Chapter 21

“I hope that’s not an excuse but the truth.”

“Wh-what are you talking about? I’m going to marry Louis anyway…”

“Yes. For the boy you love so dearly.”

021

Compliance (Part 2)

When I woke up, Anne was not by my side.

A whirlwind of sensations and emptiness stirred me up. The blanket that had once been warm and comforting now felt rough, so I shook it off and sat up.

I didn’t think I had been dreaming, but my body was drenched in cold sweat. Knowing it would dry anyway, I brushed it off and got out of bed.

A phantom pain, more like an itch than an ache, crawled over my senses, as if tiny bugs were gnawing at my skin. But it wasn’t enough to make me lose control of my body.

“Are you awake?”

After waiting in the silence for a moment, your figure soon appeared beyond the horizon.

“Sorry. I only meant to be gone for a little while, but the space shifted. I was late trying to find my way back.”

“Ah… It’s fine.”

Anne, who had approached, was holding two bowls. She crossed the bars without hesitation, as usual, and gently set them down in front of me.

One was the porridge I had eaten before, and the other seemed to be water.

“Were you hungry? Eat.”

Anne no longer told me to say grace. Hesitantly, I picked up the spoon and began to eat the porridge.

Come to think of it, even my desires felt somewhat restricted in this space. The hunger and thirst that only awakened when food was in front of me reminded me that I was still human.

The bland, tasteless porridge, almost literally flavorless, robbed me of even the pleasure of eating. I quickly emptied the bowl under Anne’s watchful gaze and reached for the water bowl.

“Ugh.”

Unlike the porridge, as soon as the water touched my lips, a groan escaped me. Anne tilted her head at my grimace.

“What’s wrong?”

“This… tastes weird.”

It was hard to explain. It was bitter, and though the water itself was cold, it burned as it went down my throat, as if I were swallowing boiling tea.

But it wasn’t like I was getting burned, and once I swallowed it all, the pain subsided. It only hurt while swallowing.

I managed to swallow one sip without spitting it out, but the bowl still held a translucent liquid.

“You have to drink it all, Louis.”

“What is this?”

“Holy Water.”

Her calm explanation brought back bitter memories that hadn’t yet scarred. Yes, the Inquisition Judge had used something like this in their torture.

Of course, it would be ridiculous to swear off water forever just because I had been waterboarded… But why this?

Just recalling that moment made my body tremble. Sensing my distress, Anne quickly closed the distance.

*Clink.*

The bowl I had dropped—or thrown—was swiftly caught by Anne. But a few drops splashed out, and my body twitched in response to the droplets.

Anne gently held out the bowl to me again. I had to suppress the urge to knock it over.

“You have to drink it all, Louis.”

“…Do I have to?”

“Yes, you have to.”

Like a parrot, she repeated herself. There was no room for compromise, so I reluctantly took the bowl.

If I resisted any further, Anne’s warm gaze might turn cold. Like a child grimacing at the thought of taking medicine, I finally took the bowl.

The difference was that I was now an adult, and the one supervising me wasn’t the herb man but a far more terrifying girl.

“Ugh.”

I opened my mouth, tilted the bowl, and swallowed the Holy Water.

I thought I could down it all in one go since I didn’t think I could handle swallowing it multiple times, but it seemed I was wrong.

“Gah, cough! Cough!”

In the end, I dropped the bowl. It rolled on the floor, and the coughing fit scattered sparkling droplets everywhere.

Suddenly, it felt as if winter had arrived. The warmth in Anne’s gaze dropped sharply.

“Louis?”

Her voice, face, and smile were the same, but the atmosphere of the space shifted. As if the colors of the world had been repainted, from warm to cold.

But even as I noticed her change, I had no time to placate her. I was too busy clutching my throat, trying to spit out what I had swallowed.

The droplets of Holy Water that had splashed out were scattered messily across the white space, not evaporating but pooling. Was it because this space only erased filth?

Anne gently wiped away the scattered droplets and said for the third time:

“You have to drink it all, Louis.”

Her slender fingers, wet with the Holy Water, glistened as if they followed a different set of rules. She carefully collected the droplets and forced my mouth open with her other hand.

