HSD Ch 1

“Please…”

The woman croaked with a knife stuck in her chest. Blood ran down the blade, forming a dark puddle on the floor.

Someone approached the injured woman, making her flinch instinctively. She knew who it was. Raising her eyes to look she was dazzled as if she was facing the sun. Those eyes were too dazzling for a human to look directly into; she felt a burning pain in her eyes making her sob weakly.

“Please…” Her weak voice was pathethic. “Save me. Don’t kill me like this.” She was overflowing with desperate emotions, it was as if her eardrums would melt just by hearing them. 

Her slender wrist swayed like a flower stalk and grabbed the hem of the man who approached her. “Don’t turn your back on me. I am your destiny. You just don’t know it yet.”

The  woman’s earnestness did not reach the man. He simply looked at the bleeding woman with a knife in her chest, with no emotions in his eyes.

“No. It can’t be fate. You are not my destiny.”

His words were cruel. Finally, she realized that the man never loved her. She knew that even if she died right in front of his eyes, his heart wouldn’t change.

“If that’s all you have to say, I’ll take my leave.” The moment those words fell, he turned his back. His steps echoed and thrummed against her weakened heart.

Getting away was brutal.The indifference did not change until the end, and the outward appearance was cruel. The man was heartless from beginning to the end. 

Squeezing her remaining strength she staggered to her feet and shook steeply as her hand tried to reach the retreating man. “It can’t be …..no.” Her face paled with disbelief. “You must love me…” She let out a whimper of despair. “That’s our destiny.” 

Her strength left her and her eyes fluttered close, she collapsed.The abandoned confession remained a stain on her pale face with an unpleasant smell of blood.

“Ah….!”

Rasilia opens her mouth, lets out a silent moan, and opens her eyes.

“Rasilia, are you okay?” Flota asked from the side. Rasilia was traveling in her carriage, accompanied by her dreamkeeper. Seems like when she closed her eyes for a moment, she dozed off and was dreaming.

“Yes…” Her eyes in cold sweat. “I’m alright.” Reality was yet to set due to the overly vivid dream; it was as if half of her consciousness was still immersed in the dreamscape.

What reflected in her eyes was not Flota, who was looking at her anxiously, but terrifyingly insensitive gold eyes. Those eyes were like a blade pierced into her chest; it gave her goosebumps.

“Did you dream?” 

Rasilia was a prophet of the DelIarta kingdom. God showed the future through Rasilia’s dreams. Her dreams were sealed at the altar after the testimonies of dream-keepers and thus became the word of the god.

“I had a dream….but i don’t think it’s a prophecy.”

God’s words were always clear. He showed her the future so she could deal with it. It could not be a prophecy for those who did not know each other to have a conversation with her that has nothing to do with the kingdom of Delarta.

“Do you have dreams which are prophecies?”

“Seems like that. But how long are we? Is it still far away?”

Rasilia struggled to suppress her nervousness and looked out the window. Before having a strange dream about the man in gold, Rasilia saw a terrible prophecy that would overthrow the kingdom Dellarta. It was the scene where Prince of Ricardo cut off the King’s head. As soon as she had the dream, Rasilia sealed her dream on the altar and immediately sent a message to the king. One of the witnesses was Flota.

It was a dangerous prophecy that was extremely precious. 

In the great temple, where Rasilia lived as a prophet, there were many people from the Ricardo empire. She couldn’t trust anyone. However, even though she said there was an urgent prophecy there was no answer from the royal family.

In the end, Rasilia decided to visit the king herself. The prophet rarely left the Great Hall themselves so Rasilia secretly left the temple without the priests knowing. The people who knew her whereabouts were Flota, who had been a dreamkeeper and her friend since her childhood, and her coachman.

“Have you ever wanted to look into the mirror?” Flota suddenly asked a random question.

“What?”

Rasilia, who was gazing at the dark forest path through the window, turned her head to face her only friend.

“Why are you asking that?”

She didn’t avoid her eyes but firmly caught her gaze instead. Flota was not sitting upright as usual and seemed to be on an edge, twisting her hair on her index finger. She looked unfamiliar today.

“I was curious. How can you not be curious about your appearance? A prophet must be a human and a woman.”

“Looking in the mirror has nothing to do with prophecies. Besides, you help out with any task.”

“Yes, I do. Which is why I hate it. If your beauty is so trivial to you, just give it to me.”

“Why…are you saying that, Flota?”

Flota grinned. It was ominous.

“I mean, you know wouldn’t it make you feel a little less wronged when you die?”

“To die…. When?”

What the hell is she talking about?

Rasilia, who had been raised as a prophet in the temple since she was very young, had no family and friends. It was Flota who replaced all of that. SheI couldn’t understand what Flota was saying. With such an unfamiliar expression on her face, it seemed that she wasn’t the Flota she had known before.

“Flota, what the hell is wrong with you? Are you mad at me? What did I do wrong?”

Flota grinned.

“It’s my fault I did a lot. It’s my fault that Rasilia is a prophet and I’m just a little dreamer. A horse is a dreamer too, but in reality it’s no different from a servant. Besides, Rasilia has never thought of using the power of the Prophet to the full, right?”

The next moment, laughter disappeared from Flota’s face, it washed away with the cold breeze coming through the window.

“I longed for it all. Everything that you have.”

“Flota…”

She didn’t knew what to say, For the first time she came to know of Flota’s inner feelings, But She didn’t expected it to be so painful. It was the moment Rasilia bit her lips.

