DKFTI 86

Sibel’s body shrank, and Aizen’s grip lost strength. Sibel took the opportunity to pulled his face free. He shook his head.

“I am not blaming you.”

The calm voice continued flowing.

“For the past three years, I kept recalling and mulling over that day, and now the memory is worn out and frayed, so it’s no longer clear.”

“……”

Why did he keep ruminating and recalling things like that? He really had the taste of a masochist.

“My interpretation always changed depending on my mood. On bad days, I hated it so much that I tried to shake it off, and on good days, I foolishly misunderstood it as you having loved me.”

While the words continued, his heartbeat grew faster and faster.

“Did I just want to check?”

Aizen seemed to be resigned. How many times did he recall that day for his face to change just from bringing the story up?

Sibel felt as if he returned to that day three years ago in an instant. His heart beat unpleasantly again.

‘My feelings back then…?’

To be honest, even his memory of them was hazy. What stayed vivid was only that countless emotions swayed in confusion.

Maybe, as Aizen said, he might have seen pushing away someone who had nothing good to gain by staying here as his goal.

And at the same time, maybe what he felt was also very close to the emotion Aizen had called a misunderstanding.

“How was it. With what heart did you lie?”

As Sibel went over the memory of that day, his face grew rigid.

‘How do I… say this?’

The conclusion was simple. I just wished for you to be happy.

But if he said that now, it would only sound like a confession that admitted his feelings. His palms started sweating again.

If it were anyone else, it might be different, but if he threw even a small piece of kindling at Aizen, it felt like it would flare and burn the whole house down.

‘This conversation is too one-sided, like exposing my hidden cards…’

Aizen couldn’t help but feel Sibel’s hesitation, who was right in front of him. The path of his gaze, the trembling of his face, the broken rhythm of his breathing, the twitch of his lips. Even with those small and trivial changes, Aizen approached the answer he wanted. He caught Sibel’s troubled look.

Normally, he would have stepped back. But there are moments when you do not want to yield no matter how pitiful the eyes staring at you look. If it was about the thing that had split his head apart for three years, all the more so.

But the confrontation between the two showed no end.

“You are spineless. You can’t even make up a decent lie.”

“Who is spineless?”

It felt like they were playing a game where the one who loved more became the weaker one. Even knowing he would lose, he had to keep challenging, and yet he felt too bitter to just step down from the ring without resistance.

The pattern was always the same. When he looked at that small head, the urge to yield finally came, just like before, just like now.

The demon king who liked to avoid things, how long did he plan to keep running away? Aizen wanted to drive in a wedge no matter what, and Sibel only wanted to avoid it right now, so their interests always ran on crossed tracks.

Aizen’s body slowly lowered. He crouched before Sibel and stretched his hand. His fingers gave Sibel’s forehead a light flick.

Tok.

It was only a gesture close to a pretense that not even a newborn would feel hurt from, but Sibel rubbed his forehead.

“I only wanted to bring it up once.”

Aizen’s gaze, which had persistently followed every reaction of Sibel, slowly dropped to the ground.

“It is unfair if only I am left as the fool still clinging.”

This was closer to a monologue than to a conversation. At the same time, it was proof that his heart hadn’t changed.

Weakened, Aizen withdrew the hand that lingered in the air and scratched his neck.

“…Anything is fine, just say something.”

Sibel bit his lower lip.

“Did you like me even a little?”

This was not a question. This was the solitary monologue he had repeated over the past three years.

“Did you worry about me?”

His head tilted, and Aizen’s eyes became hidden.

“Did you, like me, suddenly rush out and call my name?”

As silence lingered, Sibel’s hand slowly rose through the air. His hand touched Aizen’s cheek. In that instant, Aizen’s eyes, which had been hidden by his lowered head, widened in surprise.

Slowly, Aizen lifted his head, and Sibel again faced Aizen’s black pupils. The black eyes whose depths could not be read reflected him like a mirror.

It was the moment Sibel’s lips began to part.

“No matter what you say, I won’t leave here.”

Aizen’s suddenly spoke, Sibel tilted his head in confusion. Why was he making a declaration so suddenly?

Was he doing this in case he got pushed away again…?

