He dispelled the illusion magic and reached out to check the old man’s pulse himself.
His pulse was weak, and traces of necrosis that had already spread black beneath his skin were becoming visible.
The old man did not seem to have much time left.
“It’s all right, young man. Lord Garwin cured me, after all……”
Dressed in a robe, Ludville looked around the entire village.
And he met the people.
They could not feel pain.
They had no fear, and no sensation.
And the faint scent lingering around the center of the village was that of a magic-based drug that numbed the senses.
‘So they’ve all been like this since the time they announced that the Cardel young lady had gone missing…….’
Just as he had expected.
The Cardel family was most likely a group that revolved entirely around one person: their third young lady, Odely Cardel.
And yet they had completely hidden Odely’s abilities while putting ‘Garwin Cardel’ at the forefront.
This wasn’t simply a case of a spoiled youngest daughter running away from home.
Odely had carried the family’s duties all by herself until she could no longer endure them, and then she had run away.
His fist slowly clenched.
‘It makes sense.’
From the head of the family’s perspective, if sacrificing just one person could protect the entire family, choosing that option was a reasonable decision.
As a commander, Ludville could understand perfectly well why the Cardels had done such a thing.
“Then why……”
His breathing grew rough.
An unpleasant feeling that he could not explain with reason at all was relentlessly scratching at his insides.
Little by little, it gnawed away at his patience and self-control.
Something was boiling deep inside him.
A thick, vicious, cold yet burning emotion like poison endlessly screamed, asking why those vermin were still breathing.
‘Even the name Cardel should be erased from history without leaving a single one of them behind.’
That was what he thought.
Ludville let out a deep sigh.
“Haa……”
Odely Cardel.
Apparently, even the slightest connection to her made his madness flare up.
But then why was he still keeping her inside the castle instead of sending her away?
****
Ludville sat silently at his desk.
With sharp eyes, he carefully examined every report related to the Cardel family, one page at a time.
They weren’t just ordinary documents.
Discarded copies, statistics covered up with false figures, even private communications from lower-ranking officials and magical maps tracking the flow of magical power.
Through every possible source, he was digging into the family from top to bottom.
“Rosenbach Village, treatment completed……”
Looking down at the report, Ludville twisted the corner of his mouth.
The village had only been made to look fine on the outside.
Inside, it had been rotten for a long time.
Not purification, but disguise.
Concealment, manipulation, and exploitation.
‘The rural villages were mostly like that.’
Remote villages untouched by outsiders, where no one would ever bother to submit a request for an investigation.
The Cardels had swallowed up places like those first.
They chose places where no one would notice, then dressed them up to look as if they had been properly purified.
The central territories where the lords lived, however, were different.
There, diseases, curses, and demonic energy that had once been so severe that they had needed to ask for outside help had vanished as cleanly as if they had never existed.
Through the Cardels’ ‘ancient magic.’
The villagers walked through the streets with clear eyes and lively faces, as if they had never been sick in their lives.
‘Whatever method they used…….’
One thing was certain: the current Cardel family was probably paying a much greater price than before to use ancient magic.
And they were doing so with a method that was far from efficient.
‘Ever since the third young lady disappeared, they’ve only been saving people selectively…….’
That meant the Cardels’ achievements all this time had been the result of squeezing everything they could out of the young lady.
“……I should wipe them out.”
When he had faced the truth at the scene and felt his madness beginning to flare up, he had thought the raging fire would calm down once he returned to the castle.
But the spark of madness seemed to burn on its own, refusing to go out even when suppressed.
Even after dissecting the name ‘Cardel’ and examining every part of it, he could not find a reason why any of them deserved to keep breathing.
Just as his suppressed anger was slowly pushing reason aside—
“Wait a moment, Your Grace.”
Edwin hurriedly interrupted him.
“You’re not thinking of doing that, are you?”
“What am I supposedly not doing?”
“You seem to be thinking something insane. Like planning to wipe out a heroic family that has protected the empire for hundreds of years……”
“I haven’t done anything yet.”
Please at least kill the murderous look in your eyes before you say that……
Feeling an extremely ominous premonition, Edwin rushed through his words without even stopping to breathe.
“I completely agree that the Cardels are hypocrites. But even if we reveal the truth, would the empire really abandon them? The legacy of the divine beast is part of this land’s identity, isn’t it?”
He continued speaking very quickly and desperately, doing his best to read Ludville’s mood.
“In a situation like that, if Your Grace punishes them with blood, it would take no time at all for people to paint you as ‘a monster who envied the bloodline of heroes’ or ‘a heretic who coveted ancient magic.’”
Ludville answered with an annoyed expression.
“I know. You don’t have to explain it at length.”
“That’s exactly what worries me! You know all that and you’re still thinking of doing it! Do you really want to become a traitor?!”
That was when it happened.
With a soft knock, Theodore quietly opened the door and appeared.
“Your Grace, the young lady has left a message for you.”
At the sudden appearance of the head butler, the Grand Duke and his aide both froze at the same time.
“……What message?”
“She said that tomorrow is the date you agreed upon, so she would like to visit you at whatever time is convenient for Your Grace.”
Ludville slightly furrowed his brow.
His heart suddenly dropped uncomfortably hard, only to begin pounding painfully moments later.
Between the madness and anger he had been suppressing, there was strangely a mixture of unease and anticipation.
As if his body were reacting on its own before his mind could even catch up.
It was an absurd reaction, as though he had swallowed some legendary love potion that existed only in fairy tales.
Ludville glared at his slightly trembling fingertips before curling them tightly into a fist and muttering,
“Tomorrow already.”
His voice was flat and emotionless.
Edwin, having no idea what his master was really thinking, looked relieved that the subject had changed and brightened up.
He began talking excitedly.
“Looks like she’s been waiting for today this whole time. She requested an audience as soon as you returned to the castle.”
“……”
“You’re obviously going to accept, right? As Your Grace’s right-hand man, I absolutely have to witness that moment from up close……”
Ludville paid no attention to Edwin’s endless excited rambling.
And yet his heart was pounding again……
Whether the problem was his mind or his body, one thing was certain.
One of them had definitely broken.
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