With the invention of the steam engine, Envilger emerged victorious from the century-long Glorious War. When the war finally ended, Envilger rose to become the dominant power of the Western world. This is the history most people know. Yet hidden beneath that familiar history were things deliberately concealed from the public eye.
The Victoria Royal Family.
The Royal Family was, in truth, the supreme authority of Envilger. And yet, strangely, they seemed to deliberately withdraw from the gaze of the people, leaving the administration of the nation to other branches of government. The secrecy surrounding them was so thorough that, at times, people would even forget that the country they lived in had a Queen.
More strangely still, so many of the pivotal events in history coincided with the rise of Queen Victoria I. Envilger entered the Victorian Era, and it was during this very period that the Glorious War erupted. Alongside the war came the things now known to history—the steam engine, the Purification Bureau, the Serpent of the Inner Court, the Divine Armor of the Old Century, the Dunling Project…
Each of these things marked a great leap forward in the course of history, yet they all appeared within the Victorian Era, as though from the moment Victoria I placed the crown upon her head, the history of Envilger had suddenly been forced into overdrive. Everything began to happen at breathtaking speed.
"I still remember those rumors. Merlin told me about them once. But after the Royal Family sealed away the secrets, hardly anyone knows about them anymore."
Abigail leaned closer to the glass cabinet, staring at the little white mouse that had been injected with two different kinds of blood. It looked to be in agony, huddled in the corner and trembling incessantly.
"They say a curse flows through the blood of the Victoria Royal Family. According to the rumors, Victoria I was born from a union between her mother and the Devil. She carries the Devil's blood in her veins, and that is why she can so easily obtain whatever she desires. But in exchange, she and all her descendants are condemned to suffer beneath the curse."
"Are you truly descendants of the Devil, Ovis?"
Abigail turned around and looked at the boy sitting in the wheelchair.
"Abigail!"
Arthur's voice was sharp with reprimand. The Royal Family had sealed away this information long ago, and the number of people who knew these secrets had dwindled with every passing year.
"Don't get so worked up. I'm only curious. I'm a doctor, after all, and Ovis is my patient. I ought to know why he ended up like this, shouldn't I?"
Abigail stepped closer to Ovis. Through his protective goggles, the boy could see the woman's eyes behind the lenses.
"Your blood has an extraordinarily difficult time clotting. It's practically an anticoagulant. The slightest wound can leave you bleeding without end. External injuries are one thing, but internal bleeding is far more dangerous… I can't decide whether to call you incredibly brave or simply foolish. With a curse like this, you still dared to pilot the Divine Armor of the Old Century. One mistake, and you could die inside the cockpit."
In Abigail's eyes, Ovis was a delicate glass doll. Apply the slightest force, and he might shatter into pieces.
Yet this same fragile doll, who needed a wheelchair just to move around, became the nightmare of countless people once he donned the Divine Armor of the Old Century, bearing the name Lancelot.
It was difficult to believe that a suit of divine armor could change a person so completely, creating such a staggering contrast.
"But even stranger is the 'withering' property of Royal Blood. If a wound isn't treated for too long, the flesh around its edges begins to wither and rot like a plant. And even then, your blood retains an extraordinarily high level of activity. It's practically boiling inside your veins. Then there's your resistance to corruption. Is that correct, Arthur?" Abigail asked.
"Everything you mentioned has been confirmed. As for the resistance to corruption, I can't say. Ovis is the only known member of the Royal Family capable of leaving the Platinum Palace. He is the only experimental subject we have."
Arthur spoke calmly. He was not only the head of the Purification Bureau but also the Duke of Phoenix. His unusual position gave him access to far more knowledge than most.
"The Victoria Royal Family took an uncompromising stance toward the Royal Curse. Once they realized what they were dealing with, they pretended to recall every member carrying Royal Blood, gathering them all within the Platinum Palace. Then they imprisoned them there."
Abigail paused.
"I have to admit, Queen Victoria was ruthless. To prevent the curse from spreading, she turned that sacred palace into a cage and imprisoned every bearer of Royal Blood within it. And they remain there to this day."
"It is a restraint, but it is also protection. Otherwise, with how terrifying the Royal Curse is, one fall might be enough to cause internal bleeding and kill us."
Ovis spoke quietly. He looked down at his own pale, somewhat withered arm.
He was not the most unfortunate among them. Compared to those Royal Family members forever confined within the Platinum Palace, he at least possessed a brief taste of freedom. He could pilot the Divine Armor of the Old Century and travel through Old Dunling—something those imprisoned royals might never experience in their entire lives.
"How tragic. They possess the highest authority in the entire kingdom, yet they are trapped inside that ostentatious palace."
Abigail sighed before continuing.
"There's a reaction."
The attention of all three was drawn toward the agitation inside the glass cabinet.
The Geiger counter emitted a shrill, piercing alarm. The little white mouse's body began to twist violently. Its withered, rotting wounds swelled, and an impossible amount of blood—far more than its tiny body could possibly contain—came pouring out.
Yet it did not die.
Instead, it became even more vigorous.
Deformed bones pushed through its skin. Its body contorted into something grotesque, and it hurled itself against the glass cabinet with tremendous force.
