The Escort Knight Who Is Obsessed by the Villainess Wants to Escape - Chapter 159

Eliza ended up witnessing her younger self kissing Judas on the cheek.

“Ugh… so embarrassing…”

It happened in a dream.

She had never known before.

But Judas had been awake at that time.

Eliza wanted to hide from the embarrassment, but there was nowhere to hide.

She felt her entire consciousness flush with shame.

Her face felt like it was burning red.

In his memory, Judas was startled at first but then embraced the young Eliza again.

“…….”

Looking back at the past, Eliza felt embarrassed, then laughed, then cried.

A time of happiness.

The peaceful days of childhood, where just seeing them made her whole body feel warm.

She wanted to go back.

She wanted to turn everything back.

To set things right, to fix her mistakes, and to be happy with him again.

She had countless opportunities to do so, yet she had ruined them all with her own hands.

It was all her fault.

“I miss you….”

She wanted to see that face smiling at her once more.

She wanted to be held in that reassuring embrace.

Eliza wept quietly, then felt confusion wash over her again.

“…What is this feeling I’m experiencing?”

The memories she had with him.

The dazzling emotions she felt for him.

“Are all those feelings fake too? Just an illusion fabricated by someone, nothing more than a nonexistent mirage…?”

Time in his memories continued to flow.

Naturally, she realized that the other had come to feel the same way about her.

More than just affection.

But out of consideration for her, he never carelessly revealed it.

He truly was a foolish person.

Time moved swiftly.

The Tomb of the Knights, Bethany.

The day she issued the deployment order there.

“Your very existence is a hindrance to me.”

Judas, who had heard those harsh words from her.

And yet, even until the end, he tried to talk things out.

He never blamed Eliza.

And again.

When Eliza mistakenly came to believe that Judas had killed her mother.

“I hate you so much.”

With those sharp words, she wounded him.

Eliza saw that moment from Judas’s perspective.

Naturally, she could sense his emotions as well.

Even though she had been stabbed with cruel words, Judas still tried to clear up the misunderstanding.

He did his best to remain rational and attempted to talk.

But Eliza shut her eyes, closed her ears, and hid.

Even in the moment when Judas might have died, facing off against the captain of the guards.

Even then, Judas was thinking about the misunderstanding he had yet to resolve with Eliza.

“Ah….”

Eliza let out a low sigh inside his mindscape.

Judas had never tried to kill her, nor had he killed Maria.

And Judas had cared about her just as much as she had cared about Judas.

Why had things turned out this way?

She didn’t know the cause.

Only the result remained.

She had ruined everything.

She had trampled over a blooming anemone and shattered the safe cage.

It was all her fault.

“I….”

Judas, collapsing, bleeding.

“I did this to you….”

A wound so deep he might never wake up.

“I… made you like this….”

Eliza had grown into someone different from the person Judas had known.

And it was entirely thanks to Judas.

He had become her color, her weakness.

If Judas died, it would be because of her.

The memory ended.

Drifting in deep emptiness, Eliza remained blankly afloat.

Her mind was a complete mess.

Overwhelmed by guilt and confusion.

Her mother had also been struck by a blade.

Judas is dying.

And it’s all because of her inability to believe.

If only she had trusted him.

If only she had been a little more rational.

Then none of this would have happened.

At the same time, she wonders—

Who am I?

What is the real me? And what are the experiences I’ve had in this false world?

Then, suddenly, a thought surfaces—Eliza’s way of thinking.

This world can be divided into what is provable and what is not.

If that’s the case—

Can she prove that this world is real? That she is a real person?

…She cannot.

Even knowing that the world she experienced was false, nothing changed.

She was still a sinner.

She didn’t want to use the excuse that it was all fake to escape from it.

As she wrestled with her regrets, a pale ivory light flew toward her.

“You are…”

A firefly.

The same one that had once come to the cage.

The one who had led her to Kang Jaewon’s memories.

The firefly gently landed on her fingertip.

“I’m sorry…”

Carefully, she cradled the light in her hands.

The firefly did not flee.

“I’m sorry, I’m so sorry…”

Eliza sobbed.

The words barely forced their way out of her choked throat.

Her trembling lips repeated them over and over.

With no one to hear, her lonely apology drifted into the dark void.

When she finally managed to stop crying, she lifted her head.

Scattered throughout the void, lights began to twinkle.

Memories, shining golden, illuminating the universe—

They were Eliza.

By reading and accepting Kang Jaewon’s memories, she had gained the ability to read the void.

“…….”

For a moment, Eliza was lost in the sight of the dark yet dazzling universe.

But only for a moment.

She could not stay here forever.

She had to return.

Judas was waiting for her.

Even if she was a fake—

“I’m going…”

Eliza slowly reached out and released the firefly.

“Next time, maybe…”

She wanted to see it again.

But could she?

She couldn’t make a promise she wasn’t sure she could keep.

Swallowing the rest of her words, Eliza left Judas’s mindscape.

