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From the moment the poison was revealed, Rohan was overwhelmed by numerous emotions. Self-blame for not noticing it quickly enough. Fear that if he had been a little later, if he hadn’t noticed, Arpel might have really ingested the poison, and…
Intense murderous intent towards the one who targeted Arpel.
Although he couldn’t classify each emotion flowing out, the one Arpel read most clearly was none other than the murderous intent.
A violent impulse to tear apart and kill the opponent right away was jumping around, but he suppressed it all along, waiting for the situation to be resolved according to Arpel’s wishes.
And Arpel couldn’t help but know this fact. He felt better than anyone how much Rohan had endured until he uttered the word ‘interrogation’.
“That’s…”
“Brother.”
It was Owen who stepped in front of Riteran, who was exuding a strangely uncomfortable air.
Although his smile was bright, he had already noticed that Rohan’s state was not normal and had first looked at Arpel. It was a glance sent hoping that Arpel would stop Rohan, but unfortunately, he didn’t seem to have any intention of stopping him.
Owen only remembered Rohan from his time at the temple, but occasional reports conveyed a slightly different aspect. Sometimes, things like ‘tends to become impulsive when it relates to Arpel’…
‘It’s been refined.’
That was something that couldn’t be explained by the word impulsive alone. His face was smiling, but weren’t his eyes rolling?
“…Hmm.”
Riteran, discovering those eyes a beat late, let out a sigh.
The bright golden color at first glance gave the impression of sparkling eyes, but upon closer inspection, they were dangerous eyes that were more fitting to describe as glistening rather than sparkling.
Despite being a body somewhat trained in martial arts, he stiffened for a moment at the intense murderous intent that seemed to have no intention of hiding.
“…In exchange, you must not kill him.”
“Don’t worry. I’m also a priest, so I know how to heal to some extent.”
In the end, Riteran yielded the opportunity to Rohan. It was largely because he didn’t want to unnecessarily provoke the guy with dangerous eyes.
“Arpel, I’ll be back.”
His voice was affectionate as he said goodbye. Instead of answering, Arpel took Rohan’s hand. It was a hard hand with calluses from holding a sword, but to Arpel’s eyes, it still looked fair and pretty.
The shadow flickering on the floor spat out something. It was a pair of black leather gloves. The effort of collecting various things from Lexia when searching for Salvation Church branches had paid off. Wearing gloves would prevent blood from splattering on his hands.
“So blood doesn’t splatter and make a mess…”
“…Thank you.”
Although he must have known that the leather gloves came from Lexia, Rohan was completely happy just because Arpel had handed them to him.
As if it was a lie that murderous intent had once overflowed, his eyes lowered shyly, and a blush even crept up his cheeks.
Rohan put on the gloves right there and disappeared from the spot, dragging Kedwin, who was tightly bound by shadows. Seeing him go with one of the knights standing guard outside, it seemed he was being guided to a space where he could conduct the interrogation.
“So, you two…”
Only after Rohan’s figure had completely disappeared did Riteran open his mouth. His voice sounded both dumbfounded and bewildered.
The scene of those eyes, which seemed like they wouldn’t stop no matter who came to intervene, softly melting was still lingering in his mind. He hadn’t said anything touching or done anything extraordinary. He had just handed over gloves, saying blood would splatter.
To Riteran, the relationship between the two seemed like something he dared not define. Riteran, who had been gaping foolishly at this unfamiliarity, only stopped when Owen lightly elbowed him.
“…Why do you look like that?”
Owen, who was about to start speaking after letting out a small sigh, suddenly caught Arpel’s expression. His expression, ambiguous whether to call it frowning or not, seemed to have something bothering him.
“It’s nothing.”
Although he shook his head, Arpel’s mind was quite complicated.
The last face of Rohan he saw wouldn’t leave his mind. Was it because he had seen his eyes sinking sadly as he moved away? Or was it because he noticed that the faint emotion flowing from him then was guilt?
‘Why…’
He wanted to chase after Rohan, who had already left, and ask why he was so sad. He didn’t do so because the single word “I’ll be back” seemed like an expression of will asking him to leave it to Rohan.
Arpel, who had bitten his lip hard to suppress that impulse, turned his gaze to the two still sitting across from him.
He had to stay in place until Rohan returned, so he needed to do what he could in the meantime. He deliberately emptied his mind that had become full of thoughts.
“First, store the contents of this glass separately and hand it over to the temple. It will be important evidence.”
“…Understood. But I have one question. How did you know there was poison in it?”
“I have a constitution that’s more sensitive to the power of specters than other priests. I can feel the remnants of specters from this glass.”
