Hearing the high nobles air their mingled regret and resentment, Rihart’s aide, Maurice, broke into a cold sweat.
Mourning, my foot.
Maurice strung together the brazen lie, pangs of guilt pricking at his conscience.
Just how much longer would such smooth excuses work on the nobility?
Even so, it was not as though he could honestly confess that his fastidious commander found gatherings like this utterly intolerable.
Not when the man’s popularity was not merely soaring to the heavens, but practically ascending straight into paradise.
‘Nothing will go wrong, right?’
Recalling his inscrutable superior, who had slipped away with nothing more than a passing remark that he had run out of cigars, Maurice felt an inexplicable unease.
Rihart was cold by nature, a man who seldom revealed what lay beneath the surface.
Since returning from the subjugation expedition, however, he had grown even more distant, impossible to read.
About the only time a shred of humanity showed through was when he was around the Black Knights.
‘…I’m just worrying over nothing.’
Yet he could not help fretting over how things were unfolding.
Lately, the Grand Duke of Cronel seemed inclined to back the incompetent second son born to his second wife rather than his eldest, Rihart.
Maurice’s family, on the other hand, had staked their fortunes entirely upon the capable, formidable Rihart, the true heir.
Hoping against hope that tonight would pass without incident, Maurice dabbed his sweat with a handkerchief.
***
The moment she spotted Professor Thomas in a corner of the banquet hall, Mona clutched the thesis tucked beneath her skirt.
At the same time, she brought the rehearsed script to mind.
It went something like this:
‘Professor, have you looked over my paper?
I knew it! That is why I brought a copy with me.
I understand you are busy, but five minutes will be more than enough.
I arranged the formatting strictly according to regulations, so you need only check the final page marking the core hypothesis and conclusions.’
Naturally, she had also prepared for the contingency where that scoundrel of a professor refused to review it.
‘Professor. Are you aware?
If a full year passes without an advising record, the Academy’s Office of Academic Affairs may initiate an audit into your lecture credentials.
Investing just five minutes would work entirely in your favor.
If even that proves difficult, please spare a single second to sign this transfer of evaluation authority.’
Just as she was admiring her foolproof script, Mona’s eyes went wide.
Where did he go?
In the brief moment she ducked into the terrace corner to retrieve the thesis from under her skirt, that scoundrel had vanished into thin air yet again.
‘Still, he couldn’t have gotten far.’
Just as expected, Professor Thomas was striding down the corridor, chattering boisterously among his crowd.
‘Where is he headed, anyway?’
Watching the professor slip out a back door leading to the grounds, Mona recalled what the mage had told her earlier.
‘Tsk. The victory banquet is merely an excuse; he is bound to slip away to a social club.’
Could he be on his way to that social club right this second…?
What should she do?
After a brief hesitation, Mona set her jaw with determination and began tailing the professor.
Under imperial law, the head of a house held the authority to arrange a daughter’s marriage against her will.
If she failed to secure her degree soon, her father might forcibly marry her off to some total stranger.
She was in no position to be picky.
‘Once you draw a blade, you have to cut something, even if it’s just a radish…’
Even after leaving the banquet hall, however, Mona’s pursuit proved anything but smooth.
“Ugh!”
The main streets near the imperial palace were packed with crowds eager to catch even a glimpse of the war hero’s hem.
Squeezing through the throng, she somehow managed not to lose sight of Professor Thomas and his party.
Before she knew it, Mona had drifted far from the main thoroughfare and into an unfamiliar district.
‘Cigar smoke…’
An acrid stench suddenly stung her nose.
Frowning, Mona stepped into the alley the professor had entered.
A hulking man abruptly blocked her path.
As she offered an anxious reply while watching the professor’s party vanish into the dim salon, the bouncer shoved her shoulder.
“Wait, ah!”
Snatching her thick spectacles, the bouncer tossed them straight into a rubbish bin and shoved a white mask into her hands.
Before she could even protest him throwing them away, the bouncer scurried toward a group of men wearing ornate masks.
