Chapter 224
I wanted to slap away the hand that carelessly touched my face. However, because my hands were bound behind me, pulling my head back was the only means of resistance available. How annoying.
“I’m not curious enough to grant your request. Satisfied? Now take your hand away.”
“Even though we spent only a short time together, I thought we had built quite a solid friendship, but was that just my delusion?”
“How many people do you think would still maintain friendship after being betrayed?”
“Quite a few people with generous hearts who forgive would.”
“Unfortunately, I’m not one of them.”
Far from removing his hand, he now brought his face close. It was quite an uncomfortable distance, so I pulled my head back further. As my body’s balance tilted backward, I found myself staggering backward to regain my footing.
“But I’m treating you well.”
“In what way?”
“You’re able to walk on your own right now.”
He approached as much as I had moved away. Though he was smiling, the green eyes that had looked clear turned murky like a swamp, creating an eerie atmosphere.
Slowly, his gaze swept down my body, eventually stopping around my legs.
“It’s not like only Lord Blight can carry you around.”
Then he added ‘Right?’ as if seeking agreement, grinning widely. It gave me chills.
“Is that a threat?”
“Mm. No. Let’s define it as something like a complaint asking you to understand how generous mercy and kindness I’m showing.”
“As if.”
After glaring menacingly at my legs, calling it a complaint. Those were definitely sincere words. A warning to be grateful that I could walk around normally on two legs and not act up.
“But aren’t you really curious about what my request is?”
“No. I’m not curious.”
The grip on my chin weakened, so I shook my head to break free. The 3rd Prince chuckled softly and lowered his hand.
“You should be curious. I’m going to keep my promise to end the war.”
I truly hadn’t been curious about the 3rd Prince’s request at all. Until now, that is.
Using ‘ending the war’ as bait to shake his fishing rod. I didn’t want to bite completely, but I felt like taking a nibble.
“How.”
“By driving out my older brother.”
The 3rd Prince’s eyes curved beautifully.
“I’m going to seize the throne.”
The throne, not the crown prince position? Of course, becoming crown prince would mean becoming emperor later, but the current nuance was somehow subtle. It sounded like he could immediately ascend to emperor just by driving out the crown prince.
“For that, I need Lord Blight’s military power.”
“Are you planning to commit treason?”
“That’s what my older brother did.”
The expression disappeared from the 3rd Prince’s face.
“I reported to Father what my older brother had done.”
Amid the loud noise of triggered traps and distant screams, the 3rd Prince’s story began.
“Naturally, Father was furious. The undeniable evidence was clear. But the result was different from my expectations. So…”
And that story ended around the time the screaming died down. Omitting all the supplementary explanations, I asked the most important question.
“Are you certain the emperor is already dead?”
This was an event that wasn’t in the book. There, when the war broke out, Tuaso’s emperor was in good health.
“I’m sure. Ludwig confirmed it.”
“But the emperor declared war.”
“My older brother used Father’s seal.”
Was the imperial palace already seized?
“Are Ludwig and Ethan all your subordinates?”
“There were more, but I abandoned them all and came. I came here to die in the first place.”
I unconsciously twitched my eyebrows in reaction, wondering if that death might have been suicide.
“You planned to just die without doing anything?”
“What could I do? I only know how to paint and play instruments.”
I couldn’t tell if he was serious or joking. Despite having neutralized me and Luwen.
“Ah! There seems to be a misunderstanding – I wasn’t thinking of suicide. I was just trying to fake my death.”
“…What?”
This time I was genuinely surprised and found myself asking back. I never imagined that the 3rd Prince’s death itself was false information.
“Royal corpses are generally treated well, so if I just made the face look like mine, there’s a high probability of not being caught, right? Even if caught, it would buy me enough time to escape, so I thought it was a good strategy either way.”
It was good if not caught, and fine even if caught?
Perhaps because I had benefited so much from the information written in the book until now, I never imagined that it would trip me up at this point.
It was wrong information from the beginning. The 3rd Prince’s personality and death. Everything.
I reset all my evaluations of the 3rd Prince. I needed to exclude the muddled information and reassess what kind of person he was based on what I had directly experienced.
