24. 8th Rank
24. 8th Rank
That night, after Beatrice met with Crown Prince Zeke.
In the days leading up to the king's execution ceremony, fires flickered to life across the horizon of Mactern Direct Territory and the other northern territories.
To the north, the forces of Grand Duke Wiguk. To the south, an army rallied around Crown Prince Zeke.
Zeke's host, swollen with conscripts, outnumbered the enemy, but in quality Wiguk held the decisive edge—the bulk of the regular army had crossed to his side.
And so, along that torchlit front thick with tension—
Beatrice, cowled in a robe, stood with Susanne in the forest near Mactern Direct Territory.
"Your Highness, I must object. This is—"
"Quiet, Susanne."
"...Yes, Your Highness."
Why were the two of them here instead of resting in the quarters they had been assigned?
Unlike Beatrice and her resolute expression, Susanne the maid was visibly restless. Anyone could tell they had not come with Crown Prince Zeke's blessing.
Which was accurate—they had sealed their room with magic and slipped out in secret. But why?
The reason was walking toward them.
"...Amatrius Delphia Beatrice."
"You came. Grand Duke Wiguk."
"General Karthea was telling the truth, then."
Beside the Duke stood Karthea, his face every bit as uneasy as Susanne's, and a scarred man who had accompanied the general.
Unlike the other three—each concealed by robes or magic—this man made no effort to hide his appearance. As if he had no cause to.
Grand Duke Wiguk. An 8th Rank martial artist.
He had come, alone for all practical purposes, to meet her through Karthea's arrangement.
"I never imagined you would be the one to ask to see me first."
"I had business. Nothing more."
"You don't seriously think you can simply discuss business and walk away?"
"Of course I do. If you try to abduct me now, I'll resist fiercely. But you and my brother swore not to clash until the execution ceremony, didn't you?"
"...That bastard Siegfried. Did he spill everything?"
"I knew my brother and the Grand Duke had reached some kind of agreement. Guessing it was a promise not to fight until the ceremony was my own leap."
"Played. You're remarkably sharp. Even if that talent far outshines this."
Wiguk's eyes shimmered with greed. Before his subordinates he maintained an air of solemn dignity, but Beatrice knew the truth: this was the man's essence.
The living embodiment of insatiable desire, armed with the power to realize every craving. An ambition that reached beyond simple lust, gold, or glory—a man who meant to carve out a new dynasty.
What he wanted from Beatrice was not the carnal hunger stirred by her beauty, nor the prestige of wedding two royal daughters.
"It is your talent I covet, Beatrice. Ever since I first laid eyes on you."
"..."
"I'll say it again. Come to me. Under my protection, that chronic affliction of yours can be cured."
"Can you not see my current state?"
"I see it perfectly. Crafting an organ inside your body to artificially house external mana, even driving yourself to mana exhaustion—every last detail. I'm no mage, so I won't pretend to grasp how all of it connects to your disease. But—"
At the very least,
"I know a half-measure of a cure when I see one."
"..."
"So take my hand. I will heal your sickness, and in return you will wield that genius for my sake."
The hunger Grand Duke Wiguk felt toward Beatrice was the hunger for an unpolished gem.
Her overwhelming talent—certified long ago by the Empire's Archmage herself—that had already reached the 7th Rank in half a year even with a flawed fix.
That was what he craved.
He'd made her the exact same offer back when the royal palace dismissed her as useless baggage because her disease was untreatable.
And now, just like then,
Beatrice answered.
"I refuse."
"...Beatrice."
"I refused you then, didn't I?"
Her reply had never wavered.
True, Wiguk had extended his hand during her most desperate hour. Beatrice had very nearly grasped that many-layered promise of salvation. She had been that desperate.
But someone had intervened.
"Are you still speaking of that wet nurse?"
"The wet nurse you murdered."
"A talentless 1st Rank piece of trash besides."
That woman had cherished Beatrice since she was small. When the nurse saw young Beatrice standing before Wiguk, she'd rushed to the girl's side out of a half-formed dread.