Her delicate but unyielding fingers pushed in.

“Ugh, cough…”

As I was forced to lick her fingers, a burning pain surged. I thrashed and bit, but my teeth couldn’t even pierce her soft skin.

Anne lightly sat on my chest, pinning me down completely. In that state, she meticulously wiped the scattered Holy Water and poured the remaining liquid from the bowl into my mouth.

“…!”

Even in the midst of violent convulsions, my body jerked. Anne pressed down harder and looked at me. Her expression was as cold and indifferent as if she were doing something entirely natural.

Her cool, detached gaze was hard to believe was directed at me, and I froze even in my pain.

By then, all the water had been swallowed, and the pain had washed away. I had experienced this before—not during the Inquisition Judge’s torture, but when I had touched the sacred barrier on the silver bars.

A pain that left no physical scars, only burning the soul.

Even though it was over, Anne didn’t move away. She just looked down at me, her gaze eerily similar to when she had kidnapped me from the village.

The nightmare of the past came vividly to life. Her beautiful, emotionless face was overlaid with the silver helmet that had once glowed with divine light.

My terrified reaction—trembling eyes, averted gaze, convulsing body—seemed to satisfy her, and her expression softened.

“It’s okay, Louis. It’s all over.”

Anne, who had moved away, lifted me up like a doll and gently hugged me, patting my back. But unlike before, the trembling didn’t stop.

It was strange. I couldn’t understand.

At times, Anne seemed like the same girl from the past—loving and caring, yet fragile and immature, afraid of being abandoned.

But at other times, she seemed like a ruthless Inquisition Judge, a blind fanatic who would do anything for a mission I couldn’t comprehend, willingly enduring hatred and walking a thorny path.

“Meals are once a day.”

Her conflicting personalities, sometimes blending, sometimes clashing at extremes, made her seem both soft and strong.

With a determined expression, Anne looked at me and said:

“After meals, we’ll study the Scriptures. Then we’ll rest, meditate, and sometimes engage in dialogues or meet other priests or heretics.”

“Ah… ugh…”

“Once it’s proven that all darkness has been lifted, after the ‘trial,’ I’ll let you go.”

If all of this was really for me, why couldn’t you explain it to me?

Why am I called a heretic? Is it because I don’t love you? That’s absurd. You criticized the Inquisition Judge’s torture as irrational, so why do you inflict inexplicable pain on me?

You say you’ll protect me, yet you hurt me. You hug me gently, yet you strangle me. It’s always been like this. Since we reunited, your actions have been consistently inconsistent.

Sometimes you’re so loving it drives me crazy.

Other times, you seem to enjoy watching me suffer.

“It’s all over,” Anne said, but seeing that I wasn’t calming down, she sighed and forcibly sat me up.

The difference in physical strength was overwhelming. Like a toy, I was moved around and forced to sit at the table where the Scriptures lay.

Finally, I turned my head to look at Anne standing behind me.

“…”

I didn’t know what emotion was in my gaze, but I doubted it was friendly.

Unlike her fierce reaction when I said she scared me, this time Anne simply accepted my gaze with indifference.

With a sad smile, she gently brushed my hair, which I had no strength to resist.

“You might not understand now. No, you probably can’t.”

Why are you making that face?

“But believe me. This is all for you.”

That was as much as she revealed. Soon, Anne’s expression turned blank again, and she pulled out a candlestick from thin air.

As she held it, the candle lit up without any manipulation. The light, sharper and more intense than the purifying glow filling the space, forced me to look away.

But what spread behind me wasn’t just light. The heat, which couldn’t possibly come from such a small candle, made the back of my neck burn red.

Closing my eyes didn’t help me escape reality, and when I opened them, all I saw was a tattered book.

“Open the book. Since it’s the first day… let’s start from the beginning.”

The persecuted prayed to God, but if the persecutors wielded God’s power, where should I direct my prayers?

Could the answer lie within this book, revered as the Scripture? It didn’t seem likely.

But with Anne behind me, I had no choice but to open the first page of the Scripture.