“It seems like a foolish plan to threaten me when you want to borrow Luwen’s power. If you had properly requested it, he might have cooperated.”
Before I knew it, Ethan had returned covered in blood. Blood drops dripped from the end of his black hood. His tongue flickering in his bright red lips spread wide with excitement looked just like a snake’s. Whether it was a familiar sight, the 3rd Prince answered calmly without any particular disturbance.
“Well, it seemed like Fei was the only thing important to Lord Blight. He valued you more than my life, which holds the key to war. Would he still go to Tuaso?”
“If I had persuaded him, he would have moved.”
“He might have. But when?”
The 3rd Prince asked back as if he knew everything. I closed my mouth there, because as he pointed out, half of it was a lie.
Luwen wouldn’t be separated from me for long, and I didn’t want to send him alone on a journey when we didn’t know when he’d return. But if we could stop the war, it would be right to move…
The only conclusion was to go to Tuaso together, but Luwen wouldn’t obediently take me on the dangerous journey to seize the imperial palace. It was even an enemy nation.
‘Persuasion would take quite a while.’
My sister would also oppose it, so I could clearly see a future where no conclusion would be reached within a day or two.
‘Thinking about it this way, forcibly taking me as a hostage and dragging me along certainly seems like the fastest and easiest method.’
I didn’t want to admit it, but if things dragged on without conclusion, I might have even suggested to the 3rd Prince to kidnap me.
‘He’s definitely smart.’
I didn’t know why he had tried to run away, but he had execution ability. He was bold and made quick yet quite accurate judgments.
‘But I still don’t trust him.’
No matter what the circumstances, how could I trust someone who started with betrayal? This too might be a script tailored to my purposes, knowing what I wanted.
‘Escape is still the priority.’
If I became convinced that he really did this because he wanted to stop the war, then I would cooperate, but not yet. Especially since I had also seen the 3rd Prince’s cruel side.
“Ethan, surely there are no survivors?”
“They resisted quite fiercely.”
The voice answering with a helpless laugh and the terrible appearance he presented created an atmosphere of extremes.
“Good work.”
“They’ll swarm again anyway.”
Ethan answered in a humming tone while looking around. He was like a predator targeting prey, no – like a monster. Predators hunt only when hungry, but this bastard was a lunatic who simply took pleasure in killing people.
“Look. They’re gathering again. I’ll go take care of it!”
“Do it properly this time. Don’t kill them all.”
“Yes sir!”
With that eerie warning and cheerful response, Ethan disappeared.
I looked back once more. Luwen was still nowhere to be seen. Was my heart beating faster because of anxiety? I wanted to confirm that he was safe.
* * *
By dawn, we had entered the main camp of the Tuaso assassination unit. And I could understand why people hadn’t recognized Ethan.
After removing his hood and neatly combing his hair, he tore off his face. He had been wearing a mask crafted so precisely that no sense of incongruity could be felt. The form that adhered to his skin was at the level of special makeup used in modern filming.
‘Indeed. He must have created the 3rd Prince’s face with that to disguise the corpse.’
As the 3rd Prince had said, it seemed they hadn’t properly examined the corpse out of courtesy for royalty.
Anyway, erasing my assumption that Ethan had betrayed, I moved quietly under his surveillance. After walking a short distance, I encountered a man with a pale face, trembling as he led his subordinates.
“I-I greet the 3rd Prince Your Highness.”
He greeted while watching Ethan’s reaction rather than the 3rd Prince.
‘He’s giving up like that without even trying to resist?’
Did this mean Ethan’s reputation, or rather notoriety, was that famous?
“Co-Co-Count, you were with Your Highness. Th-th-thank goodness.”
“Reeeally th-th-thankful?”
“Of c-course. You don’t know how worried we were. You kept avoiding us so heartlessly…”
“Aha. I see.”
The 3rd Prince, who had been listening to their conversation and snorted, wrapped his arm around my shoulder and changed direction.
“Come, Fei, this way.”
The moment he called my name, the man turned his head sharply toward me, but immediately turned back at Ethan’s exclamation.
“Now begins the time of purging. Fei, rest while receiving treatment.”
The 3rd Prince whispered in a rather affectionate tone as he guided me to the barracks.
Author: Hyacinthus B
Hyacinthus
