Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

Imagine.

Imagine a tabula rasa. A blank canvas, white, pure.

Now, imagine a brush and using it to paint on the blank canvas.

You don’t know what you are drawing or who you are drawing, but your hands move on their own and choose the colors that should decorate that canvas.

Blue, pink, white, black. These are the most important colors.

You begin to work without stopping, and the reward is the beauty that is already being shown. The outlines have been defined, the shapes have been drawn and the colors have been filled in.

What you obtain is a portrait of a girl. A girl with dreams, bonds, hopes and a name.

However, you are not finished painting yet. There is still one color left to use.

This time, your hands choose red.

Red? Why red, of all colors? You know that red and blue do not go well together, yet you decide to do it anyway. You feel an irresistible urge to use red.

Using the red was a mistake; you knew it was a mistake before you started, and it is only when the tube of red runs dry that you stop. Red is everywhere. It covers the clothes, the face, the eyes, the hands, the arms, and the legs. You have used too much.

You have ruined the painting, but you do not want to give up: the red has not completely covered all the other colors. Perhaps with effort you can fix it.

Now imagine an eraser and using it to remove the traces of red.

You struggle immensely in this arduous task, since it is very difficult to erase a color once it has been painted, but you do your best. You put all the strength you have into your arms, driven by a passion that only love for that painting could give you.

Unfortunately, you have only made things worse: you used so much force with the eraser that you erased everything. Now the outlines are blurred, you can no longer distinguish either the shapes or the colors. You have made your painting completely unrecognizable.

As a result, you get angry. You become so angry that you kick the legs of the easel and make the canvas fall into the mud.

Now your canvas is completely dirty with earth. Perhaps before you could hope to make your portrait at least acceptable, but now it is a disaster.

There is nothing else you can do. You are forced to throw the canvas away and start over from scratch.

Light. A warm, faint, natural ray that illuminated the entire room without being intrusive or blinding. This was what finally roused Rem from her sleep.

The sunlight wasn't special. It had shone today like it had shone the day before, and the day before that, and the day before that. All the way back to when Rem had been placed in this room by her caring sibling. If it had been special, perhaps Rem's awakening would have been relaxing.

Instead, reality was not so merciful. Rem’s rebirth was not serene, peaceful, or restorative. The sunlight had grown too dense and oppressive for the soul that wished to keep sleeping and live in the limbo of illusion, like a mirage in the desert that suddenly vanishes from sight.

The moment she awoke, Rem was overwhelmed by a wave of dizziness. Her thoughts were confused, tangled, clouded, stained. She had slept too long and too deeply. Rest that should have proved to restore her body and refresh the mind now only served to wrap her wits in wool and befuddle the mind.

After regaining consciousness, Rem’s eyes looked around. The modest room was perfectly in order: the ceiling and magical lamps were meticulously maintained, the curtains were immaculate, and the furniture was polished enough to reflect her face. And yet all she saw was red. It was everywhere, splattered across all the walls, covering the windows, and staining the floor. Even the sheets she had slept in were soaked with blood, his blood.

Rem wanted to scream until her vocal cords tore apart, but would it truly have made sense? From what she could remember and had just seen, when someone screams in horror, despair, and anguish, it is because they did not expect things to unfold that way, perhaps even after trying to prevent it. That was not the case for Rem. None of what she was seeing was new to her. She had seen it, lived it, and created it herself. For that reason, all that was left in her body was a dull croak, like a choking crow, as she panted harder and harder and clutched her sweat-soaked nightgown tightly.

She could not stay there another second. It would have been too much for her. So she rose from the bed, her limbs shaking as she tried to move, tried to get dressed, tried to do anything but remain rooted in place. But her limbs, the ones that force enough to crack skulls, remained stuck, as if she were still under the malignant influence of the vision she had just endured. She could feel that her body was strong, capable of killing if necessary, and yet in that moment, she felt deeply fragile. She struggled to remain standing. She could feel the stickiness of blood around her ankles, a phantasm that she prayed would leave her. 

It was not there. 

It was not there. 

It was not there. 

It was not there. 

She had to convince herself with all her being.

Even moving was a form of torture, each step towards the wardrobe a challenge, and also the easiest thing in the world. Mere steps away from fresh clothes, her gaze was drawn to the mirror attached to the wardrobe’s doors. It was an ordinary mirror, a crafting from Costuul if she remembered correctly, but that failed to explain what was shown. Reflected in the mirror was a girl identical to her, but dressed in maid attire. Her figure was covered in blood, her hands were clenched into fists, and she was staring at her with a gaze as cold as ice, utterly devoid of warmth and light, yet with a red glimmer of barely restrained rage, as if she might suddenly step out of the mirror and beat her to death.

“Oh, believe me, I would love to do it, murderer, but not before making you go through the hell you dragged Subaru-kun into.”

Rem knew who that girl was and why she was so furious: she was [Rem], the loyal maid of Roswaal L. Mathers, tasked with punishing suspicious individuals, as was the rule for all maids. A nightmare of the psyche brought to life.

This should not have been possible. Why was she there?

“What is it? Why are you surprised to see me?” [Rem] asked maliciously, raising an eyebrow. “This is a mirror. It is normal for you to see a murderer in it if you look at it.”

This should not have been possible. She was supposed to be a monster of the past, a past Rem whom Subaru-kun had already forgiven; so why was she there tormenting her, mocking her? Had what she had witnessed in that diabolical theatre not already been enough to strip her of all her will to live?

“N-No! I… I am not you! I did not do those things!”

Rem shook her head fiercely as she declared her innocence to her reflection. If someone had seen her screaming at a mirror, they probably would have thought she was insane, but she could not have cared less.

“Ah, I see. You think none of what you saw concerns you,” [Rem] pronounced harshly, resignation laced her words as her brows furrowed. In anger or disappointment, Rem could not tell. “Subaru-kun sacrificed himself to save your life, yet you refuse to accept the responsibility for the actions that meant he had to!”

“I never wanted him to do this for me! I have nothing to do with it!” Rem shot back immediately, raising her voice in an attempt to overpower her reflection. “All I wanted was for him to believe in himself! To see in himself what I saw in him!”

“Oh, really? You have nothing to do with it? And who was it that told him she loved him, that he was her hero, even though it was clear he had reasons to be so desperate? Who motivated him to throw away his life to save you at least once, twice, thrice, if not tens of thousands of times?” [Rem] pressed her once more. “Only you could have done such a thing.”

“I only wanted to help him, because he truly is my hero! I could not have known that to do so he would have had to…”

To that fragile response, [Rem]’s stare turned acidic, an acid that [Rem] hoped would dissolve the creature beyond the mirror to a steaming pool of fluid.

“You’re lying. Perhaps you could not have known, but you could have guessed that it was an unpleasant power to use. You did not do it only to protect yourself.”

