G6 strode down the polished hallway of the West Villa, putting as much distance as possible between herself and the garden. Her "perfect act" was over. Or so she thought.
Mid-stride, she paused. The gilded corridor looked unfamiliar. Crap. Wrong way.
She glanced at Tina, who trailed behind in a state of shell-shocked awe, her face pale.
She looks like my brother when I totaled his Bugatti. (The truth: she'd rammed it into a target's car during a chase. On purpose.)
G6 cleared her throat, summoning an unbothered queen's aura. "See? They wanted me to lose my cool." She shot Tina a look that said I'm being bullied here.
Tina's only response was a slow, heavy sigh—the sound of a system rebooting.
Spotting an archway to a secluded courtyard, G6 veered off—a tactical diversion to avoid admitting she was lost. The courtyard was small, centered on a weathered marble fountain of a weeping goddess. A stone bench sat half-hidden in ivy. Quiet, save for the endless plink of water.
G6 didn't sit. She leaned against the fountain's cold ledge, back to the water, and stared at a weed cracking through the flagstone. Tina stood a few paces back, a silent, judgmental statue.
Who would've thought I'd find a quiet spot in this gilded maze? (Just like Reise had a literal hidden Gem in her body. Gemstone-6. G6.)
"Out with it," G6 said, not turning. "I can hear you cursing me in your head."
"My lady… I mean, Lady Reise." Tina began. G6's mouth twitched—a quick, sharp acknowledgment of the correction. "That was…"
"Perfect?" G6 offered, trailing her fingers in the water.
"Yes—No! You disrespected the Prince. You left a royal tea party unfinished." Tina caught herself, flustered at her own near-agreement.
G6 laughed—a short, sharp sound that seemed alien in the quiet space. It was the first real, uncalculated sound she'd made here.
"You just agreed with me," she said, a hint of a smirk in her voice. Manipulation 101: get them to nod along. "Would you rather I'd stayed and flipped the table? Grabbed that woman's hair?"
Tina took three steps closer. "What is happening to you, Lady Reise?" Her tone wasn't servile. It was stripped of everything but worry.
G6 looked at her, then away, up at the sky. "I don't know either." The answer wasn't for Tina. It was for the hollow, echoing question in her own head: Why am I here?
Then Tina did the unexpected. She hugged her.
"You can always lean on me," she whispered, soft and certain. "I know you're not the person they think you are."
G6's world narrowed to a series of sharp, tactical inputs.
Physical contact. Initiated: Tina. Classification: Embrace. Threat level: Zero. Intent: Comfort.
Her body went statue-still. Not rigid, but poised—a predator assessing a novel stimulus. The sarcastic commentary in her mind shut off completely. Her eyes, which had been gazing upward, fixed blankly on the greenery ahead.
This wasn't an emotion. It was a data point. A conflicting, useless one.
Her life was a catalog of useful sensations: the grip of a pistol, the edge of a blade, a scope's crosshair. This… warmth… served no purpose. It was a vulnerability. A point where a knife could slide in.
After a long, motionless moment, she executed a response.
Slowly, as if moving someone else's limbs, her hands came up. They didn't clutch. They rested lightly, uncertainly, against Tina's back. A scripted reply to vulnerability.
"You don't know that," G6 whispered, her voice raw and small. The edge was gone. It was a plea. A confession of her own terrifying uncertainty. "You can't possibly know that."
The hug ended with a retreat. G6's arms fell to her sides, the ghost of warmth a persistent error on her skin. She took a sharp step back, re-establishing the perimeter.
"I should… rest," she said, the words sterile. The emotion felt gross. Out of character.
Tina, her own eyes glistening, simply nodded. She understood the dismissal. "Of course, Lady Reise. I'll ensure you're not disturbed."
G6 turned and walked away. Not fleeing. A tactical withdrawal from an unsettling, non-hostile engagement.
The forgotten path to her room surfaced in her mind. Her brain, it seemed, had an emergency escape route pre-loaded.
「HER BEDROOM」
The door clicked shut. The lock thudded. Silence. Isolation. Controllable variables.
Now. Search.
Her eyes, cold and methodical, swept the room. This wasn't a sanctuary. It was her new AO—Area of Operations.
She moved with a ghost's silence. Fingertips traced the doorframe for dust variance. She crouched, checking under the bed for pressure plates. She ran a hand along the wallpaper seams, searching for a hidden panel. Every book on the shelf was a hair's breadth out of alignment—a trap for the curious. Nothing. The room was clean. Sterile. A gilded cage with no visible locks.
