Chp: 4 - The Sinner {4}
CRASH!
The sound of shattering porcelain sliced through the air like delayed lightning. Not the roar of an iron train from the world he knew, but the sharp, expensive crack of gold-rimmed ceramic now reduced to fragments on the floor. The echo of the breakage still reverberated through the vast acoustic space when another sound followed—a broken, stuttering whimper.
"F-forgive me… Young Master… please… please have mercy…"
An alien, icy buzz filled Kyouya's skull. The world seemed to recede; sounds became muffled, like echoes bouncing from the bottom of an impossibly deep well. He felt a bizarre distortion of time.
It hurts, it hurts, it hurts… Kyouya felt acute pain tearing through every fiber of his body—as though he were being hammered and stabbed by thousands of needles simultaneously. His heart pounded violently, pumping blood at abnormal speed, a death drum threatening to burst. Yet paradoxically, he couldn't move a single muscle.
What's wrong with me? I've never felt pain like this in my entire life. Damn it, why does it hurt so much?
Reflexes forged over decades of his former life screamed. I have to get up right now or I'll be late for work. A cold awareness immediately overrode the instinct, ignoring it. Wait… why the hell is work the priority right now?
This condition was beyond ordinary exhaustion or illness. I need to take sick leave—yes, sick leave! That's what I need. Screw it, even if I have to face the sharp-tongued manager's nagging tomorrow. This is more important!
I don't want to die young! I haven't even touched the savings I scraped together for my retirement!
Wake up! Wake up!
Kyouya struggled to gather his strength and rise from this strange agony. He forced the layers of darkness enveloping his vision to peel away. When his eyelids finally parted, the sight that greeted him was not the ceiling of his hard-earned rented apartment, but an excessive, almost decadent luxury.
…Polished white marble floors reflected soft light from tall windows, creating gentle patterns dimmed by snow beyond the glass. Amid that cold grandeur, a woman—dressed simply with an apron identifying her as a maid—was prostrating herself. Her face was hidden, but the violent trembling of her body was pure, primal fear—the kind that had become a survival instinct. Most striking was her caution: she didn't dare touch him. As though any contact would be the catalyst for an inescapable death sentence.
What… is happening? Where am I?
His head throbbed. The physical pain began to recede, replaced by waves of dizziness laced with confusion. An unfamiliar room. Overwhelming opulence. Medieval servant clothing that felt far too realistic to be a costume.
Strangely, his memories were blank. A thick fog seemed to shroud every detail of his past life—except one thing: his name… Kyouya.
The woman before him hadn't even spoken that name.
"Forgive me… Young Master… I didn't mean to… please forgive this lowly one!"
'You—Young Master? Me? What… is this some elaborate prank?'
The idea of a joke evaporated the moment Kyouya realized he had no friends who would stage a drama this elaborate—much less with props this clearly expensive. I don't even have friends who'd prank me like those Y-one videos…
A serious anomaly presented itself. In the peak of bewilderment, Kyouya glanced at his own reflection in the wide window. The image hit like lightning, and shock painted his face once more. It confirmed the dread of the strangeness.
'That… jet-black hair and deep violet eyes shimmering like an impossible night galaxy… even the mole under the lip on the side… exactly as described in the novel for… Darion Valdis Villiers! The main villain!? What the hell is this…'
A powerful wave of nausea surged through Kyouya. Reality had torn open. He opened his mouth, and only one word managed to escape his constricted throat—a bitter acknowledgment of this absurd new fate, and raw denial.
"Bastard…"
The word slipped slowly from lips that shouldn't have been capable of such cruelty—barely more than a whisper. Yet in the silent room, it rang deafeningly loud. The maid before him flinched; her body froze as though nailed in place.
Kyouya blinked. Icy terror crept into his gut. 'Wait. Did I just… say that out loud?'
Suddenly, another voice cut through the suffocating tension. Soft, fragile, yet carrying a weight far heavier than Darion's anger—that voice drifted through air that felt like thin wire about to snap.
"Darion… that's enough."
Instantly, the entire world seemed to freeze in a distorted swirl of time.
Kyouya turned.
A woman stood gracefully at the doorway—fragile, almost translucent beauty. Satella Villiers, Darion's mother. Her face was beautiful, with the same jet-black hair, but she looked far too pale, as though her life force had been steadily drained by the schemes and poison of House Villiers.
"M-Mother… fine here, see? …So that's enough…" The words Satella spoke weren't a statement—they were a plea directed at a cruel Fate.
At that moment, all the absurd pieces of this puzzle snapped together in Kyouya's mind, nearly making him faint. Transmigration. Into Darion's body. Precisely during his childhood—the early phase of the boy's depravity, when he had already shown psychopathic seeds: torturing servants to uphold the dignity of Archduke Villiers, toying with death as though it were entertainment. And the tragic end he had read about—executed by the protagonist, Yoshihara Kanata, in the name of Grand Justice.
'I… I really transmigrated!? Into the body of Darion, who will one day be killed by the great hero Kanata…' Cold sweat soaked his back, but his mind had already leaped ahead because he knew this world was troublesome. 'Should I run away? Find a way back? Or…'
But before Kyouya could formulate any survival strategy for this unfair, brutal world, the body moved on its own. Darion's shoulders tensed. Those small hands clenched with painful force. A surge of emotion—not his own, a familiar Foreign Will—began to seep in and dominate his consciousness.
Rage. Contempt.
"Hah, enough? Mother, have you lost your mind? She has sullied the great name of House Villiers. Father would surely agree with me if he knew what she did."
'I'm speaking? No, that's not me…'
Satella looked hesitant; her frail hands trembled. Her already pale face grew even paler. She couldn't deny the statement. Yet hadn't Darion gone too far? Yes—that was exactly why she tried to stop him, even though she only looked pitiful doing so.
