The battle was over, but the courtyard had yet to calm down.
Countless demon hunters moved through every corner of the courtyard under the dark night sky, like ghosts hiding in the shadows.
They were focused on searching for the original Demon of Envy that had separated from the Second Prince's body.
Claudia was still wearing her fitted demon hunter suit.
Her slim waist leaned gracefully to one side, one hand resting on her hip.
The half of her face covered by red markings remained expressionless, while her eyes were as sharp as a hunting eagle's, watching every part of the courtyard.
She carefully supervised the search while staying alert.
She was making sure that the crafty Demon of Envy couldn't quietly escape from the courtyard.
The First Prince stood to one side of the courtyard, looking at Claudia with a complicated expression.
His lips were tightly pressed together, and his fists were clenched.
The woman before him was both familiar and strangely unfamiliar.
He wanted to step forward and ask about his mother's true identity, the Second Prince's crimes, and what would happen to him.
But in the end, his eyes fell to the cracked ground, unable to make up his mind.
Just then, a warm gaze fell on him.
He looked up and saw his mother's eyes looking back at him.
"What do you want to say?"
Hearing that, the First Prince immediately straightened up.
He looked at his mother, but the questions in his heart still wouldn't come out.
Seeing that he was still hesitating, Claudia let out a soft sigh.
The red markings covering half her face gradually faded, revealing her young and beautiful face.
"Come here.", Her gentle voice sounded.
Only after seeing his mother's face return to normal, bringing back a sense of familiarity, did the First Prince take a deep breath.
Relaxing little by little, he walked over to Claudia.
"...Mother.", His voice slowly faded.
The First Prince stared at Claudia's young face.
He remembered that face very clearly.
His mother's appearance hadn't changed over the years. She looked exactly as she had when they parted.
Standing together, he actually looked older than she did.
Even so, his heart was still full of questions that he wanted to ask all at once.
The words reached his lips, but he still struggled to say them.
Claudia had already seen through his thoughts.
She slowly raised her head and looked at him helplessly, her face carrying a mother's gentle expression.
"If you want to ask something, just ask."
"I'll answer as much as I can."
The First Prince froze slightly before showing a bitter smile.
Had his intentions really been that obvious?
Taking a deep breath, he finally gathered the courage to ask the question that had troubled him for years.
"Why did Owiser join forces with a demon...
"And you... where have you been all these years?"
Why had she become like this?
Those questions had lingered in his heart for years, like a shadow that refused to leave, yet one he could never grasp.
From the way his mother had acted, it seemed she had long known that a demon was hiding inside Owiser.
It even seemed as though she and Viktor had planned all along to work together to eliminate the demon inside Owiser.
At the question, Claudia's expression turned serious.
She looked deeply at the First Prince and let out a sigh.
"I knew you would ask."
She turned her head away, as if she didn't want to meet Aubeny's eyes, and looked into the distance at the demon hunters searching the courtyard.
Each of them held a mercury weapon and carefully searched every grove and corner.
The moment they found even the slightest trace of demonic energy, they would become like hunting dogs.
They followed the scent through every bush and even climbed towering trees to continue the search.
Under the clear night sky, Claudia's eyes were as deep as an abyss.
"Because the Demon of Envy was released by me."
Hearing that answer, the First Prince's eyes widened.
For a moment, he forgot how to breathe.
His mind went blank with shock and confusion.
'What!?'
'The Demon of Envy had been released by Mother herself?'
His instincts refused to believe it, but Claudia continued speaking, "So I left the royal capital and left the Empire."
"Only to find a way to deal with the Demon of Envy."
Her deep gaze was filled with memories, as if she were reliving old pain.
The scenes in her mind were still as clear as ever.
Lying in a pool of blood was the woman Aubrey had loved most in his life.
Her body was covered in wounds that bled without stopping. Every inch of her skin was suffering unbearable pain.
Yet her bent arms still firmly protected the child in her womb.
The light slowly faded from the woman's eyes, and her body finally collapsed weakly.
Even then, those protective arms never loosened.
Claudia could only kneel nearby, tears streaming down her face.
She helplessly watched everything happen, unable to stop any of it.
Every disaster had been brought about by her jealousy.
Every single one.
"The demon's power was slowly eating away at my body."
It was the demon called Envy, trying to turn her into the perfect vessel.
She couldn't control it.
In the end, Aubrey imprisoned her deep within the palace.
Claudia could feel the demon constantly devouring her existence from inside her.
If things continued like that, she would be completely replaced by the demon, and her body would become nothing more than its vessel.
In the end, the Stoke family discovered her condition and took her back to their territory.
