Sometimes... oh, about once a month at this point... Bernard would find himself being asked by some employee or soldier or another just how he was always able to be so chipper, how he was always able to smile so genuinely when he came to work.

It wasn't because he worked for the world's greatest, kindest, and most charitable company that Bernard was always able to come to work wearing a smile. It wasn't because the benefits were good, and it wasn't even because of the nice office he had been given last year.

Then again, it wasn't like the company he worked for was really any of those things either, so perhaps there was some level of evening out there. It wasn't as though his smiles were that genuine either, now were they?

No... Bernard was always able to wear a smile, even when he set his pride down and let it be stomped on by blind superiors and childish brutes, because all of his plans were coming together. Everything he had wanted since a child, ever since his master had started to whisper to him in his dreams, would finally be his.

It was all falling into place. Dorfa's Fury collection was steadily growing by the day, and the preparations to ressurect the Vile God were progressing smoothly. Hanagata hadn't suspected a thing of him or his true motives. Now that he was gone, put to waste and replaced by a strapping young Fencer without a clue, Bernard knew he had been blessed with an opportunity.

Soon... Very soon, Bernard would have the power of the Vile God all for his own. That Fencer would be tossed to the side, just as Hanagata had been, and the world would be the Vild God and Bernard's for the taking.

There was just one little snag.

That face.

The face of that girl accompanying that "hero's traveling party" working so, so hard to stop the Vile God's inevitable return to the world.

It was a face Bernard had never seen before, yet at the same time, it was a face that haunted his dreams even more than those of the Vile God. It was a face he never thought he would see again, yet at the same time, it was a face he knew the very moment he laid eyes on it.

It was the face of everything Bernard had been before Dorfa. The face of grand designs. The face of simpler schemes. The face of a lover long dead and the relationship she had taken with her.

The face of the daughter he had never met — the daughter he had never known he had.

One look was all it took.

She had her mother's face, poise, and beauty... but she carried within her his blood.

The Vile God's blood.

One look was all it took for him to feel it, to know that that woman hadn't been with another man after she had left Bernard... It was all it took to know for certain that that girl traveling with that group of pests was his child.

This was a problem.

She could receive the Vild God's favor. It was known only to those of the Vile God's tribe that those of the tribe might inheret their god's will. Were she alive and out on her own, the Vile God could very well pick her over Bernard, despite how tirelessly Bernard had been working towards this goal...

He wouldn't allow for it.

He was the only one who knew the girl's true identity. Surely she would keep such a thing to herself, but she couldn't fool him. She didn't even know she needed to, and even if she tried to hide her true self, there would be no hiding it from her own kin.

Yes... The more he thought about it, the more Bernard knew what he had to do. It would require careful planning, and this "daughter" of his would need to be dealt with...

But it mattered not.

It would not be Sherman or Tiara taking the Vile God.

He was the one who had waited for it.

He was the one who had planned for it.

He was the one who would claim it.

That much, Bernard knew, he could count on for certain.

In the end, it was not Tiara that was sacrificed to the Vile God, but the father she never knew — the father she had even unknowingly helped kill in many lifetimes before this. Despite this, it was not Bernard who was granted the power he had sought... No, it was Sherman after all. Fate was rather cruel like that.

Even after all of his careful machinations, even after hoisting up his own daughter to be sacrificed... Bernard had failed. The Vile God was not his, nor even Tiara's. The Vile God's noble bloodline wasn't even allowed the grace of enjoying their ancestor's splendor as he was finally summoned to the land.

In short...?

Bernard had died for nothing.

Nothing.

After years of planning, one would think Bernard would be distraught in his last moments, seeing that damned Sherman taking what was rightfully his and his bloodline's. He had planned everything so perfectly... So perfectly! All the pieces were in their proper places... Sherman was distracted by that girl, as were all the "heroes" — there was no one to stop him from claiming what was his, as he had tried to do!

Yet he had still failed.

Would it be so strange to ruminate on such a failure?

And indeed, feelings and thoughts similar to those did come up... Even as he nearly let that girl be sacrificed, he felt nothing...

... And yet...

Try as he might to convince himself that he had placed Tiara in harm's way without any care for the girl's safety... His entire plan had hinged on her being retrieved so that he could claim the Vile God for himself. Everything was built around making sure she was not the one sacrificed.

He had told himself it was simply to make sure that she wasn't blessed by the Vile God first... He had told himself that it was simply to make sure that he could keep an eye on her, to make sure that Sherman or anyone else didn't try to interfere... But how could they? No one in Dorfa would know her ancestry if not for his actions.

It was almost as though... ensuring the girl's safety was as much the goal of his plan as claiming the Vile God for himself was.

But that couldn't be, could it? Bernard had laughed at such thoughts. All he had wanted was the Vile God.

Now he had failed.

Now he had lost everything.

... And yet...

The feelings of failure he felt didn't come close to the strange satisfaction he felt warming his dying body...

The electric pleasure of an undeniably evil man who had done one small good...

Yes, if there was one thing that could blind any man to their dreams and goals being ripped away from them faster than the blood drained out of their body, it was this feeling.

The feeling of a parent that was able to spare their child from immeasurable hardship.

As Bernard's life finally slipped away, betrayed by his god and forgotten by those fighting for the fate of the world, he found himself smiling.

And for the first time, as well as the last, Bernard smiling genuinely.

Maybe in another life, things would go differently.

Maybe... in another life...