"If Mother can't do anything, then I will handle this insult myself. Watch closely, Mother. You must not show mercy to someone who cannot keep their mouth shut properly."
The small hand extended, moving toward his waist. There hung the training sword he always wore after morning sessions. Its scabbard was pitch black, cold metal without reflection, adorned with intricate carvings like ancient tree roots swallowing light. A training blade custom-made for him.
Shk—
The sound of metal scraping—not merely smooth, but heavy, as though the blade resented touching air. The sword was drawn. Its blade was ashen silver, pale like freshly washed bone.
The sword rose, ready to deliver death to the maid. For him, no elaborate method was needed to kill lowly people.
But an unexpected white, fragile hand stopped it.
Blood flowed. Not the unfortunate maid's blood—but blood staining the blade mid-air. Satella's hand now gripped the edge of the sword; her fingers were sliced by its sharpness.
"Rion… Mother b-begs you… stop…" The faint, weak voice managed to interrupt the Will controlling Darion's body.
Darion looked back at her with a pitiful gaze, a silent plea that shattered all the arrogance Darion tried to maintain.
Ah… this… is the introductory scene of Darion's character from the early chapters…
Clang!
The bloodied sword was dropped onto the marble floor with a deafening ring. The body turned and walked away—toward the door. Kyouya couldn't resist. The original Will of Darion now fully commanded this vessel.
His footsteps echoed coldly down the silent marble corridor. The remnants of his mother's blood dripped, leaving red trails in stark contrast against the white floor.
"Mother… you're too weak…" The words… weren't Kyouya's. This tongue spoke them. That cold gaze—violet eyes dark as a cursed nebula—looked down on the woman who had carried him for nine months, the mother who had just saved a poor maid from her son's cruelty… all for nothing, because the maid would later be killed by his father anyway.
•••
His steps halted midway down the long, empty corridor. Finally, he felt control over this body return… it felt strange, like wearing borrowed clothes.
And right there, for the first time, Kyouya felt True Fear.
Not because of death. Not because of this alien world. But because he realized a Terrifying Hidden Mystery.
He was not alone in this body.
'I… I'm not controlling everything…'
Two souls. One body. Kyouya the transmigrator. And Darion the main villain.
And as though mocking the clueless transmigrator's foolishness, a sharp whisper—like an echo rising from the very core of his own mind—slowly emerged. It was unmistakably a boy's voice: smooth, yet dripping with icy scorn.
"No wonder I felt something was off… A voice suddenly appearing and spouting strange nonsense about me. I almost thought it was a hallucination from the poison I took last night. Turns out there's an insolent intruder."
'…'
"…Who are you?"
'…'
"Not going to answer? Do you want to die?"
'This kid… he's seriously going to find a way to kill me later. Better answer as best I can.' Kyouya thought, but then hesitation arose. 'Wait… he can't hear my inner thoughts, right?'
The statement was a hope—one that died instantly when Darion replied with cutting sarcasm.
"Yes yes, I didn't hear it at all—why don't you repeat that, you insolent bastard." He sneered coldly. "Better just say what your purpose is."
'Okay wait a second—I didn't mean to be in your body. It wasn't my will, I swear.'
"You THINK I care about that? Coincidence or conspiracy—the result is the same. You could be lying, or you might have some unique skill. And most disturbingly, you seem to know me. Then all that nonsense about a book, main villain, great hero. You talk about it like a boring history teacher."
Ah damn…
'I can explain. I can give you details about your future!'
"Hm, should I listen? But your statement guarantees nothing. The future you claim to know is irrelevant to me anyway. Your purpose isn't clear and you're clearly extremely suspicious. So just die."
The whisper—sounding like a direct transmission from an unknown Power Source—made Kyouya clutch the cold corridor wall.
Right. This is Darion. The future doesn't matter to him because he'll carve his own path. He lied about the future too… But why is there such a huge anomaly he can't understand? Something feels off in his mind but he can't grasp what. I only vaguely remember the important parts of the future, but why can't I recall them clearly…? No, not the time for that. Right now—what do I do with Darion's threat?
Calm down—he doesn't know how to erase me yet—Ah! Th-the pain is back!? Kyouya shouldn't have underestimated Darion. Even though he's a child, this boy already knows basic magic and the mystical mechanics of this world. It wouldn't be hard for him to find a gap in the transmigration mechanism or simply disrupt his consciousness.
"Even in that stupid story you told at the end… none of them ever truly understood who I really am."
'W-wait!' he pleaded, but Darion ignored him; the mockery grew sharper.
"You come into my body, into my life… and think you can play a role? If this really is a story from a book you read, then this isn't your story. It's mine. So get out of my body, you damn parasite!"
This piercing headache… is rejection from the Original Will. Kyouya felt like punching the wall until his knuckles bled—just to feel real pain instead of this agonizing, dizzying headache. The pain fueled his frustration, making his emotions surge.
'YOU THINK I WANT THIS!? I DON'T EVEN KNOW WHY I'M HERE!'
Kyouya had lived in a world that slowly swallowed him. Hoping for something was a lie. That novel—The Greatest Hero—strangely became the only thing that kept him going. Because Darion… even though evil, at least he fought the world. Unlike him, who just passively accepted everything.
But now, living inside that body, he didn't understand why he transmigrated with Darion's consciousness still intact. Was Fate toying with him?
From afar, Darion's mother's faint voice called—soft, full of futile worry. But he didn't answer.
And Darion—in the subconscious where only the two of them existed—curled the corner of his lips into a thin sneer. The silhouette of Darion now blended with the adult figure Kyouya knew.
"You will learn… In Kaivalya, kindness is weakness. And weakness must be eradicated."
The line Darion spoke to Kanata before the continental war began.
To be continued.