Translator: Wyvern
────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────
Chapter 52
(This is still the Emperor’s POV)
To be honest, it’d been a long time since I’d lived with such a clear and painless mind. Well, half of it was like that before I was appointed as the crown prince, and the accumulated side effects didn’t get better in any way. I tried researching on a group of wizards who could help, but to no avail.
It was only natural that I couldn’t properly adapt to Celestia, who seemed to have fallen from the sky. It wasn’t so surprising that it was hard for me to control myself and respond to her appropriately, much less figure out why I acted the way I did.
That’s why I was so uncertain. I wouldn’t do that again next time.
I could feel my heart beating faster as I was silently thinking about her.
Naturally, her red hair and bright eyes came to mind. And the magic circle engraved on her body. Come to think of it, I felt like I was forgetting a memory that I shouldn’t have.
The thoughts that I had been mulling over in a daze were all scattered as soon as the bewildered watchman burst in.
I frowned, a nasty feeling churning in my gut. Lowe had worked under me for a long time, and he was not a person who easily showed distress.
“What’s going on?”
“Your Majesty…”
“Yes? What’s going on?”
“I… Celestia…”
An inability to finish sentences was usually not a good thing, and my frown deepened.
“So… I don’t know where she is…”
“What do you mean?”
“She wasn’t in her room and no one saw where she had gone. Do you have any guesses?”
No, I couldn’t imagine her going anywhere in particular in the middle of the night.
A chill ran down my spine. Someone used magic in the imperial palace.
Then I remembered that Celestia had asked me for permission to speak to the criminal directly. I had just nodded, thinking that she would wait until tomorrow.
I hope she didn’t go.
Although I knew that my premonitions were almost never wrong, I wanted to deny it even as I sprinted outside.
I could see the exhausted guards perk up at the sight of their emperor.
I grabbed one of them. “What happened to the prisoner in the dungeon today? The prince of the Tepoda Empire.”
“The empress dowager called for his release, but after that…”
“He was released?”
“Yes.”
Barely locked up in a dungeon, then set free? No, did anyone think that something as little as gags and restraints could seal away a wizard’s abilities?
What would a talented bastard like him be able to do if he were released into the imperial palace?
My head hurt.
After ordering the guards to search, I strode towards the empress dowager’s room. Before I could even get there, one of the guards rushed to me, prostrated himself, and cried.
“There is a maid’s testimony that she saw a man in a mask holding Celestia and flying away!”
“Now, what did you say?”
“The masked man kidnapping Celestia…”
I suppressed my irritation. “In which direction?”
Still, even though the guard wasn’t quick-witted, he remembered that much. It was hard to believe that there could be a sorcerer flying in the sky in the Imperial Palace, so he sounded uncertain as he was relating the direction in which the pair had gone.
I had seen how great Khun’s abilities were, and I had an inkling that he didn’t think that he would be arrested in front of the emperor. There was no way that he had come here completely alone, so it’d be more difficult to find him after he met with a collaborator. I thought we would be able to wring some truth out of him after his capture, but I didn’t anticipate that the empress dowager would show her hand so soon.
Oh, now I was truly pissed off.
“Defenders.”
Two women and two men in black cloaks appeared, kneeling silently.
“Chase after them.”
The four of them immediately faded on the spot, so I went ahead to the detached palace where the empress dowager stayed.
She didn’t seem to be sleeping, but she appeared as if she had fallen asleep in a light robe. She offered me a seat in the parlor in the separate palace, but I did not intend to sit down while I stared at her.
The empress dowager sat comfortably in her seat, looking up at me. “You’ve come to visit me so rudely at such a late hour and haven’t said anything, so I don’t know what’s going on. Do you know what time it is now?”
I laughed bitterly. I was absolutely disgusted with her and her pretenses. “Are you having fun?”
“What are you talking about?”
“Did you visit the man in the dungeon and let him go?”
She crossed her legs with a coquettish smile that a lesser man might have fallen for. “You throw such accusations at me, and you say things that other people might misunderstand. Why would I do such a thing?”
“Ha.”