As the nurse drew close, Beatrice paused and turned to look at her. Wiguk, convinced that this distraction alone had cost him her hand—
Threw a single punch at the nurse.
The nurse died in the days that followed.
The blow of an 8th Rank martial artist, astonishingly, did not kill a 1st Rank woman outright. It merely pummeled her organs—twisting, tearing, rupturing.
On the surface she was unmarked. A week later she was dead from the sheer agony of it.
But the Delphia Kingdom did not punish a Grand Duke for the death of one wet nurse. How many times had such cases been buried? How many more people had died?
Beatrice had been young. She had watched her nurse fade and never realized Wiguk was the cause—the woman hadn't borne a single visible wound from that punch.
It was only later that she learned the truth from her brother Zeke.
"You remain appallingly, insatiably greedy."
"And you fixate on the most trivial things. A wet nurse—a 1st Rank—nothing more. You went through over ten nurses, and 1st Ranks are common as stray dogs."
"How ironic. Because while I suffered from my illness, I was little different from a 1st Rank."
"No, you were never anything like them. The talent the Archmage certified is plain before my eyes even now. You do not belong among the ants, among the 1st Ranks."
Wiguk's eyes gleamed. This was no mere slander or curse.
He too was 8th Rank—he too possessed a chosen talent.
"Might is everything in this world. With a high Rank, a lowborn sellsword like me can claim the grand title of Grand Duke Wiguk. Even that Human Butcher from the neighboring kingdom can hold the laughable post of Academy Chairwoman. Power excuses all sins. Power is enough."
"..."
"You yourself gained strength once you cured your illness. Wasn't it sweet, that power? Things that were impossible in the days when sickness kept you weak—suddenly they were within reach. That is the nature of power. Wealth and authority have their uses, but raw strength rules by its mere existence."
Thud.
Alongside the Chairwoman, he was one of only two martial artists to have reached the 8th Rank.
A casual flick of Wiguk's hand, and General Karthea and Susanne collapsed, unconscious. A burst of Rigid Energy, and a 6th Rank and a 5th Rank were reduced to the utterly helpless.
Beatrice alone remained standing, and only because she had readied layered defensive spells in advance.
And Wiguk still wasn't exerting himself.
"Look at them. This farce of a civil war. I alone could slaughter every last soldier in both their armies."
"...My brother is likely only pretending to fight."
"He may be. But that pretense is nothing more than my mercy. If I simply choose differently, just one day, they all die. In this world, where a single individual can overwhelm the masses, a high Rank is a privilege unto itself."
"Is that why you want my hand?"
"You are the one jewel among all this dross. I will cure your disease. I will help you ascend to the 8th Rank. You will become a ruler."
"And in return, I submit to you."
"Marriage will be required. We would seal it with every binding contract of magic and oath. I have no wish to be killed by the monster I raised. But that aside, you would stand as an overwhelming power—just as I do now."
Grand Duke Wiguk scooped up Karthea and Susanne, one in each hand. It was an effortless motion, yet those massive hands seemed to reek of death.
Here stood an 8th Rank, an absolute power, grinning down at the weak.
"You can kill someone."
His fingers tightened around Susanne. The grip barely moved, but a series of sickening cracks sounded.
"Or you can let someone live."
He released Karthea. The general crumpled limp to the ground, but he was alive.
"Refuse my hand now if you like. On the day of the ceremony, all these people will die by it anyway, and you will be taken by force."
"Didn't you call that mercy?"
"I happen to anticipate being in a foul temper on the execution day. My mercy may well be on leave. You will be handled much more roughly then. But accept now, and everything becomes far easier."
He tossed Susanne aside, the maid still groaning in pain even in unconsciousness, and pinned Beatrice with his stare.
Greed and anticipation, sadistic glee and a smirk all mingled on his face.
"Choose, Beatrice."
"...Let me ask you this, then. A Grand Duke who calls a 1st Rank worthless surely would not stoop to abducting one?"
