Chapter 282
Chapter 282
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Translator: crow
Chapter Title: King of the Desert (4)
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Finally, the manhole cover opened once more.
A neatly combed black crown of the head came into view.
“Captain Lin, come on up.”
I extended my hand to her.
In response, the black-haired knight clasped my palm.
Unlike the soft skin of the princesses, her hand was incredibly rough and covered in scars.
“You were right by the manhole, Sir Veil.”
“We have to surround them so they can’t escape again.”
Following behind her was Deyan, the one who had made that arrogant proposal to me.
Trailing after him came the timid doctor, Pavan.
“Urk...!!”
As the two climbed up, the fake captain I’d beaten to a pulp earlier poked his face out.
Our eyes met, and he averted his gaze like he’d spotted his natural predator, slowly hauling himself up.
“Good thing. I was worried you might kill us.”
“Do you think we’re some kind of murder squad...?”
‘It wasn’t?!’
They forced the unscathed Deyan and Pavan to their knees.
The middle-aged man let out a deep sigh, looking utterly despairing at his unconscious subordinates.
“What we do goes beyond target assassinations. We handle intelligence gathering, abductions, blackmail too.”
Lin gazed at me with a faint smile.
Unlike our first meeting, she seemed more human now that her younger brother had recovered.
Even so, the work she did remained brutally tough.
“Keeping necessary hostages intact is one of our skills too.”
“Ah.... Well, good work anyway.”
Lin, hands casually clasped behind her back, indifferently adjusted her lopsided hair.
She still had one eye covered with a bandage.
She looked just like a beautiful knight returning from deployment.
“Does Her Highness Lydia know about this?”
“She’s on her way right now, actually.”
Right on cue, Lydia approached from the mansion side.
Arms crossed, she had Batsu and Tau flanking her on either side.
She furrowed her brow at the Samad men sprawled across the lawn.
But when her eyes met mine, she flinched in surprise and relaxed her expression.
“White shirt....”
Her hair swept back casually to bare her forehead, shirt boldly unbuttoned.
She swallowed deeply, stealing glances at me.
“You look even better now, Veil...?”
“I’ve been doing some personal training lately. Anyway, stop staring at me and check this guy out first.”
Batsu and Tau narrowed their eyes down at Lydia too.
Perhaps feeling her dignity as a ruler compromised, Lydia cleared her throat.
“Ahem.”
Back to her ruler-like red gaze.
She slowly looked down at the bound Deyan.
“Hm? Aren’t you that secretary from the Samad palace back in the day?”
“You’ve got the wrong guy.”
The middle-aged man bowed his head sharply upon seeing Lydia.
As if trying to hide his face.
“Wrong guy, my foot. I saw your face in the corridors when I visited Samad.”
Lydia’s sharp gaze pierced him.
The unique intimidating aura of the Samad royal family emanated from her too.
“I don’t know anything....”
“...”
The princess smirked, well-acquainted with types like him.
Her hand drifted to her waist, as if her blood was boiling after so long.
“Ha, looks like my old temper flares up around Samad folk.”
Despite her twintails and cute short dress.
The aura she exuded was utterly ferocious.
‘Yeah, that’s Lydia’s true image.’
She’d been a cute, youthful twenty-year-old around me.
But in her element, she was more resolute and cold-hearted than anyone—a true sovereign.
So when she’d tried recruiting me for business, offering a license to kill made perfect sense.
“I-I just heard it was blue herbs and bought it...!!”
Deyan, knowing the royal terror, hurriedly made excuses.
But a former royal secretary mistaking dillma for herbs?
“Who do you think you’re fooling? Ridiculous.”
It didn’t faze Lydia one bit.
“I heard you got booted from the palace treasury for embezzlement. And this is what you’ve been up to since?”
“It’s true!! Why would I lie to Your Highness?”
Batsu and Tau fetched a chair.
Lydia sat gracefully, crossing her ample thighs.
“The mastermind’s gotta be Liam, right?”
“N-No relation to Lord Liam!!”
He’d claim ignorance, yet interrupt to blurt out at her pointed barbs.
He seemed a completely different man from the one who’d pitched the dillma deal to me.
