Chapter 1
Once Again, As Your Daughter
The space was drowned in blood so thick and dark that its true color could no longer be discerned.
There was no moon, no stars—only endless night.
And in that darkness, a single figure glowed faintly like a fallen shard of light.
A woman—white as snow, untouched by the sea of blood upon which she sat.
So still she might have been mistaken for a statue.
Step. Step.
No one knew how much time had passed before another set of footsteps entered that dreadful space.
With each step, the black boots sank into the wet floor, making a sick, sloshing sound.
The intruder stopped before the motionless woman.
“It’s been a long time, Letty.”
At the sound of that calm voice, the woman slowly lifted her head.
Her pale hair slid away from her face, revealing eyes as red as the blood around her.
Her cracked lips parted.
Her voice, rough and dry as though unused for years, trembled as she spoke—
“…Fa…ther…”
Her gaze dropped to the man’s hand—gloved in fine but clumsily stitched leather—gripping a blade so sharp it seemed it could cut through air itself.
Yet instead of fear, her face lit with something close to joy.
“Ah… finally, finally you came…”
In her arms lay a man—still and serene, as though merely asleep.
His fine robes and the pendant on his neck betrayed his identity.
The intruder’s lips tightened as he murmured the name:
“High Priest Joseph…”
The one who had caused all of this.
The man who had sworn never to set foot in this cursed land again, now forced to return because of him.
Joseph had sought to bind a god to the mortal world—
and for that, he had chosen her as the vessel.
Leticia Kuhn Kafka.
The woman who bore a god within her flesh.
The woman whose body, unable to contain divinity, had gone mad—bringing ruin to the Holy Nation of Ermano.
“Papa, can I… go to the Holy Nation of Ermano?”
The man—Raul Kuhn Kafka—remembered the words of the child she once was.
He closed his eyes, heavy with regret.
“This is not… what I wished for when I let you go.”
Years ago, when she was still small enough to smile without burden, he had given her his family name—Kafka.
And later, he had taken it back.
Now, standing before her once more, Raul’s voice was low and filled with weariness.
“I didn’t send you there so this would happen.”
The closer he stepped, the more her face twisted—
as if she might cry out any moment,
as if she wanted to scream:
Why did you come so late? Do you know what they did to me?
I missed you so much…
But she didn’t.
She couldn’t.
There was no time left.
“Please… end it now.”
She knew the truth better than anyone—
that when she died, the divine energy within her would explode like a bomb,
erasing everything:
not only the Holy Nation, but even the distant Empire of Leroy, her father’s homeland.
“You came… to stop it, didn’t you?”
She had once asked him if she could go.
And he, thinking he had no right to say otherwise, had simply said:
“If that’s where you wish to go, then go. I am not your real father, so it is not my place to stop you.”
Even before she knew the truth, and even after—
there had always been a line between them.
A quiet, invisible wall.
“I’ll make it painless. Just one stroke.”
Raul knelt before her.
He raised his arms as if to embrace her—
but the sword was still in his hand, the blade long enough to pierce them both.
“…Father?”
Their foreheads touched.
Her trembling red eyes met his calm ones.
He smiled gently.
“You were always afraid of being alone, weren’t you?”
“Ah… no, please, Father, don’t…”
She tried to shake her head, weakly, knowing what he meant to do.
“I’m not even… your real daughter…”
“Yes. That’s why, when you wished to go, I thought I had no right to stop you.”
His voice softened, filled with an aching tenderness.
It was the voice of a father telling his child not to fear the coming dark.
“If I had known it would end like this, I might have told you the truth. At least once.”
Her eyes glistened.
He smiled again, faintly.
“Leticia… my Letty. Do you know how happy I was to call you my daughter?
You made my dull, lonely life worth living.
I regret never telling you how grateful I was for that.”
He looked at her tears, unable to wipe them away.
Then, tightening his grip on the hilt—
“Since I drove you into this hell, let me at least be your father at the end.”
“I… I…”
Her lips moved soundlessly, but he understood.
He always did.
“Yes, my dear. I love you too.”
Thrust.
A single, sharp sound split the silence as the sword pierced both their hearts.
“…Hah!”
Leticia gasped, as though breaking free from a long-held breath, bolting upright.
“My lady!”
Her body trembled violently, breath caught in her throat.
Someone hurried to her side, gently taking her by the shoulders, rubbing her back in slow circles.
“Easy now. Breathe slowly… yes, just like that. You’re doing very well.”
The soft warmth, the scent of sunlight and linen—it steadied her.
Her trembling slowly ceased.
Blinking in confusion, she looked up at the one holding her.
“You’re safe, my lady. There’s nothing to fear here.”
That voice—so gentle, so familiar.
She turned toward it.
The faint light revealed a woman with auburn hair and warm green eyes.
“…Asha?”
Impossible.
Asha, her nanny—whom she had left behind when she went to the Holy Nation.
Someone she believed she would never see again.
“Yes, my lady.”
The same tender reply, the same smile from her childhood.
Leticia’s eyes filled with tears.
“It’s really… really you, Asha?”
The woman blinked, startled by her tears, then nodded with a soft laugh.
“Of course. I’m your loving nanny, Asha, serving the young Lady of House Kafka.”
“Lady… Kafka?”
Not the Saint of Ermano, but the Lady of Kafka.
Something was different.
Asha looked younger—
as though time had turned back.
“Asha… how old am I?”
“Why, yesterday was your birthday! You’re eight years old now, my lady!”
Eight.
Seven years before she left for the Holy Nation.
Ten years before that bloody end.
Her mind reeled as the last words of Raul echoed through her.
“Leticia, my Letty… you made my life worth living.”
“Let me be your father, at least in the end.”
“Yes, my dear. I love you too.”
“Father…”
“My lady?!”
Leticia leapt from the bed, bare feet hitting the cold floor.
She didn’t stop.
Down the corridor she ran—stumbling, breathless, desperate—
as if the very world might vanish if she didn’t find him this instant.
🥺 damn