“The poison is a bit slow-acting, I see.”
He glanced at the teacup on the table.
Kensington could not believe it.
*Cough.* Even as blood seeped from her mouth and the excruciating pain in her heart spread through her entire body, she simply could not believe it.
She had thought his treatment of Iason just moments ago was merely a warning to her.
She never imagined that a more wretched end awaited her…….
“Your Majesty! I am your hand, your eye. How! How could you do this to me, *urgh*……!”
Kensington reached out her hand in a surge of indignation for her betrayed loyalty.
She had stained her hands with countless blood through the spy network she had built over a lifetime, spanning the entire continent. She had shunned all glory in the shadows and lived as a dirty scavenger.
All for Perdicas II, her master.
Even though she served a flawed master filled with jealousy and greed, she believed that as a subject, she had to embrace him all the more.
She believed that the bond they had built over the long years since he was a Prince also existed in the Emperor’s heart.
Just as she had desperately looked away from the hand the Princess of Baldina reached out, she thought a bond between sovereign and subject—one that could not be easily severed—still remained within him.
She never knew she would be betrayed so utterly.
“That is your delusion. You are merely a part that can be replaced whenever your usefulness is exhausted. How long did you think I would tolerate the arrogance of you daring to act as the body of the Supreme Ruler?”
The Emperor kicked away Kensington’s hand.
“The reason the Red Fox Corps grew this large is because I permitted it. Therefore, it is mine. Not yours!”
“No, Your Majesty—!”
“But Kensington, what have you done? You used it to threaten me, looking for an opportunity to switch sides and betray me!”
The Emperor’s shout was close to the desperate outburst of a beast. His golden staff struck Kensington’s body violently.
The sound of the solid metal shattering bone echoed.
However, the Emperor was not satisfied. It was because he had intended to strike Kensington’s head.
“*Haa, haa*…….”
He inhaled ragged breaths, wheezing. Then, unable to look at his trembling hands any longer, he threw the staff aside.
“You’ve stayed in your position too long. A change of generation is needed. The time has come to discard the fouled water and pour anew.”
He was a hunter. That was how he had secured this throne.
The law of the wild—eat or be eaten—was no exception in the Kazen Imperial Family.
During the struggle for the throne, Kensington’s help had been desperate. But now, decades after he had emerged victorious in that fight, an organization with two leaders only invited chaos.
With the dishonor of having stolen his nephew’s position hanging over him, it was not easy to eliminate a loyal subject who had worked for his throne all this time.
Therefore, this current situation was the perfect pretext for Perdicas II.
By pinning all the blame for the failures of the delegation to Baldina on Kensington, he could wash his hands clean.
“Per… di… cas…….”
Kensington tried to move her stiffening tongue, but it was futile. The Princess’s voice echoed in her head.
*“Would that loyalty remain valid even if you were to die by the Emperor’s hand?”*
Her stiffened body fell to the floor with a thud.
“It is a tragic matter, as Count Kensington felt the weight of responsibility for this incident and punished herself.”
Perdicas II spoke solemnly as he looked down at the dying woman. His eyes were filled with ruthlessness.
“I have decided to respect the final choice of a loyal subject, so announce the death of Count Kensington and uphold her legacy.”
“Yes, Your Majesty.”
The Chief Attendant bowed politely.
*Tsk.* As if his business there was finished, the Emperor clicked his tongue once. He then brushed past the fallen Kensington, his robe fluttering.
In the office where he was left alone, the old Chief Attendant offered a brief moment of silence toward the fallen Kensington.
“I am sorry, Count. Please understand.”
That evening, a wagon loaded with straw left the Imperial Palace.
The wagon reached the banks of a deep river that cut through Persepolis, the capital of the Kazen Empire.
In a secluded spot by the river, sturdy men pulled Kensington’s body, hidden within the straw, and placed it upon a wooden raft.
*Whoosh!* They set the raft on fire.
It was a makeshift funeral the Chief Attendant had prepared for Kensington at the risk of being caught.
Under the light illuminating the darkness, Kensington’s two eyes remained frozen in shock. Her wide-open eyes revealed her blood-curdling resentment and were hideous to behold.
Following the flowing river, the raft drifted away.
“Let’s go.”
The men who had been watching the receding fire turned and vanished.
How much time had passed?
While the black river water rippled silently, a quiet boat approached the raft from the darkness.
*Splash.*
a figure jumped into the water, moved Kensington’s body into the boat, and let the raft drift away.
The orange ball of fire floated down the quiet waves as if nothing had happened.
*Splash!*
The stranger took a bucket and threw river water over Kensington’s body.
Again, *splash!*
The moment the water slid incessantly over her drenched, pale face, Kensington bolted upright.
“*Gasp*—!”
“Since you’re awake, have some of this.”
The stranger reached out a clean water canteen to Kensington in a lively voice.
Kensington lifted her head. A young man covered in freckles was looking down at her.
While tracing a sense of déjà vu—feeling he was unfamiliar yet seen somewhere before—Kensington soon twisted her expression.
“Red Fox—!”
It was because her thoughts reached her comrades.
‘If it is the Emperor, he will not stop with just me.’
The Red Fox Corps followed only Kensington as their leader. Even the Emperor had failed to win them over or extract them.
With Perdicas’s paranoid personality, he would rather burn the Red Fox Corps to the ground than let them live if they did not submit to him.
At that moment, the stranger winked as if to reassure her.
“They’ve already moved locations. They are waiting for you, Count.”
“Leader…….”
A familiar face appeared behind him. It was Umberto.
“The Princess of Baldina……. No, Princess Her Highness…… sent this man. Along with a note to evacuate our comrades if the Leader did not return from the Imperial Palace.”
At first, Umberto did not believe it. But he felt strangely uneasy. The Princess of Baldina had never been wrong.
“So I sounded the White Flag alarm. Everyone escaped before the Imperial Knights stormed in. The Red Foxes are safe.”
At Umberto’s words, a single tear flowed from Kensington’s eye.
Simultaneously, crimson blood trickled from between her bitten lips.
If it hadn't been for the bezoar the Princess handed her, she would have died after drinking the monkshood poison the Emperor gave her.
Kensington had already swallowed the bezoar before her audience with the Emperor. If so, did she become a turncoat first for not trusting her sovereign?
Even so, was the Emperor—who cast her away to the very end—not the one who betrayed her?
“Ha, haha, hahahaha!”
A hollow yet eerie laughter spread.
It sounded almost like a scream pulled from deep within.
Tom and Umberto remained silent until she regained her composure.
Eventually, Kensington lifted her head. The tear tracks, not yet dried, emitted a chilling aura under the moonlight.
“I must go to Baldina.”
“Yes, I shall escort you. You won't regret it.”
Tom curled the corners of his mouth.
“Before that, I must stop at the Holy Kingdom. The headquarters of the Red Fox Corps is there.”
“Is it not here, in Persepolis?”
“I chose that place in case Kazen was attacked or I died. As they say, it’s darkest under the lamp; no one would ever think we were hidden in the shadow of the Holy Kingdom, an enemy nation.”
It was so that even if Kensington died, the Red Fox Corps could continue their activities.
Even Perdicas II did not properly know the scale or location of the headquarters.
The loyalty she had intended to offer the Emperor, the shield that would have placed the Empire in the ranks of eternal superpowers, was such a thing.
*Clop, clop.*
On the path leaving the road she had tirelessly run upon, a fire burned brightly in Kensington’s eyes.
“Yes. I shall go to the Princess.”
Her former master had burned away even her final lingering attachments. Now, nothing held Louisa back.