Rem opened her mouth, searching for a way to deny the accusation, but no sound came out. It was a truth that perhaps only she could know, that something was not right with Natsuki Subaru.

It was not only the Miasma that she could perceive around him. With the return of her memories, Rem recalled how attached she had been to Subaru every single day since she fell in love with him. She watched him while he slept, while he did household chores, while he reflected aloud. In those moments, small oddities would always surface, which Rem consistently ignored because she believed she was giving them too much weight. How he was able to carry out a butler’s duties with unusual knowledge, despite claiming he had never worked before; how he often struggled to sleep and generally disliked the idea of resting; or how he frequently suggested or alluded to horrific scenarios, described in vivid detail, in case he were to fail at a task. 

Rem believed that Natsuki Subaru could be a hero not only because he had saved her, but also because she thought there was something within him capable of realizing that potential. She had imagined that Subaru always used his power to help others because he was a good and selfless person; otherwise, why would Subaru have saved Rem?

But like her Master before her, Rem had misunderstood the cause and effect of why Subaru was different. Her lack of knowledge of the mechanics behind his power caused a grave error in judgment. It was not because Subaru was a good person, though he undoubtedly was; it was that the cost of the power was too high to use casually. And only in the face of losing the people he surrounded himself with would he use it. They were, after all, all he had.

“That’s right, you are like Roswaal. In your blind ignorance, you forced a role upon Subaru-kun that he could not sustain and nearly pushed him beyond every limit. You almost made him like you,” the condemnation from [Rem] could not have been more palpable, the disgust she radiated for the actions taken so pronounced that it felt real. “Tell me, what would you do to Roswaal now that you know the truth?”

“I would kill him,” answered Rem without hesitation with a low growl, clenching her hands so strongly that her nails dug into her palms, making them bleed. If someone had met her during that moment, they would fear for their lives. “I would break every bone in his body one by one for every death Subaru-kun had endured because of his schemes, until he would regret ever being born.”

That person was arguably the person who committed the most sins for Rem, aside from herself. He had not only ruined Subaru’s life, but also hers and Ram’s. It was because of him that, on that day, the Cult destroyed her village and cut off her sister’s horn, albeit indirectly, condemning Rem to torment herself for the rest of her days. It was all his fault. The feeling of pure hatred she felt for that man, no, that thing could not be conceptualized. In comparison, what she felt for the cultists was unconditional love.

“Exactly. That is the conclusion you are supposed to reach. Now answer this: why should you not do the same to yourself?”

Rem fell silent at that question, though she did not want to. She had to say something, to argue back somehow. Anything would have been better than remaining silent in the face of her interrogator. And yet she said nothing. She could think of no reason why she should not reserve a similar treatment for herself, but it found that conclusion just wrong. After all, it is not natural for a person to hate herself so much that she rejects her own life. In that sense, she and Subaru were very similar. A meagre consolation in the face of a sea of horrible actions and decisions.

“No, you’re not like him. How dare you even conceive such a thought?” [Rem] attacked her, denying her even that small comfort. “You are not capable of changing your nature. Do you really believe you have become a different person after Subaru-kun saved you? You could not be more mistaken. Even after your heart had been thawed by him, you continued to be the same as always: a foolish coward who can’t control her violent impulses and who hid behind fury and her contempt for the Witch Cult to justify her inferiority complex. A murderer.”

Then, [Rem] got closer and closer to Rem with a slow and menacing walk, despite being reflected in a mirror, until she stepped out of it, almost crossing the border between reality and madness. Rem tried to step back, to escape from her, but her legs wouldn’t move, as if her body had gone to sleep again.

Finally, [Rem] stopped just a few inches from her face, looked coldly into her horrified blue eye and whispered one last provocation, meant to shake Rem to her core.

“After all, murder becomes a habit, doesn’t it?” 

Not wanting to look any longer at her disgusting figure, Rem flung open the wardrobe door to look for her clothes, only to find inside yet another reminder of the abomination she had always been: her morningstar. In that moment, the clinking of chains echoed in her ears, along with screams of pure agony. Why had she been allowed to wield such an object, capable of every kind of brutality? The fact that such a practice had even been a common custom struck her as unbelievably barbaric.

In her mind, a scene was replayed, one she did not want to think about for even a second longer; so she immediately shut the wardrobe door, but conscience can not be escaped so easily. 

Reflected in the mirror behind her was a dark, humanoid figure, completely black, like a silhouette. It had spiky hair, stood about twenty centimetres taller than her, and its face was obscured, expressionless; yet Rem was certain it was staring at her. Although no emotion could be seen from that figure, it did not mean it felt no pain. In fact, that person had no left arm. From the torn sleeve of its garment, a pitch-black liquid dripped down, like the evil hidden in the heart of that seemingly harmless girl. Moreover, a knife was embedded in the shadow’s neck.

Rem swallowed. She was not afraid. Unease is born from the unknown, from the impossibility of understanding what is happening, but she already understood everything. It was guilt. Rem knew exactly what was happening and why she had swallowed. She knew why that presence was behind her. He was judging her. Or rather, he had already judged her and found her guilty of an unspeakable crime, a true blasphemy against life, mercy, and forgiveness. Rem could hear the screams of that silent shadow, begging her to spare him, insisting that he had done nothing wrong, that he did not belong to the Witch Cult.

Rem immediately pushed that intrusive hallucination away, shook her head, and briskly headed toward the door, only to be stopped once again.

“Not that way.”

This time, Rem did not want to turn around. She could not turn around. She felt she was one step away from completely losing her mind. In fact, she was probably already past the point of no return, but the illusion of choice is always an excellent drug for a sick conscience.

“I… I have to go to the others. I cannot stay here. I have to go back to Subaru-kun.”

At that moment, her only priority was Subaru, and only Subaru. She wanted to let him know that she had awakened, that she was ready to accept his love and run away to Kararagi. She needed him to believe in tomorrow again, to remind herself of her worth; otherwise, she did not know what she would do.

“So this time, you are the one who wants to lean on Subaru-kun. You are truly naive to think you have a valid reason to do so,” [Rem]’s voice penetrated her ear mercilessly. “Suppose you do walk out of this room. How do you think the others will welcome you? In the best-case scenario, they will pity you. They will think you little more than a wretch, good for household chores, cooking, and little else. They won't trust you with a kitchen knife, and certainly won't trust you with anything important. Even your Nee-sama will refuse to trust you beyond her eyesight. And if you are unlucky, they will consider you to be sick, sick in mind, sick in spirit. They will not smile at you again, they won't ever ask how you are, or wish you a good day. They’ll treat you like the rabid beast that you are, in need of healing."

