“I heard there’s a separate place where the maids and servants eat.”
Elhardt gently rubbed the tip of my raised eyebrow with his fingertip as he spoke.
“You want me to go eat something delicious by myself?”
“I’d like you to.”
If he soothed me so gently with such a pleasant voice, anyone would want to do whatever he asked.
‘But I can’t let this slide.’
I quickly looked away from him.
“I’ll go get it changed. Something that’s actually fit to eat.”
Judging by the situation, it seemed he had been treated like this all along.
“The way you’re treated is the way I’m treated, and that means it’s the way Bardia is treated.”
“……?”
Someone might think I was taking the logic a bit too far, but I wasn’t exactly wrong.
Who was I, after all?
I was the first commander of Bardia’s knights, carrying countless treasures bestowed upon me by the founding king.
Starting today, I would eat a proper meal alongside the prince I had decided to protect.
“I’ll be back.”
As I tried to leave the room, he hurriedly grabbed me.
“Don’t overdo it. I really am fine with things as they are.”
There was a certain attitude possessed only by people who had been beaten down again and again until they no longer expected anything from anyone.
I caught a glimpse of that same indifference in Elhardt.
And yet….
“Thank you, Ser. For being on my side.”
Why did I sense that familiar strength in him?
He didn’t rely on others or hope for his circumstances to suddenly turn around, but neither did he become frustrated and give up.
It reminded me of someone who had endured every kind of injustice with a smile, waiting patiently for the opportunity that would eventually come.
“…Yeah.”
I decided to handle this matter in a somewhat more drastic way.
First things first, I was going to pour this foul-smelling food waste straight down the throat of whoever had brought it here.
***
‘Damn it. How long am I supposed to be treated like this?’
Osman ground his teeth as he left the detached palace where Bardia’s deposed Crown Prince was confined.
He was currently in an extremely unfair situation.
Simply because his mother was from Bardia, he had been forced to take care of some hostages.
‘I’m an imperial citizen through and through.’
Like most of the servants employed in the Imperial Palace, he came from a noble family.
Granted, he was only the third son of a baronial family and had absolutely no connections.
Still, it was absurd for him to be treated as though he were in the same boat as Bardia’s deposed Crown Prince, whose country was on the verge of being completely subjugated.
Tampering with the perfectly decent meals that had been provided was also a way of venting his frustration.
The deposed Crown Prince had once been called Bardia’s guardian deity and had been a major obstacle to the Cradion Empire’s wars of conquest. Apparently, his reputation hadn’t been undeserved, because even after eating nothing but a bowl of trash-like gruel once a day, he showed no sign of weakening.
Every time Osman carried the bowl of gruel into his room, he felt as though he were stepping into a tiger’s den.
The feeling was utterly unpleasant.
‘I wish he’d just fucking die already.’
Combined with his resentment at having to take on a job everyone else avoided, Osman had come to hate the deposed Crown Prince.
‘I seriously don’t understand why they’re keeping him alive.’
It would be better for everyone if he simply died.
Especially for Osman himself, the man needed to disappear from the Imperial Palace as soon as possible.
‘Looks like I’ll just have to put in a little extra effort.’
He had obtained poisonous herbs that caused vomiting, stomach pain, and diarrhea and mixed them into the gruel, so the man would have a miserable day today.
As long as Osman kept his mouth shut, there was hardly any way they could obtain the antidote.
‘Let’s see you endure this.’
The thought of that noble face becoming a mess as the man clutched his stomach and groaned made Osman feel a little better.
His day had seemed likely to pass relatively smoothly, as usual, until he was summoned by the head chamberlain.
‘Why does Baric want me…?’
Beside the notoriously foul-tempered head chamberlain stood a woman Osman had never seen before.
‘A new maid?’
The moment he casually shifted his gaze toward her, Osman unconsciously swallowed.
Her hair, tied up high for ease of movement, was a rare shade of silver.
Her skin was so pale, as though she had not seen sunlight in an extremely long time, that it seemed cold and white as freshly fallen snow.
Even though she wore a plain maid’s uniform without a single ornament, it seemed as though all the light around her was drawn toward her.