Too clean.
Her gaze landed on the ornate writing desk. The only piece that seemed genuinely used. Wear on the chair. A faint ink stain.
She emptied the unlocked drawers. Stationery, wax, parchment. Useless. Her hands, trained to feel the minutest imperfection, glided over the desk's surface, along its sides, under the lip.
There. A slight discrepancy in the grain on the right. A panel, nearly invisible. A locked drawer.
A ghost of her old self might have smirked. A challenge.
Her tools were improvised. A hairpin. A thin, sharp letter opener. Her hands worked with unconscious, lethal grace. This was a language she understood.
Apply tension. Manipulate tumbler one. Set. Tumbler two. Set…
A series of faint, satisfying clicks. A final, soft thud.
The hidden drawer slid open.
Inside: no weapon, no jewels. A single book, bound in soft, worn leather. It smelled of dried flowers and ink.
She lifted it out. Lighter than a gun, heavier than a life.
She opened it.
The Diary of Reise Worthon.
She sat on the floor by the balcony door. The early pages were a flood of elegant script—poems, observations, the chronicle of a caged spirit. A decade of love for Prince Dio, each entry a brushstroke in a portrait of profound loneliness. The words ached with a beauty G6 had never allowed herself.
Then, the final entry. The night before G6 arrived. The writing was frantic, desperate, the pen nearly tearing the page.
He is here. After three years, Prince Dio is a guest at the Annex. I stole through the gardens like a ghost, just to catch a glimpse.
And I saw him with her. Eliza. On his face… a light I have never seen. Not in ten years of my hoping. A look he never once granted me.
I am a portrait on his wall. She is the sun.
I am so tired of being beautiful. So tired of being seen and never known. This gilded cage is a tomb.
I would rather be no one. A blank page.
I have prepared the mixture. White droplet flowers. They say it stills the heart. A kinder end than this waking death.
I leave this as my truth. For my parents, so they do not think their love was not enough. It was… this world is too painful to breathe in.
I cast this wish upon the stars: let no one grieve the empty shell. Let a new soul, wild and free and untouched by this sorrow, find a home in this vessel. Let them live the life I was too weak to grasp.
G6 sat on the cold floor, the diary a lead weight. Her eyes were wide, unblinking.
The strength left her spine. She slumped, her head lolling back against the glass door. The diary burned against her chest—over Reise's heart. A heart deliberately stilled to make room for her own.
She was fucked.
And for a woman built on control, the refusal to admit it was the only thing holding her together. She just sat there, on a dead woman's floor, breathing air a ghost had willingly vacated.
「WEST VILLA—-ANNEX-UNUS | COMMON ROOM」
The door slammed shut. Keith collapsed into an armchair with a low whistle. "Well. I don't even have a word for that."
Prince Dio stood by the cold fireplace, his knuckles white on the mantle. The image of her back turning was burned into his mind.
"A performance," he stated, voice tight. "A new tactic. Indifference."
Earl, cleaning his glasses, didn't look up. "Your thesis is flawed."
"Explain."
"If it was for you, she would have glanced back to gauge your reaction. She did not. Her exit was terminal. She assessed the situation, found it lacking value, and terminated participation. Efficiently." Earl put his glasses back on. "It was the behavioral equivalent of discarding trash."
Keith barked a laugh. "He's got you, Dio. She didn't look back once. 'A future annoyance.' I'm having that embroidered."
Prince Dio's jaw tightened. "Her opinion is irrelevant."
"Is it?" Keith leaned forward. "The Reise we knew would swallow live embers before implying you were less than the sun. That woman looked at you like inconvenient furniture. That's not a tactic. That's a system overhaul."
"Three years is a long time," Earl mused. "Prolonged psychological stress can cause a break. A recalibration where survival overrides obsession."
"So I bored her into sanity?" Prince Dio's sarcasm was acid.
"I'm saying she operates on a new set of directives. Pragmatic. To a terrifying degree. Did you see her hands? Steady as a rock. No tremors."
The room went quiet. The image was undeniable. The old Reise's hands fluttered. This woman's were a surgeon's.
Keith's voice turned uncharacteristically serious. "Her eyes when I taunted her about Eliza. Nothing. Like a stone in a deep well. It was… fascinating."
Prince Dio's eyes narrowed at the word. Fascinating.
