#96
Hascal was a busy man.
He never missed any matter, big or small, in the half-demon exclusive zone, and he also had a foot in the series of tasks he had agreed to do long ago in exchange for becoming part of the imperial family and empire.
However, among all those schedules, what he prioritized above all else wasn’t clan affairs.
Eris.
Matters related to his eternal master were his greatest concern on earth.
“Elder-nim. There’s something additional to report.”
“Additional report?”
Therefore, when he heard his subordinate’s report, he keenly sensed something.
“If it’s a report related to the ritual, it should have already come up. Did that old man cause some trouble again?”
“That is…… it’s said to be related to Lady Marsien.”
“It’s a report related to the ritual, so why is that name coming up here? Ah, is it about those regular letters?”
He was different from the old man who didn’t even check Isabella Marsien’s letters.
“Hmm.”
The additionally reported content was that Isabella Marsien had sent a letter during the ritual. It was treated as a trivial matter and handled appropriately, but it was omitted from the report so they were giving an additional report.
It was content he would normally just nod at and pass over, but strangely, he read that letter several times and tilted his head in puzzlement.
Because his persistent intuition was reacting.
“……Keep this classified separately.”
“This…… Ah, yes sir.”
The subordinate looked puzzled, but since the elder didn’t like repeating himself, he immediately classified the letter.
“What about that young lady’s letter?”
“Seeing that it hasn’t come, it seems he burned it again.”
“Check on it.”
“Yes.”
The old half-demon who had been playing the role of Lady Marsien’s black magic teacher was a temperamental eccentric.
So in cases like Lady Marsien’s regular letters, where the target was important but the letter itself was full of useless content, he would just burn them.
It wasn’t a one or two time occurrence, and the elder had never punished or warned high-ranking half-demons for such things, so he didn’t say much about it.
But he couldn’t help feeling strangely uncomfortable.
‘I should check this out somehow later.’
That monster-like Archduke had been digging into half-demon affairs tremendously lately, leaving no room to breathe. Still, when he got feelings like this, there was nothing he could do about it. It was a strong intuition without basis that this was related to Eris-nim.
Still, there was nothing he could do immediately.
“Now, Elder-nim. They say they’ve discovered traces of someone infiltrating the ritual site.”
“……What did you just say?”
“They felt mana similar to half-demon energy and investigated, but no one among the half-demons had entered that place after the ritual. But they…… reported finding blood.”
“Incredible. You’re reporting this only now?”
“I, I’m sorry. The investigation took time……!”
“You should know that no one except those given permission can even enter the ritual site, right?”
Hascal’s expression turned ominously cold at the news that arrived two days late.
While he was scolding his subordinate for now, the déjà vu he felt then was washing over him.
“If it’s similar to half-demon energy but not energy used by half-demons, then someone must have been using half-demon relics.”
“Yes. So we checked all traces including the blood, and unexpected results came out……”
“Unexpected results?”
“……The 2nd Prince……”
This is it.
This is what connects to that inexplicable intuition he felt then.
“You mean the 2nd Prince. The 2nd Prince visited the ritual site……”
The 2nd Prince, Ersen Mayer.
He could be called the most troublesome existence currently.
‘The only being who knows the secret of the gray treasure.’
Though it was quite unpleasant as someone who was a half-demon and Eris-nim’s close associate, the prince seemed to know where the gray treasure of pure-blood demons that Eris-nim had used was located.
But directly approaching to capture the prince had failed, and subsequent attempts to spirit him away for torture had also failed.
Rather, in the second attempt, the prince was damaged, which became the trigger for the Archduke and Crown Prince to take him away.
“Tsk.”
Ersen Mayer, Ersen…… The prince he later saw through the video orb that Rico had taken looked better than what Hascal remembered.
The appearance he had thought looked exactly like Eris-nim actually showed more differences when dressed up. Hascal found this disgustingly unpleasant, but at the same time, he coveted it.
The prince’s appearance at the Marsien family ball had been reminiscent of a calm night sea.
Though he didn’t have the intense overwhelming presence and atmosphere characteristic of those who used wicked sorcery like Eris-nim, he had his own charm that made one want to destroy him.