Once again, [Rem] confronted her with searing questions without the slightest delicacy, shattering whatever remained of Rem into a million pieces. All she could do was stare at the floor in utter despair while covering her ears with her hands. It was ultimately a futile attempt; the voice was not speaking in words but in feelings about the weight of her misdeeds.

“N-No! Th-That’s not true!” Rem tried to deny weakly. “Subaru-kun would never do that! He would love me with all his heart!”

“Yes, the only one who would make the mistake of giving you a second chance would be Subaru-kun,” [Rem] finally conceded. That did not mean she had buried the hatchet. Then, she continued, getting closer and closer to her, like a shark circling hungrily around its prey. “But are you sure you would be able to value the time you spent with him? Aside from the fact that you wouldn’t even have the right to lick the ground Subaru-kun walks on, your guilt would be too great for you to enjoy his presence. You have lost your place; it has been a year since you fell asleep. Now Subaru-kun already has Emilia-sama, who, at the very least, despite everything, has never killed him. You would be nothing but a parasite to him, just like you were for Nee-sama.”

“Then what am I supposed to do?!” Rem burst out, shouting as loudly as she could and turning to face her accuser. “Roswaal is a monster, Emilia-sama hates me, Nee-sama does not love me anymore, and I cannot be with Subaru-kun! If you always have an answer to every attempt I make to move forward, then tell me what I am supposed to do!”

This time, [Rem] did not reply immediately. She simply looked her up and down with a solemn gaze. Then she pointed to the window behind her.

“There is only one thing you can do to take responsibility for your sins.”

Rem understood what [Rem] meant. It had been clear from the very beginning. Many people had told her and repeated it throughout her life, but she had never wanted to indulge those opinions, those voices. In the end, every attempt to ignore, deny, or correct those words was destined to be a failure. This was the person who had killed Natsuki Subaru and who had created a monster far worse than the one she was desperately trying to exorcise: someone who kept running away from the truth.

Rem turned around. Then, she slowly opened the wardrobe door for the second time and took her morningstar. It was slightly heavier than she expected, probably because she had not used it for more than a year. She then walked to the window and flung it open, without bothering to close it afterwards.

In front of her was a balcony with a white railing overlooking the forest. The sky seemed distorted, as if it could not decide if it was a picture-perfect summer day without clouds or a world waiting for the sun to set beneath the horizon. The ground was close, at most a few meters away from her room, but it would be more than enough.

She took the spiked ball and let it dangle beyond the railing. Then she crouched down and began wrapping the chain around one of the small columns until the ball was firmly secured. The process was automatic, done without thinking, and the thought struck her that perhaps she had considered this before within the deepest depths of her heart. Finally, she wound the remaining length of chain around her neck until it tightened slightly around her throat.

Her eyes stared out blankly at the nearby forest, as the world seemed to become very still. One movement. A single movement would be enough for everything to be decided. Nothing and no one could stop her. Not even Natsuki Subaru could do anything. He was in Priestella, more than ten days away from the mansion. By the time he learned what had happened to her, or rather, what she had done, the checkpoint would surely have updated, and there would be nothing left to fix. The only person who could save her was herself.

“What are you waiting for? Just do it already.”

Rem was scolded once again for her sloth by [Rem], who stared at her impatiently with her arms crossed. Indeed, even self-hatred is a form of sloth, especially when there seem to be no other solutions to your problems.

“Why are you hesitating? Are you afraid? How foolish. Do you really believe you have the right to feel that emotion after everything you have done? You are nothing but a cruel murderer. You are a plague upon this world, a disease that must be eradicated at any cost. Every breath you take is a waste of oxygen needed by someone more deserving, and every action you take is utterly useless to the well-being of others. Yet you have been given a chance to atone for your mistakes, and you refuse to take it. You are good at sacrificing yourself for the sake of those you love, so what does it cost you to do it one last time? Have a shred of courage, just once in your life, and accept that this is the best thing you can do.”

She was right. Rem had committed too many sins. She had been constantly blinded by her fury to deliver justice, to protect at all costs the people she loved, and to kill those who threatened her fragile peace, without realizing that she herself had always been what she despised most in the world. For that reason, it felt natural for Rem to see herself as an enemy to the well-being of Subaru-kun, of Nee-sama, and of anyone else with a kind heart. Disappearing from the face of the earth was the only way to atone.

Rem pushed harder against the sill, ready to throw herself into the embrace of the void. With that gesture, she would make the world a better place, and it was only right. It would be slow and painful, since it would not end immediately, but it was what she deserved.

“STOP! Please, stop!”

Rem was admonished a second time by a familiar voice.

“What are you doing?! Don’t you see that this will only make you repeat the same mistake?”

To her right stood a more mature woman with long azure hair. She wore a kimono-like dress that gave her stunning grace and elegance. She, too, was judging Rem sternly, but her gaze did not reveal the same hunger for justice; rather, it was touched by a different emotion: shock. She looked deeply upset by what she was witnessing. That person was none other than [Natsuki Rem], wife of Natsuki Subaru and mother of Natsuki Rigel and Natsuki Spica.

“How can you make this decision, after what you have seen? You should have understood that acting this way, without taking into account the feelings of others, will only make them suffer. You saw how Subaru-kun felt when he discovered that you had disappeared from his life, and now you intend to do it again? You cannot die. You must live to remember what you have done and to work toward a future in which Subaru-kun will be happy. To withdraw from this duty would not be an act of courage, but of cowardice.”

When she heard those words, Rem almost felt like laughing. If she had not just spent an indefinite amount of time observing how fate could toy with an individual in the most twisted and perverse ways possible, Rem would have found what was happening to her absurd. Instead, now she found it normal, even amusing. She felt as though she were crossing that thin threshold between the horrifying and the parodic. And yet, the muscles of her lips did not move to form a smile. Instead, they were tense, almost painfully so. Her whole body was rigid, like a stick being bent at its ends, about to snap within seconds.

Rem did not even turn her head, but she removed her hands from the railing. Her eyes were covered by her bangs, veiling her already downcast expression in darkness. Even so, she had listened to what that other side of her consciousness had to say and responded accordingly.

“This… is not something I can do.”

What Rem had found so amusing was not so much the words of that version of herself. Certainly, they were filled with expectations that Rem did not feel capable of fulfilling in any way, even though she could understand what she was being told to do, but that was not what made them feel so unreal. It was the presumption of being able to sustain a rhythm doubly burdened by the self-loathing in which Rem had always wallowed.

After years of inactivity, of sloth, the world wanted to remind her once again that she had never been able to stand on her own feet, but had always needed the self-sacrifice of the people she loved most to be saved, whether it was through the loss of her sister’s horn or the continuous, miserable deaths of her hero.

At that point, Rem would constantly end up eternally indebted to these people. After the Cult’s attack on the village, lifting her head from the pillow had become a heavy task for Rem, because she was always weighed down by the awareness that her well-being came at a cost that would never be fully repaid.

