Should I consider it fortunate?
Or should I consider it unexpected?
The Emperor, filled with greed and vanity, didn’t seem like such a remarkable person.
[It’s dangerous to rely solely on your senses, Ser. People sometimes do things that are completely unlike themselves, things you would never expect.]
Mikhail, the only person who knew that I could sense mana scents, had warned me of that.
‘But still, compared to the Emperor….’
My gaze shifted to the Crown Prince standing behind the Emperor.
‘There’s no doubt that the Crown Prince is far more dangerous.’
Unlike the Emperor, the Crown Prince… was difficult to figure out.
Whether he was good or evil.
What his fundamental desires were.
And that, ironically, made me all the more wary of him.
“Then I hope you enjoy yourselves to your heart’s content.”
The Emperor raised his glass before returning to his seat on the platform, and the orchestra resumed its interrupted performance.
‘So this is a victory celebration.’
I had no idea whose brilliant idea it had been to invite a hostage here.
Was he trying to flaunt the fact that, in the end, they too would have no choice but to submit just like those people?
As the orchestra changed to a dance tune, the Second Prince and his fiancée walked toward the center of the hall.
One after another, people began joining the dance behind them, and the atmosphere in the banquet hall started to heat up.
That was when a servant quietly approached us.
“Prince, His Majesty requests your presence.”
What could this be about?
I glanced toward the platform where the Emperor was seated.
The Emperor was reclining leisurely on his throne while the Empress whispered something to him.
On the opposite side of the Empress, with the Emperor between them, the Crown Prince sat with a smile on his face as he watched the dancers.
‘Surely he wouldn’t try anything right at the beginning of the banquet.’
“I’ll be back.”
Elhardt took the champagne glass from my hand, drained it in one go, and said,
“Even if you get thirsty, try to hold back for a little while.”
He was underestimating my drinking capacity.
I could probably down an entire barrel of this champagne and still be fine.
But when my eyes met Elhardt’s, I couldn’t bring myself to say I didn’t want to.
“Okay. I understand.”
Once he left, my arm, which had been wrapped around his solid forearm, suddenly felt strangely empty.
My dress also seemed a little thin.
‘Should I have brought a shawl?’
I lightly rubbed my arm and turned around.
I had sensed hostility approaching me the moment Elhardt left.
‘Is it that woman?’
A young lady who looked barely twenty was circling around from the wall and approaching me.
She wasn’t one of the important members of the major families whose names and faces I had memorized.
But judging by how close she had been standing to them, there was a good chance she belonged to the Crown Prince’s faction.
‘Let’s see what she’s trying to do.’
I deliberately turned my back to the woman and pretended to watch the dancers.
‘Is that kind of dance fashionable these days?’
As I watched the people moving slowly and gracefully, the presence behind me drew closer and closer.
‘A knife?’
The chandelier’s light reflected off something in the woman’s hand.
The distance between us rapidly closed, and I could hear the woman’s agitated breathing.
“How dare you… How dare you….”
The woman muttered through clenched teeth and swung the object in her hand.
No, to be precise, she was just about to swing it when I caught her wrist.
What fell to the floor with a clatter was a palm-sized paper knife.
‘She couldn’t kill someone with this, could she?’
Not unless she was at least an intermediate-level knight capable of freely manipulating mana.
“Take it off… Take it off right now…!”
Even after her weapon was discovered and her wrist seized, the woman showed no sign of panic. Instead, she reached out with her other hand.
“How dare someone like you wear my sister’s dress…!”
‘Huh? The dress? Her sister’s?’
Come to think of it, the woman’s gaze had been fixed on my dress the entire time.
‘As I thought….’
Several clues flashed through my mind.
The room in the Crown Prince’s Palace is filled with dresses. The maids’ restless reactions.
If this dress belonged to someone, then there was only one obvious possibility as to who its owner had been.
My prediction that they would set a trap using the deceased Crown Princess’s dress had been right.
‘Then is this woman… the Crown Princess’s younger sister?’
Considering the circumstances, it seemed highly likely.
So that was why she had been swinging a paper knife around. Rather than trying to hurt me, she had come to ruin the dress.
Well, whatever her purpose was, it didn’t matter.
“Shh. Keep your voice down.”
I pushed the woman against the wall so that no one would notice what was happening between us.
Fortunately, we had been near the corner to begin with, and I had subdued her so quickly that we hadn’t attracted anyone’s attention.
“Choose. Do you want to make a scene here in front of the imperial family, or do you want to talk quietly with just me?”
The woman glared fiercely at me with tears welling in her eyes before moving her lips.
“…Just the two of us.”
“Good. Lead me to the western corridor.”
If I questioned this woman, I might be able to find out why the Crown Prince had given me this dress.
I moved quickly before anyone could notice and interfere.
Since I was at it, I also wanted to inspect the western corridor the Crown Prince had said would be closed, so I had the woman lead the way as we left the banquet hall.
‘No one’s here yet.’
It was only natural since the banquet had just begun, but the corridor was completely empty.
‘So they’re planning to close this place off.’
I took in the layout of the area.
After passing several communal lounges that anyone could use, we reached the end of the corridor, where there was a small door leading outside.
“Where can you go if you leave through that door?”
“…Why should I tell you that?”
“Because I’m planning to take you out through there.”
“No!”
The woman shrieked in surprise.
“If you want to die, go die by yourself!”
Apparently, something happened if you went out that way.
Why?
“Is entry prohibited?”
“Yes. It’s the imperial family’s garden. If you enter without permission, you’ll die.”
She must have thought I would drag her there by force if she didn’t explain properly.
Well, that had actually been my intention, at least to some extent.
“Can’t be helped, then. Let’s talk in the lounge.”
The woman stared at me as though I were a madwoman before opening the door closest to the banquet hall and stepping inside.
As though she still hadn’t given up, she lunged at me again while following me in and closing the door.
“Take it off! I said take it off!”
Honestly, I was a little taken aback.
‘Why are young people these days so reckless?’
No matter how carefully I looked, I couldn’t sense even a trace of mana from her, yet she was attacking someone without a weapon, in a place where there was no one to protect her?
“If you don’t take it off, I’ll just tear it all to pieces!”
She had no idea that even the slightest push from me would send her helplessly crashing into the wall.
“Enough.”
I had no desire to dispose of a corpse for no gain, so I subdued the woman once more and tossed her onto the sofa.
“If I take this off, I’ll have to walk around the palace in nothing but my underwear. If you expect me to endure that kind of humiliation, shouldn’t you tell me the reason first?”
I crossed my arms and stared down at the woman, who was still dazed from being thrown onto the sofa and was struggling to sit up.
She didn’t seem genuinely malicious, merely someone with a story that had driven her this far, so I had been quite lenient with her.
‘Consider yourself lucky. If this had been me in the past, there’s no way I would have let you off.’
She had tried to strip me, after all. In return, I would have stripped her naked and thrown her outside.
A moment later, the woman finally managed to lift her upper body, only to suddenly burst into tears.
“My sister… My siiiister….”
She cried out for her sister at the top of her lungs.
“…I’m about to run out of patience. Should I just throw you out into that garden?”
Only then did she abruptly stop crying.
“Good. If you’ve calmed down, answer me now. The owner of this dress was the late Crown Princess, and she was your sister, wasn’t she?”
The woman’s eyes were rimmed red as she looked at me resentfully and nodded.
“Judging by how many people recognized this dress, it must be rather significant, huh?”
The woman nodded again before murmuring softly,
“It was her engagement dress….”
“What…?”
“The dress my sister wore on the day she got engaged to His Highness the Crown Prince!”
Wow.
This was a little….
Too much.
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