They swarmed around Xuefei, clambering onto the faces of everyone gathered at her side. Sometimes they disguised themselves as survivors, gazing at her with desperate, pleading eyes.
“Gods bless us—will we be saved? Oh, Gods bless us…”
“Lady, do you have any more bread?”
“Save me…”
“Elf Queen above, I see the shadow of that merciful sovereign in you.”
Emaciated, servile, and wretched, their sunken eyes brimmed with exhaustion and a desperate yearning for salvation. They reached out to her with hands trembling in anticipation.
Xuefei responded, “You are lost souls. Here with me, you can find true rest—genuine peace. Clearly, your obsessions have nothing to do with the gods.”
Then their souls shattered and crumbled away. The Dark Filth they should have become flowed into their chosen vessel—straight into Xuefei’s body.
And then it sublimated.
Drawing on the less than one percent of “purity” that remained, they would be reborn as members of the Demon Race in some other plane. Or they might fully transform into cradles for the Dark Filth in worlds abandoned by the gods. Because of their obsessions, they would never grow powerful, but they would also know no suffering. Now and then, a soul that slipped free like a cicada shedding its shell would even ascend to the Heaven Realm, joining the ranks of the Light Emissaries.
“Please… let me rest.”
Even the greatest blessings must come to an end. There is no such thing as a perfectly tyrannical ruler, nor an eternal savior.
“You…”
“Why did you come to me? Don’t crowd around me…”
Endless soothing. Endless receiving. Endless loss…
The obsessions flooded into Xuefei’s mind, spawning countless illusions. Memories that didn’t belong only tore at the deepest recesses of her psyche—the fragile heart wrapped in layer upon layer of bandages. The most precarious fragment of all teetered on the brink, and Xuefei felt a pain unlike any she had ever known.
“Why were you the only one who escaped?”
Smoke hung thick in the air. Was this the ruins of an elven city, or a battlefield where fates clashed?
Xuefei caught the metallic tang of blood in the air—and something else, something nameless and buried deep in her memories.
Ailin smiled, but behind her stood a human soldier, drenched in blood.
Xuefei knew him.
William, vice captain of the Knight Order under the Hero Party.
As the enemy surged forward like a tidal wave, he had received his orders: hold the rear for the greater good, to preserve humanity’s precious living heroes amid the brutality of battle.
No…
Xuefei found the word “hero” laughable.
He was a victim of war.
His armor lay in tatters, reduced to a handful of scattered fragments like stars at dawn. The rest was buried in the earth beneath his feet, or embedded in his own body, shredding his organs.
The enemy had pierced his heart, killing him.
Xuefei could peer right through the hole in his chest to the scene beyond—the elves huddled together, encouraging one another, their faces lit with fleeting moments of respite and smiles.
It was as if they couldn’t see this man named William. Nor could they see the other “lost souls” encircling Xuefei.
“You sent me to my death yourself! It’s all your fault—your sin is beyond redemption!!”
“I’m sorry…”
“Heh, look at you. A ‘hero’? How ridiculous. Have you forgotten your crimes?”
The soul let out a sound of grim satisfaction, then departed the world in peace, winging toward its rightful destination.
In its place, a gore-slicked blade swung toward Xuefei’s pale throat.
Why had they returned?
Why were these elven souls manifesting here, venting their obsessions?
But in that moment, it wasn’t questions that stirred her heart—it was curses and accusations.
“You’re worse than a mangled street rat, and you dare call yourself a hero?”
“I know you’re a liar. You swore to save the world, but it was all fake. What did you save? My corpse?”
“I’ll curse you for all eternity!”
Xuefei clutched her head and slowly sank into a crouch. She screamed at the top of her lungs, but it emerged as a feeble whimper, like the cry of someone pinned down by a nightmare— a plea as meaningless and pathetic as a deathbed rant.
“Aaah…”
Vile words wouldn’t drive her mad. She stayed silent, trying to curl into a ball to fend off the filth of their abuse. But to onlookers, her behavior looked utterly unnatural.