Hee hee hee! Rattle, palace!

Rasilia ‘s body almost fell forward as the carriage stopped suddenly.

“Ah, it must have arrived.” Flota rejoiced, changing her expression. And the carriage door slammed open.

“What…!”

Rasilia’s face turned blue. The person who opened the carriage door was none other than Prince Ricardo.

“You’re on time, Your Highness,” said Flota, while smiling. The fact she never wanted to admit struck Rasilia.

“Flota, don’t tell me you…?”

Flota betrayed. She told the Prince Ricardo the way they had to run to the royal family without anyone knowing. She must have also informed the content of the prophecy, either way.

“I did.  I want you to feel a little less wronged before you die. It’s Better than dying without knowing anything, isn’t it?”

Prince Ricardo approached and grabbed Rasilia’s chin.

“hey , this is how i see you. Delarta ’s beautiful prophet.” The grip was enormous. Her jaw was about to cramp.

“That hand…get rid of it I am God’s eye and mouth,”said Rasilia, concealing the pain.

“Ah, that god doesn’t seem like a very good god to me.”

Prince Ricardo smiled bizarrely.

Flota and Prince Ricardo, who look nothing like each other, looked the same at the moment.

“You said I was going to take my brother’s head? The Prophet is on her way to inform my brother about it. What will happen to my brother if he finds out….At Least won’t he take my head one step ahead?”

“That means that God is protecting the kingdom of Delarta…”

It was suffocating as Prince Ricardo tightened his grip as if he was about to strangle her to death.

“Listen, flower-like Prophet. You decide here and now, either die or live if you want to live , go back to the temple quietly and shut your mouth forever. As prophesied, I will behead my brother and become king. Then I’ll get you out of that haunted house. If this half- face pays for itself , won’t I make you a concubine?”

 He could see Flota’s face distorted.

“It’s no use Your Highness Rasilia is a well- intend person, so she doesn’t have the flexibility to do so.” 

Prince Ricardo ignored Flota’s words.

“Or die here, what are you going to do?”

“…I,”

Rasilia was thinking desperately . she had to get out of this place. So she could inform the king of the rebellion. 

But how?

In order to survive she has to tell a lie first. Pretending to cooperate, seeing the opportunity to escape somehow but, Unfortunately there was no other way as Flota betrayed her and seeing that the temple’s coachman was quiet the whole time, the knights brought in by the king might have killed him, or he would be with Flota.

“…I don’t want to die.”

When Prince Ricardo heard Rasilia struggling, he laughed.

“You don’t want to sell yourself and live as an old virgin for the rest of your life. Okay then…,”

It was then.

“It’s a lie.”

When I heard Flota’s voice, my side suddenly warmed up.

“What are you doing!”

Prince Ricardo yelled. He knew Flota stabbed her with a sword.

“…ta!”

She felt a burning pain. She was confused whether it was because she saw a woman stabbed in her dreams? the boundaries between reality and dream seemed to be mixed.

“Don’t be fooled, my lord. I know best what kind of person Rasilia is. She will never cooperate with Your Highness. It’s safe to kill as planned in the first place.”

Puck!

Once again, there was a lot of pain at the site of the stabbing. Flota twisted the deeply embedded sword once more. She was definitely willing to hold her breath.

“Flo,ta…yes,you…”

Rasilia staggered and reached out her hand. But Flota only looked at Rasilia with cold eyes. In those eyes she was already like a dead corpse.

“Damn it! Now this has happened, there is nothing I can do about it. This cannot be saved anymore.”

Prince Ricardo stumbled and pulled the sword out of Rasilia’s body, which had fallen sideways.

Whoops!

Blood was pouring out uncontrollably.

“Get off”

Prince Ricardo grabbed Flota’s elbow and pushed her towards the carriage door. Flota glanced back at the bleeding Rasilia as she followed him.

“Bye,Rasilia. Let’s not see each other again.”

“Flota…get on…”

Thump

The carriage door closed after the Prince came down.

Tang Tang Tang!

The Prince knocked on the carriage and gave orders to the knights.

“Take this and drop this off the cliff with the coachman’s body as well. If anything is found it will look like an accident.”

“Yes my lord.’

Oh,no……you have to get up. Get up and run away…to inform the king of the rebellion…Rasilia squeezed out the remaining power but all that power was to wriggle her fingers.

Dudududu..Whoops!

After a while , the wagon carrying the bodies of Rasilia and coachman rolled down a remote cliff.***

You’re finally here

Yes, yes they’re here they’re here 

So we’re doing…

There was a commotion around.

She could hear the noise filling her ears. Rasilia opened her eyes. The first thing that caught her eyes was the bright light.

“…..?”

It was too bright. Rasilia’s room has never been so bright.

She thought she was dead and was in the kingdom of God. Rasilia opened her eyes and looked at the unrealistic view around her. Finally, her eyes turned to the window. On the ornate window it was covered with fine cravings and gold leaves, birds she had never seen before were sitting side by side and looking at her.

Whoa.

Beep beep beep. Tweet.

“….? Did you just talk to me now?”

It was strange. Obviously the birds were chirping, but to her ears it sounded like a human voice.

“Who’s here?”

It was then.

“Your Majesty the Empress. Did you coughed?”

“….?”

Rasilia tilted her head.

 Who is the Empress?

green_tea