Chapter 5
The moment my Gram broke, Yuli screamed.
[Amin!]
Hearing Yuli’s cry, Diana Isla wanted to rush to Valther immediately, but her body froze. She couldn’t move.
As Valther—her father’s Gram—tore through Amin’s shoulder, Diana stood paralyzed on the spot.
Even as Amin kept his gaze fixed on Valther, unyielding, even while a blade split his flesh.
Even as the furious Yuli rampaged atop the wall, biting at the gauntlets of the soldiers restraining her, losing a couple of teeth in the process, blood dripping from her mouth.
She stood there, unable to move.
Soon, Valther yanked the sword out of Amin’s shoulder and kicked him down.
Diana Isla knew that Valther wouldn’t kill Amin.
Thousands of Amin’s soldiers had the imperial palace surrounded.
If they found out their lord had been killed, they would abandon his orders and storm the palace.
Valther surely knew that too.
As she expected, Valther ordered his men to bind Amin and re-entered the castle.
Only then did Diana exhale a ragged breath and run toward him.
There was no need to describe how hard her heart was pounding at that moment.
[We won, Valther. We…]
As she reached out to embrace him, Valther looked at her coldly.
[“We?” Diana.]
[What do you mean…]
[There is no “we” here.]
Valther smiled.
But it wasn’t the warm smile he had always shown young Diana.
It was contempt.
[You should’ve died back then.]
Ironically, Diana Isla blamed Amin Wilhelm for Valther’s sudden change.
Their marriage had been arranged in an instant.
Valther wanted to make the most humiliating marriage proposal to Amin.
By using Diana Isla, who had publicly devoted herself to him, he intended to teach Amin submission.
Diana had resisted, but the Marquis of Isla hadn’t listened.
If his daughter couldn’t be empress, then he wanted at least the mining rights Valther had promised in exchange for the marriage.
Diana was sold off by both Valther and her own father without a struggle.
On the day their engagement was announced, Diana slapped Amin and said:
[If it were me, I would’ve died. The day Gram pierced my shoulder, I would’ve bitten off my tongue and ended it.]
[Yeah. Sorry about that.]
Amin only gave her a crooked smile.
[Sorry for surviving.]
But Amin couldn’t die.
If he died, the thousands of soldiers who believed in him would be dead too.
So would Yuli, who waited for him atop the wall.
But Diana Isla didn’t care about that.
If Amin wouldn’t die, then she resolved to die herself.
So, before boarding the carriage, she secretly bought a dagger.
And then—
[Valther…]
She moaned his name for three days and nights in feverish agony.
Everyone outside the carriage must have heard her.
Only after seeing that memory did I understand why the knight outside had looked at me with such disgust.
A bride calling out the name of her fiancé’s brother night after night?
Anyone would find it disgraceful.
Whatever the case—
She didn’t die.
Her lingering feelings for Valther—her strange belief that he would call for her again someday—held her back.
Though she had bought a dagger to kill Amin and herself, she eventually threw it away.
Instead of dying, she chose to hate her husband.
[You ruined my life!]
Amin let her be.
Even when Diana insulted him, lashed out, or threatened her life—
[I’ll kill myself!]
He only looked at her with his lazy golden eyes.
[Go ahead.]
Diana despaired. Not long after, Valther attacked Wilhelm Castle.
It was in the second year of the grand duke couple’s marriage.
The soldiers were exhausted from famine and war.
Valther took advantage of the timing and launched a cowardly attack.
The castle gate was quickly breached, and Amin’s first stop was Diana’s chambers.
[Escape through the back gate. I’ve prepared a horse and a knight.]
Diana wanted to ask him—
Where would he go?
Surely not the front gate, where 20,000 of Valther’s soldiers were storming in?
If that was his plan, then… then maybe—
Maybe they could go together.
But she couldn’t say that.
She had spent a year and a half cursing him.
A year and a half praying for his death.
