"Wait, I'm coming in."
The uninvited guest spoke as naturally as if she'd arrived at a place she'd been invited to.
Fortunately, the window was closed.
Like most grand estates, it was structured so it couldn't be opened from the outside to prevent intruders from entering.
However, when Giselle briefly caressed the cross-shaped frame of the window, the glass vibrated and a thin gap formed between the window and the frame.
I could feel the wind flowing in, subtly controlled by Mana.
Soon, Giselle's long fingers slipped through that gap and pushed upward.
*She's fucking insane.*
The hem of her dress, black as night, began to seep into the half-darkened room.
Throughout all these actions, Giselle's red eyes remained fixed on me.
She walked with calm steps to the opposite side of the bed where I lay and opened her mouth.
"Hello, Ain. I missed you."
"Get lost."
The intensity I felt when facing her was noticeably less than in my previous life.
But the bewilderment was unavoidable.
"You don't look well, Ain. Have you caught some illness?"
This visit was earlier than usual, and this time around, we hadn't even run into each other in the plaza after my regression.
More than anything, no matter how many times I heard that bullshit, I could never get used to it.
Despite my courteous response, Giselle's composure didn't waver.
"It seems the misunderstanding hasn't been cleared up yet."
"How did you know I was here and barge in?"
Giselle began to slowly look around Iris's room, just as she had surveyed mine.
After a moment, she leaned against the desk where a lit lamp sat and spoke.
"Iris took a leave of absence from the Academy.
It was a sudden decision without any particular reason.
Your house was empty, left in a mess."
So she'd visited my house again.
And judging by how she knew what kind of disaster zone the interior was, she'd even gone inside.
Giselle's finger pointed toward the lights gathered on the ridge beyond the window.
"And I've been watching Iris's room light stay on for days without going out once.
I just stopped by to check, and what a joyful encounter this turned out to be.
Do you remember, Ain?
From your room, you could see our estate from afar too.
We even created signals to exchange every night.
Flickering the light once meant 'good night,' and twice meant..."
"I get it—you're a creepy voyeur.
I'll say it again. Get lost, Giselle."
Giselle's mouth, which had been chattering excitedly, closed.
As Giselle said, the Evergreen family estate was adjacent to ours.
Close enough to be visible from my room window, two rooms away from Iris's.
"I came because I wanted to talk with you, Ain.
That you're misunderstanding..."
"Let me guess. You want to say you have nothing to do with that bastard who came from the North, right?"
A small smile formed on Giselle's lips, which had been expressionless all along.
"I knew you would understand, Ain. I'm happy."
Still that bizarre mental structure.
What kind of thought process could possibly lead to such a conclusion?
This idiot who probably couldn't tell a sickle from the letter 'ㄱ' was once my everything.
"Are you still cherishing our ring?"
"I sold it. To trade for booze."
"Those are words that pain my heart. But it's okay, Ain.
The time we spent together is still engraved here."
Giselle said this while making a gesture of placing her clasped hands before her chest.
The heart inside must be colder than the ice sculpture Iris made.
Unlike our last reunion, this time I threw the ashtray beside me, aiming precisely at Giselle.
*Crash!*
The flying ashtray shattered against the wall, a bit away from Giselle.
It definitely missed because of my arm trembling worse than a willow branch.
Still, her gaze remained directed at me, not at the glass shards.
"Your anger hasn't subsided, Ain.
I won't go anywhere. I'll sit here and wait..."
"Giselle, I despise you."
Giselle's face, which had been smiling, became expressionless again.
Though I hadn't prepared them, blades that had been accumulating within me turned toward Giselle.
"I despise your sheltered young lady way of speaking and those crimson lips that form those words.
Whatever love you recite to me no longer moves me.
I want to rip out your vocal cords that carry that flat, emotionless voice.
When I recall the memory of pressing our lips together, moistening them with each other's fluids, nausea rises.
Your moronic way of thinking, which once seemed mysterious, now just feels like a tiresome maze.
Maybe my love was actually just lust—the kind you'd feel after your first experience with a prostitute—mistaken for love.
Ah, a prostitute might actually be better than you.
There was a time when opening those expensive legs of yours was my wish, but I never even did it once with you.
I hate you, Giselle. The wound you inflicted still throbs.
But it's not the pure pain of a wisdom tooth.
It's not growing pains that will become bittersweet when remembered someday.
