kept her identity hidden until the end. Even while enduring all sorts of hardships in the detention camp, she never brought up ‘Rose.’

Suddenly, a cold chill ran down his back. Ezekiel asked himself:

Lisanne, using the excuse of doing this for you, have I always been making choices for myself?

Am I the one making you feel ashamed? Miserable?

Am I hurting you?

There was no answer.

***

I’m going back to school.

It had been three days.

After a long silence, Ezekiel quietly looked down at the notice she handed him.

“School? Cielsa’s?”

Even though he knew the only school Lisanne had attended was the Milena Girls’ School in the north, he asked again anyway. He wanted to see any kind of reaction from her.

Since her request to keep her dignity, Lisanne had kept a certain distance from him. With Paulina and Anna gone, the Valdemaira mansion quickly sank into silence. Even so, Lisanne continued her daily life alone. On the surface, she even seemed utterly peaceful. She didn’t look particularly lonely either.

That was why Ezekiel unconsciously allowed himself a little hope.

Perhaps they could just keep living like this.

Though things were awkward now, if they strung these days together, maybe time would gradually solve it.

But it must have been the calm before the storm.

Ezekiel checked the message and Lisanne’s face in turn.

“Studying is fine. Is there a particular subject you want to study more? I’ll bring in a good teacher.”

Even though he knew that wasn’t what she meant, he denied it once.

“…Cielsa is too cold and harsh. Life there is inconvenient, and it’s even closer to the border than Derosa. And you’re still not fully well. That school isn’t the right choice.”

You know I’m not sick. I’ve fully recovered.

Lisanne, calmly writing her reply, added one more line.

Or do you want me to stay sick forever, Major?

Of course not. He was about to answer no when Ezekiel stopped.

Whenever he had to be away, he always made sure to order a servant to watch over Lisanne. If she tried to go out, he told them not to stop her but to follow her closely.

It was he himself who was treating Lisanne like a sick, isolated person.

In Derosa, Lisanne had naturally mingled with other servants. He had even once complained that she did not have enough time with him because her colleagues, including Anna, kept calling her out.

Looking back, the one who had lived isolated in the north was him. Except for Lisanne and Madam Serva, he had not allowed anyone else to approach. And back then, he had been a patient who had lost his sight and become ill-tempered.

Now Lisanne no longer needed a doctor’s treatment. The pain from the poisoning was gone, and the doctor had prescribed proper exercise to rebuild her weakened body. If there had been anything else left to fix, Paulina would not have left.

The only remaining condition, the silence Ezekiel clung to as an excuse to keep Lisanne near, was something even the doctors did not know the cause or the cure for. They only speculated that since she had lost it suddenly, it might suddenly return, or it might be something she had to carry for life.

He knew he lacked a valid excuse to persuade Lisanne.

School.

Yes, if that was what she truly wanted, he could let her go. He could wait until Lisanne finished her studies and returned.

But why did it have to be the Milena Girls’ School?

Even now, when spring had already reached Claris, that place was still stuck in winter, a cold and barren land. That school had even once been surrounded by Davis’s enemy forces.

Couldn’t it be another school instead? One closer, safer, and with better facilities than Milena Girls’ School? He was about to suggest it again when his gaze caught the traces of thought Lisanne had written.

A place where it’s not strange for me to be myself.

A place deep enough to be far from the rumors of the world.

A place where teachers and classmates like my younger siblings who know me are, so I won’t be lonely.

A place that would see Lisanne as just Lisanne. A place that would remember her as a senior and a peer who had shared school days with them. A place filled with memories built over the years.

That was what she had found.

“…Will you come back?” Ezekiel asked.