And now, she was being asked to continue doing so, but this time while bearing in mind that two people extremely important to her had suffered hell because of her, and that every day they would continue to feel the effects of that choice.

Taking on that kind of debt was something that could barely be endured once, but twice? It was simply impossible.

“I am not asking you to continue living a life as a servant to your past,” [Natsuki Rem] corrected her sternly, in the same tone a mother uses to teach a stubborn daughter. “I am telling you that your life has far too much value to be used this way. I am telling you that you can change things, that your disappearance would leave far too great a void to fill. You saw what the mansion was like after you had been forgotten. Nee-sama and Subaru-kun needed your help, and you were not there. You matter, you are important. It is no longer like it was in the village. You are no longer someone who might as well not have existed.”

That was not the point. Although Rem had always seen herself as a disgusting larva in a world of butterflies, she knew well that her life carried consequences that could not be ignored. Rem’s birth meant that the Oni God could not exist, preventing her sister from soaring high in the skies. At the same time, Rem had also begun gnawing at Subaru’s wings, who wanted nothing more than to help her fly, risking turning him into a spider that fed on the despair of others.

The fact was that Rem could not become a butterfly capable of making life more pleasant for others. At best, she could be a fly, harmless but annoying, always buzzing around others.

“It was enough to call Frederica back and hire Petra to fix everything,” [Rem] whispered in her other ear, following her line of thought. “Maybe you are good at tending the garden, doing the laundry, or cleaning, but those are all things someone else can do as well.”

“You have done other things too, things that no one else would have done in your place,” [Natsuki Rem] replied immediately, not allowing her rival’s words to settle in Rem’s mind. “You trusted Subaru-kun because you understood that he needed help to keep dreaming. You gave him back his faith in his new life, you made him a hero, your hero!”

“Sure, but what kind of hero?” [Rem] asked just as quickly, making poor Rem’s blood run cold. “Subaru-kun is not like Nee-sama. At least she is able to defend herself in this horrible world, but it is not the same for him. You passed on to him your unhealthy tendency to throw yourself into danger, turning him into a damned man who does nothing but die for the well-being of others. And you are lucky Subaru-kun did not accept the contract of that slimy Witch, otherwise you would have created a living corpse. You convinced him to walk into the slaughter, and now you expect to be able to pull him out of the situation you put him in?”

Rem shook her head furiously, like an enraged earth dragon. She was overwhelmed by the strain her mind was under. Every second she spent thinking about the immense magnitude of the situation she had ended up in, Rem felt her heartbeat accelerate, as if it might burst inside her at any moment, like a balloon. She felt violated by that sensation, because the fragility of her heart should have been reserved only for her happiest thoughts about Subaru, not this bottomless abyss.

“That is not true, and you know it. You never wanted this for him. You wanted him to be able to stand back up, to laugh like a demon. You can save him once again, just as he saved you. After all, is the fact that I am here in front of you speaking not already enough proof that you can make Subaru-kun happy, despite everything?”

At last, Rem raised her head and looked at [Natsuki Rem], recognizing that part of herself that had not yet given up, that believed there was still some way to make things better. Her blue eyes were still lost, almost clouded, but within them there was still a faint hope, too afraid to come out. After all, dreaming was something truly beautiful, until one realized how far away what the soul desired so fervently might be, losing oneself in a dim future shrouded in the fog of uncertainty.

“And how do you intend to do that? Would you take him to Kararagi? How do you think he will react when you tell him that everything he has gone through so far was the result of a misunderstanding, that ‘Rem only wanted to cheer him up’?” [Rem] bombarded her once again with questions, her tone ironic, mocking. “By now, Subaru-kun has chosen his path, and he will never turn back. Accept it. And besides, Subaru-kun already has many people who can give him that joy. You are no longer the only pillar he relies on to face difficulties. You are no longer needed.”

Rem lowered her gaze again, even more discouraged than before. That was an undeniable truth. She had always been used to perceiving herself as a replacement, an imperfect substitute for her sister, but she had been fortunate that Ram had not taken an interest in the man Rem had fallen in love with, and Subaru did not have many other people to rely on for emotional support. However, now things were no longer like that. Subaru had surrounded himself with many people who admired him, who cared about him, and who were willing to listen to him. On one hand, this was excellent news, since Subaru was no longer alone. And yet, Rem could not swallow the bitterness of having once again become superfluous.

“Maybe that is so, but no one can understand him the way you do!” [Natsuki Rem] retorted energetically, in a desperate attempt to gain the upper hand. “Perhaps Otto-san can help him devise plans, Emilia-sama can offer him her lap as a pillow and remind him that he is not alone, and Beatrice-sama can help him sleep and heal the cuts he inflicts on himself, but none of them can understand the dedication with which Subaru-kun faces his battles every day and help him in the same way you would. When the Witch of Lust appeared before him, he did not think of Emilia-sama, Beatrice-sama, or anyone else, but of you!”

This time, [Rem] said nothing. To deny that argument would have meant invalidating all those feelings of anger, inadequacy, and self-hatred that had given rise to [Rem] and had defined her entire life. Rem had always seen her life as a perpetual atonement for the sin of being born, of having robbed her sister of her true potential.

She knew that Subaru felt the same inadequacy, even if his circumstances were different. Rem saw herself in him and in his constant need for validation, and that was why she could listen to him and comfort him better than anyone else, even without knowing that he returned from death.

“Relationships change.” [Rem] then said, trying to shift from the topic. “It’s still been a year, in which you just kept sleeping. Probably now Emilia-sama has a bigger place in his heart.”

“You can’t know that!” [Natsuki Rem] urged her with renewed enthusiasm. “What you do know is that Subaru-kun would become if you were not by his side, if the world moved on without you. He needs you to smile while thinking about tomorrow. Was that not the very reason you fell in love with him?”

What made Subaru special was the way he approached difficulties. He did not see them as forced labor, but as an investment in the future, which he then chose to extend to Rem as well. It was incredible that he could still smile, still believe that everything he had endured had been worth it.

However, that positivity was at risk. Now Subaru was struggling to look beyond the suffering he was enduring, since it was too much to handle. Rem could have helped him dilute it and make it more bearable, because she would have fought alongside him until the very end.

“Of course. You, who cannot even look at yourself in the mirror without feeling disgust, because you know you are a murderer, would want to protect Subaru-kun and make him happy. You would only get in his way, because he would have to spend all his time taking care of you. That is not the kind of relationship he deserves.”

“At first it might be like that, but it cannot rain forever, can it? Sooner or later, you and he will have no more enemies to defeat, no more dangers to prevent, and you will have nothing left to think about except building your happiness together, because Subaru-kun could not be happy if you were not as well. After all, it is the end that matters, not how you get there.”

