The Escort Knight Who Is Obsessed by the Villainess Wants to Escape - Chapter 155

From then on, every day was like hell.

Judas trained daily for the sole purpose of killing people.

The brutal schedule was less like training and more like abuse.

He vomited multiple times from lack of proper nutrition, but collapsing was not an option.

Hesitation was met with kicks, throws, and beatings from those overseeing the space.

Each time, Judas gritted his teeth and reminded himself of his goal.

Anggra remained by his side, helping him stay focused on that purpose.

He fought, was beaten, and tumbled around with other children who had been dragged there.

And then, one day—

“Judas, you must endure. This is all necessary.”

“I can’t do it… Please….”

“Then will you give up? Will you abandon everything, leaving your parents’ and friends’ murderer unpunished?”

“…….”

It was a statement that pierced his conscience like a dagger.

In the end, Judas couldn’t resist his coercion.

And as he lay bound, a man wearing a deep hooded robe approached him.

He reeked of old blood.

The stench made Judas feel nauseous.

The man drew something on Judas’s face with blood, then traced symbols around him.

It was a magic circle.

Judas had suffered through this magic several times before—dark magic that induced brainwashing and suggestion.

If memory manipulation could be added, it would be perfect, but that level of magic was beyond their reach for now.

The dark mage looked at Anggra, who gave a nod.

“Proceed.”

Soon, the dark magic seeped into Judas.

“Ugh…!”

Gritting his teeth, Judas thrashed in agony while Anggra watched in satisfaction.

‘Excellent.’

Judas’s skill and determination were superior to the others.

Thus, Anggra decided to pour everything into him.

To fuel the dark magic, they even sacrificed a few children.

‘But… his heart is weak.’

When he recalls his goal, his resolve is sharper than anyone else’s.

A kind of short-term focus.

However, Judas sometimes showed moments of hesitation.

Lately, those moments had become more frequent.

Was this truly the right way to live?

Was Eliza really his enemy?

His uncertainty was showing.

‘If his heart is weak, then we simply need to fill it.’

Magic that interferes with the mind inflicts immense pain on the recipient.

Let alone true magic—this was dark magic.

A pseudo-magic that required life as a sacrifice.

The pain was exponentially greater.

If done wrong, Judas might die in the middle of the brainwashing process.

‘A safe but dull blade, or a sharp but risky one.’

A blade exists to stab and cut.

There is no need for a safe blade.

Even if it breaks, it must remain sharp.

Anggra decided to gamble with Judas’s life.

“…It was successful again.”

The dark mage reported.

“I reinforced his hostility toward Eliza di Bevel and strengthened the memory of her killing the villagers.”

“That should have improved things.”

“However, he is gradually developing resistance. There will be moments when the brainwashing weakens.”

“Hmm… That’s troublesome.”

Re-brainwashing him would mean taking on the same risks again.

And with each repetition, the burden would only grow heavier.

“We should observe him and reapply it if necessary.”

When Judas finally opened his eyes, they were different from before.

A sunken gaze.

Golden irises, empty as if devoid of life.

Anggra smiled in satisfaction.

“I like it.”

Judas quickly grew into an assassin set to kill Eliza.

He entered an assassin guild.

The guild did not train assassins; it accepted those already skilled in the art.

Thus, Anggra sending Judas there was a sort of trial process.

After a few verification steps, he was recognized as the youngest provisional member and was given his first mission.

Target: Maria.

It was the name Anggra had given him.

Eliza’s birth mother.

He had waited near Gethsemane, close to the designated point where he was supposed to carry out the assassination, before moving.

As he advanced toward his target, doubt crept into his mind.

At that moment, the brainwashing weakened just enough for hesitation to surge within him.

Was this the right thing to do?

Was this the way revenge was meant to be?

No, that was just an excuse.

Judas was exhausted.

He had once wanted revenge.

That feeling had been real.

But not like this.

