Remnants of Malice (3)
A heavy silence had settled over the interior of the carriage.
Now and then Flora would try to strike up a conversation about this or that, but every attempt was smothered by Karsein's curt one-word replies.
It wasn't as though there was nothing to talk about, and yet he offered nothing in return — she might well have shouted at him to answer her properly, but Flora knew better than to do that now.
And so the silence kept falling, again and again.
With that silence reigning unbroken inside the carriage, time slipped by before they knew it, and the carriage rolled to a stop. They had arrived at the villa.
Put another way, the two of them had exchanged not a single word on the entire ride to the Gelgeton Viscount's villa.
The moment the two of them stepped down, the knights bowed their heads.
Who would dream of demanding proof upon seeing the Bagrand Ducal carriage? Such a thing wasn't even necessary.
But Karsein was staring straight into their eyes.
Just as I expected.
It was the predictable outcome. Even at the entrance to this tea party, their manner of treating him and Flora was worlds apart.
And there was something else their eyes betrayed — something Flora, sharp as she was, had completely failed to notice.
What those knights' gazes had held. How much resentment simmered in them.
He knew it all too well, which was exactly why Karsein deliberately said nothing.
"You may proceed to the room on the left side of the second floor."
The knight gave the explanation with a crisp, formal posture — the kind of explanation that was easy enough to listen to.
Flora simply gave a light nod at their courtesy in so readily pointing out the location of the tea party, and headed into the villa.
And yet, before long, she was forced to stop in her tracks.
"This tea party has a lot of people who passed the examinations at the Eastern Noble Conference, so... huh?"
All that appeared in the mirror in the main hall's lobby was her own reflection.
Karsein was nowhere to be seen.
"What? Where did he go?"
She turned her head this way and that, but Karsein was nowhere in sight. Then, glancing back over her shoulder, she finally caught sight of that black hair.
Apparently he hadn't moved an inch since stepping out of the carriage. He stood leaning against it, scribbling something in a notebook, his thoughts utterly impossible to read.
Flora scampered over to him.
"What are you doing over there? The tea party's on the second floor — I told you that. Did you not hear me because you were goofing off?"
"No. I heard you just fine."
"Then why are you standing out here? Don't tell me — you're planning to drop me off and go home, aren't you?"
At her impatient prodding, Karsein snapped his notebook shut and answered.
"I merely tagged along as your escort. So why would I go in there?"
"...What?"
Flora's eyes went round.
"What do you think I brought a sword here for? I came in the capacity of an escort knight. What use would I be sitting in the hall alongside my mistress?"
"When did I ever bring you along as an escort knight? I just—!"
Before Flora could finish denying it,
Karsein abruptly turned and asked the knights standing guard.
"Hey. Did the host of this tea party grant permission for uninvited persons to be brought inside?"
"Excuse me? W-well, that is..."
"Or is something dangerous happening in there that would require an escort to be on duty even indoors?"
"..."
The knights exchanged bewildered glances, unable to give a ready answer to Karsein's questions.
The natural answer would have been the one that denied Karsein's position. They had no desire to sit back and watch a commoner like him attend a tea party hosted by a viscount's house, after all.
But Flora was standing right there.
With her glaring daggers at them, how could they possibly say such a thing?
If they answered that he had no business being let in, they risked being called out over the fact that he was her companion.
In the end, the two knights could not answer.
And at that, Flora lost her temper.
"Nobody told you to stay out, so why are you being like this?!"
She raised her voice as if this, above all else, could never be allowed to happen.
No other solution had come to her.
If she didn't answer like this, it truly felt as though Karsein would turn around and head straight back to the Bagrand Duchy.
Better to acknowledge him as an escort knight if it meant getting him inside the villa all the way to the end.
"I have an invitation too! I'm entering with him as my companion. There's no grounds for complaint about that, right?!"
"Y-yes, of course. You may enter...!"
The knight swallowed hard and replied.
"And what rule says an escort knight can't be admitted?!"
"Lady Pitea merely instructed that companions be brought along. She never set any limits on who they could be."
"See? There's no law saying an escort knight can't come inside!"
Meeting Karsein's eyes dead-on, Flora shouted it once more.
"If you're my escort, then forget everything else and just follow me all the way in! You're not an uninvited guest!"
At that, Karsein gave a quiet snort of laughter.
The ones shouting may not have noticed, but the nobles who had begun to gather, one by one, were all watching him closely, each weighing just how they might cook him alive.
Those who had just stepped down from their carriages.
Those watching with interest from the balconies.
Those whose mouths curled up at the corners behind the glass windows.
