Newfando.

Ever since the crushing defeat that she had suffered on the Canston Plain, Theresa had locked herself in her own room, refusing to see anyone.

Even Duke Eru had been shut out and denied when he had tried to visit her.

He knew just how headstrong and stubborn his daughter was, so he could only sigh in dejection for a while in front of her door before departing. He was sighing both for his daughter and himself.

Whenever something like this happened, he would always blame himself, thinking that his daughter wouldn't have had to work so hard if he had just been more competent.

In reality, Theresa was able to calmly accept her own failures. However, what she couldn't accept was consolation from others, particularly words of consolation from her own father as she had always looked down on him. She had always been disgusted by how weak and inept he was, so she was always extremely averse to his words of consolation, no matter how gentle or caring they were.

At this moment, she was staring out absentmindedly at the Buellen Mountain Path, which consisted of 374 steps. Newfando was a city that had been constructed on a mountain, and the entire city slowly expanded around Mount Buellen. Only after two to three centuries of development had the city reached its current scale. Situated at the summit of Mount Bullen was Fort Breeze, which was the manor occupied by the past rulers of the Boll Dukedom, while the Buellen Mountain Path was the only path that connected For Breeze to the rest of Newfando.

The scenery on this mountain path was exceptional, and from this vantage point, one could see the entirety of Newfando. Ever since Theresa was still a small child, she liked to wear her favorite white dress and sit on the mountain path to look up at the sky, or look down at the peaceful city, feeling the breeze run through her golden locks. She had always seemed like an innocent and spritely young girl, but in reality, she was significantly mature beyond her years. As for why she very rarely stayed in the castle, choosing to stay out on the mountain path instead, that was because she didn't want to be under the same roof as that woman, the demonic woman who had left a permanent and traumatic blemish on her life.

She didn't get to enjoy a happy childhood as other nobles did as she had a demonic aunt.

Sanfesa Peroni was her aunt. Of course, she was referred to respectfully by everyone else as Duchess Silon.

In the eyes of everyone else, Sanfesa was only a lecherous and debaucherous woman, but in Theresa's heart, she was a demon, a terrifying and nauseating monster that made her skin crawl.

Theresa could never forget that traumatic incident, when she was still 12 years of age, when that demon had barged into her room with a lowly servant. She could never forget the excruciating pain and the utter despair that she had been put through at the hands of those two, nor could she forget the way that that demon had looked at her as she was being assaulted.

At the time, the physical pain wasn't even much of a cause for distress anymore. At the very worst, it was only comparable to being bitten by a feral dog. However, the spiritual torture made her feel as if she had fallen into a bottomless well, where she was constantly falling and constantly drowning, resulting in a perpetual sense of asphyxiation and powerlessness. There seemed to be no end to the torture as her soul continued to plummet, and even upon sinking to the bottom, there was always another even deeper well waiting for her to prolong her torment.

"You're always such a haughty little brat, how does it feel to be stomped into the dirt? This man has even copulated with female dogs in the past! As long as I give him enough Loonies, he's willing to do anything! Let's see if you can still hold onto your pride after you've been disgraced by him!"

This was what Sanfesa had said at the time while leaning against the doorframe. She had even kept the door open so that any of the servants in the castle passing by could see what was happening inside.

From that day forth, Theresa became desperate to make herself more powerful. She had to protect herself. She knew that the only person in this world who could protect her was herself. Her parents couldn't be relied upon. Her mother had died at a young age, while her father was weak and inept, bending to his cousin's every whim. In fact, it was no exaggeration to say that before she married Duke Silon, Sanfesa was the true owner of Fort Breeze. All of the servants in the castle followed her orders, and all of the dukedom's officials also had close ties with her. Duke Eru was made to look more and more like a puppet, yet he didn't seem to mind that at all.

He was so foolish that he had always regarded his cousin as a close family member that he could trust. Even as she was beginning to encroach upon his rule over the Boll Dukedom, he was still none the wiser.

Even from a young age, Theresa was already far more intelligent than her father was. At the time, she had only been a few years old, yet she had already begun openly opposing her own aunt in public on many occasions.

Despite her young age, she already possessed brilliant political acumen, and she knew that her dissent toward Sanfesa was a declaration of dominance, telling all of the nobles and officials who were close to Sanfesa that she was the legitimate heir to the Boll Dukedom, and that she was the one who was going to seize power when she grew up.

