With her cloak's protection gone, Elsa didn't grow cautious in the slightest — if anything, her hunger for battle only sharpened.
After a prolonged exchange, Puck tried to spring a trap and finish her off with his most devastating attack magic — and failed.
"Sorry, Lia. I'm all out of mana. I think I need to sleep for a while."
"If things ever get truly desperate, summon even if it costs you your very soul, alright?"
Emilia smiled gently to reassure him.
"I'll manage on my own after this. Rest well, Puck."
Without Puck, Elsa seized the upper hand almost imdiately.
Before long, Emilia was sent flying by a kick that knocked her clean out of the fight. Old Rom jumped in right after her, but Elsa's speed made short work of him too. As for Felt — she barely managed to fling a single throwing knife before Elsa denied her any chance at a real confrontation.
"What a naughty little girl," Elsa said, unhurried as ever, a mocking smile playing on her lips as she closed in. "No resolve, no power to fight — at the very least, you should have stayed curled up quietly in your corner."
She advanced on Felt, raised her kukri — and brought it slicing down.
But the blade cut nothing.
"I'm going all in!"
Natsuki Subaru threw himself in a flying tackle, wrenching Felt out from under Elsa's blade.
Elsa reacted instantly and moved to give chase — but Emilia, having managed to rally, sent an ice pillar shooting in to buy a precious second of delay.
"Run, Felt — I'll make you an opening!"
Natsuki Subaru fixed her with a steady, unwavering look and declared it like a vow — the words of a high schooler with at least so semblance of a conscience (debatable).
At the very least, he wasn't about to stand by and watch a little kid like her die in front of him.
After a desperate, tangled struggle, he made good on that promise — kicking a loose plank up at the last second to deflect the throwing knife Elsa had sent flying with murderous certainty.
Felt escaped.
"I've had enough of this little sideshow," Elsa said lazily, casually batting away an incoming ice pillar with a flick of her blade. Facing only Emilia now, she looked utterly unbothered. "If you have any last tricks up your sleeve, I'd suggest pulling them out now."
"I do have one," Emilia answered, hesitating. "But no one except would survive it."
A cold sweat slid down Natsuki Subaru's temple. He scrambled to stop her.
"Please don't do that. I'm begging you — don't act on impulse."
"I wasn't going to!"
Emilia raised both hands, ready to launch another ice pillar at any mont, and stole a sideways glance at Natsuki Subaru.
"It's just… you're still fighting so hard…"
She drew her gaze back forward, brow faintly furrowed, her voice quietly earnest.
"..."
Natsuki Subaru turned his head and stared — mouth hanging open in quiet shock — at Emilia's faintly flushing cheek.
Those words, drenched so thoroughly in everything that made Emilia Emilia, sent a cascade of images rushing through his mind.
The first ti he saw her in that back alley — that angelically beautiful face, the one that had made his own cheeks burn without his permission. The smile she wore on the tower, her hand gentle against his. The way she had looked on the bridge communing with spirits, surrounded by light like sothing out of a dream. Her pouty, unconvincing attempts at looking angry. The open, unguarded joy on her face when she was happy.
Every mont that had ever made his heart skip — they surfaced all at once. All of it, it turned out, had never really left him.
And Emilia — she had always been that sa angelic girl. She hadn't changed at all.
"What's the matter, Subaru?"
Emilia watched with concern as Natsuki Subaru wobbled unsteadily back to his feet.
"Nothing," he said. "I just finally rembered why I ca here in the first place."
Natsuki Subaru grinned, pulled himself to his full height, and squared himself directly against Elsa.
"Bring it on. I'm not scared — who needs a last resort anyway?"
He grabbed Old Rom's massive club in one hand and leveled the other end at Elsa like a challenge.
"I'm going to send you flying myself!"
Eyes blazing with conviction, Natsuki Subaru delivered his declaration — his final one.]
"Subaru, you're so cool!"
Below the screen, Emilia's gaze had gone impossibly soft, her eyes practically glimring.
Especially now that she knew — every magnificent thing that Subaru had just done, he had done entirely for her. That knowledge made the emotions welling up inside her impossible to hold back.
All this ti, she had never truly understood him.
In her mory, she had always been kept by Subaru inside a snow-white world — white walls, white clothes, even the bed was nothing but white. An unmistakable cage built entirely of white.
And only when Subaru was utterly exhausted, his spirit worn to the bone, would she ever get a chance to see him.
She would rest his head on her lap and softly rub his temples.
That — and nothing more — was all Emilia had been able to do since the day she was imprisoned.
At first, she had burned with rage at Natsuki Subaru for locking her away like this.
But in the rare monts they shared, she had watched the boy lying against her — the tears that escaped from the corners of his eyes without him noticing, the unguarded, fragile expressions he let slip.
That feeling — of being needed, of filling a hollow she had never known how to fill in herself — gradually smothered her anger, and slowly she had co to accept this twisted arrangent between them.
Until — the day it all changed.
Even from within her pure white cage, Emilia could tell that judgnt had co.
Because the nations of the world, united in rare agreent over their outrage at Purge King Natsuki Subaru's brutal reign, had dispatched Reinhard to put an end to the evil.
And so Emilia had faced a choice.
To remain the imprisoned princess and await rescue by the knight.
Or to walk the sa road as the villainous Natsuki Subaru, all the way to the bitter end.
Yet without a mont's hesitation, Emilia made her choice.
She would break her way out of this cage if she had to — because she was going to stand beside Natsuki Subaru.
"Is this feeling called love?"
Emilia still didn't fully understand her own heart. She had simply moved on pure instinct.
But that state of things only lasted until the instant her hand touched the door of the cage — and then it all ca crashing down.
The mont Emilia touched the door, every last one of the complex sealing formations etched across it vanished — as though they had never existed at all.
In truth, from the very day this cage was built, Natsuki Subaru had designed it so that it could be destroyed from the inside with ease.
Which ant — if Emilia had ever wanted to, she could have walked out at any ti.
This cell held a prisoner who had chosen, of their own free will, to stay.
The instant she stepped outside, Emilia understood that — and finally saw clearly into her own heart.
"Yes. I love Subaru. That much is beyond any doubt."
Emilia pulled herself free of the mory and lifted her eyes to fix them on Natsuki Subaru, there on the screen before her.
"And now I understand — Subaru loves too. That much is equally beyond any doubt."
"We love each other. There's no question about it."
She tilted her head slightly. A flash of mory crossed her mind — the Purge King Natsuki Subaru, faced with her heartfelt confession, fleeing in a flustered panic — and then she forcibly erased it.
"I'm sorry it took so long to realize it, Subaru."
She tilted her head again, her voice tinged with a quiet sadness.
"I suppose that's why your love for slowly faded away… but it's alright."
"From here on, I'll make sure you feel my love every single mont, without pause~"
____
👻🔥 40 ch: Walnut-chan🔥👻
🎯 100 Powerstones = 1 extra chapter for everybody
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