"Naturally not. But why suddenly ask that?"
"Because I want to confirm it. And as for your mercy on the day of the execution... it may never be required."
"What?"
Before then,
a certain mad dragon might sweep through the Delphia Kingdom—civil war, political calculations, and all.
The only one who might stop the Chairwoman was Wiguk, the kingdom's sole 8th Rank. Maybe.
"May I ask a somewhat abrupt question?"
"Ask what you wish."
"There are only two 8th Rank martial artists: you, and the Chairwoman. Until recently, I was at Grandis Academy myself. If you were to compare yourself to her—"
"You ask the right questions."
The Grand Duke's expression shifted. His fingers rose to scratch the scars carved across his face.
As though summoning a memory—and straining furiously to forget it at the same time.
"...In my youth, I fought in the Kingdom's civil war. I was a mercenary."
"The civil war that put Aken Delminos on the throne?"
"I was 7th Rank then. Brimming with confidence. My fellows called me the Mercenary King—presumptuous as that sounds—and my reputation in the trade was solid. I was a genius. I never doubted my talent."
"..."
"But on that battlefield, after witnessing the Human Butcher firsthand... I understood."
Only then did Beatrice fully register: Wiguk never called the Chairwoman 'the Mad Dragon.' To him, she was always 'the Human Butcher.'
The Mad Dragon was a fearsome title, but it still carried a sliver of respect. The Human Butcher, though—that name was so blatantly brutal that no one dared utter it in her presence. Even when the Chairwoman was absent, people called her the Mad Dragon or the Chairwoman, almost never the Human Butcher.
Yet Wiguk spoke of her exclusively by that name.
As if no other title existed.
"I learned what a so-called 'overwhelming power' that is—an 8th Rank. And how minuscule my proud, 'genius' self truly was. That butcher is now the head of an academy? It's laughable."
"...Does the Chairwoman know who you are?"
"Not a chance. On that battlefield, I wasn't an exceptional mercenary, nor a young prodigy, nor even a 7th Rank. I was just—just..."
Weak.
That was all.
For a long moment Wiguk stared at the ground, jaw clenched, fist balled tight enough to bleed. Then he turned his gaze back to Beatrice.
His eyes were different from the greed-filled look he'd worn moments before.
"This is why I make you this offer. Because I know what an 8th Rank truly is. Because I know exactly what it would mean to have an 8th Rank—one that I control—under my command."
"..."
"You mentioned your wet nurse earlier. Back then, I was that nurse. A weakling who could be killed by the Human Butcher's whim, by a single careless gesture. To climb from a place where someone else decides whether you live or die, to the place where you decide—that is the root of the greed you accuse me of."
As the Grand Duke paused, waiting for a reply, Beatrice silently reached a final conviction.
I had some doubt, but the Grand Duke wasn't the one who abducted the Finance Director. That makes it all but certain: the culprit was my brother.
As for the offer... what could she say? The truth was, she didn't have time to even think about it.
Instead, Wiguk's words about the strong and the weak—about 8th Ranks and 1st Ranks—spun ceaselessly through her mind.
Finance Director.
A 1st Rank. Where in the world was he?
Her worry, and her terror of the Chairwoman, dug deeper and deeper.
*
"...There. A little more kneading right there, please."
"Yes! Right away!"
"Here's your drink, sir."
"Thank you. Ice in the next one."
"As you wish."
"How do you like my juggling? I used to make decent coin with it!"
"Sculptures earn money?"
"I'm hollow inside, so it's easy to hide things. No worries about thieves, either!"
"Uh... right. Well, your juggling's entertaining. Keep it up."
"Yes!"
What in the world was this?
A kind maid gave me a massage. A warm-looking old man handed me a chilled drink. An innocent child performed tricks for my amusement.
And not only was I sprawled across a plush bed, but a crafty-looking officer stood beside me, fanning me with an expression of sullen disapproval.
Why—
—am I this comfortable?