Cowardice Is Not the Villain's Monopoly (1)
"...Haa."
A maid cute enough that half the people who passed her in the street would have said so let out a sigh fit to cave the ground in. She was not wearing one of the maid dresses lately in fashion, but a uniform drab enough to look almost gloomy, and anyone with an eye for such things could tell at a glance that she served a house which prized tradition and kept itself rather closed.
"Anna, what's been the matter with you?"
"Nothing. I'm just tired..."
Anna, a maid with a rather ordinary name, had been heaving sigh after sigh for some time, and her fellow servants could not help but worry. She was usually so full of life.
"...I think I'm going to be let go."
"Why?"
"Did you mess something up?"
"The other day, while I was cleaning, I saw His Lordship the Count..."
"What!?"
"Of all people..."
She had seen the Count. That single sentence was enough. The other maids understood at once why she was sighing.
Their workplace, the comital house of Loengrin, was, in a word, a patriarchal house in which the family head controlled every last thing. The previous count, now dead, was said to have been rather gentle. Roseth, the present Count of Loengrin and head of the house, was strict beyond all measure, and a cold man who could not endure anything that offended his eye. Would you even believe it, if you heard that he had cast out servants whose families had attended Loengrin for hundreds of years, for no better reason than that they displeased him?
He was ruthless to that degree, and the servants who remained lived always taut with the sense that they were walking on thin ice. The only comfort was that the pay was generous.
"Haa. You can hardly breathe in there, but at least they paid well."
"How did you run into him?"
"I told you. I was just cleaning. I happened to cross paths with him."
"Aigoo..."
It had been nothing but rotten luck, and the maids could not keep the pity off their faces. Anna's own only grew more wretched.
And then came the sound of hooves. Clip-clop. Clip-clop.
At the sudden noise the maids turned before they knew it, and they saw him.
"Oh my..."
A strikingly handsome young man, mounted on a pure white horse, had drawn to a halt before the main gate of the Loengrin estate.
"Where do you even find a person who looks that kind..."
"Since when are handsome and kind the same thing?"
"Then does that face look wicked to you?"
"...No. It's very kind."
"That's what I mean."
The women's whispers set the garden murmuring, but only for a moment.
All at once the youth on the white horse drew a great, sharp breath.
A tremendous shout rang out, leaving a piercing whine in the ears, and in that instant it rolled through the vast garden and every corner of the estate. It was a voice beyond belief. Women dropped onto their backsides one after another. They had only heard a shout, but the spirit behind it was more than a woman's body could bear.
"H-he might be dangerous...?"
Anna murmured it, and the women nodded.
"I don't mind a dangerous man, myself..."
"...Your taste is a little much."
The world, after all, holds every kind of taste.
Naturally, neither the head of the house nor the knights were about to step out against some ruffian bellowing before the estate as if he meant to raise a public disturbance. In their place, soldiers came forward and did no more than try to settle him.
"And who are you, sir, to be doing a thing like this!"
"Judging by that armor and that horse, you look like the young master of a rather distinguished house. Do calm yourself."
The white horse looked expensive enough, but so did the armor, which had no practicality in it and merely looked costly, and the jewel-set sword. From those alone it was plain that this man was some green noble up from the provinces—come to the Royal Capital, no doubt, for the royal grandson's birthday.
A green fool, plain as day.
Heard the rumors and came sniffing. Means to pick a fight with Loengrin and scrape up a little fame.
Neat-looking, and stupid as they come.
It was a season thick with unsettling rumors about Loengrin. Well, some of them were even true. Even so, this was Loengrin. They were a house with the accumulated weight of centuries, not the sort to show an opening to passing rabble, and the soldiers themselves were of considerable quality. Just as their eyes began to gleam with danger, there came a sharp snap, and the man thrust something out.
"Deliver this to the Count of Loengrin! And be sure to pass on the warning—if he still does not come out after seeing it, I will not hesitate to make a show of force!"
"At once!"
"M-my ears are killing me."
He had seemed ready to bull his way through to the very end, and the soldiers only blinked at the letter he suddenly offered.
"You may read the letter, if you like. But the truth you learn by reading it will be entirely yours to bear!"
No one spoke. Somehow, this was no ordinary matter. The force of it was too sharp for a green young master, and the soldiers were still wondering what to do with the letter when one of them gave in.
"L-let's take it to the butler, for now."
"R-right. That would be best."
On an ordinary day they would have driven him off themselves, or burned the letter. They could not handle a youth who looked like a noble so carelessly, however, and the uncommon presence pouring off him achieved the remarkable feat of seeing the letter carried all the way up to someone above them. Astonishingly, the whole business had not taken even ten minutes.
Watching the letter disappear into the estate, the man folded his arms and held his silence atop the horse, shameless as if to ask when he had ever made a fuss.
"...Manly, isn't he, for how he looks?"
"I know, right?"
It was absurd, how taciturn he became the moment his purpose was met, and just as a strangely favorable opinion was taking shape—
"Huff— huff—!"
The soldier who had gone to deliver the letter came running back in a panic.
"Th-the butler is calling for you! H-he says to come inside the estate..."
None of them could hide their shock as they looked at the youth. He only glared at those still standing in his way, as if this were the natural next step.
"Move. I have your master to meet."
The soldiers were hardly under a spell. Even so, at some point they were obeying him, and they yielded the path without a fight.
Feels like we ought to do as he says.
Roseth, long sunk in his work, made no effort to hide his displeasure. Being interrupted was bad enough, but there had never been a case of such nerve.
