Chapter 35
“However, I think I know what the Imperial Consort is aiming for. Under the pretext that you need an exorcism to wake up… it seems she plans to personally invite a High Priest who isn’t under the influence of the Duchy of Castline to meet with you.”
“And while she’s at it, those maids who suffered such humiliation at the Empress’s Palace will become proud servants who threw themselves into danger to lift Imperial Princess Titania’s ‘curse,’ right? She won’t ever have to get rid of them then. We’ll have to bury the past, keep them by our side, and even grant them rewards?”
“In fact, it seems she’s trying to pay you back for that very thing.”
Adrian gave a bitter smile.
When I had rolled those maids through a grueling ordeal under the guise of ‘Hey, prove your loyalty to your master,’ Imperial Consort Cleo had seized the opportunity. ‘Oh my, this kind of prayer is only for someone truly cursed,’ she’d said, inventing a non-existent curse out of thin air.
There was no way she could have known beforehand that the Emoticon Sword was effectively a demonic sword to others; perhaps the Imperial Consort’s plan and the appearance of the Emoticon Sword had simply coincided by chance.
Everyone knew the security of the Rose Palace was a disaster. The guards, who hadn’t protected me and weren’t even at their posts at the time, would have gladly given whatever testimony suited Imperial Consort Cleo’s taste from their prison cells. The maids, even more so.
“And Her Majesty the Empress will likely be reprimanded.”
A bitter taste filled my mouth.
Wow, I nearly died, yet I can’t even rest in peace for a single week. What a spectacular, dynamic Imperial Palace life this is.
I spoke through gritted teeth.
“…Because she allowed an unholy curse to roam freely within the majestic Imperial Palace?”
“Because it’s easy to push the narrative that the reason you need protection now is due to Mother’s initial negligence.”
They’re certainly making efficient use of someone else’s sword!
Either way, the conclusion was simple. I couldn’t stay lying down any longer. Yet, I couldn’t just jump up and say, ‘There was no such thing as a curse.’
If I did that, it would be like admitting I’d been faking an illness this whole time… lying here when there was nothing wrong with me.
Adrian continued with a wry smile.
“I heard that after a massive investigation of the Rose Palace area tomorrow, the High Priest will enter the palace and come to the Empress’s Palace to heal you. An official document with His Majesty’s seal has already arrived, ordering cooperation.”
Investigating the Rose Palace tomorrow? It was obvious they intended to bar anyone from entering or leaving the Rose Palace area and secretly plant evidence of a curse tonight.
Then, tomorrow, they would bring in a High Priest who was in their pocket to make the curse an established fact.
I was completely cornered. I had underestimated the Imperial Consort. To think she’d make it so I couldn’t stop her even while knowing her plan. Still, I couldn’t just live my life being a victim.
I briefly chewed over the original novel’s knowledge that might be useful in this situation. Then, I made my decision.
“……Please call someone from the Duchy of Castline. Tell them it’s urgent.”
In the face of survival and the future, let’s set aside pride for a moment.
When Titania had left him with the words ‘Do not interfere anymore,’ Raymon had naturally assumed he wouldn’t see her for a while. To his surprise, however, as soon as she learned of the Imperial Consort’s schemes in the palace, Titania contacted him without a word of complaint. She asked for ‘help.’ She said she would use one of the debts she had so graciously cleared.
Since time was short and she knew the influence and capabilities of the Castline family well, she intended to utilize them this time.
As he listened to her plan—a concoction of methods he hadn’t even imagined, a bit of stubbornness, a gamble, and a dash of acting—Raymon’s lips twitched involuntarily.
‘Why go this far?’
He had almost asked that.
Even the Castline family had grasped that the Imperial Consort was up to something suspicious. However, since it didn’t directly harm the Castline family, they had been waiting to see how she would act.
Of course, if Titania had been directly harmed, they would have moved. But they wouldn’t have responded this proactively.
Titania, resting comfortably in the Empress’s Palace, looked at ease. Just in case, she would mutter to herself while reading the books Raymon brought her, and she claimed that rolling around late in bed and eating snacks in comfort was the height of luxury. He hadn’t expected Titania to react to this situation in such a way.
She could have just pretended to sleep and then acted as if she woke up after receiving the blessing of the High Priest summoned by the Imperial Consort’s side, or she could have announced she had already woken up before the High Priest arrived.
Either way, there was nothing for Titania to lose right now.
Both the Duchy of Castline and the Imperial Family knew that the ‘curse’ the Imperial Consort spoke of wasn’t real. This was merely a provocation from the Consort.