Not all of them, perhaps — but every person in the vicinity had their eyes fixed on him.
I have a rough idea now. Why they went to the trouble of luring me here.
If he had to guess, it was Flora who had insisted on bringing him along.
But it was unquestionably those nobles who had arranged the circumstances so that Karsein would come to this place.
He didn't know what had happened at the last tea party, but the intent behind this was far too, painfully obvious.
Of course, from Karsein's standpoint, he had nothing to feel awkward about. It was as good as the groundwork already being laid for him.
He answered the still-fuming Flora with a look of boundless composure.
"So you're saying you told me to just follow you along. Clearly."
"Huh?"
And with that, Karsein stepped into the villa.
"W-wait, I'm coming too!"
Afraid he might stop short or turn back like before, Flora chased after him wide-eyed. When nothing of the sort happened, the blonde girl finally relaxed.
However...
Karsein had absolutely no intention of letting this opening slip away.
No. He had no intention of letting it go at all.
Once they were inside the villa, no one pointed fingers at him anymore.
Before the tea party began, acquaintances were exchanging brief greetings among themselves, while the companions were each ushered into separate rooms.
"Wait for me here. When I call for you, just open that door over there and come out."
With those words, Flora headed off to her own place.
Even at the tea party, her seat was directly beside the host — a position that proudly proclaimed the enduring prestige of the Bagrand Duchy for all to see.
And I have my own preparations to see to as well.
Since this episode was a main one as well, a choice had appeared for him back at the villa's entrance.
The content was simple: it asked whether he would go along with the knights' discriminatory treatment.
They had showered Flora with courtesy, yet like Emma, they had treated him coldly — not even bothering to pronounce his name properly.
And so one of the choices that had appeared was this:
[ 1. Hey, you lot. You can pronounce Flora's name just fine — why can't you even be bothered to say mine properly? ]
Exactly that. Calling it out to their faces and demanding a response.
Needless to say, it was a trap.
They might well have recognized him, but the moment he raised the issue, every manner of problem would come bursting out at once, like a river tearing through a broken dam.
It wouldn't be strange to take them to task for failing to properly address the name of an attending noble — but this was not the ducal estate. This was a gathering place for nobles. In a word, enemies on every side.
And in a place like this, Karsein was entirely alone.
Hadn't he learned that much at the ducal estate? When facing a gathered crowd, if the matter turned into a battle of public opinion, he had no leverage in either direction.
If the assembled nobles shaped the narrative in their own favor and he found himself fighting a headwind instead, it would only put him in greater danger.
Besides, strictly speaking, those knights had done nothing truly wrong — they had merely been filtering in the nobles who held invitations. They hadn't picked a fight, nor had they provoked him.
It was only a light, casual slight — which meant that if anyone decided to make an issue of it, the loss would be entirely his. Just as Flora had done before, those knights could put on a performance as the wronged party and cast him as the aggressor.
Frankly speaking, Karsein's public activities weren't exactly extensive. They could simply claim they hadn't recognized him on account of his attire, and that would be the end of it. Given how he was dressed, saying they'd failed to recognize him was far, far easier to pull off.
Another obstacle: none of the young ladies had ever announced who they would be bringing as a companion to the tea party. What was more, those very people could just as easily turn the question back on him — how do we know this man is really Karsein?
In short: even knowing the truth, it was a situation where he must not point it out.
Well — when it comes to me, Karsein, no one would blink at whatever came out of their mouths. I'd expected at least this much.
In the end, he had bulldozed past that trap by brazenly declaring himself an escort knight, but still. He didn't believe for a second that this choice would be the end of it.
Which means... I'll just have to dig around a place like this.
[ Remaining too long may incur corresponding penalties. ]
[ Do you wish to enter? ]
Obviously, he had to enter.
The moment he stepped in without a moment's hesitation, the timer began to tick down.
An episode he knew nothing about.
An episode with not a single clue to guide him.
All the more reason to return to the basics.
For starters, there was one clue. The fact that they hadn't recognized Karsein at a glance.
He'd been able to confirm it by watching the knights' gazes closely. For a brief moment, they had hesitated, wondering who he was. They'd caught on shortly after that it was Karsein — but that short interval was not something to simply brush past.
Why had they failed to recognize Karsein immediately?
The answer to that, he had to find here.
Because the choices are always shaped by the episode, this mansion was bound to hold a clue within its walls.
This wasn't a point-and-click game, so he had to physically go through drawers and search between the furniture one item at a time — but even so, the effort paid off.
"...Just as I thought. Here it is."