“It is not certain that the end will be what you expect. You will never be able to enjoy what you have, even after there are no more cultists to defeat. There will be no nights when you sleep peacefully, no times when you do not regret the words you said and the actions you took, and no moments when you do not think that you could have given birth to Rigel and Spica in Kararagi, instead of chasing a foolish throne for your rival in love. You will do nothing but think that you do not deserve it, that you inevitably end up causing problems, even without meaning to. After all, you ruined your sister’s life and created the embodiment of distrust in people and in the world, so how can you hope to achieve a different result by always doing the same things?”

“You cannot know that. It would be slothful of you to refuse to try to improve your condition just because you might fail.”

“You wanted to do the same with Nee-sama, and instead you almost made her a prisoner of Subaru-kun, who had become a monster like you.”

“You could not know what Subaru-kun was going through, just as you could not know that he might become…”

“Be quiet!”

After that exclamation, Rem slammed her fists against the railing with force, then leaned against it, groaning. After that, she burst into tears and let her body slide onto the floor, like a widow abandoning herself to despair before her husband’s grave.

She was unable to face all those questions, all that torment. She could not take it anymore. She wanted to leave that world, too cruel toward the weak, that demanded its inhabitants never give up. Rem wanted to silence both the voice that called her to duty, to endure until the next day, and the one that reminded her how great her sins were, and how small she was. She could no longer bear such a thing, not when she was a murderer devoid of all dignity, who deserved everything that was happening to her.

She didn’t want to listen to them anymore, to pay attention to her own madness. She no longer wanted to be able to understand their words, their emotions. If she had had the power to split open her skull and remove the part of her brain that made her hear those voices and see those people, she would have already used it.

She was losing her mind; she was certain of it by now. In that moment, Rem fully understood Subaru’s need to hurt himself in order not to think.

She needed a distraction. Her gaze lowered toward one of the spikes of her morningstar. Perhaps she could use it, either to silence those vivid hallucinations or to silence her soul directly. Both options were acceptable.

Meanwhile, both [Rem] and [Natsuki Rem] approached her until they loomed over the poor Rem and ordered her the same thing, in unison.

“Stand up.”

“…Silence.”

“If you do not…”

“I said silence! Leave me alone!”

Some distant analytical part of her knew she was panicking. She could feel her fingers digging into her scalp as the world wobbled and contracted down upon her. Despite the vastness of the balcony, she felt trapped, enclosed, forced into too small a box for such overpowering emotions. Clammy sweat fought with fresh tears. All she wanted to do was slam her head as hard as possible against something, but she had learned from Subaru that even that was not a good idea.

She was aware that it would be terribly hypocritical of her to claim she could become Subaru’s emotional pillar of support after killing him and pushing him to kill himself repeatedly to save her, yet she was equally certain that Subaru would be devastated if he discovered that his Rem had awakened, that she had chosen to abandon him after learning who he truly was, and that he had been wrong to trust Rem with his darkest sides and secrets.

She didn’t know what she should do. It was a ruthless war between the conscious and the unconscious, between what was born from rationality and what was the product of emotions, and Rem was its collateral damage.

At that point, [Natsuki Rem] crouched down, placing herself at the same level as her flawed past self.

“...”

Rem didn’t say anything. She refused to answer that question, not because it was particularly unpleasant, but because the answer was rather dissonant. This was because Natsuki Subaru was a monster, yet it did not feel appropriate for Rem to define him with such a despicable word. Subaru was a pathetic person, with hands too small to grasp his great dreams, but his resilience had led him to leap higher than anyone else, up to the stars, to the point that his efforts had not been understood by others, leaving him alone. In that sense, Natsuki Subaru was a monster, because all monsters are destined to remain alone, just as Rem herself had always been.

“Alright, I will rephrase the question: should Natsuki Subaru be considered a threat because of what he did in those alternative futures? Do you think he should be punished for the possibility of becoming such an evil entity?”

“No! Never!” Rem reacted fiercely, tearing her gaze away from the ground and focusing on [Natsuki Rem], as if she had to fight her. “Subaru-kun has already suffered enough! No one else should dare to make the same mistake! Subaru-kun is a good person who always thinks about our well-being, and if he ends up in situations where he did not act rationally or was forced to do unpleasant things, it is not his fault!”

“Then why can’t you apply the same logic to yourself?” [Natsuki Rem] asked, with a hint of irritation. “You are more than your failures, just as Subaru-kun is more than his! If you do not consider Subaru-kun guilty for the choices he made in other worlds different from ours, why should you not be innocent for actions committed under different circumstances that you could not control?”

“It is not the same thing,” [Rem] countered cynically. “Our Subaru-kun did not make the choices that led to the creation of those other parallel futures, so he is not guilty of anything. If it had not been for that vision, the worlds in which he became a monster would never have had any impact on Subaru-kun’s life or on ours. Instead, your actions have marked him forever, even if those events were erased. You were lucky that things did not turn out even worse than they already did, both for him and for Nee-sama. You are a murderer, and you must die as such.”

“But you are not only that! You have also been able to give him more than anyone else!” [Natsuki Rem] replied immediately. “You gave him two wonderful children, friends who could keep him safe, economic stability, a peaceful life, and much more! And you can still do these things, but you will not be able to if you are dead!”

At first, Rem was too stunned to respond to that last sentence. For a moment, all the negativity, anguish, anger, and melancholy were swept from her mind, like a sky cleared of every cloud. However, it was only a fleeting instant.

After a handful of seconds, she slowly turned toward her counterpart from a distant future that could no longer exist and stared at her with a completely incredulous expression, as if she had just heard a crude absurdity.

“...You cannot say these things to me and expect me to take you seriously.”

[Natsuki Rem] assumed an equally shocked expression, but Rem would not fall for it a second time. She had been wrong to consider her some kind of ally, a force pushing her to persevere through difficulties. Now she saw her as nothing more than one last device devised by her guilty conscience to lash her back for her sins, a lie, an illusion, an unattainable mirage of false hope, of a reality she herself had denied, foolishly thinking it had been the best thing to do.

While her mind struggled not to completely break down through total denial, with the same effectiveness as covering the cracks of a collapsing dam with adhesive tape, that mirage had spoken words that could not be applied to her case, claiming to understand her inner turmoil simply because they shared the same name.

The reason for that sudden distrust lay in a single implication that the apparition tried to instil in her, that [Natsuki Rem] and Rem were the same identity.

Rem could not be like [Natsuki Rem], because now she knew who she was deep down. She was a murderer, a ruthless cynic, unable to leave the past behind, convinced that she had always been born wrong, that there was nothing she could do to bridge the gap between who she was and who she wanted to be.