That was the power of the Samad royals.
“I heard he approved the dillma export licenses?”
“He absolutely didn’t!!”
Deyan protested with an innocent face.
Seeing his boss like that, even Doctor Pavan realized the immense power of this girl before him.
“If you don’t want Liam taking the fall, tell the truth.”
“I don’t know.... It was all my doing alone. Punish just me....”
The dillma middleman bowed his head low.
Lydia sighed deeply.
In the dark garden, her red eyes gleamed ferociously, like a predator spotting prey.
“No helping it, then. Batsu, fetch the brazier.”
“Yes, Your Highness.”
‘Brazier...?’
I tilted my head, wondering why suddenly.
As if answering for her, Batsu and Tau silently carried over a brazier from the mansion entrance.
“Sword.”
Legs crossed elegantly, Lydia extended a graceful hand to Batsu.
He handed over the knight captain’s sword with crisp precision.
As if he knew exactly what she planned.
“We Samad folk have the fastest, most effective way to interrogate sinners.”
Lydia indifferently thrust the received sword into the brazier.
Hot haze rose, heating the blade.
“You’ll talk anyway. The sword knows the answers.”
Batsu and Tau silently approached the sinner.
They rolled up his suit sleeve, exposing his arm.
“Hm. Nicely heated.”
Lydia lifted the glowing sword, gazing at it impassively.
Then slowly handed it to Tau.
“Begin. Before the banquet hall music ends and the screams carry.”
The banquet hall was in waltz time, booming with grand music.
The melody drowned out our voices nicely.
‘Right, Lydia has this side too.’
I’d momentarily forgotten.
For all her love of her people, she was merciless to those threatening them.
She knew well that peace stemmed from overwhelming power—the creed of a great nation.
“Daring to spread drugs in my empire. You know how many died in Samad from dillma back then, yet you spread that filth...?”
The empire’s Third Imperial Princess kept a calm face, thinking of her dying subjects.
She didn’t enjoy this, but drug lords scattered quick if contact lagged—so a heavy hand was needed.
But.
“Please wait a moment, Your Highness.”
No need anymore.
“Why stain those fair hands with a filthy criminal’s blood?”
I grinned wide, waving off Batsu.
Pointing at the Black Knights, I flashed a sly, foxy smile.
“We’ve got experts right here.”
Lydia followed my finger to Captain Lin and the Black Knights.
Their black hair and uniforms made only their intense eyes gleam in the dark garden.
“But don’t you serve only Rozanna?”
“No, we now devote ourselves to the empire.”
Lin and the three knights bowed politely in unison.
Seeing the legendary Black Knights treat her with such respect, Lydia blinked her red eyes.
“Well, you have another way to uncover the mastermind?”
“Yes. We know how to do it cleanly, without a mark.”
Lin gestured, and two Black Knights vanished quietly.
They returned carrying a large jar.
Filled to the brim with clear water.
“Water knows the answers.”
The Black Knight clenched his black leather gloves tight.
Grabbing Deyan’s hair, he declared.
“Then, let’s begin.”
“Fine, let’s see the famed Black Knights in action.”
Lydia turned her chair around.
She beckoned me over, telling me not to watch the ugly scene.
“You called...?”
“Yeah. Why didn’t you report something like this to me first?”
The youngest princess pouted up at me.
“What if you got hurt by those dangerous thugs?”
“I’m the empire’s greatest swordsman, Your Highness....”
Lydia rose lightly from her chair.
While the men waterboarded the guy on the side, she straightened my shirt.
“What’s with this getup?”
“Oh, it was camouflage to pass as a customer to the drug dealers.”
The princess carefully buttoned up the open shirt.
Yet her skilled hands moved surprisingly slowly.
“Ahem. Well, this look isn’t bad.... Definitely more manly....”
“Pardon?”
I asked back at Lydia’s quiet mutter, and she shook her head.
Her neatly tied twintails swayed.
“These scars too—if you’d applied ointment in time, they wouldn’t have scarred....”
“No time on the front lines to tend wounds.”
Lydia exhaled softly, trying to button to the top.