“It is true that I visited him, but I was just trying to treat him a little better because he was a prince of a foreign country and I had to treat him with dignity. Shouldn’t the empress dowager take care of things that the emperor did not care about?”
“Is that so?”
“Did you hear that the chieftain’s wife, Lansha, was released? I wondered if they were like the group that captured her. If I don’t ask, the emperor will never ask. She is the wife of the one who has already abandoned her.”
“The chief is very prudent when dealing with matters like these.”
“Doesn’t even the emperor take care of his secretary?”
I held my breath, trying not to yell. “If I had decided that I would keep the criminal in custody, you should have known your place.”
“But he came in after the uproar at the academy, so I wanted to hear some stories.”
“Do you usually enjoy chatting with prisoners?”
“No, but he didn’t seem to be very dangerous. I just heard that he was with the emperor even before the incident. And doesn’t it seem like the emperor used this crime to conspire to win public opinion? So I wanted to know the circumstances.”
I nearly laughed.
My fists clenched as I tried to rein in the power that threatened to burst forth. Except for when I was very young, I never burned my clothes because of fluctuating emotions. However, it was not easy to maintain rationality when dealing with this woman.
But if you try to be too smart, you’re bound to show me the cards in your hands.
The bitter laugh, at least, escaped me. “Excuse me, how did you know?”
“What do you mean?”
“I never told anyone that Khun and I had spoken together before the incident.”
The empress dowager, who always had a retort, shut her mouth for a moment. “That is… … .”
“Did you hear that from him yourself? It seems that you have become very close in a short period of time… Have you ever contacted them before?”
“Emperor, what do you mean…?”
“Khun has already confessed to everything.”
Her appearance showed a shade of nervousness, but her determined attitude did not fall apart.
“I don’t know. I don’t know what the Prince of Tepoda insinuated…”
“You don’t know? Then I’ll let you know. I know you’re bored, but please wait a little longer.”
I moved to leave. Even without magic, it would be possible to make the empress confess to the crimes she had committed.
If I could think calmly, I could think of this as an opportunity as well.
I pressed again, thinking that my anger was strangely not calming down. “So, where is she?”
“What do you mean?”
“My secretary, who was kidnapped by Khun, the felon whom you just released.”
“What do I know? I’ve told you I don’t know. Don’t be rude, interrogating me at this hour.”
“Are you going to back out when things are so obvious?”
As she turned her head as if she had no intention of talking anymore, the maid ran and put down a large tray and stepped back. She took a kettle of warm tea out of the tea tray and poured it into a teacup full of flower patterns. I shot at her hand at the gesture and snapped.
Crash!
The flowery teacup shot out of her hand and shattered. Only the handle was left, and the hot tea water floated on the cup holder, but slowly flowed down and disappeared as if it were being sucked into the teapot.
“What are you doing?” The empress gritted her teeth and threw down the pretty pieces of porcelain on top of the teacup.
As she did, I sat with my legs crossed in the opposite seat, clasped my hands and replied leisurely. “What’s wrong?”
“The use of magic in the palace… No, is it your duty to intimidate me with force?”
I raised my eyebrows as if this was a stupid question. “Well, why weren’t you careful? Your grip must be stronger than you look.”
“Emperor!”
“Did I do that?”
“Then who would have done it!”
“What do I know? I don’t know.”
The Empress Dowager kept her mouth shut in response to my goading reply. What I meant was clear. I had no intention of backing down just because she isn’t confessing to anything.
I didn’t expect her to drink that much, so I continued, staring at the broken teacup on the table. “You know what? Empress dowager.”
“What do you mean?”
“The reason why I keep this position is that it is very much due to your behavior.”
“Ha! That’s ridiculous.”
“At first, honestly, I didn’t even want to have the throne. You made a mistake in your judgment. If you had left me alone from the beginning, I would have given you the crown, even if it was obvious that you would ruin the country.”
It was the first time for me to say all this.
The empress stared. “Why didn’t you give it to me if you didn’t need it?”
He touched one of the broken teacup pieces with his hands. It crumbled into powder, just as if it was originally made of sugar.
