119 – Isabella
Everyone was enjoying the festival.
The sound of loud laughter continued throughout the streets, and everyone was having a good time drinking alcohol or playing event games in groups of twos and threes.
As it is the largest festival in the empire, there are plenty of things to do.
“······.”
However, there was one person who was not particularly welcomed.
Isabella Graham.
This is because the harsh words spat out to the audience during the ‘Leon Clendor’ incident not long ago still remain in their hearts.
“Welcome—”
When Isabella visits the festival booth, the employee freezes while greeting her.
After glancing at her with her cold eyes, he greets her stiffly with a different attitude than before.
“Kkkkk. Are you showing it too openly? “You know who I am, right?”
“···Sure. “You are a guest.”
Is it because disdain has become greater than fear?
Now, even with moderate threats, he was openly giving off a bad vibe.
As Isabella let out a black haze all over her body, the waitress sighed and said,
“No, you don’t get tired of it? “Why do you always argue with other people like that?”
“······.”
“What on earth is so twisted? Is that all that comes from the grand duke’s family? “As long as you’re strong, that’s all you need?”
“Uh. “Might is law here.”
However, Isabella’s expression did not change even in the face of her employee’s cold attitude.
As always, she simply presses down on her opponent with her own organs.
With Graham’s special technique, a curse.
“Ah! “Keuuu!”
A technique to destroy the mind of an employee.
Soon, the employee fell to the floor and started vomiting.
The grotesque scene unfolding in her own head made her feel sick to her stomach and her head became dizzy.
“I know the topic. “Where do I keep my eyes straight on the subject beneath me?”
“Kuheuuu!”
The friendly atmosphere suddenly turned cold.
The cadets who were happily drinking at the trouble that occurred between Isabella and her employees look at them with uncomfortable eyes.
Eventually, the situation came to an end when another employee, inferior to her, bowed his head to Isabella and apologized for her own motivation for being rude.
-It’s really too much.
-What is the cost of gaining strength in that way?
However, the noise whispering about Isabella seemed to be louder than before.
This is because Isabella’s method of unilaterally criticizing her opponents has accumulated over a long period of time.
“······.”
However, Isabella actually welcomed this situation.
This is because her negative attitude towards herself becomes a source of strength.
The more they spit out harsh words towards themselves.
The better the feelings are conveyed, the stronger the power of ‘negativity’ becomes.
You can become the strongest cadet that no one can surpass.
“The seasoning is not right. “Please cook the food again.”
So, Isabella stopped by her festival booth and repeatedly committed actions that would incur her resentment.
If there was something worth catching, she would grab it like a wild beast and put pressure on her opponent, and such behavior was enough to incur public resentment from those around her.
Because it was a festival season where everyone should have fun, the antipathy toward oneself was twice as much as usual.
This is a golden opportunity to accumulate negativity.
“What are you doing?”
In the meantime, Enya came to visit Isabella.
He spat out the following words with angry eyes.
“Are you just going to leave now? “Why are you acting like that?”
“······.”
Enya begins to criticize Isabella in a very harsh tone.
However, there was Enya’s own warmth inside.
I came here because I was worried about Isabella.
I’m afraid that if I leave her alone, I’ll incur even more hate.
“What does it matter to you?”
“····What?”
“Who cares? “If you act arrogantly, you will get hit.”
But Isabella licked her lips and looked at Enya.
It was as if he was waiting for her to get angry.
“······.”
And at that moment, Enya could feel it.
That Isabella is preying on her own anger.
That she is waiting for an opportunity to trample on her own heart, only to feed her power of denial.
“Why…why on earth…”
Enya looked at Isabella with tearful eyes.
She was her best friend when she was young.
But after she awakened Graham’s unique special technique, her irreplaceable friend completely changed.
The good and kind friend turned into an evil woman who slanders and exploits others.
‘Enya.’
However, in Enya’s memories, the young Isabella was still good.
When I returned to her house, kicking stones from the street, I remembered how kind she was, who fell in love with her stones and brought them back to her room.
Also, when she lost her way in the mountains and encountered a wild boar, she remembered her trusty friend who covered her with his whole body.
Isabella was a better child than anyone else.
“······.”
But now she has become a power-crazed evil woman.
Even now she was watching for her opportunity, licking her lips to prey on her own emotions.
She wants herself to be sad and angry.
-Poof.
So Enya just turned around.
Thump. Thud. She left her position at a brisk pace.
Isabella twitched the corner of her mouth as she looked at her back.
***
Midnight.
While the festival was a success, Isabella climbed the mountain at the Academy.
Today is the day when the ‘art of control’ is lifted, so it is necessary to come to a place where there is no one.
From noble mtl dot com
“Whoa…”
Isabella took a deep breath after climbing up the deserted mountain.
Seeing her heart start to beat faster, it was clear that the ‘art of control’ would soon be lifted.
She had to brace herself because she didn’t know what would happen if the ‘art of control’ was released.
She must hold on to this moment to avoid becoming a wreck like her older sister.
“Wow!”
At that time, a signal began to arrive.
A crushing headache started to come to my head, and it became difficult to breathe as if my chest was tight.
It was a precursor symptom that appeared just before the art of control was about to be lifted.
“uuu…”
It started to become difficult to control my emotions.
Immense sadness and self-loathing poured out like a flood.
