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Chapter 19
“Loving Even If It Kills ME
This morning, when he turned his back on Senelia, it was a feeling he desperately wanted to deny.
Benerucia let out a bitter laugh.
He didn’t know when it had started.
But even someone like Lucalina had ended up loving Senelia beyond the point of no return.
Ah, how arrogant he had been.
He regretted mercilessly turning away from Senelia this morning. Only now did her somewhat gaunt face come to mind.
‘I shouldn’t have treated her so cruelly.’
Once that thought crossed his mind, Benerucia’s head was filled with nothing but Senelia.
All the thoughts he had forced himself to delay came crashing in like a tidal wave.
For example… the thought that Senelia might never return to him again.
If it weren’t for Lucalina’s sharp voice breaking in, he might have leapt to his feet right then.
“Senelia Daphnen?”
Benerucia flinched at the name coming from Lucalina’s lips.
She had been away from the capital for eleven years, and the Daphnen viscountcy wasn’t a particularly prominent noble family. Senelia had only started appearing in social circles about eight years ago.
And yet, Lucalina knew Senelia’s surname—without him ever having mentioned it.
But that wasn’t the end of Lucalina’s surprising words.
“Didn’t you break up with Senelia Daphnen seven years ago?”
Benerucia’s expression hardened.
Seven years ago was even before he and Senelia had become lovers.
Break up? Her words didn’t make sense.
“Luna, you’re acting strange today.”
Benerucia’s instincts were screaming.
The sense of unfamiliarity he felt from Lucalina—this wasn’t just a coincidence.
This was the same instinct that had saved him countless times on the battlefield.
“What exactly are you hiding from me?”
When Benerucia pressed her, Lucalina bit her lip tightly.
She had gone too far—she realized it too late after his unexpected question.
After a brief hesitation, she asked him something completely unrelated.
“Ben, do you really think you love Senelia Daphnen?”
There was something strange about that question.
As if… she thought Benerucia’s feelings were just a delusion.
“…Yes, I love Selly.”
Pressed by Lucalina’s sharp gaze, Benerucia finally answered.
Then Lucalina clenched her teeth and continued.
“You’re mistaken.”
“Luna.”
“Because three years from now, you and I will be married.”
“…What?”
It sounded like a prophecy. Benerucia asked again, startled.
“…I’m not just saying it. I know the future.”
Lucalina took a deep breath, and as if she had made up her mind, she continued.
“I’m a Thorn of Chlorakean.”
‘Thorn of Chlorakean.’
As a member of the imperial family, Benerucia understood what that meant.
And now, Lucalina had spoken that word—something only the royal family should know.
If she wasn’t truly a Thorn of Chlorakean, there was no way she could know that term.
“As I said, I returned to the past five years ago. I dragged out the war instead of ending it immediately, so I could gather people who’d stand with us.”
The Thorn of Chlorakean, as known by the imperial family, referred to those who had reincarnated or possessed others.
But in truth, it referred to those who could defy the path set by the three Fates.
In other words, Lucalina was a new kind of anomaly—one who could change destiny.
She continued.
“Choose me, Ben. Clifford will eventually kill you. Only if we join forces can we both survive.”
Benerucia was too overwhelmed to say anything.
But ironically, in that moment… he thought it would be okay, even if he had to die—if it meant he could stay by Senelia’s side.
“It makes sense that I feel off to you. I returned at age 27, three years older than I am now. In effect, I’ve lived eight extra years.”
Lucalina, oblivious to his thoughts, went on.
“The year two years from now… that one year was utter hell. Clifford and I went to war. It was a war so great that it made everything we’d experienced so far look like child’s play. It’s no wonder I seem unfamiliar to you.”
Benerucia couldn’t fathom her words.
For him and Clifford to go to war meant a civil war in the empire over the throne.
If it were truly bigger than any war either had fought, the empire must have been devastated.
“…Why did the war break out?”
“Because Clifford never let go of his wariness toward you.”
Benerucia fell silent again.
He already knew Clifford always regarded him with suspicion.
But he couldn’t believe Clifford would suddenly decide to kill him without a trigger.
“That’s it?”
Benerucia’s tone had changed, almost like he was interrogating her.
Lucalina’s brows twitched.
“Then what else is there?”
“I…”
Benerucia hesitated.
His feelings had changed, and he didn’t know if it was right to say this now.
But even with that hesitation, he felt his guess was probably right.
“Wasn’t it because I never completely let you go?”
“…What?”
Lucalina blinked, shocked.
To Benerucia, her voice sounded like she was asking: How could you say that?
“My brother has always been wary of us. But during the 11 years we were apart, he never tried to kill me.”
Benerucia wasn’t blaming Lucalina.
He just thought that if his guess was correct, then he needed to distance himself from her.
“My brother… never wanted to kill me.”
If Clifford had wanted him dead, he would’ve cut him down when he was just a powerless 15-year-old.
But after Benerucia went to war, he gained knights who supported him.
“Ben, have you forgotten who sent you to the battlefield in the first place?”
Lucalina asked bitterly.
Most nobles believed Clifford hadn’t wanted to kill his brother directly and instead sent him to a death trap.
It wasn’t entirely wrong.
“If he dies in war, it’ll just be his fate.”
Clifford knew full well that Benerucia could die in battle—and still sent him.
“But if he comes back alive, there’ll be one less reason for us to fight.”
But in gaining his own faction separate from the nobles, Benerucia became someone who could oppose them.
Clifford wasn’t wrong.
Had Benerucia allowed the nobles to sway him and threatened the throne, Clifford might have killed him.
Though time on the battlefield constantly threatened Benerucia’s life, in the end—it saved him.
“My brother hasn’t killed me yet. And it’s not just because we’re blood.”
Benerucia’s thoughts weren’t based on sentimentality.
He knew exactly what he meant to Clifford.
“Every person has at least a shred of humanity they want to protect.”
To Clifford, Benerucia was the last of that humanity.
Though not full-blooded siblings, after killing their other half-blood siblings, Clifford couldn’t fall any further. Benerucia was the final line he wouldn’t cross.
In Clifford’s mind, there was only one person who could shake Benerucia enough to break this fragile peace.
The only one Benerucia had never forgotten since he was a child… and whom Clifford believed he still hadn’t let go of.
Lucalina Elian. No one else.
“So that horrific war I experienced… was because of me?”
Lucalina’s lips trembled.
For the first time, her eyes showed resentment toward Benerucia.
How could such devastation be her fault alone?
“That’s not it. I’m saying, if something like that were to happen… it would be because of me.”
Benerucia shook his head gently and tried to calm her with a soft voice.
“Not opposing my brother is the least I can do. I’m alive because he endured everything and ascended the throne.”
If Clifford had sacrificed Benerucia back then, he would’ve been safer.
Even if he eventually threw him to the wolves later, Clifford still protected him in the end.
Benerucia had already shed so much blood on the battlefield.
If someone heard this, they might call it hypocrisy.
But he didn’t want to stain his hands with his brother’s blood.
That was why he endured all the pressure from the imperial family.
Clifford knew this too.
They were each other’s last vestige of humanity.
That’s how the strange peace between them was maintained.
As long as neither broke it—there would be no war.
And Benerucia suspected he was the one who’d broken it.
Just thinking about Senelia—about what he would be willing to do for her—was reason enough.
If having Senelia meant crossing that line, he would do it.
“Luna, I’ve never thought of marrying anyone else. I only wanted to marry you… but I knew it wasn’t possible.”
At Benerucia’s words, Lucalina’s eyes shimmered.