The fact that they were able to take away Claudia, who was about to become a complete demon, already proved that the Stoke family was anything but ordinary.
The Stoke family was actually a clan of demon hunters hidden within the Empire.
Her father, a demon hunter, planned to draw the demon out of her body and kill it.
But by then, Claudia had already completely lost consciousness.
Taken over by the demon, she had become nothing more than a vessel.
However, when she woke up again...
Everyone in her family had been slaughtered.
Not a single one survived.
"My father, your grandfather, was an excellent demon hunter."
"But he didn't realize that the demon inside me was Envy."
Among the Seven Original Demons, Envy was incredibly powerful.
It was far beyond what an ordinary demon hunter could handle.
No matter how outstanding that demon hunter was.
In the end, even though Claudia had no memory of what happened, she could still guess why her family had been wiped out.
They had failed in their battle against the Demon of Envy.
Every one of them had been killed by her after she became a demon.
Claudia had become the sinner who destroyed her own family.
But after she woke up, she had regained her consciousness.
The reason she woke up wasn't because the demon had been destroyed.
It was because the demon attached to her had been forcibly driven out.
The power of demon hunters and demons could never coexist.
The appearance of the Demon of Envy had brought destruction upon the Stoke family.
In the end, all of the Stoke family's inheritance remained only with the still-living Claudia.
Claudia inherited her late father's power.
That incredibly powerful demon hunter strength forcibly drove the demon from her body.
"But as you can see."
Claudia slowly turned around and met the First Prince's eyes.
One of her eyes gradually filled with crimson, and a deep glow seemed to move within the scarlet pupil.
Thin red lines spread upward from her neck, with tiny thorn-like spikes branching out.
The markings wrapped around her neck like thorny vines, climbed over half her face, and surrounded her crimson eye.
"Whenever I use this power, the traces left behind by that demon appear again."
The Demon of Envy had never completely left her body.
After it had fully taken over Claudia, even though the demon hunter's power drove it out...
She was no longer a completely human being.
But it was because of that remaining demonic power that Claudia became one of the strongest demon hunters.
"That's why I understand the Demon of Envy better than anyone."
After saying that, Claudia looked at the First Prince's trembling eyes and smiled helplessly.
If Aubrey had loved her just a little more.
If her jealousy hadn't been so strong.
If Aubrey hadn't imprisoned her, and had dealt with the demon inside her in time before it had the chance to corrupt her body.
Would things have turned out differently?
But no amount of "what if" could change reality.
So Claudia put her mask back on.
Only so that others wouldn't be frightened by the half of her face covered in markings.
Looking out once more through the silver-white mask, she slowly spoke, "In the end, the Stoke family was wiped out."
"But to prevent public panic, the true reason couldn't be made public."
The royal family's dignity could not be damaged.
So the Queen could never be declared a criminal.
Instead, the official announcement claimed that the Stoke family had worked with foreign forces to gather wealth on a massive scale.
In the end, the wise Queen Claudia had put justice above family ties and destroyed them herself.
Not long afterward, Claudia left the Empire, but no one knew the real reason for her departure.
After listening to everything his mother had said, the First Prince felt lost.
He could only watch as his mother calmly spoke of it all.
Any single part of her story was enough to break a person's heart.
Yet the First Prince couldn't say a word.
He couldn't express the grief in his heart.
In the silence, a faint scraping sound suddenly reached their ears.
Following the sound, they saw several demon hunters slowly carrying a massive block of ice out of the banquet hall ruins.
A faint golden glow shone from within the ice.
When they carried it before Claudia, the demon hunters bowed deeply.
"My lady, we found this in the ruins."
Claudia lowered her head to examine it and noticed that the mysterious golden ice showed no sign of melting.
The longer she looked, the deeper her frown became.
Because she saw someone inside it.
A girl.
She had waist-length golden hair and wore beautiful, elegant clothes as she lay inside the ice.
Curled into herself, her arms wrapped around her body, her eyes closed, and her breathing steady, she looked as though she were simply asleep.
The First Prince also narrowed his eyes as he carefully examined the mysterious golden ice.
Suddenly, his mouth fell open.
His eyes widened in shock and disbelief.
Just as the two of them focused on the golden ice, light footsteps approached.
A noble walked up before the block of ice and respectfully addressed Claudia and the First Prince.
"Your Highness, First Prince. Your Majesty, Queen."
"It's getting late. Now that everything has been settled, we nobles should also be leaving..."
Before he could finish speaking, his eyes drifted toward the massive block of ice.
The words he was about to say stopped at once.
The moment he clearly saw the girl inside, his eyes widened, and he blurted out in shock, "T-This... isn't that Duke Levi's daughter!?"