To His Hell and Back
Chapter 242: Death Rolls-I

Chapter 242: Death Rolls-I

song recommendation: THE CASTLE. Chris Grey

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Under the merciless moonlight, Marissa moved like a puppet. Her limbs jerked with unnatural stiffness, each step accompanied by a sickening crack. Though her body staggered forward, her head lolled backward at an impossible angle, revealing a gaping wound torn across her neck, as if something had tried to rip it from her shoulders.

She shouldn’t have been able to walk. She shouldn’t have been alive.

Cassius didn’t need to get closer to know the truth: his sister had been turned into a Remnant, one of those soulless husks the sorcerers reanimated to serve without thought, without will, no matter how broken the body.

He knew what had become of her. He recognized it instantly. As her brother, he’d memorized every nuance of her movement, every flicker of her expression. And this... this was not Marissa.

Yet even with that knowledge, Cassius stepped toward her.

Reaching out his hand, he tried to hold to his baby sister, recalling how decades ago he was still young when he visited his mother’s room after hearing the sharp cry of a baby by the earliest dawn.

He stepped inside the room, seeing his mother who had turned around, disappointed that she had given birth to a girl.

The other servants hadn’t been in a celebratory mood either, after all if their Queen was sad, how could they remain optimistic?

So by the time Cassius walked inside the room, he saw how every adults walked passed the crib of the baby, doing what was necessary but not more than that, just enough to make sure she remains alive, though even if she died, they wouldn’t show their disappointment.

He was used to adult’s indifference and knew this was the norm in the castle. He didn’t feel bad upon finding those disinterested adults but he was curious about the younger baby who has became his younger sister.

While the others busied themselves elsewhere, Cassius stood silently beside the crib. Inside, the infant cried a soft, high pitched wails muffled by her puffy, red cheeks. Despite how miserable the baby had cried, despite how small it was that felt so easy to kill, no one came to soothe her.

He leaned closer, then glanced over his shoulder. Their mother had already drifted into a restless sleep, too exhausted or perhaps, too disappointed to even care what had happened to the baby. He doubted his mother had even looked at the baby’s face, only hearing the disappointment that the baby was a girl before she turned away.

Cassius looked back at the baby. He raised a tentative hand and brushed her hair that felt fine, soft, and so fragile it barely resisted his touch.

He didn’t feel warmth, not the stirring of affection others spoke of when meeting a sibling for the first time. But what he did feel was something colder, yet stronger. In this vast, loveless castle, she would have no one, just like him. Born from the same mother. Shaped by the same cruel father. Destined for the same quiet misery.

It wasn’t blood that tied him to her. It was the certainty of shared suffering.

"Don’t cry," Cassius’s voice was soft as he whispered to the baby, "You can’t cry much in this castle. People will think you are weak if you cry."

The baby looked at him with her bright red eyes. She blinked before holding to his hand and let out a smile, her tears halting.

Cassius who saw that laughed at the baby’s silliness.

The maids who had gathered around the bed of the Queen then muttered, "What should we name the baby?"

"The Queen told us that we could choose whatever name we want."

"But if we choose something terrible and the King knows- it would be our life on stake."

"I don’t want to name a princess, that burden is far too heavy for someone lowly as I."

Cassius turned his red gaze back at the baby and then turned to the maids, pointing to one of them who had immediately bowed and knelt on the ground in response.

They lowered their heads, too surprised beyond words as they hadn’t felt the Crown Prince’s presence earlier or the fact that he had been beside the baby which caused them to gossip.

But Cassius didn’t pay much attention to their worry or how blue their face had turned. Instead he cradled the baby and hummed, "Marissa."

The servants blinked, "The sea, Your Highness?"

"No," Cassius played with the baby’s hands and smiled, "The beloved."

Now, Cassius had held his darling sister back to his arms. He hugged her tight, his eyes closing in anger as Marissa crawled to his skin, tearing him open, causing for his blood to drip along the raindrops.

Cassius, however, didn’t move.

He inspected his sister and shook his head, "Antidote. They must have one."

He whispered to himself, trying to think of a way. If those sorcerers have created a potion that could turn a vampire into a remnant, they must have an antidote as well. After all anyone who created poison would always make an antidote in hand.

If he could just find that sorcerer- grab that bastard by the neck and make him cough the damned antidote his sister would be alright-

"She will still die," a voice rang out from the tree.

Cassius snapped his eyes to find the smiling Fake Hans.

At once could Cassius tell this man was fake, not due to the reflection but due to the fact that the real Hans never had green pair of eyes and yet now he does.

"You see, the only reason why she’s still ali- I mean moving, is due to our timely potion being injected to her. Without it? She’s dead. The antidote will revert her to her original state which was in a brink of death and nothing could stop it."

Cassius felt Marissa digging deep to his flesh but he ignored the pain, snapping his eyes at the Fake Hans, swearing through his tightly clenched teeth, "You’re dead."

The Fake Hans smiled and then let out a bright chuckle as if he was genuinely pleased by the swore that Cassius had made, "I don’t mind dying," said the sorcerer and the skin on his body slowly melted into showing a different face, a face of a young man with the bright green eyes and a dark gray hair.

"But you have to kill your sister first."