When the first ray of morning light slipped through the gap in the heavy floor-to-ceiling curtains and crept into the quiet bedroom, Helos finally awoke from that deep slumber.
Except the process of regaining consciousness was far from pleasant.
Deep in her mind, a phantom pain lingered, as if countless steel needles had been stirring inside her skull. Her limbs and joints were so weak and sore they might as well have belonged to someone else.
She tried to move her fingers. The stiffness in her joints made her let out an extremely faint groan.
So thirsty.
Her throat felt as dry as if she’d swallowed a handful of red-hot gravel.
Helos struggled to open her heavy eyelids. Her vision was filled with a blurry ceiling.
The familiar scent of a mild calming incense drifted into her nostrils, easing the nerves that had been wound tight for so long.
This was her room in the Duke’s residence in the Imperial Capital.
She was back.
Not in that eerie, terrifying forest. Not under the domination of that blue will that made her soul tremble.
“Awake?”
A low voice suddenly sounded right by her ear.
Helos shuddered in fright and instinctively tried to shrink back under the covers, but her body was too weak, and she only managed a futile squirm.
She turned her head with difficulty, looking toward the source of the voice.
Beside her bed stood an exquisitely crafted high-backed chair.
And the black-haired young man who had disappeared for three whole years, who had made her gnash her teeth in countless days and nights yet never stopped thinking about, was now slumped unceremoniously in that chair.
Julius.
He was still wearing the same casual clothes from last night, stained with dust and grass clippings, the buttons even slightly misaligned, making him look completely disheveled.
His neat black short hair was a mess, as if it had been mauled by some beast.
Right now, he held a glass of water that had long gone cold. His dark eyes, bloodshot, were fixed on her without blinking.
Seeing Helos open her eyes, the tightly drawn expression on Julius’s face, as rigid as stone, finally relaxed with a hint of snowmelt.
“How do you feel?”
He set down the glass, leaned forward, and reached out as if to touch the girl’s forehead, but then, as if remembering something, his movement froze in midair, and he awkwardly withdrew his hand.
Helos stared at him quietly.
She saw the dark circles under his eyes, the stubble on his chin, his cautious, clumsy look as if he was afraid the slightest touch would break her.
An indescribable ache and grievance surged up to the tip of her nose.
“…You look hideous.”
The girl opened her mouth. Her voice came out hoarse as sandpaper, but the disdain in her tone was genuine.
“Can’t you at least clean yourself up before appearing in front of me? You’re an eyesore.”
Julius was taken aback.
He seemed not to have expected Helos’s first words after waking to be this.
But he quickly recovered. The corner of his mouth twitched uncontrollably upward, curving into a helpless yet indulgent smile.
“Yes, yes.”
He picked up the glass again, not caring that it was cold. With practiced ease, he grabbed a pillow from the side, propped it behind Helos, then helped her sit up slowly, bringing the rim of the glass to her lips.
“I know this mug of mine really insults Miss Second Young Lady’s eyes. But given the limited conditions here, you’ll have to make do.”
Helos shot him an exasperated glare, but her body obediently followed his hand, gulping down the lifesaving water.
Only when the glass was empty did she feel her scorched throat finally come back to life.
“Phew—”
Helos let out a long breath and collapsed limply against the pillow.
Her clear pale purple eyes fell on Julius once more.
This time, her gaze held less disdain and more complexity.
She lowered her eyelids, her fingers unconsciously twisting the soft bedcover. Her voice was so low it was almost inaudible.
“You… Where the hell did you disappear to for these three years?”
Julius’s hand, about to set down the glass, paused.
He was silent for a moment, then turned and sat back down in the chair.
Looking at Helos, a deep emotion flickered in his dark eyes.
“I went to a very faraway place.”
He didn’t mention the Theocracy of El, didn’t mention the Chosen One, didn’t mention those life-and-death trials.
He simply glossed over that long and arduous time.
“I thought if I became strong enough, I could come back and continue being your guard.”
Julius’s voice was low, carrying a hard-to-hide self-mockery.
“But I didn’t expect… I almost didn’t make it in time.”
Helos’s fingers tightened suddenly.
She remembered last night.
Though the memory was chaotic, blurry, like a grotesque nightmare.
She still remembered that feeling.
The fear of being controlled by that cold will, watching her own hands create monsters.
And then…
That warm embrace at the end.
And that apology choked with tears.
“Hmph.”
Helos jerked her head away, burying her face in the pillow, leaving only a bright red ear tip for Julius.
“At least you have some conscience.”
Her voice came out muffled.
“Even though you’re a liar who doesn’t keep his word, a bastard who disappeared for three years, but since you did come back in the end, I’ll reluctantly forgive you this once.”
Julius watched the girl curling herself into a ball, and the smile in his eyes deepened.
He knew this was Helos.
This was the Helos who was hard on the outside but soft inside, always using sharp words to hide her vulnerability.
“Thank you for your magnanimity, Miss Helos.”