The firefly watched her departure. It remembered.

Then, it moved in another direction.

It traveled through the pitch-black cosmos.

It seemed empty, but it wasn’t.

As the master of this place, the firefly could see the golden lights hidden in the darkness.

Brilliant, radiant, and warm memories.

A world filled with Eliza.

It passed through them. Again, and again, and again.

Even as the master of this world, it did not know everything.

It wasn’t sure if this place had an end, but it drifted toward the distant outskirts.

There, a writhing mass of darkness loomed.

Inside, it took the form of a theater.

Onstage, two men stood.

Judas and Cain.

The memory of Judas killing Cain repeated over and over.

A young boy sat in the audience.

The firefly sat beside him.

Its ivory light took on a human shape.

Kang Jaewon appeared out of nowhere.

Seated in a chair, he called out to the boy.

“Judas.”

“……”

“You are Judas, right?”

The young boy—

Judas looked up at him and nodded.

“…Yes.”

“…I see.”

Kang Jaewon let out a deep sigh as he gazed at the weary boy.

“Before you leave, let’s talk.”

Kang Jaewon sat next to Judas and spoke.

Judas did not answer and turned back to the stage.

The moment Cain’s neck was severed played on repeat.

Kang Jaewon did not hastily attempt to continue the conversation. He waited for a moment.

A place far removed, even from the inner world.

Judas had been hiding here all along, replaying that memory.

“Do you like that moment?”

“…Yes. Because it was a moment when the price was paid correctly.”

“Yeah. Honestly, I felt relieved too. Those bastards who tormented Eliza.”

“……”

“…Do you resent Eliza?”

Judas slowly, but without hesitation, shook his head.

“I heard he didn’t do it willingly. That doesn’t mean it never happened… but I don’t know. I just… wanted it all to stop.”

“…Yeah. I understand. You went through a lot.”

“……”

Kang Jaewon spoke calmly.

Judas appreciated his straightforward comfort.

“I… I ran away like a coward. With that prayer on Christmas Eve….”

He paused for a moment and looked up at Kang Jaewon.

Kang Jaewon smirked.

“Just call me hyung if you want. Whatever feels right.”

“…I dragged you into this.”

“Well… doesn’t really feel like it was all your fault, to be honest.”

How did I end up possessing this world?

I’m not entirely sure, but I know a few things that influenced it.

Judas, who prayed on Christmas Eve.

And Kang Jaewon, who also made a wish on Christmas Eve—to understand Eliza through the image of the sun.

I don’t know if they’re really connected, but it doesn’t feel like just a coincidence.

“So that’s why you’ve been hiding in the corner all this time? Because you felt guilty for dragging me in?”

“Yes….”

“Oh, come on…. But I’m curious—do you also… see or feel the things I’ve experienced?”

Judas shook his head.

“I caught glimpses when I was stimulated, like when you killed Cain, but not really. Most of the time, I was just asleep, hiding here.”

“And now that you’re satisfied with killing Cain, you’re ready to disappear.”

“…Yes.”

Judas’s body was becoming translucent.

It had faded so much that the space behind him was almost visible through him.

“I see…. Well, at least you don’t resent anyone, and you seem satisfied, so that’s a relief for me. To be honest, I felt uneasy about it. I took over someone else’s body—if the original owner had hated Eliza, it would’ve made me feel… weird.”

“You don’t need to worry. That body is completely yours now.”

“…What?”

“I did feel liberated watching that scene, but it doesn’t feel like I was the one who did it. The movements that killed Cain, the experiences up until that moment… none of them were mine. I was just… a distant spectator.”

Judas’s body was disappearing from the feet up.

“So the name Judas and that body—they belong to you now. They have nothing to do with me. Even now, I’m just borrowing that body’s younger form for a moment. I don’t really have a physical form anymore—I’ve become nothing but a concept, something that no longer exists. That body isn’t me. It feels unfamiliar.”

“…Are you sure you’re younger than me? You sound ridiculously wise.”

“Just… spending time here made me that way. Oh, and I took a peek at your memories from when you were called Kang Jaewon. They were interesting, so I ended up learning a few things…. Sorry for looking without permission.”

“You apologize for the weirdest things. Forget it.”

Kang Jaewon spoke playfully on purpose.

“And listen, idiot. You said it was your body before, but did I ever say we were still connected? Let me make it clear—that body is me. No one else.”

Judas, looking momentarily dazed, soon let out a relieved smile.

His upper body scattered like light.

“Yes.”

“Be happy. If there is a next time… well, whatever happens.”

“Thank you.”

Judas bowed his head slightly.

Before long, he scattered outside the theater.

The shimmering dust spread like the Milky Way before quickly fading.

The Judas who killed Cain on the stage, the Cain who bled—both were gone.

When the lights went out, only the dark stage remained.

Kang Jaewon, left alone in the audience.

No—Judas.

He stood up.

‘It’s time to go back now.’