TVH 62

Chapter 62

Dante narrowed his eyes and asked,
“How?”

Elyuard gave a sly smile.
“If you’re jealous, become a devil yourself. As your teacher, I’ll instruct you well. I’ll have you working like a slave at the bottom of hell for about a hundred years.”

“Well, it doesn’t matter if you don’t have any skills.”

Dante muttered indifferently, leaned out from the wall, and aimed his gun at somewhere.

Bang! Bang! Bang!

The sound of rapid gunfire rang out, and bullet holes appeared one after another on the wall opposite.

I stepped back, eyes wide like a startled rabbit.
“Good heavens… Dante, aren’t you afraid? What if you get shot…?”

“Nothing to do but wake up, I suppose.”

Dante reloaded his pistol and answered nonchalantly.

As we fought our way down the alley in a gunfight, men in black riding in a car aimed their guns at us simultaneously.

“What a bothersome dream,” I muttered.
“Elyuard, try doing something worthy of a skilled devil,” I urged.

Elyuard made a finger-gun gesture and pretended to shoot. A massive explosion followed, sending the car flying into the air and flipping over.

“Now. Let’s move quickly.”

Following Dante’s instructions, I crouched and dashed quickly into the hotel.

“Ugh…”

My heart pounded from the realism of the dream.

But the relief was fleeting. The moment we stepped into the lavish, luxurious hotel entrance, it felt as if we were suddenly plunged into deep water.

The floor beneath me wobbled, and the space transformed in an instant into a dark, shabby house.

“What…?”

I blinked and looked around.

It was my aunt’s house where I stayed as a child. Even for a dream, this lack of context was extreme.

“Dante? Elyuard?”

I realized only now that they had disappeared.

Of all places, I was left alone in the one I hated most. Did I just think of old memories in an instant?

“You useless girl! Do you know how much this costs?”

My aunt’s sharp shout rang out. I turned toward the sound and saw a broken statue first.

Ah, the time I had broken a magically infused statue while cleaning it.

“I was just gently wiping it, but it cracked and broke…”

A tiny, intimidated child’s voice sent chills down my spine—it was my voice from when I was little.

“Everything she touches breaks, especially high-value items with magic. She’s definitely cursed.”

My uncle’s click of the tongue was exactly as I remembered.

Well, it’s no wonder a small child could break things while cleaning. And if you knew she’d break everything she touched and still made her do it, that’s on you.

But in their eyes, I didn’t exist, so no matter how angry I got, it was pointless.

I deliberately avoided looking at them. I didn’t want to see them. I just wanted to find the object that served as a medium and leave this place quickly.

“Go away! How did you even end up with this responsibility!”

I tried to stay composed despite my aunt’s aggravating voice.

I was just a bystander watching past memories—I couldn’t change the hurtful past. Worrying would only waste my emotions.

I climbed the stairs toward the small attic that had been my room. For some reason, I felt I needed to be here.

Creak.

The sound of the old door opening was familiar.

Inside, sitting on a rusty iron bed, was Dante, still in his secret agent outfit, staring at me with a blank expression.

Had he heard everything? I had vaguely explained the situation before… I hadn’t wanted to show it in such detail.

“When did you get here?”

My timid voice brought a faint smile to Dante’s face.

“I just arrived.”

There was no hint of pity or sympathy in his calm tone.

“And Elyuard?”

“I don’t know. Shall we start by looking for the object?”

I nodded and looked around the room. Cobwebs on the ceiling, creaking floorboards, dusty windowsills, a cold fireplace, clutter stacked like a storage room. Everything was perfectly preserved in my memory.

“I don’t see anything that could serve as a medium.”

“In that case, shall we go outside?”

Dante wiped the dusty window with his finger. Through the cleared part, the dark night sky was visible.

“Yes, let’s go out.”

No one appeared as we left the house. Perhaps they vanished because I didn’t want to see them.

Then it happened.

“Fire!”

A frantic shout rang out, and the surroundings suddenly brightened with flickering scarlet flames.

Ah, the fire from that day. Dante stopped and looked back at the burning house.

The roof was fully ablaze, and the fire was spreading rapidly to the attic.

“Let’s just go, Dante.”

I grabbed Dante’s arm and pulled.

Through the wide-open attic window, we could see a terrified child.

That’s me. Why this nightmare of all things?

I clenched my teeth and shut my eyes tightly. At that time, I jumped out to survive. Though unharmed, the memory left me scarred in another way.

I shut my eyes tightly and prayed the dream would change.

I didn’t want to show weakness. I wanted to seem like a strong person who could shrug off hurt and say it was nothing.

“I know it’s a dream, but I couldn’t just watch.”

Dante’s deep voice reached me through my lowered eyelids. Opening them, I saw Dante holding a brown-haired girl in his arms.

She was unconscious, hanging limp. Did he catch me as I fell from the burning house?

“This won’t change the past, though.”

Dante’s words made me step back. Did he know this child was me?

Seeing my childhood self cradled in his arms made something deep within me spill over.

It felt like my small self was sinking into his ocean-like eyes.

“…”

Before I could speak, the surroundings vanished like a curtain being drawn. The child in his arms disappeared too.

The space had changed to our house, the Garciel Mansion. Finally, I was out of the dream with no context. Apparently, the child from the nightmare was the medium.

“You arrived early. Looks like it was a more horrifying dream than expected. Weakening your heart.”

Inside the mansion, Elyuard sat on a wooden rocking chair, legs crossed alluringly.

“Elyuard? Where have you been?”

I asked, confused. He smiled faintly and tilted his crossed legs.

“The master and General Dyke went down to the abyss. I wasn’t there, so I couldn’t accompany them. Even devils can’t easily access that place.”

He wasn’t there, so he couldn’t come in—what did that mean? Elyuard rose from his seat.

“Finally, we’ve entered the diary owner’s memories.”

He gestured toward a spot. I turned to see where he was pointing.

Two people were sitting across from each other on the sofa by the fireplace.

A beautiful woman with long, thick brown hair—Rilke.

And across from her, a man with black hair, lake-blue eyes, and handsome features who looked exactly like Dante.

Dante…?

No, he looked identical to Dante.

I observed him closely.

Could this be “Eden van Sinelli”? No wonder Grandmother Liliana mistook Dante for her first love. They didn’t just resemble each other—they were identical.

Then, could the affair letter from 150 years ago have been sent by Grandmother Liliana? The letter fiercely asking why they hadn’t divorced despite deciding to do so.

“That man looks exactly like Dante,” I said.

Dante looked down at me and asked,
“Do I look like that?”

“Yes. You, in your classical attire with hair brushed back, just like Dante.”

Covered-Dante and stripped-Dante… nothing is easy to decide. Old-style clothes really suit him too.

“I think I look better,” Dante said arrogantly.

This man, as I suspected before, has a strong desire to win in appearance. I shook my head and pointed at Rilke.

“But Rilke doesn’t look like me at all. Only hair and eye color match. I don’t understand why Grandmother Liliana mistook me for her.”

“Perhaps she saw something else,” Elyuard suggested.

Maybe taking on the role of the mansion’s caretaker gave me a similar aura—my mannerisms, personality, or the like.

I scratched my head and looked at Dante and Elyuard.
“They can’t see us, right?”

Dante nodded and focused on the two, presumably Rilke and Eden.

“Yes, it’s just a memory. Unlike dreams we can intervene in, we can only replay words and actions recorded in the past.”

Elyuard brushed his bangs back as he spoke.
“But the order seems jumbled, like you opened random chapters.”

Ah, so it’s like a random replay.

Then, the voices of the two in Rilke’s memory began to become clear.