Chapter 5. A Misunderstanding Masquerading as Truth

It was a nap as sweet as honey.

The fatigue that had been crushing me seemed to have drained away completely. The moment I opened my eyes, a clean, bright clarity washed over me.

"Mmm..."

I stretched and started to push myself up from the bed—and the first thing that entered my vision was Seria, kneeling at the foot of it, folded forward with her forehead nearly to the floor. Her silver hair was a tangled mess, and stains darkened her apron. Only then did the madness of earlier come rushing back. I flinched and jerked away.

"S-Seria?"

At my call she slowly lifted her head. Her eyes were still hazy with the afterglow of pleasure, her cheeks flushed a deep red. The expressionless ice doll I knew was nowhere to be found. What turned toward me was the gaze of a beast that had been broken in completely.

But an instant before she could speak, the door of the Detached Palace burst inward hard enough to tear from its hinges.

"Little brother! Your sisters came to—oh my."

"Gun! We brought a special elixir—ah!"

Third Princess Chloe and Fourth Princess Aria came charging through.

A dead silence settled over the bedroom.

Both sisters' eyes locked onto the same things: me, sitting on the bed with my shirt half undone; Seria, kneeling at my feet and panting; and the thick white streaks smeared stickily across her maid uniform.

"S-sisters, this is a misunderstanding. It isn't what you—"

I was breaking into a cold sweat, scrambling for an excuse, when Seria rose unsteadily and opened her mouth. Her voice trembled in a strangely deliberate way.

"I greet Your Highnesses."

In the eyes of a woman who, only moments ago, had been drowning in humiliation, there flickered a thin, cunning spark of rebellion against her master.

"I apologize for failing to show the proper courtesy. I was attending His Highness until just now."

"S-Seria? Attending His Highness... until just now?"

Aria's pupils shook as if the ground itself had split beneath her.

Skirting the shackles of Article One—no lies—by the barest margin, Seria began to sow the seeds of a delusion dressed up as truth.

"Yes. In the grip of overwhelming pleasure, I received His Highness's touch... and experienced my first climax."

"Are you insane?! Seria, what are you saying—!"

I lunged to stop her, but there wasn't a single falsehood in her words. The pink pattern engraved along her collarbone judged that she had not broken Article One, and no penalty triggered.

"He reached my deepest place, and now I belong to His Highness alone, forever."

In truth she meant that it had touched the magicite paper—but to the princesses' ears, it could mean only one thing.

"G-good heavens...!"

"Our frail little brother, already climbing the stairs into adulthood...!"

Chloe clapped a hand over her mouth. Aria went scarlet and didn't know where to put her eyes.

Seria smiled inwardly. Physical harm, or open fury toward her master, would detonate a penalty—but lining up truths in a way that cornered him was a loophole in Article Three, the ban on treason.

With this, I have repaid a little of that earlier humiliation.

She glanced my way and, for the first time in her life, curled the corner of her mouth into a mischievous smirk.

"R-right! Gun, you mustn't overdo it, so be sure to take this special elixir! W-we'll just be going!"

The sisters flung down their bundle and fled the Detached Palace as if the place were on fire.

I pressed a hand to my forehead, stared at Seria standing there utterly unashamed, and let out a disbelieving laugh.

"...You've got quite the head on you, don't you?"

"You flatter me, Your Highness. I spoke nothing but the truth."

"Is that so? Then shall I turn that little lie into an established fact for real?"

At my cold, decadent provocation, Seria's shoulders twitched. I climbed down from the bed, caught her chin, and tipped her face up.

"Pull another stunt like that in front of my sisters, and I'll make sure you really can't walk off that bed. Understood?"

"...I will bear it in mind."

She bowed her head, but the shells of her ears had flushed so red they looked ready to burst. A dangerous, razor-edged push and pull between master and servant was setting the afternoon of the Detached Palace alight.

At that same hour, in the palace of Second Prince Kyle.

In a lavishly decorated outdoor garden, a tea party for the daughters of influential houses was in full swing.

"Oh my, Your Highness. The fragrance of this black tea is simply exquisite."

"Your eye is excellent, my lady. These leaves were brought in specially from the south."

Kyle regarded the young ladies with a tender gaze and a thoroughly artificial smile. For all the elegance on display, his mind was packed with nothing but anticipation of Sixth Prince Gun's death.

That bitch Ella will have handled it properly. Staging an accident for an Abilityless Sixth Prince is hardly any work at all.

He was lifting his teacup at his leisure when it happened.

The garden's iron gate, shut fast, exploded inward, and someone walked through the wreckage.

"Kyaaah!"

"W-what is that?!"

The young ladies shrieked in terror. The figure stepping over the ruined gate was the assassin Ella, drenched from head to toe in blood and dust. Her eyes were utterly unfocused, and a cold dagger was clenched in each hand.

"E-Ella...? Why are you here now...!"

The assassin he himself had sent had appeared in the middle of the tea party for all to see. Kyle shot to his feet in a panic.

Ella did not answer him. She couldn't. In her mind there existed only the single command Gun had given her.

Like a broken machine, Ella turned her head and rushed the screaming ladies.

"You mad—! Stop her! Cut that woman down, now!"

Kyle howled, but it was already too late. Before the escort knights could even draw their swords, Ella vaulted onto the ladies' table.

A wet slash.

"Gyaaah!"

"S-someone save—ghk!"

Pandemonium. In an instant the heads of three daughters of great houses were rolling across the ground. The elegant tea had become a reeking slaughterhouse in ten seconds flat.

"Has that woman lost her mind?! What do you think you're doing, Ella!"