"She's unwell," he declared, turning back to the fireplace. "The pressure has unhinged her. She'll be back to simpering within a week."
But as he stared into the cold grate, Prince Dio knew he was lying. The silence she left was infuriating. It itched under his skin.
He wasn't waiting for the old Reise to return.
He was waiting for the new one's next move.
「G6'S ROOM | NIGHT」
The room was dark, lit only by moon bleeding through the glass doors. G6 sat against the doorframe, the diary heavy in her lap.
'Let a new soul… find a home in this vessel.'
The words echoed.
G6 leaned her head back. The diary weighed a thousand pounds.
She'd been a weapon. She'd watched the light leave eyes, had caused it. But this was different. A slow suicide of the soul, documented in elegant, heartbreaking script.
'I am so tired of being seen and never known.'
A bitter taste filled her mouth. She'd mocked Reise. Called her pathetic. This was the cry of someone systematically erased.
'A kinder end than this waking death.'
Her fingers trembled as she traced the faint, rust-colored smudge on the page. Blood. Reise hadn't just died. She'd erased herself. And her final wish wasn't for revenge.
It was for a replacement. Someone better.
The irony was a physical blow. The universe had sent an assassin. It had sent the Reaper.
A sharp knock shattered the silence.
G6 didn't move.
Another knock, softer. "Lady Reise? It is late. May I enter?" Tina's voice, hesitant.
G6 closed her eyes. The compassion was for the girl in the diary. The girl who was gone. Guilt, cold and sharp, washed over her. She was a fraud in a dead woman's clothes.
She pushed up, crossed the room, and leaned her forehead against the cool wood of the door.
"What is it, Tina?" Her voice was hollow, stripped.
A pause. "Your preference for dinner. The kitchen can prepare anything."
Food turned her stomach. How could she eat when the previous occupant had starved herself of everything?
"I'm not hungry."
"You must eat. You've had a trying day." Gentle, but firm.
"I said I'm not hungry." The words came out sharp—a sliver of the Reaper. She softened her tone. "Just… leave it."
A long, worried silence through the door.
Then the diary's line echoed again: 'I leave a final letter hiding like it doesn't want to be read.'
G6's eyes changed. Depressive blankness vanished, replaced by sharp, analytical focus. A detective finding the missing piece.
She walked to the tea table, five steps from the balcony. Sat. Placed the diary down.
She dropped her head into her hands, fingers tangling in pink hair that felt like a cheap wig. A harsh, humorless sound escaped her—half laugh, half sob.
Pathetic.
The insult echoed, now aimed at herself. She, G6, who prided herself on reading threats, had dismissed Reise as a two-dimensional fool. A lovesick girl.
But she wasn't. She was a person. Erased. Her only power left was the choice to stop her own heart.
Her eyes snapped open, zeroing on the diary. The letter. The poison. Reise left evidence.
It wasn't a search. It was an excavation.
A switch flipped. Grief and guilt crystallized into one razor imperative: Find it.
She moved.
「INTERCUTTING SCENES」
G6 (Inside):
The wardrobe was first. Armfuls of silk and tulle were hauled out and thrown behind her without a glance. They landed in a heap, a pastel mountain blocking the floor.
Tina (Outside, in the hall):
Whump. Whump.
Tina stood frozen, back against the opposite wall. Her knuckles were white. Each sound made her flinch.
G6 (Inside):
"Which drawer?" She yanked a vanity drawer free. Combs, ribbons, exploded across the floor. Nothing.
Tina (Outside):
The violent screech of wood. The skittering of a hundred small things. Tina's heart hammered. She's searching. But for what?
G6 (Inside):
A porcelain shepherdess figurine was swept off the vanity. It shattered. A distraction. Irrelevant. Her eyes didn't track its destruction.
Tina (Outside):
CRASH.
Tina jumped, hand to her chest. That was expensive. The old Reise would have cherished it. The new one didn't seem to notice.
Inner Tina: 'Clarity,' she said. This looks like obsession.
G6 (Inside):
"Where is it?" she whispered, breath even, movements precise. An upended bookshelf. Books fluttered down. She stepped over them.
(Outside):
Soft shuffling. Lilia, the servant girl from earlier, approached, her face painted with concern. "Miss Tina? Is… is Lady Reise alright?"
Tina's attention shifted. "Our lady is… processing. Today was eventful." Her voice was strained, her face trying to convey nothing to worry about.
