* * *
“Your name is Wot, is it?”
“Yes. I was told Your Majesty summoned me.”
Fast, just like I expected. About half a day after I’d set the rumors loose, the empress’s secret summons reached me through Giyet. All that effort I’d put into laying traps so ‘the story of Wot’ would drift into the empress’s ears had finally paid off. Given her personality, I’d figured that the moment she realized the emperor and Duke Reshaniel had been bartering over her life, she’d immediately start looking for an alternative.
I recalled Duke Reshaniel’s grand healing journey described in [Will You Regret It When I Die?]. In exchange for the three healing sessions, he had pressured the imperial family throughout that period to force through his demands. The emperor hadn’t had any other options, so he ended up scrambling to appease Duke Reshaniel. But now, instead of some pesty little mosquito, the one standing here was me, with the original healing mana.
“Your Majesty’s condition is simple. It’s the Celestine Green poison. I can cure it.”
“…Celestine Green poison?”
“Yes. I’ll explain the details after the treatment.”
The disguise artifact necklace was rapidly draining my mana heart, so I didn’t have time to waste. Rolling up my sleeves, I looked at the empress.
She let out a small, hollow laugh and asked, “Very well. I’m curious how long this healing will take. Should I assume something like a year?”
“Well, we’ll see. For now, please give me your hand.”
The empress held out an arm as thin as a tree branch. Smirking to myself, I shoved my own sleeve higher and grabbed her arm. A pure white radiance slammed into the patches of her skin that were darkened here and there, as if bruised black.
“Uuh…” She let out a faint groan of pain and squeezed her eyes shut.
“How do you feel?” I asked.
“My head doesn’t hurt anymore…” Lowering her gaze, the empress looked down at her arm. All the scattered spots that had dotted her withered arm were gone.
Seeing her pupils tremble, I said with satisfaction, “Your Majesty is fully cured.”
Simple, right?
“…What did you say?”
“Your Majesty is not in pain anymore, right?”
No one knows their own body better than they do. Still, this was an illness so deep that even Duke Reshaniel had said he’d need three sessions to treat it, so hearing she was suddenly cured had to be pretty disorienting.
“I can’t… quite believe it. I’ll have to… have the imperial doctor examine me properly.”
“Of course. You can summon the imperial doctor right away.”
As the empress pulled the bell cord with trembling hands and ordered the maids to fetch the doctors, I whistled inwardly. At last, I had snatched away the title of imperial family benefactor from Duke Reshaniel and thrown an obstacle into his smooth ascent.
If he hadn’t dragged out treating his patient, I wouldn’t have swooped in and taken his place. And if he wanted to keep Wot’s reputation in check from now on, he’s going to need a lot more mana. Go on then. Try fighting your own illusion to the death.
Wot is the kind of person who’s here one moment and gone the next, popping up all over the place. In other words, I’m way more mysterious than Duke Reshaniel. Which means the rumors and reputation surrounding Wot are going to get blown way out of proportion compared to reality. The thought was so deliciously satisfying that I was grinning brightly by the time I saw the imperial doctors file in one after another at the empress’s command. Among them…
“Gasp, greetings to Doctor Wot!”
…there were a few who actually knew my name. One even tried approaching me before attending to the empress, so I waved him off.
“Check on Her Majesty’s condition first.” With my arms crossed, I watched as several capable doctors quickly examined her.
“Y-Your Majesty, what in the world happened?”
“Your condition has i-improved dramatically.”
“You’re back to your usual state of health!”
The moment every last doctor finished their examination, the empress’s pupils finally began to shake in earnest. The instant she truly felt her recovery, her eyes grew red.
I pretended not to notice and spoke with a smile. “It was an honor to be able to heal you, Your Majesty.”
She clutched tightly at my sleeve and murmured, “Then, tell me. Why was I ill in the first place? And your reward…”
“I’ll write down the cause of this illness for you. You can have your doctors verify it if you like. As for a reward, there’s no need. I don’t heal people because I’m looking for a reward.”
All I’d meant to do was make a quick exit. But at the moment, a faint sheen of moisture appeared in the empress’s eyes.
“I heard you cured the former Duke Kalinos as well, without asking for much in return,” she said.
“Ah. Yup.”
“…Wot, your very existence makes me wonder if there really are people in this world who are good without any political agenda. I must have gone soft. Very soft.”
Given how long she’d been suffering from some nameless illness, it wasn’t surprising that even a rational empress would get a little emotional… Especially since she knew Duke Reshaniel had been using her life as a bargaining chip. Hearing me say I wanted no reward in that state, she couldn’t help but compare me to the man who’d weighed her life on a scale.