As time passed, Sanfesa's hatred toward her niece only grew more and more potent, and finally, she was able to seize an opportunity to completely destroy Theresa from the inside.

"You're always hurling insults at me, saying that I'm a slut and a whore, aren't you? Well, let's see if you can still maintain your purity after today." Sanfesa had worn a sadistic smile as she watched the blood flowing down Theresa's delicate legs. The pristine white bedsheets were stained by her blood, and what was supposed to be one of the most cherished moments of a young woman's had instead been reduced to a horrific nightmare of unspeakable torment. With that, Theresa's purity was taken from her in the most brutal fashion imaginable.

That was a nightmare that Theresa could never expel from her mind. Countless nights, she had laid in her bed, unable to get to sleep, contemplating suicide. However, she was unable to convince herself to just give up like that. She didn't want to die in such a shameful manner. She could already imagine just how smug that accursed aunt of hers would look if she were to die. Hence, she dedicated herself to studying magic with single-minded focus and determination, and this traumatic past was why she had been willing to employ such a radical method of bodily modification.

No young woman at her age would've been willing to abandon their own body, but Theresa was willing to take such a route as she no longer had any attachment to her own body. In fact, she had never even felt an ounce of regret toward this decision.

The effects were also very immediate. Upon learning that Theresa had made significant strides as a magician, Sanfesa had never dared to pick on her again. Shortly thereafter, she married Duke Silon and went to the Delair Dukedom, not giving Theresa the chance to exact her revenge.

By the time Theresa grew up and took over control of the army of Newfando, Count Onen and the Farody Family had already grown to become major threats that had to be dealt with. As a result, Theresa had never had the chance to target her aunt.

...

If it weren't for Erwin's intervention, Theresa would've already eradicated those two threats, thereby allowing her to strike against Sanfesa anytime she wanted.

However, the heavens seemed to be against her, placing Erwin into her life at this important juncture.

But at the same time, despite the fact that Erwin had foiled her plans, he also showed her that there were still people in this world who cared whether she lived or died.

She had never felt that kind of warmth and care in her life, and as a result, her severely ravaged heart had been healed ever so slightly.

She had locked herself in her own room these past few days, not because she was analyzing her own mistakes or grappling with the frustration of her failure. Instead, she had only been thinking about a single person.

"Does he really have a way to kill me?" she murmured to herself as she cast her gaze toward the misty mountain path while supporting her own chin with one hand.

This was a piece of scenery that was very much characteristic of Mount Buellen. As the light of the sun shone down upon the cloud and mist that gathered around the mountain path, Fort Breeze was made to resemble a city in the heavens to those looking up from the foot of the mountain.

At this moment, the mist was like a projection of the feelings in her heart, murky and ambiguous.

"Now that I think about it, dying by his hands wouldn't be a bad way to go," Theresa murmured to herself as a smile appeared on her face.

For someone like Theresa, who was perpetually suicidal, life and death were extremely inconsequential concepts to her. She was choosing to live now, but she could just as easily take her own life at any moment on a whim. It wasn't that she harbored no fear toward death, she simply didn't have any attachment toward living. Aside from the vile resentment in her heart, there really wasn't anything keeping her tethered to this world.

However, for some reason, there was also a hint of sorrow deep in her heart. This was an emotion that she hadn't felt for a very long time, and it was a very unfamiliar feeling for her.

This sense of sorrow stemmed from the memory of the sympathetic expression on Erwin's face.

Those eyes seemed to be able to see through her entire life story, even though he knew nothing about her.

He didn't know if it was mere coincidence or if this was a trick that was regularly employed by Erwin, but she didn't want to delve into the subject.

It seemed that it was meant to be for someone like him to suddenly appear in her life without any warning. Her sorrow didn't stem from her own suffering. Instead, it stemmed from the thought of whether anyone would remember her if she ceased to exist. Then again, upon further thought, she realized that she didn't really need anyone to remember her.

Theresa smiled as she shook her head and tossed a red spider lily into the wind, allowing it to drift and spin in a mesmerizing display.

She knew why her father had come to knock on these doors every day for the past few days as she had already received the news, informing her that Mackney had joined the City of Freedom.

In the wake of this news, Duke Eru was like a cat on a hot tin roof, but Theresa wasn't bothered in the slightest.

The woman that Erwin was with was so powerful that Theresa couldn't even gauge what caliber a magician she was, so what was the point in getting all flustered and bothered? No matter what she did, there was no way that she would be a match for those two.