'Crunch'

Haah....

I open my eyes, breathing heavily. The corridor of the underground isolation zone is filled with the loud blare of emergency sirens and the cold flash of red emergency lights. A familiar magic sword is gripped in my hand, and the corpse of a gun-wielding gatekeeper I just cut down lies nearby.

It's a regression I've lost count of. Where did things go so wrong? A while ago, when the Imperial Family controlled the media and blocked visitations, claiming "Her Highness the Princess is too ill to be seen," a corner of my heart grew anxious. Since we were childhood friends, I could only hope for her recovery with a worried heart... then suddenly, a secret imperial decree was issued stating the Princess had been kidnapped by a witch and was trapped in the emergency isolation zone.

As a magic officer of the Korean Empire's Imperial Guard, I rushed to save her without a second thought the moment I heard the news. My only thought was to save my precious childhood friend at any cost. However, the scene I encountered when I broke through the thick security control room door was utter madness.

There was no witch there. Instead, there were the horribly mangled corpses of magical beasts and guards, and in the middle of the blood-soaked control room stood my childhood friend, Princess Lee Sia.

What... is that really the Princess I knew?

The face and voice were definitely the Princess I knew. But the emotional expression, the look in her eyes, even her eerily twisted movements were nothing like the pure and gentle person I remembered.

Nevertheless, the moment she spotted me, her clear rose-red eyes sparkled and she looked as happy as a child... that expression was exactly the same as the face that used to smile at me when we were young.

The Princess simply crushed me while smiling innocently. My screams were buried under her breathless excitement... and when I opened my eyes, it was always this marble corridor where the emergency sirens were wailing.

What on earth happened to the Princess...? Why did she become like that!

I even tried to strike the Princess with my magic sword. But the blade couldn't even leave a scratch; instead, the Princess lost her reason and went on a rampage because "I tried to kill her," tearing me to shreds. I tried abandoning the isolation zone and fleeing outside the castle to the modern city. But a few days later, the Princess caught up to me, emerging into the city and turning every building and citizen she saw into bloody pulp just to find me and hug me to death.

Why did the Princess, who was said to be ill, turn into such a strange monster? What did they mean by her being kidnapped? Without knowing anything, I've become trapped in this blood-stained eternal cycle.