Ailin bent down in confusion and asked, “Lady Xuefei? What’s wrong? Are you hurt?”
Xuefei couldn’t hear Ailin’s words at all.
Her ears rang only with the souls’ confessions, now twisted into shadows that stretched endlessly with their echoing voices. Whether it was illusion or reality no longer mattered. She simply longed for the storm to pass.
This wasn’t Xuefei’s first time on a battlefield, nor was it the first fight she’d joined after her draconic transformation.
“You know what Rewind truly means for the dead on the Camiran Continent? Do you even understand?!”
“We are already dead. Can you guarantee you’ll save us? Don’t make me laugh—you’ll just shed cold tears amid the blood rain to prove your innocence, you hypocrite!”
“Our lives mean nothing to you at all. So you can just discard them whenever you please?”
Xuefei’s figure trembled harder and harder.
She could put a name to the source of every single voice, as if she recognized every one of the maids by name.
Her memory was flawless, but once again Xuefei felt frustrated by how sharp it was—even despairing.
“You think saving this handful of people lets you forget about us? How laughable. Think about all the souls who died by your hand—there are far more of them than the ones you’re trying to rescue!”
William advanced step by step, then squatted down in front of Xuefei and bellowed right in her ear, as though in the next instant he would plunge his blood-soaked arm straight into her heart.
“Don’t come near me. Don’t…”
“I’ve already apologized. I’ve already repented. Don’t come find me anymore…”
“I… s-sorry…”
None of the voices accepted Xuefei’s trembling apology. Instead, they grew even more vicious, escalating from scorn to accusations, and from accusations to curses.
“You should have scattered your soul with the rest of us, you failure!”
“Look at you, putting on that pitiful act again. Have you ever actually grieved for our deaths?!”
“…”
Rain began to fall.
The elves all lifted their heads and stretched out their hands. The cool touch soothed their wounded hearts. The surviving brothers, sisters, and parents embraced one another. In that moment, their proud racial image vanished entirely. They sought warmth from each other in the most primal way—but in giving and accepting that warmth, weren’t they also offering it to one another?
Only that dragon girl, growing ever dimmer in the rain—a figure even Ailin didn’t dare approach—knelt alone in the muddy slurry of soil and rainwater. Yet it could not stain the fair skin of her legs, protected as they were by the transparent scales…
Demonish energy began to spread wildly from her entire body. She bowed her head, and no one could make out the emotions churning within this savior.
The howling gale was her lament. The crashing thunder was her rage.
At last, she spoke slowly amid the downpour.
Her voice was colder than the biting winds of early winter:
“Why should I protect you people?”
“I have no need to apologize.”
“Does it even matter?”
Killing intent.
From self-reflection to self-doubt, Xuefei teetered on the brink of collapse, her mind nearly blank—until her brain kicked into “self-defense” mode.
“You can all just die. I have no obligation to save any of you. All of you—die!”
Ailin’s eyes flew wide. She wanted to stagger back, to flee from this soft, gentle girl who had suddenly turned into a Demon—but her body felt frozen, refusing to obey.
Finally…
Xuefei raised her head. Her eyes were a lusterless crimson.
“Die!”
She spread her wings and bared her teeth, lunging like a feral beast at her nearest target—Ailin.
The next instant, blood and flesh erupted.
“Splurt—!”
Ailin collapsed to the ground, clapping a hand over her mouth as tears of terror burst forth.
But to her astonishment, she wasn’t hurt.
“…”
“Y-You… you’re…?”
The figure who appeared before her was another girl who looked strikingly similar, though hers was a sturdier build with a pair of dragon wings—and far more reassuring.
Blood trickled down from her shoulder, but this dragon girl paid it no mind. She pulled the petite, rampaging figure into a tight embrace, her eyes brimming with enviable affection.
Gently stroking the head of the berserk Dragon Princess Xuefei, she said, her voice thick with apology:
“Little Xuefei, I’m late.”