Mona stared after the bouncer in utter dismay as he bustled off with the patrons.
Unable to bring herself to fish her spectacles out of a bin heaped with vomit and empty liquor bottles, she settled for slipping on the mask.
‘Dammit.’
Pressing her bangs flat so her discolored irises remained hidden, Mona choked down a curse.
She had been so consumed by chasing the professor that she only now realized the place she had wandered into was distinctly unsettling.
With nightfall, gaudy magical lanterns flared to life across the street, and people in revealing attire began to surface one after another.
‘When they called it a social club, I assumed it was something refined, but it’s just an entertainment salon.’
Having taken “social club” literally as a gentleman’s parlor to play cards and socialize, Mona felt thoroughly defeated.
Had she come all this way only to give up and turn back…?
Regrettable as it was, finding the professor in a place like this was far beyond her abilities.
Dejected, Mona trudged back along the path she had taken.
‘…Is this even the way I came?’
Once darkness fell, the flashing magical lamps transformed the entire scenery, utterly throwing off her sense of direction.
All she could see were suspicious vendor stalls multiplying with every turn.
The farther she walked, the heavier the bitter, choking smoke and stench grew, until Mona, coughing, approached one of the vendors.
Before she could even ask where to catch a carriage, the merchant shoved a case right in front of her face.
The moment the merchant opened the box, a familiar herbal scent grazed the tip of her nose.
‘This… smells like Almaris.’
Almaris was one of the ingredients Mona handled most during her research on befriending monsters, so there was no mistaking it.
Why on earth would anyone put that flower into cigars?
Almaris was a plant-type monster flower, much like a mandragora; while not poisonous, it subtly distorted the flow of surrounding mana.
Because of that, it was treated as a hazardous substance…
When Mona kept her lips tight and offered no reply, the merchant snapped irritably and went right back to soliciting other passersby.
‘It looks like this place peddles illicit tobacco…’
Which meant the imperial guard rarely raided the area. It might be even more dangerous than an entertainment salon.
‘Am I cursed today or something?’
Swallowing down her nerves, Mona hurried through the alley as fast as her feet could carry her.
Once she slipped past the row of tobacco vendors, the surroundings shifted in an instant.
The pungent stench of tar faded, replaced by an inexplicable chill that clung to her skin.
…What is this?
Mona’s eyes snapped wide.
‘The mana here is flowing strangely.’
She was already naturally sensitive to mana, but the heightened perception resulting from the experiment’s side effects made her realize it at once.
The mana in this area was running in reverse.
What some referred to as a sinister force: demonic energy.
Her heart began to thud, wild and erratic.
Rather than fear, a corner of her mind boiled with sheer excitement.
Only monsters, beings that defied the natural order, were capable of reversing the circulation of mana.
Why was the presence of a monster lingering in a place like this?
…What kind of monster could it be?
A mere slime could never generate a mana distortion of this scale.
Her curiosity was so overwhelming that her feet refused to turn away.
Mona knew better than anyone that curiosity killed the cat; the massive scar carved into her shoulder from a failed experiment was proof enough.
Even after suffering that disaster, however, she remained a reckless cat who stubbornly pressed on with her research into befriending monsters.
‘It’s not like it killed me.’
Losing all reason whenever monsters were involved, Mona moved as if entranced toward the source of the heavy mana distortion.
Truth be told, she had a card up her sleeve.
Her constitution allowed her to befriend monsters, so things would somehow work out—
“Aaaargh!”
A bloodcurdling, ragged shriek drilled straight through her eardrums.
“Ghk…! Urgh, cough! Lord Rihart, please… please, spare m—!”
A sickening crunch of mangled flesh and snapping bone tore through the air.
Then, a deathly silence fell over the alley once more.
Lord… Rihart?
Just as she froze in shock, realizing she had heard a name she should never have heard—
From the pitch-black darkness, Mona met a beast’s gaze head-on, glowing blood-red.
Those were not the eyes of a man, but of a predator.