Perhaps interpreting Raymon’s lingering gaze in her own way, Titania blinked her vivid green eyes and spoke.
“It won’t be a great loss to the Castline family.”
“…I was not worried about such things.”
“Is it because it feels like you’re unintentionally getting caught in the upcoming struggle for the throne?”
“Are you worried about Prince Adrian?”
That wasn’t his true intention. Remembering Titania’s expression as she smiled and told him ‘not to interfere anymore under the pretext of being a savior,’ he couldn’t bring himself to say what he wanted.
Ah, yes, that face. That look that said there was such a clear line between them. That this was enough, so let’s just treat each other with courtesy….
A smile that looked like a mask, made by piecing together the shards of a heart that once screamed for him to love her, to look at her, to realize she was there.
Thinking of that smile made his breath catch, just as it had when he held her limp, corpse-like body when she couldn’t breathe in his arms.
He felt like a sinner. His emotions wavered at a single minor word, a single expression. If Raymon had been just a bit more objective, he would have realized how strange it was for someone like him—who had seen the deaths of humans and demon beasts without pause since childhood—to be this shaken by so little.
“Ah, does it look like I’m helping Her Majesty the Empress with this? And ultimately, helping Prince Adrian become the Emperor. Does it look like I’m setting things up so that the card known as the Duchy of Castline joins them?”
When a sharp response came back, as if she were suspicious, Raymon almost answered instinctively.
That it wasn’t like that.
That if she had simply said, ‘In exchange for the debt, I want the Duchy of Castline to support Prince Adrian as the next successor to the throne,’ it was a matter that could have been easily settled after a discussion within the family.
Yes, he knew Titania wouldn’t use him, or Raymon, or the Duchy of Castline….
How?
How could he say that? Based on what trust?
Suddenly, Raymon felt a sense of desolation.
He couldn’t dare say that he knew the mangled emotions Titania—his young fiancée who had grown up isolated in the palace and only knew how to throw tantrums—had shown him with single-minded devotion.
Even if they were emotions that had festered endlessly because she couldn’t hate, couldn’t rage, and couldn’t give up, eventually rotting her from within—he couldn’t say that he alone knew that at their core…
Was a blind devotion that could never look away from its object.
Suddenly, at some point—just as she repeatedly claimed—perhaps at the moment she hit her head on the balcony and fell into a coma.
That young, blind girl, the fiancée who loved Raymon, had died. And the one who opened her eyes again was someone who said she ‘understood’ Raymon but didn’t expect a shred of love….
And thus, she had been reborn as someone who could say she would use Raymon and the Duchy of Castline for her own sake.
He must not say that much. It was an instinctive feeling.
Why?
For what reason?
Before he could even realize the question he was asking himself, something that might have been an illusion appeared and clouded his vision.
—I’m sorry…….
It felt as if a desert had formed in the deepest part of his chest. As soon as he heard the voice, he felt as if someone were whispering against his parched, cracked heart beneath the dry earth.
—I’m sorry.
It was a voice so hoarse it was almost a whisper. Hair as dry as parched straw was tangled on the floor. He saw green eyes that looked utterly exhausted. Those eyes, which had always been as cloudy as muddy water, were as clear as a spring that had finally settled after a rain. Eyes that looked as if they alone held the answer.
—I’m sorry that someone like me loved you.
Would it feel like this to scrape together the last of your parched emotions and set them ablaze? If one were to gather dry, crumbling, ashen leaves and throw them into a spark, would a greater fire erupt?
An indescribable emotion seethed within him.
He wanted to seize those gaunt, thin wrists right this second.
What are you up to? What are you trying to do? What do you mean? Stop this nonsense and tell me everything.
Why are you showing me a side of you that looks like you’re about to die or disappear? Are you trying to shake me up for no reason?
Like a spark spreading over a drought-stricken field and instantly becoming a disaster, he felt as if he would lose his reason and scream at any moment.
But before the unknown emotion could completely consume his heart, the illusion vanished without warning.
Before Raymon could even fully regain his senses, he had to hear Titania’s cold words.
“I know my place well, so you don’t need to do that.”
“…May I ask what you mean by that?”
“Bibi isn’t here, so I’ll be honest.”
Titania, who usually managed to put on a smiling face in front of young Bibi, spoke with a face that looked weary beyond her years.
“The Duchy of Castline doesn’t even like me, do they?”
“That’s… not true….”
Feeling as if he’d been struck in the back of the head, Raymon couldn’t bring himself to readily deny it.