The moment Avelos’s name left his lips out loud, the hand gripping Uriel’s waist released its hold. As the hand that had threatened to crush him fell away, Uriel let out a low, ragged breath and collapsed into Avelos’s arms.
“Ah, hnn….”
“My, did that hurt quite a bit?”
Avelos asked as though he had no idea his own actions were the cause of Uriel’s reaction — his gaze flat and indifferent, as if watching something that had nothing to do with him at all.
“Haven’t I told you time and again to keep yourself presentable? Uriel, I believe I mentioned that coming around looking like this could invite misunderstandings, given that you come from the pleasure slaves.”
“I’m… I’m sorry.”
At Avelos’s words — delivered like someone who intended to wound — Uriel pressed his lower lip tightly between his teeth. As Avelos’s hand had gone in and out, the hem of his shirt had been pulled even further into disarray; Uriel reached down and tucked it back into his trousers. The shirt, slightly too small for Uriel’s frame, caused trouble like this every single time.
By now, Uriel understood clearly what purpose Avelos had kept him alive and dragged him to the imperial palace as a slave for. It was unmistakably to stamp him with the slave brand, to toy with him like this — to make him suffer and feel ashamed. It wasn’t even something he had done himself, and yet the injustice of it all made tears threaten to spill.
“Or perhaps you’re doing this on purpose? Hoping I’ll pity you, that I’ll see you as someone special — the way my great-grandfather did, back when he was your master.”
“The clothes are old. That’s why it happened. I… didn’t do anything.”
“How fortunate, then. I have no interest in sharing what my great-grandfather used.”
Stung by the unfairness and the hurt of it, Uriel snapped back without thinking. Then, startled by his own words, he quickly glanced at Avelos to gauge his reaction. Fortunately, Avelos’s cool expression hadn’t changed from before. It wasn’t the face of someone in a good mood, but he didn’t appear any more displeased by Uriel’s insolent reply than he already had been.
Uriel nearly let out a sigh of relief, then caught himself. He was the one who had been wrongfully toyed with — and yet here he was, watching Avelos’s moods. It was dispiriting in every way.
“Now that the misunderstanding is cleared up, please step aside. I need to… clean.”
“Ah, the cleaning.”
Avelos gave a short, quiet laugh at Uriel’s words. Come to think of it, when he had issued the order to bring Uriel to him and a servant had asked why, Avelos seemed to have said something about the cleaning being incomplete. Avelos clicked his tongue briefly, then stepped two paces to the side.
With Avelos — that great wall of a man — no longer blocking his path, Uriel slowly surveyed the interior of the sitting room. He had been told the cleaning was lacking in some area, but no matter how carefully he looked, he couldn’t find a single flaw.
Uriel gave up searching and decided to ask Avelos directly.
“Your Majesty, if you tell me where it falls short, I’ll tidy it up at once.”
“Hmm. Where was it, now.”
Uriel’s sole responsibility was the cleaning of this sitting room. It was, of course, one of the many sitting rooms the Emperor used — large, and filled with ornaments — but since he only had to see to that one space, the work itself wasn’t difficult. He was a fairly neat person by nature, and he took his given duties seriously. Even on days when no one came by, he never neglected to sweep and wipe it down every single day.
Thanks to that, the sitting room was spotless, without a thing to fault. If Avelos had any conscience at all, there was surely nothing he could point to as lacking. Avelos glanced idly around the room, then strode over toward the table.
Slosh.
He grabbed the vase set in the center of the table and upended it — just like that. Water poured out of the vase and soaked the floor in a spreading puddle.
“Wh— what are you—”
“You just need to wipe this up.”
Uriel’s face went rigid at the deliberate act, done purely to torment him. He was furious, but there was nothing he could say to an emperor — so he only bit down on his lip.
“I came in a hurry and didn’t bring my cleaning things. I’ll go and get them….”
Instead of answering, Avelos nudged the side of the sofa with his foot. It seemed like a gesture telling Uriel to look there, so Uriel did — and spotted a basket containing cloth and a brush. They weren’t his things. Leaving something like that in the sitting room would normally earn a harsh scolding. Uriel had never once made that kind of mistake.
“I had a maid bring them in, knowing you’d need them — so there’s no need to go out.”
“Oh….”
It was so transparently prepared just to mock him that Uriel stood frozen, unable to offer thanks and yet unable to simply start cleaning either. Avelos watched him a moment, then dropped down onto the sofa right beside where Uriel stood.
