The Villain’s Ending

Chapter 18

Afterimage (5)

Estelle traced Levina’s neck, then lightly raised a finger to caress her cheek.

“Estelle.”

Levina opened her mouth. Her voice was sharp as a blade.

“Take that hand off me, or else.”

“Or else? What will you do? Will I also suddenly be found hanging in my room one day? Your brother probably went to hell. God says not to commit suicide, you know.”

Estelle said, almost humming. Her gaze did not falter from Levina’s eyes. She even seemed to be enjoying it.

“Aren’t you curious? About what happens when someone hangs themselves. How many do you think I’ve hanged?”

Estelle whispered into Levina’s ear. Her tone was so calm, like she was making casual conversation.

“It might be different for heretics. First, their faces turn a pretty shade of purple, you know. I wonder if it’s a similar color to what you’re holding? They swell up gradually, and then eventually turn black.”She paused for a moment and took another bite of her sandwich. The sound of her chewing the ham and cheese was unusually loud.

“Then their tongues roll out, and their eyeballs try to pop out. They writhe and struggle with their whole body, but I always tied their hands, so I’m not sure what happened. Ah, perhaps Miss Fiancee over there would know better. Wouldn’t you, Seraphina?”

Estelle’s gaze turned towards Seraphina, who was sitting in the corner.

Seraphina bowed her head even deeper. Like someone who wished to become invisible.

“They say you embraced the corpse for two whole days? Didn’t it smell? People rot when they die, don’t they? I’ve seen people rot alive, but I’ve never seen a dead person rot.”

I burned them all. Though I only saw one person rot alive.

“……”

“It must have been a terrible stench once it started to rot. What were you thinking, smelling all that?”

“Stop.”

Levina said. Her voice was even lower than before.

“Stop it, Estelle.”

“They say the bugs eat the eyes first. He probably wasn’t sad to have so many new friends. I only had one, you know. Lavin betrayed me! Eheheh!”

Estelle walked towards Seraphina. The click-clack of her heels cut through the silence of the banquet hall. Click, clack.

She squatted down in front of Seraphina and peered into her face. Seraphina’s face was ghostly pale. Streaked with what might have been tears or sweat.

“What’s wrong? You should smile. Your wish came true, didn’t it? I heard you were desperate to break off the engagement. God granted your wish. Shouldn’t you offer a prayer of thanks? Oh, and you can give your offering to me. I’ll make sure it’s used for something suitably valuable.”

Seraphina bit her lip. Blood seeped out, but she said nothing. No, she couldn’t.

Estelle looked at her and cackled. It was a childish, innocent laugh.

“Estelle. That’s enough.”

Finally, Kyle could no longer hold back and spoke.

“Why? Did I say anything wrong?”

“Yes. This isn’t the time for such words.”

“Then should I pretend to be sad? Is there anyone here who’s genuinely sad? Kyle, you’re not particularly sad either, are you? You just ended up here by chance, didn’t you? Because of some crazy bitch who unluckily hugged a corpse.”

Estelle was smiling, but her right hand was trembling violently.

“So just shut up, Estelle. At least have some….”

She gripped her own wrist, and once the trembling ceased, she continued speaking.

“Kyle. You need to know your place. What good is being skilled with a sword and having great abilities, if you’re so utterly tactless?”

The smile had vanished from her face.

“Look, it’s a problem if you mistake us for being on the same level just because we chatted lightly and hunted some demons together.”

She flicked Kyle’s chin with her finger. With the lightest touch of contempt.

“I am the Saintess of the Order, and you are, at best, a commoner with some exceptional abilities. Oh, you might get a title someday, with abilities like yours. So? Is that the position from which you can offer me suggestions or advice?”

Estelle’s words were directed at Kyle, but they were also directed at herself.

The title of Saintess. Estelle simply hated being called ‘Saintess.’ She had liked it when Lavin started calling her ‘Estelle’ at some point. Even if others called her ‘Estelle’ instead of ‘Saintess,’ she knew it wasn’t much different from calling her ‘Saintess Estelle.’ Who would carelessly ignore the Saintess when she spoke, or move seats pretending not to see whatever prank she pulled when an interesting part came up in a novel, or casually accept a half-eaten apple and eat it deliciously?

Estelle slowly closed and opened her eyes.

“I could instantly find fault and declare you, and that esteemed Young Head, and that idiotic bastard who doesn’t even look sad that his own son died, heretics at any moment… but what’s the point of saying it?”

Her voice was quiet, but it overpowered all other sounds in the banquet hall. People watched the two, holding their breath. No one had ever imagined that a person calling herself Saintess would act this way.

“Kyle. Be aware of your place. Lavin was very good at that. He became someone who was meant to die, so he died, didn’t he? Huh?”