Cracks instantly spread across the supposedly reinforced glass.
"Arthur!"
Abigail shouted.
Their experiment had been far too reckless.
Arthur opened fire without hesitation. The bullet tore through the glass cabinet and then punched straight through the white mouse's skull. Viscous blood exploded outward, splattering evenly across the surrounding equipment and coating Abigail from head to toe in crimson.
But it was not over.
After lying still for a brief moment, the headless corpse began to twitch again.
Ovis's pupils contracted.
He knew exactly what this meant.
"A Demon… Arthur, you didn't kill it completely!"
In that fleeting span of time, the Secret Blood had not only suppressed the curse within the Royal Blood—it had transformed the little white mouse into a Demon.
Demons were terrifying creatures. Even if their hearts were pierced, their frenzied will could still drive their bodies to continue fighting. And if their heads were severed, they would not necessarily die at once. Instead, they would continue moving according to their instinctive thirst for blood.
That was why both the head and the heart of a Demon had to be destroyed. Only then could they be rendered completely powerless.
This was Arthur's mistake. He had never imagined the mutation would happen so quickly, nor that it would be so complete.
By the time he prepared to fire a second shot, the white mouse had already arched its body.
Then it launched itself forward with terrifying speed.
Its razor-sharp claws slashed through Abigail's protective suit. Fortunately, she had been wearing enough layers beneath it to prevent the attack from reaching her skin.
And at that very moment, Ovis forced himself to rise from his wheelchair.
He seized a scalpel from the table beside him.
He was a child.
And he was Lancelot.
In the blink of an eye, the shriek of steel rang through the laboratory. The scalpel struck the white mouse with absolute precision in midair, pierced its heart, and pinned its writhing body firmly against the wall.
Ovis's entire body pitched forward.
Arthur caught him just in time.
Even so, a broad stream of blood was already running down his arm.
His sudden movement had torn out the needles still embedded in his veins. Abigail hurriedly began treating the wounds, applying pressure to stop the bleeding.
Ovis gasped for breath.
The sensation of losing blood was terrible.
It was like being a bottle filled to the brim with water, only to have someone slowly drain it drop by drop. It felt as though his very soul were flowing away together with his blood, leaving behind nothing but a dried and hollow shell.
That was the Royal Curse.
As age increased, so too did the curse's corrosion of the body.
When Ovis had still been young, he could run across the grass with all his strength. But as the years passed, and as he continued to bear the burden of the Divine Armor of the Old Century, his body became increasingly fragile.
Even walking for too long could cause his joints to wear down and bleed.
And so, he could only sit in a wheelchair.
The Royal Family members confined within the Platinum Palace were no different. Their souls were imprisoned within these wretched bodies.
That was also why Queen Victoria had become so uncompromising this time.
The New Church had brought with it a sliver of hope.
And in the face of that hope, Lloyd was insignificant.
"That man… Lloyd Holmes. He really is terrifying…"
As Abigail continued treating Ovis's wounds, she asked with a lingering sense of unease:
"Your Purification Bureau has been working with someone like that all this time?"
"What about him?"
Arthur helped Abigail settle Ovis back into his wheelchair.
"That Secret Blood. Such terrifying blood. In such a short amount of time, it transformed a little white mouse into something so grotesque…"
As she spoke, Abigail glanced once more at the mouse pinned against the wall.
Although it had been rendered powerless, its repulsive flesh was still slowly writhing.
"Lloyd's entire body is filled with this blood. And as he grows older, that blood is changing him little by little."
"Do you think Secret Blood can cure the Royal Curse?" Arthur asked.
"Perhaps. At the very least, it has indeed rendered the Royal Curse ineffective."
Abigail stood and examined the mouse's corpse.
Its wounds were healing at an astonishing speed. The anticoagulant property inherent in Royal Blood had completely disappeared.
"Wait for Merlin. He's an alchemist. The extraction and refinement of Secret Blood should be left to him."
The two continued speaking as they cleaned up the wreckage scattered throughout the laboratory.
The corruption carried by Demons was a memetic contamination, capable of spreading through different mediums. Although its effects would be greatly diminished in the process, that was precisely why they could not afford to be careless.
The entire room was now contaminated.
Everything had to be cleaned as quickly as possible.
Ovis remained silent.
Whether he could no longer feel the pain, or had simply grown accustomed to it, no one could tell.
He stared at the little white mouse pinned to the wall.
After an unknown length of time, he finally asked:
"If your research into the Royal Curse succeeds, will you restart the Ranger Project?"
"Then the Victoria Royal Family will finally be able to free itself from the curse. You will no longer be bound to the Platinum Palace."
Abigail answered without even raising her head.
Ovis continued staring at the mouse.
Its once-gentle body was gone.
What remained was a grotesque and terrifying creature, no different from the monsters Ovis had killed in the past.
"But is this really the right thing to do?"
"What the hell are you thinking, you brat? We're trying to save your life!"
Abigail shouted.
"No… I just think…"
Ovis lowered his head, lost in thought.
"This feels like replacing one curse with another."
Another…
A curse far more vicious than the one before it.