“You are wrong! I am you! I also killed Subaru-kun! I have blood on my hands!” [Natsuki Rem] asserted vehemently. “I left Emilia-sama, Nee-sama, and Beatrice-sama to die without any explanation, yet I managed to create my paradise with Subaru-kun! I am not someone you cannot become! You made him the hero you always dreamed would save you, and you lifted him when he could no longer go on! And even if that were not the case, why should you not have the chance to change as well? I am sure Subaru-kun would give it to you!”

It was false. Completely wrong. Rem had convinced Subaru not to give up, to continue ignoring his survival instinct, to persist in chasing his love for Emilia, instead of living in peace and obtaining the rest he deserved after no one was willing to stay by his side. She had chosen to deny him that peaceful future, that possibility of becoming the wife and mother of his children.

At that moment, something froze inside her, and Rem immediately understood what it was, because it was a sensation far too familiar. Her time. It had stopped once again, just like that night when Rem lost everything, when everything was destroyed, set ablaze, and everyone was dead. Her mind still recalled the smell of ash, her eyes fixed on the charred bodies, her legs unwilling to move, her fear of dying.

However, these traumatic details were not the reason Rem’s time stopped. It was her sinful relief that, at last, her sister was the same as her, and her guilt, because her ingratitude had won over the concern and love that had always bound them. Her vanity, her desire to be treated like something more than a cheap copy had erupted in that fire, shattering any hope that Rem could be a sister worthy of being loved.

How ironic. It was Subaru who made it start again, with his gentleness, and Rem tried to help him the same way, by making him see the results of his goodness. Instead, this led to completely canceling the thawing of her heart, after the discovery of his ability as a time traveller, destroying every progress made until that moment.

Of course, this wasn’t Subaru’s fault, but entirely hers. Her attempt was just another act of her selfishness. For the second time, she had taken advantage of the charity of the few people willing to love her as she was, condemning them to a severe and unfair punishment, when she should have been the one to suffer it. This suffocating awareness was the reason why Rem’s time came to a halt once more. 

And now, it was time to put an end to it.

“What could you possibly know about how I should deal with the truth of my sins?!” Rem snapped, with anger as sudden as it was powerful, staring at her counterpart with tears filled with rage, sorrow, and exasperation, a concentration of emotions that exploded like a gunshot fired without warning.

“The only thing you and I have in common is that we are abominations who should never have lived! Because of us, Nee-sama will never again be what she always deserved to be, since she was the only one who believed that we deserved to stand by her side! And look at what we have done to her! We are nothing but ungrateful fools! If she had still had her horn, Subaru-kun would never have been killed by us, by me! Because I am not you! I cannot be! At least you made Subaru-kun happy, you listened to him and brought him to a paradise where he no longer had to worry about anything other than feeding his family, without having to think about how to survive every moment of his life! You managed to give him security, love, peace, and everything he deserved for his efforts! Instead, I denied him those things! All I did was make him despair over me, only to prevent him from building a happy future after I deceived him with my sacrifices, and to leave him alone when he needed me! I am the one who forced him to face Roswaal, the Great Rabbit, the Archbishops, and who knows what else if the vision had not stopped! I am the cause of Subaru-kun’s torment, and it is right that I disappear from his life, that he forgets me, and that he can finally move on!”

After finishing her outburst, Rem was left breathless. The situation was very similar to the one she had been in with Subaru in the Capital, before facing the White Whale. However, while he at least had someone to listen to him as he shouted and declared that he hated himself, Rem had no one but herself. After all, she had never felt comfortable speaking with her sister about her suffering, about her constant need to strive every day, so that she could justify to herself that at least she had tried to redeem herself, that deep down she had never truly been relieved that Ram had lost her horn, lowering herself to the same level as her unfortunate twin.

However, Rem would also receive an answer after being patiently listened to by the projection of her mind, which did not falter in the face of the release of all those repressed feelings. Instead, she let out a heavy sigh, rolled her eyes in irritation, and looked at her with an equally exasperated expression, as if she had dealt with something like this dozens of times.

“Oh, Od, you always do this… Why do you always have to look for someone to blame to deal with what happens to you?”

Rem was taken aback by the tone in which that question was asked. It was full of weariness and resignation, even though [Natsuki Rem] should have been the one encouraging her to keep going. Perhaps, at last, even she would throw in the towel, so that Rem could finally be free.

But that turned out to be a mistake. [Natsuki Rem] was not finished yet.

Her gaze then hardened noticeably, almost accusatory, and she began to lash out at Rem with ferocity.

“Do you think being this self-righteous makes you a better person? It was precisely this attitude of yours that led you to kill Subaru-kun! Every time you failed at something, when someone did not appreciate your efforts, or when you were treated with pity, the only way you dealt with it was by focusing on a scapegoat to vent all your frustrations! The Cult, Subaru-kun, Roswaal! And before even blaming someone else for the evils that afflict you, you attack yourself! You always tell yourself that you could have prevented that threat if you had tried harder, that it is your fault that the people you care about suffer, and that you are the problem, until you actually become it, simply because it is a reality that is easier for you to live in! And now you are doing exactly that! It was your stubborn refusal to value life, your life, that made Subaru-kun suffer! I will not allow you to do this to him again. You have the right to hate yourself, but not to make a mockery of his sacrifices and his efforts!”

After [Natsuki Rem] finished, Rem stood petrified, while the chirping of birds filled the void left by her silence. Then, she pointed at her with her index finger. Her finger trembled with an emotion she could not define.

Was it anger, for being lectured by a hallucination?

Was it frustration, for not being able to maintain the same composure?

Or was it shame, for being exposed so blatantly by someone who should never have said those things to her?

Rem did not know, but she was certain she had not appreciated those words, even if they were, at least partially, true.

“...Y-You!... You!”

She would have liked to be able to respond like [Rem], always having an answer ready for every argument. Instead, she could not find the words, as if she had forgotten how to speak. She could not even properly articulate her thoughts.

So Rem clenched her teeth and chose the most drastic course of action. She turned her back on the winner of the argument, approached the railing, and climbed onto it without difficulty.

The reason she did so was not so much because she wanted to end it all at that moment, but rather to place herself in a position of power over that part of her fragmented consciousness.

Rem looked down at the lawn. It was high, higher than she expected. She was not used to considering the idea of jumping from a balcony as dangerous, given how strong her legs were. And yet, at that moment her body was trembling like an overly tightened violin string, and her vision was becoming blurred. She felt she might faint at any moment, but she refused to step down. Her pride and her fear kept her anchored in that spot, preventing her both from jumping and from retreating.

“Have you gone mad?!” [Natsuki Rem] protested forcefully. “This is not how you should face all of this!”

“This is not a matter of how to take on one’s duties, but of doing it, and that’s all,” [Rem] hissed once again, with the same attitude of a cobra trying to mesmerize its prey.