G6 (Inside):
Every corner was wrecked. Nothing. She took a steadying breath, scanned the stripped room. The bed. The one place untouched.
She tried to lift it with her old strength. The frame didn't budge. "THIS BODY LACKS MUSCLES," she growled.
With a grunt of effort, she grabbed the mattress and heaved.
Tina (Outside):
A low, scraping groan. The sound of immense weight being moved. Lilia flinched. "This doesn't sound like processing, Miss Tina. It sounds like she's moving furniture…"
Tina shook her head, erasing the ridiculous thought. Running away? Packing? No.
"Her ways are her own," Tina said, the words hollow. "Go rest, Lilia. Speak of this to no one."
G6 (Inside):
As Lilia's footsteps faded, G6's world narrowed to the bedframe.
And there it was.
Tucked neatly in the center. A single, folded parchment, sealed with red wax stamped with a perfect rose. Lying atop it, a small, empty crystal bottle.
G6 reached for them. Her fingers trembled—not with fear, but with terrible, reverent finality.
Tina (Outside):
The noises had stopped. The sudden silence was more terrifying than the violence. Tina leaned her head back against the wall. What had she found?
[Intercutting Ends]
G6 held the last things the old Reise had touched. Assassin's instinct first. The bottle. She brought it to her nose, gave a short, sharp sniff.
The scent was deceptively simple. Floral. Sweet, cloying, with a sharp, green undertone of crushed stems. The essence of a meadow, bottled for a funeral.
White droplet flowers. The name from the diary. She logged the scent. Standard procedure.
She sat on the mountain of gowns. With numb fingers, she broke the rose seal. The wax crumbled like dried blood.
Moonlight was enough. She unfolded the parchment.
My Dearest Tina,
If you are reading this, my final wish failed. Forgive this last selfish act.
You have been my keeper of secrets. My silent shield. You saw the woman behind the title. For that, I will love you always.
Be strong. Go to my parents. Do not let them weep. Tell them their daughter loved them more than any crown, but the weight became a mountain she could no longer carry. It was the world's failure, not theirs. Comfort my mother. Stand with my father. Knock sense into my careless brothers. The House of Worthon must not falter.
I dreamed of being here not as 'Dio's Fiancée,' but as Reise Worthon. Just Reise. To have my worth measured by my magic, my mind. To stand beside Earl and Keith as their equal—a Guardian of the Sky. What battles could we have won? It is a beautiful dream. One I'm too weary to dream any longer.
Do not mourn the woman I was. Mourn the woman I could have been.
This is a release. I have poured my last hope into a plea to the stars. I have begged for a new soul, wild and free, to find a home in this vessel. To live the life I was too weak to grasp.
But I hide this letter, fearing you will find it. Clinging to a foolish hope that when it is next opened, it will not be you, grieving, but her. The one I wished for. And she will have no need for these words, because she will be too busy living.
If it is you, my sister, I am so sorry. Forget these words. Remember the girl I was before this palace stole my light.
Thank you for everything.
With all the love my broken heart can hold,
Reise.
G6's hands were steady as stone. The silence in the ravaged room was filled with a ghost's last breath.
'…when someone next opens this… it will not be you… but her. The one I wished for.'
The clinical part of her brain recognized the truth. The universe had taken a shot when she'd pathetically OD'd.
She was not an intruder.
She was an answer.
She looked at the empty bottle. Not a tool of cowardice. A key.
Akira "G6" Gemstone, the Reaper, who dealt in endings, had just been given a mandate to live.
She stood, grabbed a match from the mantle, and struck it. The small flame lit the dark room. She held the letter to the fire, then dropped it into the fireplace.
She watched it burn, the paper curling, blackening, turning to ash. The last image of the old Reise, fading eternally.
She walked to the mirror. Stared at Reise's face, her own sharp features seeming to overlap beneath the surface. Their grey eyes were the same. Just a different fire.
G6 smirked.
"It's an insult," she said, her voice cold and plain. "Asking a Reaper to live when all she does is end lives."
She tilted her head. "But I'll accept the gift. What happens here doesn't concern you anymore."
A final, sharp declaration to the empty room, to the ghost in the ashes:
"I'll live this life to the fullest. Now, rest in peace."
She turned from the mirror, the last ghost of Reise fading with her reflection.
"This body and life are officially mine."
The Wicked Rose was gone.
Long live the Thorn.
-–To Be Continued…-–