The Emperor Who Was Once a Tyrant Returns Chapter 126 : Chapter 126

Chapter . 126

-Why?

-Even when you were young, Sister, your ambition was great.

The duke, like that, sank into old mories that rose up strangely vividly before those blue-gray eyes as he looked at .

Back when he had been neither a duke nor a noble, and so had to bow and scrape before nobles.

Back when he could not even dream of having a wife like Margaret, a son like Edward, or a daughter like Cecile. But back when he had not been a traitor.

Rhiannon had liked trying on Grandmother’s flamboyant clothes and jewelry on her own body.

Since she was prettier than Grandmother, she said that the person who suited them best should have the prettiest things.

Even when they explained that there was a law saying commoners must not dress like nobles, she never accepted it.

-I am going to beco the Empress when I grow up! Because I am the prettiest in the world!

When Rhiannon said that, people smiled and nodded.

-She would be satisfied with becoming the lady of a good family, so why is she so greedy?

No matter how much Grandfather worried by himself.

-Everyone just laughs even though none of you believe I will really beco the Empress. Just you wait.

Rhiannon, in her own way, hardened her resolve.

And there was soone who believed she would beco the Empress no less than Rhiannon did.

It was the boy next door who had liked Rhiannon.

-You are truly beautiful. If you want it, of course you will beco the Empress. Because no one, not even the Emperor, could help but love you!

The boy’s pure faith and love were sothing that neither Rhiannon nor anyone else could possibly fail to recognize. To the point that when they got engaged, no one was surprised.

But as the wedding approached, Grandmother’s friend said she would take one of Grandmother’s granddaughters as her maid.

She said that if she served her well when she went to the Imperial Palace, she would also find her a suitable match.

Grandfather was delighted as if he could leap, and he wanted to send the granddaughter from the poorest of his children’s households.

Since her parents had died early but left property, and since Rhiannon had been raised delicately in Grandfather’s house and was soon to marry, she was not even soone to be considered.

-I want to go.

But Rhiannon was stubborn.

-What about your fiancé?

-Older Brother, persuade him for .

That fiancé did not even need persuading.

-…So my words were right after all. I always thought Rhiannon was a woman far too good for …….

Rhiannon thought so too. Sister never brought up the fiancé she had left behind in her hotown again, and if her sisters or brothers brought it up, she glared coldly and made them shut their mouths.

Except for just once.

-…It was wrong…….

-Rhiannon?

-He… deceived . He said that even the Emperor would love … but… it was not true.

The morning after she finally ascended the Empress’s throne she had dread of.

Not the ti when she had thought she would beco the Empress, only to beco the new Empress’s maid.

-…I want to go back to that ti. So that Rhiannon can marry that man.

-Even so, your son might not be born at all.

-Edward would have been born as Margaret’s son, even if not as my son. I believe that…….

Perhaps there would not have been any great change. Even if Rhiannon had married that man, she might not have been able to abandon her ambition and might have divorced him and beco the Emperor’s concubine. And he might have been able to marry Margaret.

But Rhiannon would have received her husband’s love instead of the Emperor’s favor. If so, perhaps she would not have beco the Empress she was now…….

Even though it was more likely that it would not have turned out that way, in the end he wanted to give Rhiannon a chance rather than himself.

Even though he had abandoned the sister who had raised the family and chosen Margaret and Cecile instead.

-Really? Is it only for that reason? Is it not because you want to start everything over again with Rhiannon, erase every possibility of defeat, and win this ti at last?

As Prince Leontes, it was reasonable to think that.

-If Rhiannon receives His Majesty the Emperor’s favor again, I will stop it. I swear it to the Crystal of Truth.

-How will you stop it?

-No matter that she is my sister, she brought my family to ruin. If I kill her with my own hands and then die too, could even the Emperor stop it?

Then Alexander would not be born as Rhiannon’s son, either. He and Edward would be born as soone else’s children, or no, they might even be born as brothers…….

And so, after swearing to the Blood Crystal, he asked the Prince.

-In truth, it is not as though I can truly turn back ti and return to the past, so why do you ask that of ?

-When anyone stands before the end of their life, they are bound to look back on the days they have lived. On ti that cannot be undone. I want to erase, from your heart, the mont that remained as your true regret.

As he said that, he told him to focus on that mory and recall that single mont from long ago that he wanted to return to.

Everything he had done so far might have been possible with the mages the Prince commanded, but he had never even heard a word that sothing like this could be possible with magic. Was this, too, the sacred power of the Armatia imperial line, or…….

-Was it true regret, or not?

But when the Prince asked, there was only one answer. Because he did not want to make even that answer into a regret.

-Close your eyes.

Over his closed eyes, that scene rose up so vividly. Just as it had risen countless tis in his unconscious without him realizing it.

And amid it, even the points he had not noticed back then beca visible.

-Older Brother, persuade him for .

Sister’s words, from soone who knew that even her older brother wanted to rise in the world by riding on the virtue of a peerlessly beautiful sister.

And yet, a face that hesitated sowhere. A fresh face, beautiful yet still green, leaving behind a man who truly loved her while leaning on his words.

A face far more pure and lively than the one that had grown far more beautiful in the Imperial Palace, and so filled with hesitation he could not possibly hide. Why had he failed to see it back then?

The mont when all this victory and success and defeat and ruin and ending began.

The next mont, Sister, that mory filled with Sister, disappeared. For a mont he realized that mory had vanished, but soon only the mory that he had forgotten sothing remained. Along with the feeling that a thorn had been pulled from his chest.