“Same as last time — you don’t need to mind me. Pretend I’m not here and do what you need to do.”
“Yes.”
Even so, Uriel couldn’t very well stand there doing nothing when the Emperor had plainly set him a task. He picked up the cloth that had been prepared and walked toward the water pooled at Avelos’s feet. To wipe up the spill on the floor between the table and the sofa, he would have to bend down and kneel.
The gap between the table and sofa was wide enough. But with Avelos now seated on the sofa, the inconvenience created by his legs was something Uriel simply had to endure.
Uriel squeezed himself into the narrow space and knelt down. Fortunately, the water that had been in the vase was clean, so wiping it up wasn’t difficult. The thoroughly dry cloth soaked up the water from the floor without trouble.
It hadn’t been a large vase, yet there was quite a lot of water. Perhaps because it had been poured from a height and spread wide across the floor. Uriel, who hadn’t been at all willing at first, found himself gradually absorbed in the task of wiping up the spilled water.
He had wiped up nearly all of the water from the floor when he suddenly felt a prickling sensation on the top of his head. As though someone were staring him down….
“Your Majesty…?”
When Uriel cautiously raised his head, what he found was Avelos with his brow furrowed. Lately, Avelos had only ever worn playful or sly expressions — he hadn’t frowned like that in some time.
Why, all of a sudden…. In an instant, a thought flickered through Uriel’s mind. Don’t tell me the brand has already faded completely.
Hoping he was wrong, Uriel hastily reached back to feel along his waist. Devastatingly, he wasn’t wrong. The skin was far too smooth.
“Ah….”
Just a few days ago, when Avelos had checked, there had still been a fair amount of scarring left. Cursing his body for having healed in the time since, Uriel ran his fingers over the same spot again and again. But no matter how much he felt around, there was nothing to find under his fingertips.
It seemed Avelos had also noticed Uriel’s exposed waist as he had bent over to wipe the floor. He was strangely, unnervingly fixated on Uriel’s slave brand.
“Uriel.”
At the low, quiet call of his name, Uriel froze in place — still in the posture of reaching back to feel at his waist. He tried to steady his trembling fingertips, but it was useless. Slowly, he lifted his bowed head and looked up at Avelos. Those violet eyes gave nothing away — impossible to read.
“…Yes, Your Majesty.”
“Whether to call this a blessing or a curse.”
“…….”
He was speaking of Uriel’s body — the body that held magical power. A body that healed on its own was a blessing. But now, captured by Avelos and made a slave, it was nothing short of a curse. If not for the body that healed without end, the agony of a hot iron melting through his flesh would have been over after just once.
“Unfortunately, my schedule is quite full today, so it will have to wait. I’ll call for you in two days.”
With that, Avelos rose from his seat. Uriel stared blankly at his retreating figure, then squeezed his eyes shut. Sleeping would not come easily in the two days that remained.
Time passed quickly. On the day Avelos had foretold — the second day — Uriel woke several hours earlier than usual. In truth, saying he woke wasn’t quite right; it was more accurate to say he had barely slept at all. Having a body with regenerative abilities didn’t mean he felt no pain. The pain he experienced was hardly any different from anyone else’s.
Yuri had originally been quite good at enduring pain. In his past life, there had been almost no days without it, and his home environment had not been one where expressing pain was acceptable — so that was simply how he’d learned to be. No matter how much he hurt, he rarely let it show, and he had never once let anyone see him cry. But that hadn’t meant he was truly fine — it had only ever been endurance.
Now, he hated pain. He was sick of it, and it horrified him. A mind that had grown accustomed to a healthy, pain-free body reacted sharply to even the slightest hint of discomfort. The agony of a burning mass of iron melting through his flesh, heat burrowing all the way down to the deepest layers — it was nothing short of horrifying.
“Ah!”
Lost in thought, he cut his hand again on the decorative sword. The place he’d cut before had vanished without a trace. Strangely, seeing the blood brought a calming feeling over him.
The stinging pain from the wound demanded his attention, and it seemed to crowd out his other thoughts. The fingertip — cut more deeply than before — welled up with bright red blood in little pulses. Watching the red drops form and fall one by one down his finger, he felt his mind grow quiet. He stood still, doing nothing but staring at his bleeding fingertip. How much time had passed? It seemed the bleeding had already begun to clot — no more blood was flowing.
He pressed his grown-out fingernail against the wound and picked it open a little.