Hascal wanted to see him bleed. He wanted to see those ash-colored eyes that seemed to gaze into the distance clearly tinted with pain as he cut flesh and broke bones with his own hands. That distorted face would surely……
“Elder-nim……?”
“Hmm.”
At his subordinate’s call, Hascal habitually filed away his violence toward Prince Ersen.
And said with a strange smile:
“I thought he was stubbornly holding on, and it turns out he had some tricks after all.”
“The prince…… you mean? Ah, that’s right. Actually, I thought he would have died early on.”
It was as his subordinate said.
When he was in the prince’s palace, they had cast minor curses almost daily that could have killed him.
The prince who endured all of that was now staying in the Crown Prince’s palace.
And even there, he was withstanding quite a few attacks.
‘Someone like the Archduke would know what’s happening. Seeing that he’s staying quiet, they don’t seem very close.’
He didn’t think that it was being observed to draw out that judgment.
Because what the half-demons had done to the prince under the elder’s leadership, while seeming trivial individually, was at a level that could kill or drive a person mad when combined.
That monster wasn’t the kind of human who would sacrifice someone he was friendly with just to draw out such a judgment from him.
‘It is quite irritating that he entered the Crown Prince’s palace.’
But that part would soon be resolved since the Marsien family was moving as reported two days ago.
Then what they needed to know now was what the 2nd Prince knew, what he had provided to the Crown Prince’s side, and what purpose he was moving for……
The great curse cast on the four people was like a relic of Eris-nim. They needed to successfully achieve the purpose for which they cast that curse after Eris-nim’s death, but that vermin dared to interfere with those affairs.
But though the vermin was annoying, he judged that it couldn’t possibly interfere with them more than it already was.
So they had attacked the vermin while accelerating the deepening of the curses on those four people – the Crown Prince, the Archduke, Young Master Lindea, and Marcus – a bit faster than planned.
Strangely, the prince didn’t die.
No, he had planned to take him away and torture him if he got tired and asked for help, but he didn’t even ask for help.
He didn’t go to the temple asking to have curses lifted either.
Then what was he doing in the Crown Prince’s palace while enduring like that?
‘He even recently blatantly destroyed one of the half-demon strongholds together with that Archduke.’
Everyone had been grinding their teeth because the prince looked too fine compared to the clan’s curses inflicted on him then.
The elder was even anxious because he planned to monopolize information about the gray treasure and spirit away the prince in front of all the upper ranks to play with him to his heart’s content.
It was because an ominous premonition washed over him that he might not be able to get that thing under his control like this.
Thinking of the Archduke who had naturally coordinated with the prince as if they were on the same side at that place, while taking no measures for those being cursed……
‘I wondered what he was hiding.’
Prince Ersen the 2nd was planning something harmful to the half-demons.
This was the moment it settled as conviction within the half-demons.
Just as all the nerves of the half-demon upper ranks were focused on Prince Ersen, this incident broke out.
“There’s only one way to go to the ritual site without a token.”
“……So that one was carrying Eris-nim’s relic.”
“Right. I’m certain.”
It didn’t make sense that Eris-nim had left so many things to that vermin.
So these must be stolen items.
No, they had to be.
“To think he even had the ring.”
Though he had no idea where it appeared from or through what route it could be obtained, one of the highest-grade relics that pure-blood demons used instead of treasures before obtaining gray treasures was that ‘black ring.’
Until now, only pure-blood demons wearing that ring could visit that place in such a manner.
“Incredible. Acting as if he’s a pure-blood demon!”
After receiving reports that no traces of going inside were left either, it became even more certain.
Hascal ordered his subordinate with strangely glistening eyes:
“Whatever that thing has, we need to bring it all. Summon the high-ranking half-demons.”
“What are you planning to do……”
“He’ll soon be expelled from the imperial palace, so then he’ll ask the half-demons to grant him that palace before innocent nobles get their hands on it.”
“Would the Emperor give it just because we ask for an imperial palace building?”
“Isn’t there the Crown Prince’s curse? If we make the condition of weakening and lifting it, he’ll do anything.”
The subordinate exclaimed in admiration.
Author: Hyacinthus B
Hyacinthus
