Alastair wandered after leaving the Fae Realm, moving without direction, driven only by the storm raging inside his mind.
Sybil's words echoed again and again, looping until they threatened to shatter his sanity.
We were never in love.
The one you love is Grace… not me.
Over and over.
Relentless.
Merciless.
Even if you were reborn as Sybil, you are still Grace, he told himself, the thought cutting deep.
How can you say you are not?
Why did you choose him instead of me?
And that fragment of your soul… why did she reject me and choose them instead?
Why? What was I lacking?
No matter how hard he thought, Alastair could not understand why they never chose him.
And the memory of Cooper pulling Sybil into his arms, kissing her before his very eyes, twisted into unbearable rage.
His chest burned, and blood welled up his throat.
"Damn it!" he roared, swinging his arm into a nearby tree.
The impact sent a thunderous crack through the forest. One tree collapsed, then another, and another, falling like dominoes.
Alastair did not care.
The world around him might as well not exist.
His pride, his towering arrogance, would never allow him to stoop so low as to steal Sybil from Cooper.
She had said it.
She did not love him.
Yet he could not understand what she saw in that man.
When they first met, he had known she did not love him, but it had not troubled him then.
He believed he had all the time in the world to make her fall in love with him again, just as she had in her previous life.
But fate was cruel.
The time he thought endless had been reduced to a mere two days.
He had tried everything to stall it, to preserve her life, yet it still ended like this.
The pain clawed at his heart until it was unbearable.
In just a few short days, Alastair had suffered repeated heartbreak at the hands of two women who both carried the soul of the one he loved most.
From the beginning, he had planned to place Charlotte's soul into Grace's body, erasing the unnecessary memories and leaving only Grace's original self behind.
But Charlotte clung to those fabricated memories born from a thousand-year dream, refusing to yield.
They are nothing but false memories, he had thought.
Illusions created during her long slumber. Not real at all.
Why cling to them so desperately?
Charlotte resisted to the very end, even going so far as to erase Grace's original memories beyond recovery.
Alastair had been driven mad with fury.
He had come close to destroying Charlotte's soul, if Sybil had not intervened.
When he first saw Sybil, he had been struck dumb.
Her appearance was identical to Grace's, save for the color of her hair and eyes. Even her voice was the same.
Her gaze differed.
Those eyes looked at him as if he were a stranger.
Her demeanor, her personality, everything was different.
And yet—
he had felt hope again.
From the depths of despair, believing he had lost Grace forever, he had been granted a new chance.
A new light.
He never imagined that this fragile hope would end in such agony.
Alastair summoned Grace's body from his storage ring, brushing his fingers gently over her face and her long, silver hair.
There is no soul as pure and beautiful as yours, he thought.
Those two may carry fragments of you, but they are so terribly flawed.
What must I do to bring you back, with your soul intact?
Their souls are distorted… what should I do?
His thoughts churned until his head throbbed.
Then, at last—
clarity struck.
There is still that method.
It was not ideal.
But it was better than doing nothing.
A cruel smile curved his lips.
Alastair spent three days preparing himself.
When the time came, he returned to the Fae Realm on the most suitable day for the soul implantation ritual—
the day of Sybil's wedding.
He stepped into the modest wedding ceremony, where only a small number of guests had gathered.
Every eye turned toward him in shock.
Including the bride and groom.
"Alastair," Sybil greeted him, standing beside Cooper.
She wore a simple white wedding dress that somehow made her glow even more.
Her smile was bright. Genuine.
Too genuine.
It made Alastair's heart lurch.
That smile was just like Grace's.
He stared at her without blinking, until Cooper began to shift beside her.
"Thank you for coming to congratulate us on our wedding," Sybil said.
"Who said I came to congratulate you?" Alastair replied with a crooked smile.
"What…?" Sybil's face drained of color. She stumbled back, pulling Cooper with her.
"I came to claim your souls."
He lunged forward, seizing Sybil, then swept Charlotte into his grasp as well.
"Sybil!" Cooper shouted.
"Charlotte!" Noah cried.
"What are you doing?!" Talis demanded.
"Hahaha. Just as I said," Alastair laughed as he rose into the air.
A magical barrier rose around him.
He summoned Grace's body and began extracting the souls of Sybil and Charlotte.
His plan was simple.
Erase their memories.
Fuse their souls into one.
Then place that pure, empty soul into Grace's body.
"No—! Let us go!" Charlotte screamed.
"Haven't you done enough evil already?!"
"I have no other choice," Alastair said. His grip tightened.
"You forced my hand."
"Alastair," Sybil pleaded through the pain.
"Why cling so desperately? She is dead. Even if you succeed, she will have no memories of you. Can you truly accept that?"
"I don't care," he snarled.
"I can create new memories with her."
He clenched his jaw.
He had thought of this before.
It would hurt that she would not remember him—
but it was better than losing her forever.
"You're despicable," Charlotte spat.
"Killing countless people just for your own happiness. Did Grace know you were this vile? Or did you only become this monster after she died?"
Alastair froze.
She was right.
He had not always been like this.
It was after Grace took the curse in his place, after she began to die, that he changed.
He had slaughtered thousands, tens of thousands, in search of a way to save her.
He remembered her expression—
pained and horrified—
as she watched him kill for her sake.
Alastair, stop.
Please don't kill for me anymore.
I don't want this.
Let me die.
I don't want the man I love to be drenched in blood because of me.
If Grace were still here and knew what he was doing now—
ripping the souls from innocent girls to resurrect her—
she would never approve.
"Forgive me, Grace," he whispered.
"I cannot do as you wished. I cannot bear to lose you."
He tightened his grip, forcing the extraction.
Sybil and Charlotte screamed in agony.
The guests rushed forward, striking the barrier—
but it would not break.
Alastair looked at their faces.
His gaze lingered on Sybil's.
She looked too much like Grace.
"I'm sorry," his voice was hoarse.
"But I cannot endure seeing Grace's soul belong to another man—!"
Blood burst from his mouth as he clutched his chest.
Not again. What is happening to me?
For three days now, he had been coughing blood, his heart wracked with pain.
Something was changing within him.
Body. Soul.
He did not know what.
"Alastair," Talis said.
"You are walking the path of demonhood. If you do not stop now, the demon within you will devour what remains of your humanity. You will become a true demon."
"A true demon?" Alastair laughed.
"I've been called a thousand-year demon already. What difference does it make?"
Human or demon—
it no longer mattered.
He would not stop.
A strangled sound escaped his throat as his body ignited with unbearable heat.
His soul felt as though it were being pierced by countless needles.
He released Sybil and Charlotte, clutching his chest in agony.
Then he saw his hands.
His nails had turned blood-red—
long and razor-sharp like a demon's claws.
Have I truly become a demon…?
Before he could process it, a young girl's voice echoed inside his mind.
"Demon, hear my call. I, Vera, summon you!"
A spatial gate opened beside him, dragging his body toward it.
"What—?! No! Grace!"
Alastair lunged for her body, trying to pull it back into his storage ring—
but it was too late.
The portal swallowed him whole.