Translator: Wyvern
────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────
Chapter 52
(This is still the Emperor’s POV)
To be honest, it’d been a long time since I’d lived with such a clear and painless mind. Well, half of it was like that before I was appointed as the crown prince, and the accumulated side effects didn’t get better in any way. I tried researching on a group of wizards who could help, but to no avail.
It was only natural that I couldn’t properly adapt to Celestia, who seemed to have fallen from the sky. It wasn’t so surprising that it was hard for me to control myself and respond to her appropriately, much less figure out why I acted the way I did.
That’s why I was so uncertain. I wouldn’t do that again next time.
I could feel my heart beating faster as I was silently thinking about her.
Naturally, her red hair and bright eyes came to mind. And the magic circle engraved on her body. Come to think of it, I felt like I was forgetting a memory that I shouldn’t have.
The thoughts that I had been mulling over in a daze were all scattered as soon as the bewildered watchman burst in.
I frowned, a nasty feeling churning in my gut. Lowe had worked under me for a long time, and he was not a person who easily showed distress.
“What’s going on?”
“Your Majesty…”
“Yes? What’s going on?”
“I… Celestia…”
An inability to finish sentences was usually not a good thing, and my frown deepened.
“So… I don’t know where she is…”
“What do you mean?”
“She wasn’t in her room and no one saw where she had gone. Do you have any guesses?”
No, I couldn’t imagine her going anywhere in particular in the middle of the night.
A chill ran down my spine. Someone used magic in the imperial palace.
Then I remembered that Celestia had asked me for permission to speak to the criminal directly. I had just nodded, thinking that she would wait until tomorrow.
I hope she didn’t go.
Although I knew that my premonitions were almost never wrong, I wanted to deny it even as I sprinted outside.
I could see the exhausted guards perk up at the sight of their emperor.
I grabbed one of them. “What happened to the prisoner in the dungeon today? The prince of the Tepoda Empire.”
“The empress dowager called for his release, but after that…”
“He was released?”
“Yes.”
Barely locked up in a dungeon, then set free? No, did anyone think that something as little as gags and restraints could seal away a wizard’s abilities?
What would a talented bastard like him be able to do if he were released into the imperial palace?
My head hurt.
After ordering the guards to search, I strode towards the empress dowager’s room. Before I could even get there, one of the guards rushed to me, prostrated himself, and cried.
“There is a maid’s testimony that she saw a man in a mask holding Celestia and flying away!”
“Now, what did you say?”
“The masked man kidnapping Celestia…”
I suppressed my irritation. “In which direction?”
Still, even though the guard wasn’t quick-witted, he remembered that much. It was hard to believe that there could be a sorcerer flying in the sky in the Imperial Palace, so he sounded uncertain as he was relating the direction in which the pair had gone.
I had seen how great Khun’s abilities were, and I had an inkling that he didn’t think that he would be arrested in front of the emperor. There was no way that he had come here completely alone, so it’d be more difficult to find him after he met with a collaborator. I thought we would be able to wring some truth out of him after his capture, but I didn’t anticipate that the empress dowager would show her hand so soon.
Oh, now I was truly pissed off.
“Defenders.”
Two women and two men in black cloaks appeared, kneeling silently.
“Chase after them.”
The four of them immediately faded on the spot, so I went ahead to the detached palace where the empress dowager stayed.
She didn’t seem to be sleeping, but she appeared as if she had fallen asleep in a light robe. She offered me a seat in the parlor in the separate palace, but I did not intend to sit down while I stared at her.
The empress dowager sat comfortably in her seat, looking up at me. “You’ve come to visit me so rudely at such a late hour and haven’t said anything, so I don’t know what’s going on. Do you know what time it is now?”
I laughed bitterly. I was absolutely disgusted with her and her pretenses. “Are you having fun?”
“What are you talking about?”
“Did you visit the man in the dungeon and let him go?”
She crossed her legs with a coquettish smile that a lesser man might have fallen for. “You throw such accusations at me, and you say things that other people might misunderstand. Why would I do such a thing?”
“Ha.”