He played along, his tone carrying a hint of teasing.
“Should I also thank you for not killing me? After all, last night someone pointed at my nose and shouted she was going to kill me.”
“Shut up!”
Helos, like a cat whose tail had been stepped on, suddenly lifted her head from the pillow. Her pale little face flushed bright red.
“That was an accident! That wasn’t me talking! That was—I was being controlled!”
She explained frantically, afraid that Julius might truly misunderstand.
“I know.”
Julius’s smile faded, and his expression turned serious.
He reached out, this time without hesitation, gently placed his hand on top of Helos’s head, and ruffled her smooth silver hair.
“I know that wasn’t you.”
His palm was broad and warm, carrying a reassuring strength.
“Welcome back, Helos.”
Helos stared at him blankly.
After a long moment, she sniffled, turned her face away, and muttered quietly:
“…Idiot.”
The room settled into a rare, warm atmosphere.
This kind of mood was both familiar and strange to the two of them.
As if those three years had never passed, and they were still that master-and-servant pair in Olivius City—one causing trouble, the other cleaning up the mess.
But something had quietly changed.
“Oh, right.”
Helos suddenly remembered something. She turned her head sharply and asked nervously:
“What about Gavi? And my sister? Are they all right?”
“Don’t worry.”
Julius reassured her.
“Miss Eleanor is resting in the next room. She stayed up most of the night watching over you, and I only convinced her to sleep a little while ago. As for Gavi—”
He paused, his expression turning a bit odd.
“She’s fine too. But… the state she’s in is pretty surprising.”
Helos breathed a sigh of relief, then, as if she thought of something else, she shrank her neck guiltily.
“Um, about Gavi turning into that…”
“We’ll talk about that later.”
Julius cut her off.
He withdrew his hand from the top of her head, leaned forward slightly, and clasped his hands together on his knees.
The warmth in the young man’s dark eyes gradually faded, replaced by a seriousness and gravity she had never seen before.
“Helos.”
He said her name, his voice low and firm.
“Are you feeling better now?”
Helos looked at him like that, and the brief sense of relief she had just felt dissipated by half.
She keenly realized that the topic to come would not be easy.
She took a deep breath and nodded.
“Yeah, I’m fine. Go ahead.”
Julius nodded.
He didn’t rush to speak. Instead, he stood up, walked to the window, and pulled the heavy curtain open a crack.
Bright sunlight instantly flooded the room, driving away the last traces of gloom.
Julius stood with his back to the light and turned around again.
His silhouette, caught in the interplay of light and shadow, seemed especially tall.
“Helos, there are some things we need to discuss.”
He began slowly, each word striking Helos’s heart like a hammer.
“About the mutation that happened to you, about Graham, who led you into that forbidden experiment, and about the Chaos Believers lurking in the Imperial Capital.”
Julius paused, his gaze locking onto Helos’s eyes.
“And… about why I’m here.”
He started to slowly recount the events of these past days.
From the eerie ritual in the Southern Diocese, to Agatha’s exposure in the alley, to the horrifying image Eleanor saw in the crystal ball, and finally their encounter in the forest.
He didn’t hide anything, nor did he exaggerate.
He simply laid out the cruel truth before Helos in the most objective and calm language.
As Julius spoke, Helos’s face grew paler and paler.
Her hands clutched the covers tightly, the tips of her fingers turning white.
Though she had some vague impressions, hearing it all laid out completely from Julius’s mouth made her truly realize how terrible a mistake she had made.
She thought she was pursuing truth, mastering power.
But instead, she had stepped step by step into a carefully woven trap.
She had almost become the source of destruction for everything.
“Professor Graham… He’s a Chaos Believer?”
Helos’s voice trembled, her eyes filled with disbelief.
“But he was so good to me… He taught me so much…”
“Those were all bait.”
Julius shattered her illusion mercilessly.
“He exploited your thirst for knowledge. Helos, that wasn’t alchemy at all. That was the forbidden knowledge of chaos.”
The room fell into a deathly silence again.
Helos lowered her head and said nothing for a long time.
Julius didn’t urge her.
He knew this was a massive blow for Helos.
To admit that someone you trusted had betrayed you, to admit that what you had pursued was wrong—that was crueler than any physical pain.
But he had to let her know the truth.
Because only by facing it could she truly crawl out of that pit.
After a long while.
Helos finally lifted her head.
Her eyes were a little red, but a glimmer of determination had rekindled in those pale purple irises.
She recalled what she had encountered when she examined [Enlightenment Arts Alchemy].
And when she compared it with the contents of the alchemy, it really didn’t seem like anything good.
“Julius.”
She looked at the black-haired young man before her. Her voice, though still trembling, was no longer confused.
“I believe you… If everything you say is true, then we have to drag those ill-intentioned bastards out and kill them.”
“But there’s one thing I don’t understand.”
Helos paused, then posed another question.
“These Chaos Believers—what is their ultimate goal in going through all this trouble?”