There was silence in the stable—a heavy, suffocating silence that wrapped around Nyx like chains of smoke. Time seemed to stretch endlessly. Love's voice had stopped, but the echoes of her words still hung in the air, tormenting him.
He didn't move. He didn't speak. He just sat there, eyes fixed on nothing, heart pounding like drums of war inside his chest. His mind was a battlefield, torn between fury, disbelief, and a strange numbness that crept up like frost.
If he were Nyx—truly Nyx—he would have been disgusted by his own existence, repulsed by the blood that ran in his veins. But he wasn't. Not really.
He was someone else, living inside the shell of a boy born from horror. And because of that, he wasn't disgusted by himself. Because he knew—he was not him.
"I'm still free," he whispered to himself, as if trying to hold onto that one truth in a world that had just unraveled.
Then, after what felt like an eternity, Love's voice returned. This time, softer—but still laced with bitterness.
[No one knows that Alice was pregnant,]
She said.
[The servants who found out… they were all killed. Nero gave the order himself. No one was allowed to speak. No one was allowed to look. Only a handful of the most loyal people—people who had pledged their lives to the emperor—knew the truth.]
[To the rest of the empire, Alice was simply ill. Gravely ill. Bedridden. Too fragile to be seen. The nobles whispered. The people pitied. But no one knew. No one even suspected. The empire kept moving, blind to the sickness that had rooted itself at its very core.]
Love continued:
[After just five months… everything began to collapse. The empire was rotting. Nero no longer cared about the outside world. He did not attend court. He passed no decrees. He ignored reports of famine, rebellion, war.]
[He just sat in Alice's chamber. Always. Unmoving. Unblinking. Watching her. Watching her stomach swell with the child.]
[And when he wasn't there, the ministers and a mage—Arcetius—handled the rule in his absence. But they didn't save the empire.]
[They watched it fall apart. Maybe they wanted it to fall apart. Maybe they just didn't care.]
[But Nero… he wasn't even aware. He was obsessed. Possessed. Like a man cursed to wait for a miracle that should have never been.]
Nyx said nothing.
[He sat by her side every day,] Love said.
[Silent. Motionless. His eyes never left her belly. And in those eyes—there was no soul. No love. No regret. Only hunger. Desperation. Like a ghoul waiting to feast.]
[After nine months… it happened,] Love said.
[She gave birth. Alone in that room. The loyalists were there to help, yes—but they too were disposable. As soon as the child was born, they were executed. One by one. Nero didn't want witnesses. He didn't want anyone else to touch what he believed was his.]
[And when he saw the child… he smiled. For the first time in years, he smiled like a man who had found heaven. All the horrors he had committed—he forgot them. In that moment, he wasn't a monster. He was just a father. A father cradling his child.]
[He never let Alice see her son. Not even once. The moment the child left her body, Nero took him away. And with him, he took whatever light was left in Alice's world.]
[He never looked at Alice again. Never spoke to her. Never even acknowledged that she existed.]
[He spent every waking hour with the child. Cradling him. Singing to him. Rocking him to sleep. And when he had to part from the child—to let him be fed—he stood outside the door, counting the seconds until they were reunited.]
[The world outside could have burned. And maybe it was. But Nero didn't care. To him, the empire was that child. Nothing else mattered.]
Nyx sat still, breath shallow. He felt like screaming, but even that felt too small—too powerless—compared to the weight of what he had just heard.
[But time is merciless,]
Love said.
[It moves the same for kings and beggars, saints and sinners. Happiness—no matter how twisted—doesn't last forever.]
[And one day, Alice escaped.]
[With the help of some of the royal family—those who still had hearts beating in their chests—she fled the palace in the dead of night. Disguised. Weak. But determined.]
[She ran to her mother's homeland. Her last sanctuary.]
[And there… she told them everything. Everything Nero had done. Everything he had become.]
The stable grew colder.
----
Love's voice was a little calm and relaxed:
["I only know this much. I don't know the exact story after this."]
Nyx's expression twisted into one of mild annoyance, confusion flaring in his eyes. "What do you mean you don't know the story after this?"
Love's voice was casual, almost indifferent.
["I mean what I said—I don't know the exact story after this."]
"That doesn't make any sense." Nyx leaned forward, his tone sharpened with frustration. "You've been telling me everything so far like you watched it happen. How can you suddenly not know what happened next?"
["I didn't say I don't know anything,"]
Love replied coolly.
["I said I don't know the exact story. There's a difference."]
Nyx crossed his arms, eyes narrowed. "Then what am I supposed to do with that? How am I supposed to find out what happened after all this?"
Love's answer came with a faint echo of amusement.
["The story after this is the kind people whisper at night. It's not recorded in books. It's not spoken in court. It's the kind of story mothers tell their children to warn them about monsters. It's like the story they made to tell the glory of warriors who defeat the monster king."]
Nyx tilted his head, his voice quieting. "So… it might just like a fairy tale?"
["Maybe."]
A pause.
["Or maybe it's truth dressed as legend. You decide."]
Nyx sighed, shaking his head. "Alright then… tell me. Let's hear this legend."
Love chuckled softly, her voice lowering to a near-whisper.
["Okay, so listen…"]
To be continued...