Estelle knew her words were hurting herself, but she couldn’t stop. If she didn’t act like this, she might blame herself. She didn’t want to think it was her fault. Lavin knew very well that she was the one who had allowed monsters to be summoned into the forbidden library. He knew no one would believe him, so he didn’t bother to speak about it to others, but he could have at least hurled resentment or hatred at her, but he didn’t. He was truly a strange friend. Because he had agreed to her request to be friends, even after all that. Because he didn’t push her away. Whenever she pretended to be the merciful, generous, faithful Saintess, and then revealed just a little of her true colors like this, everyone looked at her with such loathing. Just as if they were looking at a heretic. Just like Kyle was looking at her now.

But Lavin didn’t really care. Perhaps he had already been preparing himself to hang, deep down. Still, it didn’t really matter. Lavin seemed to know that she was the one who had opened the forbidden library, and that she was doing all sorts of crazy things, hoping for something ‘interesting’ to happen, regardless of whether students got caught up in it and died. In truth, she also enjoyed watching heretics hang and die, but she didn’t want to show him that side of her. Yet he wouldn’t have glared at her, or looked at her with resentment, or acted as if the Saintess he knew wasn’t this kind of person. Lavin, surely.

Estelle lightly stroked Kyle’s cheek with her palm. It was not a gesture of comfort or affection.

Kyle fell silent. He no longer knew what to say.

The silence in the banquet hall deepened further. Everyone just watched Estelle’s next action with bated breath.

“So.”

Yes, that was… what should I call it? Something only my family had done for me. Only one, of course. My mother and father, too, would look at me like I was trash that needed to be disposed of, or a beast that had carried off a sheep from the fold, whenever I came home after tormenting someone somewhere, or when I got into a fight with some boy from the neighborhood as a child and impulsively smashed his head with a rock.

Lavin and my younger brother had nothing in common. As I said, my brother resembled me, so if he had grown up, he would certainly have been more handsome than Lavin.

But if there was one thing that was the same… it was that no matter what I said, they wouldn’t look at me with those eyes. Those eyes of disbelief, as if asking how I could do such a thing, or eyes that seemed to impose some standard on me.

Estelle turned back to Levina. A playful smile was back on her face. The unstable appearance from moments before was nowhere to be seen.

“Tell me. How do you feel? Now that Étoile is dead, what kind of….”

Levina’s face froze.

“……Étoile?”

Levina repeated the name. It was a name she had never heard before. So she looked at Estelle with a puzzled expression.

At the unfamiliar name that came from Estelle’s lips, everyone in the banquet hall tilted their heads in confusion.

At that moment, the smile vanished from Estelle’s face. She seemed to realize what she had said. Her lips trembled uncontrollably.

Étoile. It was the name of her dead younger brother. A name she had never once spoken aloud to anyone. The faint afterimage she had seen superimposed on Lavin.

“……Ah.”

A short gasp escaped her lips. The wine glass slipped from her hand and fell to the floor.

CRASH.

Red wine scattered like bloodstains across the white marble floor. Sharp fragments flew everywhere. Everyone’s gaze was fixed on the broken glass. No one saw Estelle’s face.

“Ugh.”

A sudden urge to vomit rose within her. The unpleasant sensation of stomach acid burning its way up her throat. The sandwich she had just eaten, the wine, and nameless emotions churned in her stomach. She could no longer stand there.

Estelle turned around and fled the banquet hall as if escaping. Her footsteps faltered. Her white priestly robe disappeared down the corridor.

That day, the funeral ended in such a manner.

Roughly a week later, perhaps. News reached Estelle’s ears that someone had died. They said a beautiful girl with blonde hair and blue eyes had hanged herself on the doorknob of the room Lavin once used. A doorknob, she wondered how one could even die that way. Her name was Seraphina.

The news instantly swept through the Academy. Having little interest, Estelle let the news go in one ear and out the other, pulled out a cheap cigarette from her pocket, jammed it into her mouth, and lit it. She inhaled deeply. The smoke pierced her lungs. It tasted awful. It was the same cheap brand Lavin always smoked, but it still tasted awful. It was like inhaling the smoke from burning wet leaves. She wondered why he liked smoking such a thing. Even when she offered to buy him better ones, he refused.

Outside the window, it was still sunny. A cloudless blue sky. Leaves swaying in the wind. It was the scenery of a peaceful afternoon. Did that woman who died feel this way after Lavin’s death? She didn’t know. She had felt a certain fondness for him, and had wanted to be his friend, but it wasn’t a feeling of wanting to love him with her whole being.

Estelle slowly exhaled the smoke. The hazy smoke obscured her vision. She didn’t want to see anything.