"Butler. Has there ever been a man rude enough to visit Loengrin this high-handedly, without an appointment or so much as prior leave?"
"...I am sorry, Your Excellency."
"Then you ought not to create things that require an apology."
The butler held his tongue.
"Haa. Enough. What use is talking to the incompetent. Yes—let me have a look at that impudent bastard's face."
The words had barely left him before the butler went straight outside to carry out the order, and yet even that did not seem to please Roseth. No. He was a man who loathed every human being but himself to begin with.
"Irritating. Why is every last one of them so incompetent."
He hated servants. They did not know their place, and they talked back under the excuse of loyal counsel.
He hated men. They fouled his eyes and ears with greasy faces and filthy voices.
He hated women. The reek of their perfume was bad enough, but worse were those who, not knowing their place, dared try to lay hands on his body.
...He found humankind contemptible.
"Huu—."
Barely pressing down a disgust he could not conceal, Roseth skimmed the letter. He seemed only to glance over it, but that alone was enough for him to grasp the whole of its contents and its context.
"Your Excellency, the guest has arri—"
He hurled a glass. The force of it was less like glass than like a thrown shot, and the butler who barely dodged—no, who survived only because it miraculously grazed his hair—broke into a cold sweat. Had it struck, he would have died on the spot.
Opposite him, the youth who had slipped the glass with ease wore a scornful smile and was glaring at Roseth.
"A rough welcome. Does Loengrin threaten its guests like this?"
"...Impudent wretch. You hand over trash like that and expect kind words? Cutting you to pieces would hardly satisfy me."
"Hm. For a house of Holy Knights, your tongue is rougher than most mercenaries'."
Roseth shuddered with fresh displeasure and meant to roar, but the youth did not hesitate. As if nothing at all had happened, he simply walked right up before him. And then, all at once—
"Let the two of us speak alone. We will be able to focus on the 'deal' that way, will we not?"
"Trusting in what, exactly?"
"Do not concern yourself. I am not fool enough to try something so stupid as threatening you. Hm. Or is it this—are you afraid of the likes of me, Your Excellency, Count Roseth?"
Roseth said nothing.
Crack.
"That looked like an expensive fountain pen. What a waste. You don't seem to know the worth of a thing."
"Shut your mouth!"
The snarl came with a gesture, aimed at the butler. The butler understood it, and still he hesitated. Ought he to leave his lord alone with a thug whose identity he did not even know?
"I-if you need anything, please call."
He could not grate any further on a lord who already looked to be in a foul mood. The butler shut the door and went out, and a stillness settled over the office.
"Now, at last, it is only the two of us, Your Excellency."
"...Stop flapping that impudent mouth, and tell me where you got this information."
Roseth flung the letter at the youth without hesitation. The youth received the throw readily enough, and the letter ended on the floor. It was called a letter, but in substance it was no different from a formal document. Nothing other than—
"I was startled myself, Your Excellency. No—Your Excellency the Opium King. To think you were moving such a quantity of opium within the South."
"I told you not to talk nonsense."
So it was. The document concerned a certain trading company that Loengrin operated in secret, and the opium that company distributed. Opium imported from places all across the East and the West amounted to more than dozens of tons, and the writing set down that the company was the one spreading it throughout the continent. If this came to light, Loengrin—no, Roseth—would have to stand in a court of law. He had committed every crime a noble must not.
And yet.
"Hmph. You think a trifle like this can drag me in? You think Loengrin is the only one profiting from this opium?"
"Oho. Are you admitting it, then? That you have banded together with a number of other nobles, yourself among them, to circulate opium."
"Admission or not, I am telling you that the likes of you cannot touch me. If you think catching me at a thing like this is enough to threaten me, I have nothing to call you but a fool."
Roseth sneered at the youth.
The distribution of opium? Yes. It was illegal, and it was something that should not be done.
And what of it?
I can slip free of a thing like this whenever I please.
Let there be all the evidence in the world. People ready to die in Loengrin's place, ready to take the blame, overflowed and overflowed again. Roseth felt no sense of danger at all. And so the only reason he had bothered to meet this impudent youth alone was this.
"Spit out where you got this information. Well, it's obvious enough. There is no end of bastards who want to drag me out. Still, certainty would be better."
Tak.
Roseth flicked his fingers lightly, and a Holy Law installed in the office activated.
Concealment Holy Law
It was a Holy Law that kept sound, resonance, and the like from escaping outward—originally used to hide one's presence. Turned another way, however, it was equally suited to carrying out secret work.
Thud. Thud. Thud.
The moment the Holy Law took hold, people revealed themselves. Holy Knights who had been concealing their forms with the same Concealment Holy Law—no.
"...Half-Fiends?"
"Ho. A decent eye. Well, the likes of your identity can be learned at leisure. ...Bring that impudent maggot to his knees."
Roseth gave the order, and the Half-Fiends moved at once. He was just about to bring the black tea to his lips, taking the man's screams for music, when—
Crack.
One of the Half-Fiends collapsed.
It had happened in the blink of an eye, and Roseth froze as he was, teacup still in hand. And then, suddenly—
"Thanks. I didn't think you'd go and build me a stage all on your own. I wasn't asking for this kind of consideration."
"Y-you—?"
"Well. As a token of thanks, for now..."
A light tap.
"I'll just take the two front teeth."
Pop.
With a sound as crisp as it was perfectly clear, Roseth's front teeth came out as lightly as anything. For a moment it seemed they might have been false teeth. Unfortunately—
A jet of blood sprayed.
That alone was enough to say that, for the time being, they were not.
...Unfortunately.