While Sibel felt puzzled for a moment, Aizen’s hand overlapped the back of his hand as if he intended to block in advance the retreat of the hand that lingered on his cheek.

Did he now start to gain some awareness? Sibel thought Aizen looked exactly like someone who was frightened.

He would feel fear at words that came out with just a twitch of the lips, and yet he acted blindly. Did he have much fear or no fear? Sibel couldn’t understand it.

Sibel ended up breaking into a small laugh. A soft breeze touched his pale clear face.

“Why do you go so far? Did you smear honey on the Demon King’s castle?”

Aizen did not give a reply, but his earlier words served as the answer without Sibel needing to hear it.

“Why do you go so far as this?”

A person who fell in love quickly still had differences. If he had been someone whose heart drifted easily, he would not have circled the same place so stubbornly for years.

“I always worried. I wondered if you died, or if you got hurt, and it’s shameless but I even wondered if you might no longer hate me….”

He knew how brazen these words were from Aizen’s position, but he felt that Aizen’s candor passed into him.

It was also because he lacked the iron nerves to lie before someone who spoke with sincerity.

“The truth is, back then, I didn’t want to push you away.”

Shanti and Ruru called this side of Sibel’s heart an excess of affection. They said he gave affection to humans as he gave it to demons.

But Sibel thought such a heart alone couldn’t have boiled inside him for three years. He recalled the days when he feared even checking if Aizen was alive or dead. It was not something he could hide anyway.

Being unable to push away the human called Aizen now felt like an illness.

“But you know. If I went back, I think I would make the same choice, and I would speak the same words, and I would wound you in the same way.”

Sibel had also thought deeply for three years. This was his conclusion. Whatever the heart, whatever the intention, in the end they could not help but wound each other. That was the same then and now.

If he turned his eyes just a little toward the future instead of the present, he saw a blazing sea of fire.

“I have too much to protect, and I do not want to ruin you, and also….”

There were hundreds of reasons to push him away. But perhaps the real problem always began with the words “even so.”

Aizen’s grip tightened as if he wanted to anchor Sibel in the present when he started to turn back again, and at the same time Sibel shook off the thoughts that had rushed in.

“Think simple. This is all my revenge.”

“Revenge?”

“Revenge I do to you. You are only receiving it.”

Revenge indeed suited Aizen well.

“Leave it to me. If you let yourself be swayed, that is even better.”

In that instant, a strange glint crossed Aizen’s eyes. Sibel felt a chill, but because his hand was tightly held, he couldn’t move at all.

It felt very twisted, but his heart felt at ease. What was this?

Sibel’s heart lost its way in confusion. Then Aizen seized Sibel’s wrist and pulled him. Sibel’s body followed the force that drew him.

A face that had been close became even closer. Their noses seemed about to touch.

“I want to kiss you.”

Aizen’s gaze touched Sibel’s lips that looked soft and moist.

At that moment Sibel felt an alarm ringing in his ears. Had he not just handed Aizen the key that released the reins. He looked as if he really would run wild.

“I want more than that.”

He did not even try to conceal his base nature. But absurdly, it came across natural.

Aizen’s straightforwardness struck Sibel as ridiculous., but not hateful. At that moment, his facial muscles tingled as if they would break into a smile.

Then Sibel spotted something behind Aizen’s cheek. Something white and blurred.

‘Annoying, this damned house.’

What entered Sibel’s eyes as his focus settled was none other than….

“Hey.”

Sibel pointed over Aizen’s shoulder as Aizen edged his lips closer. Aizen turned his head.

“Ha….”

At that moment, an exasperated sigh left Aizen’s mouth.

Sibel’s body flinched, and Aizen straightened his posture.

“This wretched castle is always the same.”

The sound of his teeth grinding rang out. For some reason, a holy sword started to form in Aizen’s hand.

What Sibel had seen was a ghost. In the black corridor, a ghost floated white and hazy while staring at them.

His heart almost fell out of his chest.

While Sibel massaged his pounding heart with his hand, Aizen walked step by step toward the ghost. A sinister energy filled his back.

‘Uh oh…. That man is about to kill a dead ghost again….’

Sibel felt a murderous aura, and he thought Aizen would really kill someone.