Specters… Riteran’s face turned pale as he briefly echoed Arpel’s words, and Owen wrinkled his face as if he had expected this. It was because something naturally came to mind.
“It might be related to the landslide. It would be good to send people to that area.”
“…Landslide? What’s this about now?”
Owen belatedly explained the whole story. On the way to Fides territory, they experienced a landslide artificially caused by someone, and the soil and tree roots were rotting due to the influence of specters.
Riteran rested his chin on his hand at the mention that it seemed like they were trying to delay their arrival time at the territory. It was around that time that Kedwin had hurriedly left his post, so if it was to secure the poison, it made sense in its own way.
His gaze turned to Arpel in front of him. His eyes, filled with complexity and gravity, looked at him for a long time as if analyzing him.
To poison this man, an unidentifiable group used specters to cause a landslide.
As discussed initially, since a traitor had emerged from among the insiders, if they searched through the documents he had processed, they could quickly find out where the revelation from the Demon God was received.
In other words, it meant that Arpel, whom the aide had targeted, was related to that revelation.
Unlike the other one who pretended not to be on the outside, he was no different from openly bringing a storm.
‘…Perhaps this one is even more dangerous.’
Cold sweat ran down his back.
The purple eyes that never avoided his gaze resembled an abyss whose depths were unfathomable the more he looked. Riteran quietly rubbed his eyelids. He couldn’t understand what kind of incident his little brother had gotten involved in, or why he was hanging around with such dangerous guys.
If Owen had heard this, he would have been dumbfounded, wondering who was hanging around with whom.
***
Although it was late at night, they finished their dinner and headed not to their respective rooms but to Riteran’s office. It was to wait for Rohan and to look through Kedwin’s documents.
After sitting down and briefly scanning through the territory status investigation reports that he had been organizing so far for a few minutes.
With a small knock, Rohan appeared.
Arpel, who immediately stood up from his seat regardless of whether papers were flying or not, strode towards Rohan. The gloomy air he had last seen was nowhere to be found, and his bright face only showed a gentle smile.
Arpel looked at that smile carefully and asked. Although he knew that the faint smell of blood that hadn’t yet been blown away by the wind wasn’t his, he still couldn’t completely shake off his worry.
“Wasn’t it difficult?”
Although incredulous looks poured from behind, Arpel didn’t care. It was his consistently unchanging attitude.
Nodding with a smiling face to convey that he was fine, Rohan immediately got to the point. He began to quickly unravel what he had obtained through the interrogation.
“The ‘place where filthy energy has pooled’ that the Demon God mentioned seems to be Bemos Village, the guy’s hometown.”
“…Hometown? Did you say hometown?”
Riteran had a look of utter incomprehension. Problems would have occurred right where his own family lived, so why had he kept his mouth shut?
Even if he couldn’t quickly report to him and request help from the temple, completely hiding it was nothing but driving the village where they lived to its doom. Seeing the confusion he couldn’t hide on his face, Rohan calmly continued his story.
“It seems that recently, people living in the village have been falling asleep one by one and not waking up. Since they can’t eat or drink, many people are dying in their sleep. The villagers seem to call this a curse or divine punishment.”
“Then why on earth didn’t he report to me…!”
“Because they don’t believe in the gods.”
Arpel opened his eyes in confusion at the unexpected words. Although not all religions other than the two temples were considered heretical, most people in the empire believed in the temples. It was because the priests were the ones who protected them from the threatening existence known as ‘specters’.
Even if they couldn’t judge that the phenomenon of falling asleep and not waking up was due to specters, it was common to seek help from the temple when such a strange phenomenon was right in front of them.
But they didn’t do that. The reason would soon become clear.
“…Simply put, they’re heretics. They claim that the phenomenon of not waking from sleep is a curse from the Fox God. They firmly believe that the curse will only be lifted if they make offerings to the angry Fox God and beg for forgiveness. Even… what they did to Arpel was all because of a revelation that the guy’s wife supposedly received from the Fox God.”
Grind. The sound of teeth grinding was clearly heard in the middle.
Riteran, who had been quietly listening to the story, couldn’t hide his complex expression and rubbed his face with both hands.
After that, Rohan told many more stories. He said that if things ended successfully, to safely escape from being a suspect, they had prepared someone else who could be suspected, and that it was one of the maids who was carrying the tray.
Kedwin confessed that he had even secretly hidden a bottle of poison in her room to frame her, who had last checked the food for poison. If things had gone according to his plan, it would have been that young maid who would have been caught as a substitute criminal.