Then she stumbled, her face pressing right into my chest.
“Eek....”
Her eyes widened round at my sweat-and-ale-sticky abs.
Plus my subtle scent seemed to fill her mouth with saliva.
“You alright?”
“Y-Yeah.... I’m fine....”
Lydia hurriedly rubbed her cheek and whipped her gaze away.
Meanwhile, Deyan cracked, and Lin called us from afar.
“Your Highness, he named the mastermind.”
“Already?”
Lin approached slowly, face grave, and spoke.
Her single black eye gleamed intensely, sharp as a clever crow.
“The group he belongs to is ‘Black Sun,’ made up of high officials ousted from the royals.”
“Black Sun...?”
I echoed, and Lin nodded mechanically.
“Retired officials trading illegally on palace intel they hoarded. Apparently many are close to Crown Prince Liam.”
“So that’s why brother approved the dillma exports.”
Lydia propped her chin, face icy.
“Yes, one mentor figure among the execs pushed hard, and he approved on condition of medical exports only.”
“That explains his firm denials of involvement.”
The Third Imperial Princess neatly pieced it together.
Impressed by her tidy deduction, Lin’s lips curved up as she continued.
“Several Black Sun execs and members involved are attending the mansion right now.”
“Here in there?”
Lydia’s lips parted; she hadn’t known that.
“Yes, those whose royal badges have subtly black suns are members.”
Samad royal badges normally feature a sun mark.
Mostly gold, so the subtly black ones were all culprits.
“Understood, Captain Lin.”
Hearing the full story, Lydia pressed her red lips together.
In the dark garden, her eyes flashed murderously as she said.
“I’ll handle from here.”
She looked just like Leonhardt resolved for a purge.
One of the empire’s rulers, she wiped the smile from her face and strode toward the mansion.
“Tonight’s banquet hall’s gonna get a bit rowdy.”
「――――――」
The mansion’s banquet hall bustled with party clamor.
Samad and imperial folk mingled half-and-half, building camaraderie.
Among them were Samad royals and empire high officials aplenty.
Even the now-familiar Chancellor Mosian graced the event.
Lydia cut through the thronged crowd.
She mounted the stage at the hall’s center.
I and Lin took positions as her guards.
「Having a good time at the party?」
As petite Lydia ascended the stage, the VIPs’ attention focused.
Naturally, many Samad officials wore royal badges.
And...
Among their suns, some were eerily dark, like solar eclipses, dotted here and there.
「I have a brief announcement, so I’ve taken the podium.」
“Please speak freely, Your Highness—.”
A Samad grand duke gazed proudly up at his granddaughter from below.
He smirked with his children, watching Lydia.
「Some people I’m looking for are here right now.」
Lydia’s red eyes scanned the dozens filling the hall.
Her quick mind sorted them, and she spoke coldly.
「Everyone except those wearing Samad Black Sun badges—please exit immediately.」
Lin and I drew our swords in sync.
The VIPs swallowed hard, sensing trouble.
「Tossing badges now won’t help. I’ve memorized all your faces.」
At Lydia’s ferocious speech, VIPs eyed each other warily.
Then the grand duke, knowing her temperament best, led the exodus with gestures.
“Seems there’s an issue.”
“Yeah, everyone out for now.”
Under royal and guard command, guests hurriedly departed.
Black Sun badged men stayed stoically at tables.
Those ditching badges to blend in got blocked by eastern knights like Batsu and Tau.
Thus, only about fifteen Samad men remained in the vast hall.
“What in the world is going on...?”
Even Liam, heading out, glanced back in confusion.
But Batsu slammed the doors, so he couldn’t check.
「Quite a few, huh.」
Lydia gazed coldly down at the remaining Samad men.
「So many parasites trying to rot my empire from within.」
She glanced at Lin and me.
In her sovereign chill tone, she requested.
「For the peace of both nations, I ask you—Veil, and Lin.」
The princess raised her palm in signal, and the chandelier lights winked out.
Moonlight streamed through windows as Black Knights lining the walls rose.
「Arrest them all.」
The hall plunged into pure darkness.
Only the matured black panther’s red eyes gleamed.