“It is true that I visited him, but I was just trying to treat him a little better because he was a prince of a foreign country and I had to treat him with dignity. Shouldn’t the empress dowager take care of things that the emperor did not care about?”
“Is that so?”
“Did you hear that the chieftain’s wife, Lansha, was released? I wondered if they were like the group that captured her. If I don’t ask, the emperor will never ask. She is the wife of the one who has already abandoned her.”
“The chief is very prudent when dealing with matters like these.”
“Doesn’t even the emperor take care of his secretary?”
I held my breath, trying not to yell. “If I had decided that I would keep the criminal in custody, you should have known your place.”
“But he came in after the uproar at the academy, so I wanted to hear some stories.”
“Do you usually enjoy chatting with prisoners?”
“No, but he didn’t seem to be very dangerous. I just heard that he was with the emperor even before the incident. And doesn’t it seem like the emperor used this crime to conspire to win public opinion? So I wanted to know the circumstances.”
I nearly laughed.
My fists clenched as I tried to rein in the power that threatened to burst forth. Except for when I was very young, I never burned my clothes because of fluctuating emotions. However, it was not easy to maintain rationality when dealing with this woman.
But if you try to be too smart, you’re bound to show me the cards in your hands.
The bitter laugh, at least, escaped me. “Excuse me, how did you know?”
“What do you mean?”
“I never told anyone that Khun and I had spoken together before the incident.”
The empress dowager, who always had a retort, shut her mouth for a moment. “That is… … .”
“Did you hear that from him yourself? It seems that you have become very close in a short period of time… Have you ever contacted them before?”
“Emperor, what do you mean…?”
“Khun has already confessed to everything.”
Her appearance showed a shade of nervousness, but her determined attitude did not fall apart.
“I don’t know. I don’t know what the Prince of Tepoda insinuated…”
“You don’t know? Then I’ll let you know. I know you’re bored, but please wait a little longer.”
I moved to leave. Even without magic, it would be possible to make the empress confess to the crimes she had committed.
If I could think calmly, I could think of this as an opportunity as well.
I pressed again, thinking that my anger was strangely not calming down. “So, where is she?”
“What do you mean?”
“My secretary, who was kidnapped by Khun, the felon whom you just released.”
“What do I know? I’ve told you I don’t know. Don’t be rude, interrogating me at this hour.”
“Are you going to back out when things are so obvious?”
As she turned her head as if she had no intention of talking anymore, the maid ran and put down a large tray and stepped back. She took a kettle of warm tea out of the tea tray and poured it into a teacup full of flower patterns. I shot at her hand at the gesture and snapped.
Crash!
The flowery teacup shot out of her hand and shattered. Only the handle was left, and the hot tea water floated on the cup holder, but slowly flowed down and disappeared as if it were being sucked into the teapot.
“What are you doing?” The empress gritted her teeth and threw down the pretty pieces of porcelain on top of the teacup.
As she did, I sat with my legs crossed in the opposite seat, clasped my hands and replied leisurely. “What’s wrong?”
“The use of magic in the palace… No, is it your duty to intimidate me with force?”
I raised my eyebrows as if this was a stupid question. “Well, why weren’t you careful? Your grip must be stronger than you look.”
“Emperor!”
“Did I do that?”
“Then who would have done it!”
“What do I know? I don’t know.”
The Empress Dowager kept her mouth shut in response to my goading reply. What I meant was clear. I had no intention of backing down just because she isn’t confessing to anything.
I didn’t expect her to drink that much, so I continued, staring at the broken teacup on the table. “You know what? Empress dowager.”
“What do you mean?”
“The reason why I keep this position is that it is very much due to your behavior.”
“Ha! That’s ridiculous.”
“At first, honestly, I didn’t even want to have the throne. You made a mistake in your judgment. If you had left me alone from the beginning, I would have given you the crown, even if it was obvious that you would ruin the country.”
It was the first time for me to say all this.
The empress stared. “Why didn’t you give it to me if you didn’t need it?”
He touched one of the broken teacup pieces with his hands. It crumbled into powder, just as if it was originally made of sugar.