-How did it feel?

-What I truly forgot was the fact that there had been a thorn lodged in my chest……. No matter how small, it had been lodged there, and it was a thorn I only rembered after it ca out.

Prince Leontes rely smiled and said.

-You passed the test.

-Thank you, Prince Leontes.

As he knelt and gave thanks, he asked one last thing.

-Please let my end be placed in my sister’s hands.

And so, the barrier that had blocked the assassins who had co for him incessantly until tonight now disappeared.

He was killed without resistance by an assassin’s hand that made it look as though he had taken his own life.

The face that rose before his closing eyes was, unsurprisingly, not his son’s.

-Why in the world did you rebel against your mother? And even so, are you a person of our family? Do you an to deny our family’s blood because you inherited the imperial line?

-Uncle…….

-If you regard as your uncle, then bow unconditionally to your mother and co back. If you do not, know that you will never see your aunt or your cousin again. I am truly disappointed in you.

He had left, leaving behind the young boy who watched him without saying another word…….

If he spoke harshly, he would co back saying he was wrong… because he was a good child……. Then, just this once, he would persuade Sister to accept his most outstanding nephew, Alex, again, even if he had to kneel to her. Bringing his wife, his young son, all of them… and even everyone else as well…….

But Alex never ca even once. That little bastard.

He had hated him so much!

‘…Edward… my son… forgive your father…….’

-Why is Brother Alex not coming? Can’t Father bring him? Mother misses him too.

Only the voice rose up, but the young face did not, and so the man, who was the father of two boys and also their uncle, breathed his last like that.

The Empress Faction that had survived the battle of Mount Petrafis was dragged, all of them except the mages, to the execution grounds.

Not all of them were knights of the Lauderdale family. The Empress Faction knights from other families, enraged, spat at the Lauderdale knights they had been close with and even flattered until now.

And while shouting that they would take revenge, they accused even elderly people of the Lauderdale family who had not been there on false confessions. Other Empress Faction mbers, who narrowly slipped away, did that too.

The Emperor punished the Empress Faction according to those accusations and confiscated their property, while ignoring the Empress’s desperate pleas.

“We will serve the Empress.”

The maids and knights sent by the Emperor approached. The Empress’s maids and knights had all fled or been dragged to the scaffold, and Rhiannon stood alone.

The Empress wore a blue cloak lined with white sable and embroidered with dragons. The hem of her garnt woven with gold thread that trailed long behind her, the Empress’s crown on her head, she looked exactly as she had when she was invested as Empress. She was more dignified than then.

“Guide .”

The Empress commanded. People covered their mouths and laughed as they began leading her from her luxurious residence to the tower.

A tower in an isolated place, where royal criminals had been confined for generations and watched by a magic circle.

“We greet Your Majesty the Empress.”

“Be at peace, Your Majesty the Empress.”

“You are even more beautiful today, Your Majesty.”

Everywhere she went, people crowded in and greeted her. They affected proper courtesy to greet her, and then burst into laughter right in front of her.

“Your pride truly is sothing!”

“How cruel. Even as her family is being butchered, she does not grieve, and she even wears the Empress’s crown.”

“That is why neither son even cos out when their mother is being confined. What an incredible family.”

Rhiannon held her neck straight and walked. While carving each and every one of those laughing faces into her mory.

The people she would put to torture one by one before Leontes, with their limbs hung from wheels.

The Empress’s crown was heavy, and the long hem that no one held up for her was cumberso. But the Empress walked with a posture that did not collapse in the slightest.

“This is the place, Your Majesty.”

The maid who had guided her to the tower held out both hands.

“You must hand over the Empress’s crown before you may enter.”

“They are imprisoning by force, and they say I must hand over my crown to enter?”

“HAHAHA!”

When Rhiannon flared in fury, people exchanged glances and laughed. Now, no matter what she said, people laughed.

“I will take revenge! On all of you! I will definitely take revenge!”

“HAHAHA!”

“HAHAHAHA!”

No matter what she showed them, they would laugh. No matter what she said, they would not let her go until she handed over the Empress’s crown.

And so, Rhiannon lifted, with her own hands, the Empress’s crown that she had sworn she would never hand over by her own will, even if it was taken from her.

And the mont the maid reached to take the crown, she threw it far away. The crown flew as if it had wings and fell into the lake in the Emperor’s Garden. Just as her last mage had set it up before being dragged away by the Emperor’s mages.

“The Empress’s crown belongs only to , so if another wears it on their head, they will die.”

Only then did the laughter stop at the Empress’s words. Because the Empress was soone who could do that and more. That alone would not be a lie.

Rhiannon smiled instead. They would rember this mont. When she burned Leontes and his group alive at the stake, they would see her smiling before them.

She would show the entire country the Empress’s smile, more beautiful than it was now.

That was when it happened.

The surface of the lake, which had been still with not a breath of wind, rippled. People turned their heads.

And above that rippling surface, the Empress’s crown rose up.

The Empress’s crown circled once on the water’s surface. Round and round, drawing a circle.

Then sothing fell from the sky. A startling dive, a falcon.

Prince Leontes’s falcon seized the Empress’s crown in its beak and flew up.

“No!”

Rhiannon scread.

“It is mine! Where are you taking it!”

The Empress, wearing a sable-fur cloak and ceremonial robes woven with gold thread, leapt into the lake. Chasing the falcon flying over the lake with the golden crown in its beak.