Kyle's voice cracked with terror and rage. Blood-soaked, Ella turned her head toward him even as the knights' blades ran her through. Her unfocused, clouded eyes bent toward Kyle in a grotesque curve.

She opened her mouth. The voice was low, yet clear enough for every survivor in the garden to hear.

"...What? What nonsense are you spout—"

She gave ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠him no room to make an excuse. Without a moment's hesitation, Ella drove the dagger in her hand into her own throat. She retched up a mouthful of blood, collapsed at Kyle's feet, and died.

In the garden, only the escort knights of the dead ladies and Kyle himself remained, standing as if their souls had left them. Perfect silence. And then, hideous ruin.

"N-no... she went mad on her own... I don't know anything about this...!"

Kyle's trembling hand pointed at Ella's blood-soaked corpse, but there was no taking it back. Overnight he had become the most infamous aristocratic mass murderer of the age—the prince who invited young ladies to his own tea party and had them slaughtered.

"Sixth Prince... Gun... you bastard...!"

Weeping tears of blood, Kyle was plunging into the abyss of despair.

The office of First Prince Leonhardt.

Word of the blood-soaked massacre at Kyle's tea party overturned the imperial palace in an instant.

"Puhahaha! That worthless bastard Kyle has finally lost his mind!"

Hearing the report, Leonhardt clutched his stomach and roared with laughter.

"He invites the young ladies himself and then has an assassin butcher them? And only the daughters of the great houses, at that? The snake finally strangled himself with his own cunning!"

The rival who had irritated him most, the Second Prince, had been branded the serial killer of the age and thrown in a cell overnight. No sweeter news could have reached Leonhardt. But the moment the laughter left him, his eyes narrowed to a sharp edge.

"And yet... doesn't something feel off?"

"In what respect, Your Highness?"

At his aide's question, Leonhardt tapped the desk and muttered.

"The assassin—her name was Ella, wasn't it? She's the one that Kyle brat sent to deal with our little brother."

"Yes. That is correct."

"The assassin who was supposed to tear that powerless defective Gun to pieces—why did she suddenly crash Kyle's tea party and start slicing up young ladies?"

A deep suspicion settled in Leonhardt's eyes.

"Don't tell me that brat Gun pulled something."

"Come now, Your Highness. He is a perfect Abilityless—the tablet didn't so much as react. He couldn't possibly have that kind of power."

"True. Power, he hasn't got. But he's imperial blood. Who's to say he isn't hiding a fang somewhere?"

Leonhardt rose and glared out the window, toward the distant Detached Palace.

"Contact Hilda. Now."

"You mean the spy we planted as head maid of the Detached Palace?"

"Yeah. Have her report every last move ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠the Sixth Prince makes. Especially whether anything—anything at all—seemed off about him between last night and today. Dig until there's nothing left."

A keen instinct, worthy of the most likely heir to the throne. But that instinct was already thrashing, helpless, inside the perfect web Gun had spun.

At the same hour, in the reception room of the Detached Palace.

A soft chime. The secret communication stone hidden in Head Maid Hilda's clothes glimmered faintly. An urgent order to report, sent from the First Prince's palace.

"..."

Hilda clutched the stone and glanced at Gun, stretched the length of the sofa and eating grapes. He lay with his head pillowed in a lap, accepting the fruit with perfect ease—and the one stroking his hair, of course, was Seria, her face still thoroughly sulky.

"Your Highness."

Hilda approached and bowed her head with care.

"His Highness the First Prince has ordered an urgent report."

"Oh? So it's finally here. What does he want?"

"In connection with the massacre at the ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠tea party, he commands a detailed account of whether Your Highness is concealing a unique ability, and whether there have been any suspicious movements."

"As expected of my dear eldest brother. His instincts are disgustingly sharp."

I popped a grape Seria had peeled into my mouth and grinned.

"Well then, time to write the reply the way we practiced this morning. What was it I told you to write, again?"

At my languid tone, Hilda's body flinched on reflex. The magicite pattern engraved beneath her collarbone glowed softly, binding her soul.

Wiping cold sweat from her brow, Hilda hurriedly began to inscribe a reply upon the mana communication stone.

Perfect disinformation, without a hair's breadth of error. I skimmed what Hilda had written on the stone and nodded, satisfied.

"Perfect. Beautifully done."

"...Thank you, Master."

"Send it as it is. Brother Leonhardt will read this, set his mind entirely at ease, and sleep with both legs stretched out."

Hilda activated the stone's transmission magic. With a thin, rising whine, the false report that would wipe the First Prince's suspicion of me clean away flew off toward the imperial palace.

"Being a double agent pays better than I thought."

I chuckled and pushed myself up from the sofa. The Second Prince had been ruined by an assassin bound to my Imprint, and the First Prince had been struck blind and deaf by a spy bound to the same. From a sofa in the Detached Palace, I had made fools of the two most powerful factions in the empire.

"Hey, Hilda. You worked hard, so do you want a grape too?"

Looking at the grape I held out, Hilda went pale and flung herself flat on the floor.

"N-no! H-how could I dare touch something so precious, something my Master eats...!"

A perfect piece on the board, forged from absolute terror and absolute devotion. Seria, who had been watching that display with a cold eye, leaned in and whispered at my ear.

"At this deception of yours, His Highness the First Prince is being played to perfection."

"Why? Jealous?"

"...Hardly. I am merely astonished, all over again, by that serpentine nature of yours."

Seria delivered the fact with a blank face, and even so she carefully wiped the fruit juice from the corner of my mouth with her apron. The absolute control bound up in my unique ability was slowly closing its hand around the leash of the entire imperial palace.