Then, suddenly, the woman’s gaze turned toward him.
“…….”
The moment those clear, sky-blue eyes swept over him as though judging him, a strange chill ran down his spine.
He felt as though the ugly thoughts he had kept hidden would be exposed in an instant.
Suddenly uncomfortable, Osman hurriedly looked away from the woman and turned toward the head chamberlain.
“You summoned me, Lord Chamberlain?”
“Yes, Osman. I called you because there’s something I need to confirm.”
“Yes, sir. Please ask.”
“Is it true that the guest staying in the detached palace has not been receiving proper meals?”
Osman was startled inwardly, but answered without letting it show.
“I don’t know what you mean. Did the hostage say that? What, is he accusing me of mistreating him?”
There wasn’t a single person in the Cradion Empire’s Imperial Palace who would take the hostage’s side anyway.
Wasn’t Osman suffering through this in the first place because Bardia hadn’t even sent a single servant or maid to attend him?
“To be honest, I find it rather unfortunate. He has fallen into a persecution complex and falsely accused me, despite not even recognizing the Empire’s generosity toward him.”
Osman poured out his words of grievance, genuinely feeling wronged rather than merely pretending.
“I don’t know what you were told by whom, but I truly did my best.”
“Then what exactly is this bowl of gruel?”
Only then did Osman notice the bowl in Chamberlain’s hand.
“Who knows? It certainly isn’t mine. Perhaps it’s the bowl used to feed the dogs kept in the palace.”
The contents were clearly the gruel containing the poisonous herbs he had brought to the hostage that morning, but Osman shamelessly answered.
He had no idea who had discovered it or how, but if he simply denied everything, how could they prove the truth?
“Did a dog happen to die?”
There was no one here who would hold him accountable for doing something wrong anyway.
Nothing would change just because one hostage died.
He was inwardly chuckling at how fitting it seemed to compare the hostage to a dog when the woman quietly watching Osman smiled faintly.
“……!”
What he felt in that instant was, astonishingly, fear.
‘Huh…? Wh-what…?’
Was this what it would feel like to lie before a divine statue in a temple or insult a god?
A chilling sensation that seemed to pierce straight through his very being made his heart sink, and cold sweat began to trickle down his body.
‘S-Something’s wrong….’
He couldn’t move even a single finger.
He couldn’t even blink.
He felt that if he made even the slightest movement, some enormous being would crush him on the spot.
“…Osman, am I not asking you a question?”
The head chamberlain seemed to be saying something to him, but Osman couldn’t hear a word.
Right now, he had to vomit out every filthy thing inside him.
It felt as though someone were shouting inside his head that if he didn’t, he had no right to remain alive.
“Osman!”
The pressure tightened around his throat until he felt as though he were suffocating.
‘If I don’t talk, I’ll die. I’m going to die. I’ll die miserably, cursed more horribly than anyone in this world. Die, die, die…!’
It was the moment when his reason was paralyzed by horrifying fear.
“I-I’m sorry!”
At last, Osman flattened himself against the floor.
“I—I tried to harm the hostage. I was dissatisfied with being assigned this task, so I tampered with his food. And today, I even added poisonous herbs that cause stomach pain….”
Even as he confessed everything from his own mouth, despite the fact that he could have simply continued denying it until the end, Osman had no idea what had come over him.
He had no time to think about it. He could only beg and beg.
“I wanted him to suffer and die miserably, so I—I dared to….”
Amid the heavy silence, only Osman’s muttering continued.
“…….”
He confessed everything without hiding a single detail: what he had been thinking when he committed the deed, and what irreverent thoughts he had harbored.
When his confession was finally over, someone placed the bowl of gruel in front of him with a thud.
Osman picked it up and gulped it down as though it were holy water that would absolve him of his sins.
The revolting smell numbed his nose, while the spoiled chunks clung thickly to his throat.
“Urgh!”
He felt the urge to vomit—not because of the poisonous herbs, but from the sheer disgust of swallowing food that was utterly inedible.
“You should drink every last drop.”
A soft voice pierced his ears.
“Lick the bottom of the bowl clean.”
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