“You are already pathetic as you are, but if you cannot even endure a tiny fraction of what Subaru-kun has gone through, then you truly have no reason to keep living. After all, you want to fight by his side, don’t you? And yet you are not even capable of processing all this information and accepting the truth that you are nothing but refuse, like a tissue that should be thrown away. You must die to even begin to atone for your sins. There is no other solution.”

“There is always a better alternative! If you feel the need to be punished, then I will give you one: you must spend the rest of your life making Subaru happy and making him believe he has truly achieved the ending he always desired, because it is the only way you have to compensate for his pain, to make him understand that, in the end, it was worth it!”

“Do not listen to her. It is never worth saving yourself. You must die!”

“No! You must live so you do not make Subaru-kun sad, because he gave you value!”

“You must die!”

“You must live!”

“You must die!”

“You must live!”

“You must die!”

“You must live!”

“You must die!”

“You must live!”

“You must die!”

“You must live!”

“Rem!”

In that instant, just as her mind was about to collapse, Rem was abruptly pulled back to reality, and she turned her head toward the new voice, different from her own.

In front of her stood Frederica. She was panting as well, probably because she had run to reach her, and she looked extremely agitated, like an animal ready to act.

What was Frederica doing there? Why was she so agitated? Was it because of Rem? If so, how did she know what Rem was about to do?

Moreover, Frederica was not alone. She was accompanied by someone else. Clind, her former mentor and instructor in the art of being a maid, as well as Roswaal’s number one lackey.

Why was he there, together with Frederica of all people?

All questions that would lack answers. Their surprise appearance, the focus upon them, the consideration of their many different facets, crimes, attributes, everything that made them, them, was a distraction.

Her mind slipped, and her feet, still weak from enforced inactivity, from emotional instability clouding her mind, from unexpected visitors, soon followed.

“A-Ah!”

The only thing she could do was look at them as she slipped toward her end. For a moment, Rem’s eyes met Frederica’s emerald ones, so panicked and trembling.

Then, Rem’s body fell. She still had time to save herself; she only needed to grab the ledge she had slipped from, but then…

“Argh!”

…her head struck violently against the balcony railing. Even though she was an Oni and there was not a great height difference between Rem’s head and the railing, it was still enough to cause significant damage. Her head was on fire from the pain, far more than it had been before. She’d almost felt her brain crashing against the inside of her skull.

In that instant, Rem saw stars. It was as if she had suddenly been struck by an electric shock that stunned her. Nausea quickly followed as she lost her grip on consciousness. Rem’s strength focused on staying awake, and the focus on that prevented her from trying to grab the edge of the balcony to stop her fall.

Thus, Rem fell for another second, until she crossed the boundary between life and death.

“Agh!... Hrk… gh…!”

The world turned red.

The first thing Rem felt was a slight jolt coming from within her, from her neck, to be precise.

Unfortunately, her neck did not snap immediately as she had intended. Instead, the chain wrapped around her neck tightened forcefully, choking her slowly and relentlessly.

Immediately, Rem began to kick the air violently and thrash about like a jellyfish. Her lungs were burning to the point that she could barely even open her mouth to let air pass through her throat. She felt her head pounding, as if all the blood had drained from her skull.

The only way she could free herself was by trying to loosen the chain’s grip with her hands. Normally, she would have managed without much trouble thanks to her strength, but it proved far more difficult than expected because of the blow to her head she had just received, which had stunned her to the point that she could not raise her arms.

All she managed to do was touch the chain with one hand in a weak attempt to breathe, close her eyes, gasp, and hope that everything would end as soon as possible.

It was frightening, terrifying, dreadful. She could not see anything, understand anything, or feel anything except the sensation that her soul was leaving her body, like juice being squeezed from an orange into a glass.

Was this what Subaru-kun felt every time he died? It was one thing to see it in that room, but another to experience it firsthand. Now Rem understood it too. Here was yet another thing they could understand about each other. It should have been a comforting thought, yet it was the most dehumanizing thing Rem had ever experienced.

How had she, in those conditions, shown such tenacity in defending Subaru in the failed loops? It must have been desperation, not courage, because the idea of losing him must have been even more painful than death.

She could hear Frederica screaming her name in the distance, but the sound was muffled and drowned out by a ringing that echoed in her ears. It was as if Rem were suddenly drowning. It was fitting. By now, she was completely drowned in her hatred for herself.

Then Rem felt her body being lifted gently, yet hurriedly, as if she were a bucket full of water that must not be spilt, along with the sound of cold links scraping against her neck and clattering against the balcony railing. At that moment, Rem gathered enough strength to resist the chain’s grip, and for an instant, she opened her eyes and called Frederica in a faint voice.

“...F-Frederica…”

Her field of vision was even more blurred than before, with various shades of gray washing out the colors around her, and spots preventing her from clearly understanding what she was seeing.

Until she saw them, more clearly than she ever would have wanted.

Down on the ground, near the forest, they were all there, watching her die and rejoicing in it.

There was the old chief of her village, who had never approved of Rem’s very existence, because now the Oni God was weak and fragile.

There were her parents, whose lineage had been stained by one daughter too many.

There was Roswaal, the madman who needed Rem to be forgotten to make Subaru like him.

There was Ram, her twin sister, the Oni God, the one who should have stood at the top of the world and who had been dragged into servitude and powerlessness.

There was Beatrice, the lost Great Spirit, who had never managed to leave her library after Rem’s hero had destroyed the only promise that anchored her to the world of the living.

There was Emilia, the royal candidate forever marked by the void of her past, who would now have Subaru all to herself.

There was Frederica, the innocent maid, forced to serve a master she hated, but who could have been a far more respectable person.

There was Ram, the twin sister who had forgotten her, who was willing to let her die and who loved only her master.

There was Ram, the imprisoned twin sister, a divinity kept in chains, who had ended up in those conditions because of Rem’s impulsiveness.

There was [Rem], the young maid, or rather the young murderer, who had not been able to distinguish a threat to the fragile peace that had been created from an ally who only wanted to brighten her days.

And finally, there was Natsuki Subaru, better known as the Purge King, the boy constantly tormented by Rem’s spectre, who was no longer able to trust anyone and who would now finally obtain his revenge.

Seeing all those people, only some of the many victims unfortunate enough to have interacted with her, Rem found herself asking a question.

Was it really worth trying? Should she try to live when so many people wanted her to disappear? Was it truly worth it?

Subaru deserved someone better, and Rem deserved to rest for one final moment before taking her place in hell.

It had been she who created Natsuki Subaru, the hero famous throughout the world for achieving the impossible, and she could have created the Purge King, feared by the entire world for his ability to decide the fate of the masses, so it was she who had to take responsibility for both of those consequences.