She turned toward the back gate… but then changed direction.
Her heart was pounding violently.
It would’ve been noble if she had done it out of guilt—a desire to honor Amin’s last stand.
But that wasn’t it.
Her heart beat because she wanted to see Valther’s face one more time.
That desperate longing.
It sickened her.
But she couldn’t stop herself.
[Ah… Foolish Diana. No matter how many times you’re beaten, you’re just a hunting dog that always returns to its master.]
Even as she heard Valther’s humiliating words at the end—
She couldn’t stop herself and begged.
Begged to Gram, the sword that tore into her body.
That she be reborn not as a soul, but as a soulless sword.
That she become the blade in the hands of someone who hated Valther the most.
Because if she had to hold the sword herself, she could never stab him.
So she asked to become the sword.
And Gram answered her.
[You truly wish for your flesh to become a blade, Diana?]
Yes.
The voice in her ear was unmistakably Gram’s.
[Then your soul may scatter. If that’s fine with you—]
Diana nodded.
Her body, drained of strength, was growing stiff.
[I’ll find a woman worthy of using your body.]
A woman worthy of using your body.
That’s me.
The one who entered Diana Isla’s body—the Diana Isla who had returned from the past.
And it was my Gram who told me this.
Could my Gram and Father’s Gram be connected?
Just like Diana and Diana Isla swapped souls?
Right now, nothing was certain.
But one thing was—
“Yeah. Ranting about dying is less productive than ranting about killing.”
I looked up at Amin.
He gazed back with those same lazy golden eyes.
He reeked of alcohol.
“…Tolerable.”
He loosened his already-unbuttoned shirt even further.
Hard muscles and a long scar across his shoulder became visible.
His eyes gleamed.
“Go ahead. Stab me.”
The only thing clear now was—
I had married this lunatic.
* * *
According to Diana Isla’s memories, Amin had drowned himself in alcohol ever since he lost to Valther.
Guilt over driving his people into death.
Grief over being unable to rescue the 3rd Princess still held hostage.
And above all—
[If it were me, I would’ve died.]
That humiliating marriage.
All of it crushed him.
Even in his broken state, he tried to recover the territory from war and monster raids, often heading into battle himself.
But the situation didn’t improve. He just kept sinking deeper.
There were many reasons, but from Diana Isla’s perspective, the biggest one was simple: alcohol.
He always carried a barrel with him.
He always stank of it.
Just like now.
“Wanna make a bet?”
Amin, still with his drowsy look, smiled faintly at me.
“If you stab me with that, I’ll annul this marriage. For real. By the way—”
He grabbed a bottle of strong liquor from the bridal chamber and flopped onto the sofa.
His shirt gaped open, revealing toned abs and a long scar in even more detail.
“The heart’s right here.”
He pointed at his chest.
“If you stab upward from below, you’ll pierce the lung too. That way, you won’t hear a scream—just the sound of air escaping.”
He amused me.
I already knew all that—six years ago.
When I was dragged off by Valther’s guards.
“After that, you’ll cut off my ear, hop on the horse waiting out back, and race to the Marquis of Rochen’s estate. If you push your horse hard enough, a dainty lady like you could make it in a day. Then, beg them to send you to the imperial capital. Say you brought the ear of arrogant Amin Wilhelm, who dared defy the emperor. They’ll treat you like a lunatic, sure, but they won’t want a diplomatic incident. They’ll take you to Valther. And then, you—”
Amin grinned.
“You might win Valther’s love back.”
But I thought his real problem was something else entirely.
He—
“Alright, let’s begin.”
He took a drink from the bottle and set it down.
Then he picked up the broken Gram and brought its edge to his own chest.
Where he said his heart was.
He tilted his head toward me and whispered,
“Try to kill me.”
…No. That’s not it.
His problem is simple.
He’s just a drunken lunatic.
As I stared at his face, I began to regret ever thinking he was worthy of Gram.
