CH 2.1

“Your Eminence, you should have ignored her at all. Young Lady Rivero is not sane. When dealing with such a person—”

“Sir, be careful with your words. According to what you said, doesn’t it sound like the cause of that vulgar behavior of Lady Rivero is from Cardinal Yohan?”

“I didn’t mean that! Forgive me!”

“Yohan! I love you! You love me, too, right? I know everything! You fell for me at the first sight! Don’t be shy! I will feed you even if you leave the priesthood and become a penniless person!”

“… She’s really tedious. If this weren’t for the Rivero family.”

Cardinal Jun scowled at me. Of course Yohan wasn’t someone to let him keep that kind of offensive gaze. Yohan stopped Cardinal Jun. Well, it’s inevitable that Cardinal Jun hates me. Because I’m the woman who made Yohan, the holy person loved by everyone, leave the priesthood. In the eyes of his fellow cardinal, would I not have been seen as a sorceress who corrupted the divinity and mission given to Yohan?

“… Let’s go back.”

Yohan seemed to hate Cardinal Jun, his friend as well as his colleague, glaring at me, so he shook me off and got on the horse. Ah, my word choice wasn’t right. It wasn’t that he shook me off, but he took my hands off him strongly because he was so shy and then got on the horse. He touched where I had touched him a few times. I’m sure he wanted to feel the remaining warmth from my hands on his clothes.

Even if he didn’t do that, my hands existed to touch him, right? I shook myself off the holy knights and ran to Yohan. I was so excited that I ended up tripping. I was embarrassed so I covered my face. The forgotten pain in my ankle rushed over. My ankle swelled hard because I kept neglecting it. It’s not enough to show a slender and elegant ankle line like a deer’s ankle, yet my ankle was swollen and looked like rhinoceros? I dared not to show myself in front of Yohan.

“Did you really get hurt?”

“We can’t let her go back alone like this.”

While the holy knights were grumbling, Yohan couldn’t win against his worry for me and overcome his shyness.

“Heal Young Lady Rivero and let her stay overnight in the temple.”

“Cardinal Yohan!”

“This is inevitable. We can’t just abandon the oldest daughter of the Rivero family.”

“That Rivero again…”

“She’s someone who’s not in her right mind. She even hurt her ankle, so as the servant of God, we can’t ignore her.”

I took a double take. How unsightly it was of me to fall that made Yohan say that? Of course I didn’t doubt Yohan’s heart just because of those words. Yohan loving me is a widely known fact that wouldn’t change. He wouldn’t tell them to treat my wound if he doesn’t love me, and he wouldn’t tell them to let me stay overnight in the temple if he doesn’t love me, right?

The female priests came and supported me. Yohan entered the deeper location in the temple with Cardinal Jun. I also wanted to follow him, but the female priests restrained me. Maybe because they are women like me, they treated me harsher than the male priests and holy knights. It was really upsetting, but I didn’t get angry because I could understand their feelings.

You know, right? Yohan is the most beautiful and cool man in the world. Such a man is mine only, so how envious they were. The poor are jealous of the rich, and the ugly are jealous of the beautiful people. I alone got the love of the best man in the world, so that much of ugly jealousy is nothing.

The female priests didn’t heal my ankle. They only lent me a space to lay down for a night and abandoned me. Ah, I wasn’t abandoned. The holy knights were in guard in front of the door and windows of the room I stayed at. Wouldn’t that be a measurement from Yohan, who worried about my safety?

***

“Still, I guess I should have gotten proper treatment back then.”

As the lightning struck, the figure of a human monologuing was shown. Just like how she said it twice, the glittering golden hair was enough to be one of the most dazzling things in the Holy Nation.

“This ankle always gets sprained after that. They said it’s a tendency.”

It’s been years since then though. Tite Rivero grumbled in a low voice and then asked Reese about her opinion. Reese without a doubt didn’t answer her, and Tite continued her monologue.

“Phew, there’s a lot of lightning. I’m glad we arrived before the rain starts. Don’t you agree?”

Tite smiled wide. At the same time, the lightning struck. As if telling them that God was watching all the crimes done by Tite, the lightning struck relentlessly and showed the figure of Tite and Reese, who was gagged and tied in front of her. The earth quaked as if it felt pity that it could not punish Tite for her sin against God and humans.

The smiling Tite was certainly beautiful. If only she wasn’t crazy, the titles of the most beautiful woman in the Holy Nation, and the most shining woman in the Holy Nation, might be Tite’s title, not Reese’s.

Alas, Tite Rivero was crazy. There was no one in the Holy Nation, in the land where humans lived who didn’t know that.

Tite Rivero was the most famous crazy girl, and an evil stalker. This far, there were people who got hurt by her hands, but no one died. And now, Reese would become the first casualty of the evil stalker Tite Rivero.

Frightened, Reese tried hard to loosen the gag on her mouth. Rumble. The lightning struck again. The flash reflected the two. Tite didn’t erase her smile as though Reese’s figure was funny.

“Do you know about our first meeting? That day was the best day of my life. Just like this ceaseless lightning, the firecrackers and petals were prepared for me. Me, Tite Rivero. They were prepared for the meeting between me and him.”