It would have been much easier to let go, to use that last thread of voice to tell Frederica to let her fall, and finally put an end to all of this, returning to being an empty shell, incapable of feeling anything, including pain.

However, if she had done that…

“Be yourself, Rem. Don’t worry about what people say.”

“It’s alright. I’m here with you.”

“Don’t worry! I’m demonically inspired today!”

“I was saved because you were there with me. And as you can see, I’m alive!”

“It’s always been my dream to talk about the future with a demon while we both laugh!”

“Stand up, Natsuki Subaru! Stand up! Rem’s hero!”

“Let’s start again from here. From the starting point. No, from zero!”

…

…

…

…

…

…

…

…Rem couldn’t do it. She couldn’t. She couldn’t forget those emotions and pretend they did not exist or stain those memories.

In hindsight, perhaps those words had caused suffering, perhaps she had not managed to form strong bonds with Emilia or Beatrice, perhaps she and Ram had never truly managed to talk to each other despite their mutual love, perhaps neither Rem nor Subaru had truly understood what the other had gone through, perhaps they had both made foolish choices that led them to hurt each other.

However, the nature of those moments had always remained the same. They had not been tainted by revelation, by the harsh truth, by the complexity of things.

Despite everything, in the end, Rem had loved deeply in her life, hoping that one day people would return her feelings with the same intensity, without realizing that those people had always been there, because she had done something good in her existence.

At last, Rem learned to look at what she had, not at what she lacked.

Thus, she raised her head and used all the breath she had left.

“...F-Frederica… d-don’t…let me go…”

“I’m here, Rem! Hold on!”

Rem gathered her strength and tried to raise her other hand with all the determination she had, but she felt she would not be able to hold it up for more than an instant. Fortunately, just as she was about to let it fall, Frederica did not hesitate to grab it.

“Clind, help me lift her!”

Clind did not need to be told twice and grabbed Rem by the waist, allowing her to ease the pressure of the chain on her neck, while Frederica continued to pull her up by the arm. As soon as they managed to lift her body over the balcony, Frederica partially transformed her hands and tore the morningstar chain apart with her bare hands. Finally, they gently laid her on the floor with extreme care, as if placing down a cracked ceramic vase on the verge of shattering into a thousand pieces.

It was truly horrible. As Frederica untangled the remaining chain from around her neck, Rem was gasping and continued to spit traces of saliva streaked with blood, but she was forced to keep her head tilted upward, which meant that she occasionally choked on her own saliva.

She felt a severe swelling in her throat, as if a piece of food were stuck in her pharynx, and it hurt unbearably. It did not help that she had begun crying like a newborn again and that her sobs were constantly interrupted by coughing fits. It was torture.

The only way she could preserve even a shred of dignity was by covering her face with her arm, hoping that the mucus from her nose would dry against the fabric of her pyjamas.

Despite that, a part of Rem felt immense relief because she felt the need to cry. Before, her tears had not lightened the weight of the accusations and responsibilities she had taken upon herself, but now she felt unexpectedly freed.

Once Frederica removed the remaining links from her throat, she flinched.

Her neck showed ugly red marks, and the skin was badly abraded. Red spots were scattered across her face, caused by broken capillaries.

Finally, Rem’s eyes were vacant, distant, almost dull, fixed on the expanse of clouds above the mansion.

Seeing her like that, Frederica clenched her teeth and looked at her with a gaze that mixed shock, horror, and accusation.

“Rem! Y-You…!”

Rem closed her eyes, mentally preparing herself for what was about to come. She had expected such a reaction. It was natural for Frederica to be angry, to feel betrayed by Rem’s action, and she was completely right. And yet, Rem still felt deeply bitter, even though she could not explain why.

“…How could you-ngh!”

Unexpectedly, before she could finish her scolding, Frederica stopped and remained with her mouth open, as if frozen. Then she covered it with a trembling hand, while her expression turned stricken.

A few seconds later, Frederica closed her eyes, took a deep breath, and opened them again. Now there was no accusation or offense left in them, only deep sadness and understanding.

“No…” she corrected herself in a low murmur. “I know how you could.”

Now Frederica too was crying, her face covered with her hands. All her composure as a maid had vanished, leaving only a fragile woman overwhelmed by guilt.

“I’m sorry, Rem. I’m so sorry… I should have… I should have paid more attention, understood that you needed help, to be listened to…”

Rem wanted to tell her that it was not true, that it was not her fault. Frederica had always been a kind and caring person, and she had shown it even during the vision. She had just saved her life, and yet she felt the need to apologize. She had nothing to apologize for, unlike Rem.

However, as Emilia would say, it was much better to thank someone than to apologize, so Rem decided to do exactly that.

“Thank…you.”

At first, Frederica was surprised by those words, but then she made a relieved expression.

“Oh, Rem…“

After muttering those words, Frederica gently leaned against Rem's belly and cried, while Rem massaged her head. 

Frederica’s body was so warm and soft, just like her. It was the first time she had experienced something like that. Not even her mother had ever taken such care of her when she was just born, because her attention had always been occupied by her sister. 

Rem wanted to feel more of that sensation, maybe by Subaru next time.

After a couple of minutes, Frederica stood up, dried her red eyes and looked at Rem with a worried expression that didn’t allow her to be denied.

“You need to rest. Do you want to sleep for a while?”

No. Rem did not want to sleep anymore. At that moment, she wanted to feel the air moving in her chest, the taste of the things she ate, and the smell of the things she sensed.

She didn’t know what she wanted to do now. She didn’t know how she would face Nee-sama, Subaru, Emilia, and all the other people she had disappointed. She didn’t even know how she should feel now, but she was certain she did not want to sleep.

She did not even want to blink, afraid that her eyelids would become too heavy for her.

So Rem tried to get up, but Frederica immediately stopped her, with as much gentleness as firmness.

“Don’t move. I’ll take care of it. I’m going to carry you to bed.”

Rem would have wanted to refuse, to say it was not necessary, but she did not want to contradict Frederica, who had done so much for her, so she obeyed and let herself be laid down.

“Clind, could you go get a sleeping draught, please?”

Clind nodded and ran off. Meanwhile, Frederica lifted Rem’s fragile body with the same care with which she would lift something delicate and carried her away from that balcony and that cursed room, while Rem rested her head against her chest.

It was a truly wonderful sensation, but Rem felt the need to pull away for a moment and look back, to remember one last time what she had left behind and how much she had risked, and she did so with great effort for a few seconds.

However, there was still one person there.

With blue eyes as empty as the depths of the ocean, yet filled with fury and resentment, [Rem] was staring at her with a harsh, disgusted expression, the same as an executioner who relished the suffering of the condemned.

“Pathetic. You could not endure even a fraction of the suffering Subaru-kun went through.”

Then Frederica closed the door behind her, and Rem’s eyelids finally fell shut.