It was when I was just about to answer modestly, hiding my sly little thoughts. The door slammed open with a bang, and a loud commotion echoed from the hallway.
“Empress! I’ve found a way to heal you! There’s someone called Wot—”
“Your Majesty,” she said
“…Uh, huh?”
“Don’t I look rather healthy to you?”
In that instant, something slipped from the emperor’s hand with a soft thud. The book written by Hennessy, with its idealized portrait of Duke Kalinos, rolled across the floor.
Wow. Could the timing be any worse? I had planned to nudge Hennessy into getting the emperor to read that book. But that was supposed to be a contingency plan for the future, nothing more…
The emperor stared back and forth between the empress and me, stammering nonstop. “Du-During the recess in the council meeting, I-I was trying to clear m-my head, and Senator Hennesy ha-handed me this book… that’s when I fo-found out about so-someone named Wot…”
“Please, calm down, Your Majesty,” the empress said.
“M-My dear, y-you’ve been healed?” Great big tears started dripping from the eyes of the already soft-hearted emperor.
And right then…
“So, you’re Master Wot, the one described in this book! You sa-saed our em-empress… Huuuk, huuuuu….!”
I muttered under my breath, “Wow. I got caught by a troublesome one…”
This was the emperor, the man so faint of heart he supposedly passed out in front of Duke Kalinos on a regular basis. In other words, this was not someone I could just slip away from whenever I felt like it. Which is how I ended up sitting there while the emperor, sniffling and snuffling, told me the entire love story between him and the empress.
“…And that’s how it all happened, you see. Ah! Have I taken up too much of your time? I ought to send you a gift as a token of my gratitude.”
“That won’t be necessary. If you’ll excuse me, I just need to step out to the… washroom for a moment…”
After being forced to listen to his long, self-congratulatory tale, I finally seized the excuse of needing to go to the washroom so I could slip out and at least finish my potion. By then, the artifact necklace disguising my appearance had almost completely drained my mana. Thanks to my already depleted mana heart, it felt like blood was about to gush up out of my throat. I hurriedly pinched my nose and bolted outside.
* * *
That day’s imperial court meeting had ground to a halt and was adjourned. Whether the nobles from the northern territories were fuming or not, Duke Reshaniel was lounging back in his chair, taking his ease. He looked like a man convinced everything would unfold exactly as he intended.
Count Florette, on the other hand, was glaring at Duke Reshaniel with a sour expression. As expected, no matter how I think about it, that man is detestable.
Catching the faint flicker of anger in the otherwise indifferent face of the man beside him, Duke Kalinos, he abruptly revised his opinion of Kalinos, which had been sinking into the negatives, back up into the positives. Compared to human trash like Duke Reshaniel, Duke Kalinos at least qualifies as a human.
But no matter how he tried to spin it, he couldn’t bear the thought of sharing a table with that nauseatingly brazen b*stard any longer. If he stayed, he might very well end up causing a scene right there in the council chamber.
With that thought, Count Florette rose to his feet and slipped out like the wind. Fortunately, there was something waiting that would help him sort out his mood. He’d barely taken a few steps after leaving the palace where the meeting was being held when he ran into a familiar face.
“Huuh? Doctor Giyet?”
“Ah, Count Florette, it’s an honor to see you!”
“What brings you to the imperial palace?”
“I came to see Lady Wot. I heard she’d been urgently summoned to the imperial palace. I was hoping I might get to see her and hear her thoughts.”
“Oh, is that so? I was curious about her myself.”
So he was finally going to meet this Wot everyone wouldn’t shut up about. His curiosity piqued, and glad for the distraction, he struck up a conversation with Giyet and followed along.
“Where would this Doctor Wot be, roughly?”
“Ah, she should be somewhere near the empress’s palace… Wait, let’s go together.”
Acting as if it were nothing of consequence, Count Florette followed him toward the empress’s palace. It happened when they cut through a secluded patch of overgrown grass near the empress’s palace to take a shortcut.
“Oh, there she is! Looks like we found her at just the right time!”
“Huuh?” With just the faintest hint of expectation on his face, Count Florette looked toward where Giyet was pointing. “T-That’s…”
“Yes? What’s wrong?”
“T-That person is Wot? A-Are you serious?” Count Florette’s eyes flew wide, as if he’d just laid eyes on something he was never meant to see.
Meanwhile, for reasons unknown, Wot was sprinting away, one hand clamped over her nose and mouth. Eyes still wide, Count Florette hurried his steps. “L-Let’s just follow her for now.”
“Pardon?”
“Qu-Quickly!”
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