He had never imagined revenge that required him to throw away his entire life—no, to destroy it.

The vengeance that the child once wished for had been simple, direct, and thrilling in a naive, one-dimensional way.

Only after being thrown into a cruel reality did he realize how foolish and shortsighted that desire had been.

Or maybe he hadn’t realized it—maybe he was simply too tired.

He shouldn’t be tired, but he was.

Why was he so weak?

He was just a child, one who couldn’t handle or even judge the weight of his actions. Yet, Judas could only blame himself.

Every time he wavered, Anggra had scolded and berated him into submission.

But that wasn’t the only reason doubt had taken root.

One day, he overheard a prison guard talking.

It was easy to say that Eliza had been the one who massacred the village.

But it seemed like she hadn’t done it of her own free will.

Narcissa and the Bavel family.

Arrogant nobles.

And then there was Eliza, the illegitimate child.

The village’s annihilation had merely been a tool to control Eliza.

She had been forced to sign under threat.

If that was the case, shouldn’t the blame fall on them instead of her?

He didn’t know anymore.

At this point, none of it mattered.

He wanted to give up.

He was afraid.

Judas had a feeling—no, a certainty.

If he killed Eliza, he too would die there.

He was nothing more than a disposable tool.

He didn’t want to die.

His life was just as important as his revenge.

Even if he didn’t want to go through with it, his body moved toward the target nonetheless.

The hired coachman was likely guiding Maria safely through the secluded forest path.

And then, when he finally arrived—

“…Huh?”

The carriage was in flames.

Shocked, Judas hurried forward.

‘Did someone interfere? A bandit attack?’

The coachman was unconscious, as if in a deep sleep.

There was no sign of the target inside the carriage.

She was nowhere to be found.

Only footprints leading away in the distance remained.

‘…Escape? No, no. She’s not alone. Someone took her.’

He didn’t know who had taken her or why.

But to Judas, this was an act of providence.

Now, he didn’t have to go through with it.

This wasn’t a failure.

It was an unexpected accident—something beyond his control.

But he couldn’t just walk away.

The assassin’s guild always left a mark at the scene.

First, he stabbed the coachman with a poison-laced blade, ensuring his death.

Then, he stepped into the carriage.

Thankfully, the door was still open.

He drove a dagger into the seat where Maria had been sitting.

The very dagger meant to kill her.

‘This… this is enough… I did my part… I had no choice…’

A small boy walked away from the burning wreckage.

Not long after, he was expelled from the assassin’s guild and severely punished by Anggra.

He was subjected to brainwashing once again.

Judas prayed.

‘Please… make it stop…’

To the sun in the sky. Or the moon.

To anyone who might be called a god.

‘Let it end…’

Even if it meant his death, he just wanted it all to stop.

A desperate prayer on one lonely Christmas night.

***

‘…….’

Judas did not kill Maria.

She reconfirmed what he already knew from Judas’s perspective.

The carriage was empty, and Judas had only sheathed his sword and walked away.

Unaware of this, she had hurled harsh words at Judas without restraint.

‘…….’

Now, she had neither the strength to grieve nor the energy to be angry at herself.

She simply accepted the truth in vain.

She only acknowledged the reality that she was the sinner.

As he resigned herself to despair and self-reproach, one thing still puzzled her.

From the very beginning, she had felt an odd sense of discord, and she still couldn’t shake it off.

‘…Who is this child?’

Judas.

It was a name she knew and a face she recognized.

This memory, too, was undoubtedly Judas’s.

‘But… he’s too different….’

Even his personality was different.

As a child, Judas had once defied Grand Duke Barak, unafraid to risk his own neck.

Yet now, he was strangely passive around Anggra and the people at the training facility.

It was too unnatural to be attributed to a mere change over time.

The moment of their meeting was approaching.

But that alone was not the reason.

Eliza had immediately seen through the disguised corpse that Judas had planted.

That was not Judas.

It was the same now.