This is because his true feelings, which he had blocked with the art of control, are coming back.
“Wow! Ugh!”
I felt like my heart would break.
The evil deeds he had committed so far passed through his mind like a panorama.
His first evil act was killing the puppy he raised with Enya.
-Drop it in front of Enya.
The first test given by her father to replace her older sister who had gone crazy.
That was to kill the puppy he cared for himself.
Of course, the puppy was a sickly puppy from the time he was first found and was destined to die soon, but there was a big difference between dying in care and killing it with one’s own hands.
-If you can’t do it, quit. Maybe you can reform your sister.
But there was no way to protect her sister.
She doesn’t want her older sister, who always cared for her, to be ruined anymore.
-Hey, Isabella… Ba, ba, what did you just do…?
-Why? After all, it’s a toy we used to play with, right?
After that, Isabella bore Graham’s cursed fate.
In order to be reborn as the next head of the family, she has undertaken a mission to accumulate the power of negativity.
On behalf of my sister who went crazy.
-Ah, Dad… Stop now… Please… Come back to the way it was before…
Of course, it was not an easy task.
It was not once or twice that the alcohol of control went out of control and collapsed in just one day.
Every time, my father always repeated the same thing.
-Kkekekekeuk… That’s a very good feeling. Try being more sad.
Her own emotions were eaten away.
Because the pain of someone close to you can be great nourishment.
From then on, Isabella was able to realize that her life could not go back to how it was before.
The warm appearance of my father in the past was all a pretense for this moment.
-Belly. There’s a reason, right? Huh? You didn’t do that on purpose, right? You can’t do that.
-What do you say? Plaguy.
From then on, Isabella began to become toxic.
To not go crazy like her older sister.
And to protect her sister who went crazy.
Following her father’s guidance, she learned how to accumulate negativity.
And she absorbed all the ways to control that power.
Luckily for her, she had an incredible talent for manipulating that power.
-uuu…
But that didn’t make it easier to accumulate negativity.
It was okay when the art of control was maintained, but on days when the art of control could not be maintained and ran wild, it was so painful that I fell into endless depression and wanted to die.
When he remembered the faces of everyone he had hurt, he couldn’t help but hurt himself.
Only then did Isabella understand why her sister attempted her suicide.
-Ha, is it fun?
It has been six years since I endured such painful times.
When she was 15 years old, Isabella had already become accustomed to accumulating her negativity.
She was able to endure the drinking of control that she had been drinking heavily in just one day for over a month, and now she was able to feel a kind of catharsis when she used the power of denial.
She came to understand her father.
‘Disgusting bastard.’
However, the more she understood her father, the more Isabella hated her father.
You committed such an evil act just to get this kind of pleasure from her.
The Graham family itself, which had repeated such evil deeds for generations, was also infinitely hateful.
In the end, isn’t breeding her offspring also to save a scapegoat to accumulate her own negativity?
The more I learned, the more crazy families there were.
-You will soon become like that too. You can never escape this fate.
-Well. I don’t have perverted tastes like you.
Isabella, who realized the cursed fate of the Graham family, made a decision.
She would surely end this cursed fate on her own behalf.
She said that one day, when she has accumulated enough power of denial that she will become the head of the family, she will not give birth to her children without herself being addicted to denial.
She said that until she dies, she will live to atone for those she has hurt.
She made that promise.
“Wow! Kuhuhhh! Ugh!”
But this is not easy either.
She had to hurt countless people to get there.
Also, ‘self-hatred’, which is the best food for accumulating negativity, has already surpassed its limit.
Will I be able to endure a lifetime of having to hurt the people I love?
“I’m sorry… I’m sorry… I was wrong…”
It takes 30 minutes for the art of control to return.
Isabella exploded with her suppressed emotions as she suffered from her seemingly endless suicidal thoughts and self-loathing.
She repeated her words of apology, recalling the faces of those who had hurt her and herself.
There is no way he can reach them until he becomes the head of the family.
“Haa…Haa…Haa…”
How long have we endured this painful time?
The art of control was finally returning.
You can be liberated from this pain and guilt that is weighing you down.
Isabella slowly calmed her breathing, feeling more and more at ease.
Now, if you just hold on for about 5 more minutes, it will be like before again─.
– Jeopuk.
But at that moment.
The sound of footsteps penetrating her ears.
The sound of her footsteps rustling through the bushes was heading precisely in this direction.
Embarrassed, Isabella hurriedly got up and tried to escape.
“Black!”
But her entire body felt weak.
This was because it took a lot of mana to disarm and recreate the control spell, and she was overworked by a torrent of emotions.
-Jeobeok… Jeobeok… Jebeok….
In the meantime, the sound of footsteps was unstoppable.
Step by step, I was steadily moving towards this place.
‘Oh, no…’
Isabella sensed her own condition.
Tangled hair and red-hot eyes.
Face stained with tears and clothes messed up.
She did not show her most miserable side to anyone.
“······!!”
While looking in the direction of the sign, I grabbed the dirt floor.
Finally, the owner of the footsteps arrived here.
He ended up having his face revealed.
“······.”
And the first person to witness Isabella’s collapse was none other than Ed.
Isabella Root.
She came to the event location to open the route.
Soon, Ed smiled a complicated smile and spoke to Isabella.
“It was here. Are you okay?”