It's an unwanted agony similar to the revulsion you feel when discovering a corpse crawling with maggots."
Though not a drop of proper alcohol had touched me, my tongue moved smoothly as if a floodgate had opened.
Words like deformed offspring born from layers of resentment and rage toward Giselle poured out.
Some of them were probably about myself too.
If there was any lie in what I said, it would be about wanting to fuck Giselle but not being able to.
When living as 'Ain,' I hadn't particularly craved a physical relationship with Giselle.
Just having her by my side was enough. For Ain.
My throat burned, perhaps from talking too much with my parched mouth.
With a destructive impulse to intensify that thirst, I put a cigar in my mouth.
I was holding the cigar cutter when it happened.
An orange flame bloomed in Giselle's hand as she'd somehow approached me.
She looked down at me, waiting for me to cut the cigar, her expression showing no bewilderment whatsoever.
Giselle's lips were curled up slightly again.
"You've become skilled at lying, Ain.
There's no way you could despise me. I can tell because our souls are connected.
Your love for me is as solid and unquestionable as mine, isn't it?"
I couldn't stand it anymore.
If I punched Giselle's doll-like smooth face right now, could I distort that expressionless look?
How satisfying would it be to grab Giselle's hair, scream at her, and slash at her with the cigar cutter I'm holding?
...It would probably only multiply my displeasure.
Seeing how she's unfazed by what I said, violence wouldn't crack her autistic thinking either.
Rather, she might even go:
*'You're doing this for me. I'm happy, Ain.'*
Just imagining that possibility gave me chills.
"By the way, I love someone else. Not you."
"That's an even more transparent lie, Ain.
There's no way you could love anyone but me."
Damn, it's not working at all.
I spat out the cigar I'd been holding without any desire to smoke it.
Though it was from the past since that love had already sailed, it had been sincere...
...Wait.
"...What if I did?"
"What are you talking about, Ain?"
"What if I loved someone other than you?"
"What could be more futile than hypothesizing something that can't happen, Ain?"
I remembered.
*'An insult to Ain is an insult to me. Take back what you just said. Right now.'*
*'The child who insulted Ain wouldn't take back their words, so I had to act.'*
The image of Giselle turning the gang that had bullied powerless, talentless me at the Academy into half-corpses.
How she burned one of them with flames conjured from her hands until their entire body was charred, then calmly made excuses.
That childlike cruelty and her closed-off attitude toward anyone other than Ain.
"Did you kill her?"
"Who are you talking about, Ain?"
"Mace. The nun. The Divinity Studies teacher. You killed them, Giselle."
The childish bullying Mace endured at the Academy overlapped with Giselle before my eyes.
I recalled the misfortunes that befell her one after another, as if they'd been prepared for Mace.
I reconsidered that thick malice I'd felt, whose source I couldn't identify.
It led to the question of whether it made any sense that even sunny Mace would readily accept and consume some unknown liquid given by a complete stranger.
If it had really been a gift from a beggar, she would have eaten it right there.
Not specifically at my house.
If what I'd thought were a series of disasters were actually planned by someone harboring the malice I'd noticed.
If that someone was Giselle right before my eyes.
If it was her, who wouldn't hesitate to commit any violence under the pretext of doing it for me.
I grabbed Giselle's pale nape and pulled her close.
Strength gradually entered my trembling hand.
Giselle answered in her still-calm tone.
"You know better than anyone that I have no religion, Ain.
I've never once been involved with those in holy orders."
Rich coming from someone who opens their mouth and talks about souls and whatnot.
I asked the wrong question.
Even if it was something Giselle did in my previous life, there's no way she'd remember it now.
To borrow her expression, I should ask by 'hypothesizing something that can't happen.'
"If I loved someone other than you, what would you do?"
"I told you, Ain. That won't..."
"Fuck, fine. Let's say it won't happen. But if it did, what do you think you'd do?
Please, just imagine it.
What would you do to the person I love?"
Giselle's face remained frozen without a flicker.
Her body was pulled toward me without any resistance.
Giselle's neck, which I'd been gripping, suddenly drew even closer.
*Smooch*
I threw away what I'd been holding without realizing it.
Giselle, with red handprints on her neck, licked her lips as if tasting my cheek where she'd kissed it.
Looking down at my face, which was probably filled with shock, she murmured, still expressionless.
"I would just wait. For a lifetime.
Even without any promise, I wouldn't mind at all."