When it came to Judas, Eliza could always perceive the truth at a glance.

Not through reason and deduction, but through instinct and intuition.

And now, in her memory, she was convinced that this Judas was not Judas.

‘How could this be…?’

Troubled by the thought, she continued to comb through her memories.

.

.

The day Judas participated in the selection ceremony for her knight candidate.

He stood among the line of applicants, somewhere in the middle.

His hand fidgeted uncomfortably with something in his pocket.

A sharp shard of glass, easy to conceal and carry.

And a piece of paper.

A note from Anggra.

It bore an order—to kill Eliza—and was imbued with a hypnotic spell to engrain the command into his mind.

Judas had glanced at it once on his way there.

But this time, it did not affect him as strongly as before.

He had been brainwashed so many times that he had developed a resistance.

As he waited, Judas was in constant turmoil.

If he attacked Eliza here, he would die.

If he didn’t, he would fail the selection.

And failing here would not end with mere punishment.

They might decide he was no longer needed and kill him instead.

He didn’t want to die.

He kept praying.

Begging for it to stop.

The same prayer he had whispered on Christmas.

‘It should be about time for me to arrive….’

Just as Eliza had that thought—

‘…Huh?’

Her consciousness was suddenly flung far away.

She was torn away from the scene she had just been watching.

‘W-What?’

Eliza, now floating in midair, looked around in confusion.

A universe without a single point of light.

A pitch-black void where she was left completely alone.

‘Where… am I?’

This was likely Judas’s psyche.

A realm that could be considered his inner world.

There was nothing around her.

Not even the memory she had just been witnessing.

She had no idea how to return.

‘What do I do…? I haven’t seen everything yet… Why is this happening? Do I need to escape this memory first?’

As she hesitated—

A tiny light approached from afar.

An ivory glow drew a faint line across the void.

‘…A firefly?’

A firefly that once lived in her birdcage.

The little creature that had flown away when her cage crumbled, never to return.

The firefly landed on her left ring finger.

It gave a short flutter of its wings as if greeting her.

‘Why are you…?’

And then, it flew off again—heading somewhere unknown.

The slow movement seemed to be guiding Eliza.

‘Is it telling me to follow?’

Just then, an ivory-colored afterimage lingered between the firefly and her hand.

Like a thread connecting them.

Eliza drifted through the darkness, following the child.

And then, she was pulled into the memories of someone unfamiliar, yet strangely foreign.

***

An unfamiliar scene.

Yet, a familiar atmosphere and surroundings.

When Eliza first arrived at the main house, many people whispered about her.

The countless servants and retainers spoke aloud, ensuring she could hear their mocking words.

‘Is that the bastard child?’

‘I heard she inherited the mage’s power. That’s why the duchess….’

‘So, the duchess has been on edge for years because of that child?’

‘Because of her, we were the ones who suffered.’

‘In the end, she was dragged back to the main house… how pitiful.’

‘But where is her mother? Why did she come alone?’

‘Who knows? Maybe she abandoned her.’

As Eliza was being dragged away by a knight, she heard everything.

Perhaps they wanted her to.

They made no effort to hide their words.

The memory she was witnessing now felt eerily similar to that moment.

It was like looking into a mirror.

“Hey, did you hear? That kid grew up in an orphanage.”

“No wonder. He always seemed a bit off. Is that why he got reported to the teacher?”

“Why does he have to make things uncomfortable by stirring up trouble….”

“Exactly. Kids who get bullied always have a reason.”

“But is that rumor true? That he killed his parents…?”

Murmuring voices.

At the center of it all, a boy sat motionless.

His student ID swayed loosely against the baggy uniform he wore.

A cocky-looking male student approached him and called out his name.

“Hey, Kang Jaewon.”

Eliza silently observed the boy addressed by that unfamiliar name.

She didn’t recognize his face.

Black hair, dark eyes.

Someone she had never seen before.

And yet, this boy—

‘…Judas?’