Chapter 110
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Translator: penny
Chapter: 109
Chapter Title: Photo
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“Nngh...”
Alberion, who had lost consciousness, let out a strained groan as she slowly opened her eyes.
“How’s your body feeling?”
“Hik!?”
The moment she caught sight of Kairen’s face in her vision, she flinched in surprise, her body jerking back.
“You startled me... it’s you.”
“...”
“But why are you suddenly asking about my condition...”
She muttered with a slightly relieved expression, then suddenly felt something off and glanced downward.
“Ah.”
“Hehe.”
“Aah...!”
After a brief dazed look, Alberion let out a scream of despair.
“The black heart is gone...?”
“Right?”
“D-D-Did you... did you do this?”
She caressed her chest in disbelief, then stared at Kairen with wide eyes.
“I actually have the ability to cure curses.”
“Ah...”
Upon hearing Kairen’s explanation, Alberion looked puzzled for a moment before realizing something.
“You used the power of the Demon King flowing in your blood...”
Kairen’s eyes widened in shock as she scratched her head and muttered.
“H-How do you know that?”
“The direct imperial family members of the imperial house know the Belverk secrets from the start.”
“Oh, right.”
Kairen suddenly recalled what his mother had said the day he learned Belverk’s secret and nodded in agreement.
“To prevent unnecessary power struggles, you see. Anyway...”
Meanwhile, she trailed off as she looked up at Kairen, who was crouched in front of her.
- Wa-rak...!
In the next instant, she abruptly stood up and pulled Kairen into a tight hug.
“My friend!”
“Eek.”
“How can I ever repay this favor...”
She muttered with a teary expression for a moment, then narrowed her eyes slyly.
“Right, I’ll invite you to the academy’s secret fraternity...”
“There’s no such thing.”
“...Huh?”
“You were just gonna round up some delinquent kids you vaguely knew and pretend, right?”
But Kairen, who had been listening quietly, sighed and called her out.
“Have you ever even properly run one of those debauched gatherings?”
“...”
“You didn’t just blindly follow along and get fleeced for a ton of money, did you?”
Under his continued probing, Alberion rolled her eyes and sweated nervously before answering with a sullen expression.
“...But I’m impotent, what could I do?”
At that response, Kairen furrowed his brow and examined her for a moment before muttering inwardly.
‘As expected, lifting the gender disruption curse at the same time was too much.’
He had succeeded in removing the black heart, but it seemed absorbing the fundamental curse on Alberion had been beyond him.
- Hweechung...
Realizing that, Kairen staggered as he tried to stand from his seat.
“Fine, then I’ll give you a different reward. What would be good...”
As he listened to the now somewhat cheerful muttering of Alberion, he thought to himself once more.
‘At least the crisis is over for now...’
“Huh? My friend?”
‘Thank goodness... I guess.’
And right after that, Kairen finally lost his balance and collapsed from his seat.
“My friend!!!”
Fearing he might fall onto the syringe needle scattered on the floor, Alberion hurriedly threw herself to catch him, raising her voice in alarm.
“Crown Prince.”
“I-I’m listening!”
“Just promise me one thing.”
At that moment, Kairen, with narrowed eyes, spoke to her in a low voice.
“I won’t tell you to become the next emperor...”
“...”
“But at least pull yourself together now and become someone you can be proud of to yourself.”
At his sincere advice, Alberion’s face paled as she checked on Kairen, her expression hardening.
“...You promised.”
In that state, she extended her trembling pinky finger to hook it with Kairen’s.
“...I suppose so.”
How much time passed like that? After Kairen finished speaking and lost consciousness, Alberion held him quietly for a long while before carefully standing up.
“Someone you can be proud of to yourself...”
She repeated the concept she was pondering for the first time, mulling it over, then suddenly wore a cold expression.
“Then, I have a lot of work ahead.”
At the same time, her eyes began to burn golden for the first time in quite a while.
- Kkaddeuk...
With Kairen in her arms, she quietly ground her teeth as she headed for the door, then glared at the dormitory C wing visible beyond and finished her words.
“...First, shall we repay the debt I owe my little brother.”
About two days later. Academy dormitory B wing.
Surviving the Academy (5/7)
Staring blankly at the count floating before my eyes as always today, I pulled out a letter from my pocket and fell into thought.
‘Time has flown by already...’
Since that day two days ago, Crown Prince Alberion—no, Crown Princess—had hidden herself away so completely that no one knew where she’d gone.
「Let’s meet again on the day I leave the academy.」
Her only trace was this single handwritten letter she’d left for me.
