The Tyrant's Happy Ending - Chapter 16.4

Austin knew all too well what was coming.

“How long has it been since the war ended? Have you already lost your touch?”

“…No, Your Majesty.”

“I told you to make some progress before I arrived. Why does he still look so intact?”

Austin swallowed hard. Indeed, aside from his torn shirt, Eden Petra appeared disturbingly unscathed—far from the image of someone who had endured torture. It was clear that his condition would test Lyle’s patience.

“It seems his divine power prevents any lasting harm,” Austin responded, his voice measured and cautious.

Lyle’s smile twisted into something bitter. “The irony of it all. A faithless wretch like him wielding divine power. Even the gods must weep at the sight.”

He ran a hand over his jaw thoughtfully. “If the gods refuse to act against the one who dared harm their most precious, then perhaps delivering punishment on their behalf might please them.”

“…Indeed, Your Majesty.”

Lyle’s eyes narrowed. “Interrogation needs pain to leave an impact. And if divine power prevents that…”

Austin nodded slowly, resigned to what was coming. Lyle’s smile broadened, cold and cruel. “Then the only solution is obvious. Bring them in.”

At Lyle’s order, Austin signaled his men. Even as he did, he cast a glance at Eden—one that held no sympathy, only the grim knowledge of what awaited him.

‘Unfortunate.’

Austin didn’t pity him; he had witnessed enough during his time at Lyle’s side to know the depths of his ruthlessness. He knew that Eden Petra was far from a holy figure, aware of the unspeakable crimes he committed under the guise of the papacy. But still, anyone familiar with Lyle’s history would understand one thing: Eden had made the fatal mistake of harming the one person Lyle cherished most.

The preparations were completed, and Lyle surveyed the instruments laid out before him: an iron brazier glowing with coals, heated branding irons, dark liquid brimming in bowls, blades sharp and cruel, a burning torch, a spiked whip, and tools so grotesque they seemed crafted in the depths of hell.

These tools, rarely touched even in the depths of the palace prison, were now called into use. Lyle selected a branding iron, its searing heat humming against the cold air, and gripped Eden’s hair, yanking his head back. The sharp slap echoed like a gunshot.

Crack!

“Ugh…!”

Eden’s eyes shot open, unfocused and bloodshot. Lyle’s twisted smile deepened as he saw the flicker of awareness return. Eden’s face, filled with confusion and rage, met Lyle’s gaze.
“Now you’re awake,” Lyle said in a voice colder than ice.

“Y-You savage… How dare you!” Eden’s aristocratic features contorted as he spat out curses, his demeanor anything but holy.
Lyle’s response was another brutal slap, followed by two more.
By the third, Eden’s face was a swollen, bloody mess, and a tooth clattered to the stone floor. Lyle leaned in, satisfaction gleaming in his eyes.

“Fourteen years ago, I was told Yernen had branded me a slave and sent me to the front. But Yernen never did that. So who orchestrated it, I wonder?” His voice dropped to a deadly whisper. “It wasn’t those puppet nobles or that idiot Harriot. It was you, hiding behind them, pulling the strings.”
Eden’s mouth moved soundlessly as realization dawned.

“I don’t forgive debts, Eden. Not mine, and not Yernen’s.”
The branding iron glowed as Lyle pressed it against Eden’s cheek.

“Aaaaagh!”

The screams echoed through the dungeon, flesh sizzling and smoke billowing. The acrid stench made everyone’s eyes water, but Lyle’s gaze never wavered. He watched as the once-proud features melted into a grotesque mask of pain.

“The slave mark strips power, divine or otherwise,” Lyle said coldly. Eden, now a quivering, gasping wreck, barely comprehended the words.

Lyle’s hand closed around Eden’s neck. “Is this all you can take?”

Eden choked, veins bulging as Lyle released him just long enough to pour the dark, burning liquid over his wound. Eden’s body jerked, recognizing the familiar, searing pain. He knew it would etch permanent marks, just as he had once carved them into Yernen.

“It’s only fair, isn’t it?” Lyle’s tone was mockingly pleasant. “You reap what you sow, trash.”

The memory of those indelible scars Yernen had borne drove Lyle’s fury. The slave brand could heal, but this liquid would ensure that the mark never truly disappeared.

Eden’s muffled groans turned to wails, and Lyle watched, eyes blazing with determination. This was only the beginning. He needed answers—from when Eden’s machinations against Yernen began to the extent of his connections with the kingdom’s elites.

Lyle, the undefeated warlord of the northern conquest, was feared not just for his combat prowess but for his mastery in interrogation. He knew that pain was the one true language all men understood.

And mercy had no place here.

He released Eden’s throat and signaled to Austin. “Prepare it.”
Austin obeyed, positioning a blade that gleamed with a deadly promise. The knight grimaced as he set Eden’s trembling hand on the cutting edge.

Just as Eden’s dazed eyes registered what was happening, Lyle pressed down, grinding Eden’s temple against the stone floor with a brutal stomp.

“Gaaah!”

Eden’s scream, raw and guttural, echoed through the dungeon as the realization of Lyle’s ruthlessness settled in. He had crossed a man who was truly beyond reason.

But before he could utter a word, Lyle’s foot struck the guillotine with brutal swiftness.

The sharp blade, weighted with lethal force, sliced through flesh without resistance, meeting the base blade with a metallic kiss.

“Aaaagh!”

A shriek laced with raw agony ricocheted off the stone chamber walls.

Lyle, holding the torch he received from a nearby knight, looked down at the writhing worm at his feet. He pressed his boot onto the severed, bleeding hand. A surge of crimson erupted, splattering the stone floor. Yet even more excruciating than the amputation was the fire that followed.

“Argh!”

The acrid stench of burning flesh and billowing smoke twisted his features into a grimace. Yet, Lyle watched the smoldering fingers without a flicker of emotion.

After all, what he was doing now… these scenes were as familiar to him as the battlefields he’d once called home.
Yernen had said it: the Yernen of now was unrecognizably different from before. But he was not the only one who had changed.

Though, it was a side of him Yernen would never witness.
“Do you know what happens if a wound keeps bleeding?”

Lyle leaned in, voice like cold steel against Eden’s ear, who now screamed breathlessly.

“If you’re lucky, you bleed out. If not, it rots from the extremities inward. But I don’t favor either option much. You see… they both lead to a swift death.”

Eden’s gaze, glazed with terror, met Lyle’s.

‘How pathetic.’

Oddly enough, what burned in those eyes was fear, pure and unfiltered.

Lyle’s mouth curled into a chilling smile as he met Eden’s stare.

“You don’t think this is the end, do you?”

I told you. You will endure it, at least as long as Yernen did.
Lyle’s voice was a whisper now.

“Don’t worry. I won’t let you die that easily. We’ll start from the tips of your limbs, working up until you have none left. Then, I’ll heal you, let your limbs grow back, and start anew. Isn’t it poetic justice? Everything I learned on the battlefields you thrust me into.”

“L-Lyle… Baltimore!”

Eden choked out, veins straining red in his eyes as he glared, like a demon clawing its way out of hell, only to dissolve under the sun’s unforgiving glare.

“I’ll make you live a fate worse than death.”

With that, Lyle gestured. Austern, who had stood nearby, pale as the dead, seized Eden’s hand and fed it into the guillotine once more. This time, just one more finger’s length.