It felt a bit off to just trust this one letter and wait until the day she leaves the academy, but with nothing else I could do, it couldn’t be helped.
‘Guess I have to go to class today too, getting teased endlessly by the senior girls...’
As I made an uneasy face and prepared to leave the room, that’s when it happened.
“Little one, it’s not time to be sleeping!”
“Ugh.”
“From today, you have to personally observe the magic beast response exam!”
Marquis Magnaris burst into my room without even knocking, greeting me with a bright smile.
“M-Me?”
“Of course! This is an old contract between the Magnaris family and Belverk!”
Well, the exchange between the academy and Belverk is a long-standing tradition, so I get it, but...
“Current head Astridje no-showed as if it were natural, putting me in a bind, though...”
“Then how’d you manage until now?”
“...Haa.”
Why me of all people? The other sisters would probably handle this better...
“At first, I called Edelrasia.”
“Aha.”
“...Until some incident blew half the dormitory away, I thought she was a good substitute.”
That thought didn’t last long as I recalled our eldest sister, who’d been writing new legends on the northern front for the past two years, and nodded in understanding.
“Last year, I tried Lilien too, but one male student nearly got murdered.”
“What’d she do?”
“He lost his fear and called her narrow-minded.”
And thinking of Lilien, who’d come home to the mansion around this time last year with a cold expression and stayed in a foul mood for a week, she clearly wasn’t suited for this either.
“And Uriel... the cons outweigh the pros.”
“What’d she demand?”
“...No comment.”
Uriel seemed the most fitting, but even Marquis Magnaris, who has a mad scientist streak, was that horrified by her demands.
Surely she didn’t ask for academy students as ‘tonics’ or something?
Nah, no way. She promised me in a letter recently that she wouldn’t eat people anymore...
“Anyway, among all past Belverks, you lot are the craziest bunch...”
“...”
“So, little one. You’re going to be very important from now on.”
From Marquis Magnaris’s perspective, I, the mildest Belverk, must be his last hope.
“You’ll come next year too, right...?”
Seeing her glance at me sideways and then ask with a subtle expression made it clear.
“O-One condition!”
“...!”
“I-If you grant that condition, I’ll come next year too!”
But I’d grown savvy enough about the ways of the world by now.
If I was irreplaceable manpower, I knew perfectly well that when offered a deal like this, demanding fair compensation kept me from being a sucker!
“You’ll keep that promise, right?”
“Yes!”
“Words alone won’t do. Here’s the contract...”
Yet Marquis Magnaris was in such a hurry she summoned and shoved the contract at me without even hearing my condition.
“Signed!”
“Haa, now I can relax...”
Yeah, since she hadn’t seen me in two years, she probably thought I was still that innocent kid from back then...
“So, what does our little vampire want?”
Sorry to disappoint, Marquis, but I’m now a complete package: Lilien’s prickliness, Uriel’s slyness, and Edelrasia’s charisma.
“...Mother’s secret!”
“Sure, I can give you that anyt—Huh?”
That’s why I could bring up a sensitive topic I couldn’t have dreamed of two years ago, even if a bit tensely.
“Wh-Wh-What did you say?”
“Kairen wants to know Mother’s secret!”
“Ah...”
But Marquis Magnaris, who’d been staring blankly at me, suddenly paled and started sweating profusely.
“C-Can’t you wish for something else?”
“Hehe.”
I nearly softened at the sight, but with my eyes turning red, I quietly smirked and unleashed the Belverk skill I’d honed over two years.
“Don’t even dream of it!”
Of course, that skill was the passive debate technique all Belverks have—in other words, blackmail.
About five minutes later.
“Absolutely, no matter what!”
“...”
“It must never get back to Astridje...”
After agonizing in her seat, Marquis Magnaris finally pulled a photo from her pocket with trembling hands and held it out.
“And if it does get out, I had nothing to do with it!”
Kairen watched her terrified expression—more so than ever—closely, tilting his head curiously.
‘What could this be that she’s reacting so sensitively...’
He took the photo from Marquis Magnaris and looked down at it.
“Huh?”
For a moment, Kairen wore a blank expression.
“This is Mother, and His Majesty the Emperor... and...”
He scratched his head with a thoroughly puzzled look.
“And...”
What was in the photo Marquis Magnaris handed over was, surprisingly, Astridje in her academy uniform with a blank expression, the young emperor from his school days grinning with his arm around her,
“...who?”
and an unidentified figure in a white mask sitting demurely between them.