Silently in the Dark
Baron Stupido's domain was tiny. In truth, calling it a fief was generous—it was barely the size of a modest village. Yet a noble was still a noble, and a territorial lord was still a lord.
"Quite a decent meal, wouldn't you say?"
"Indeed. It even suited Your Highness's palate, so Baron Stupido must have prepared it with great care."
"Since it was just a rural holding, I honestly didn't expect much. It was far better than I anticipated—though naturally, it's nothing compared to what we enjoy back at the Detached Palace."
"Of course, Your Highness."
As Cecilia had noted, Baron Stupido's hospitality was far from lacking. Even in my eyes, having spent the past week relishing the comforts of the Detached Palace, the feast was more than adequate.
After dinner, I personally attended Cecilia's bath... and then we retired to the bedroom together.
"Is there really any need for you to sleep in the same room as me?"
"We'll be staying together once we reach the Academy anyway. Wouldn't it be better to get used to it now rather than run into inconveniences after we arrive?"
"Hmm... You don't talk in your sleep, do you? I'm not a light sleeper, but if you wake me, you'd better be prepared for the consequences."
"I sleep exceptionally quietly, Your Highness. And I rarely oversleep."
"Fine, then. You're certainly not planning to share my bed, so will you take that sofa over there?"
"That will be more than enough."
While attending Cecilia's bath, I had suggested sharing a room. Something in the air smelled suspicious, and staying in separate rooms posed too great a risk.
Of course, contrary to that assessment, Baron Stupido himself didn't strike me as an enemy. If anything, he was paralyzed with anxiety over hosting the Third Imperial Princess in his modest estate; his frantic deference held neither malice nor deceit. If the baron truly wished us harm, he would have simply poisoned our dinner.
"That settles it, then. We depart first thing tomorrow morning, so let us retire early."
"I will prepare your bed, Your Highness."
"I'm exhausted from all that time in the carriage. Be quick about it."
It was still early evening, but just as she said, the long hours in the carriage had taken their toll, prompting Cecilia to turn in early.
If I hadn't been here... and if someone truly intended to murder the Third Princess...
"I'll have it ready in a moment."
She couldn't have been an easier target.
Silence enveloped the darkened bedchamber where Cecilia slept.
Every light had been extinguished, leaving only the faint, rhythmic sound of her shallow breathing as she rested on the bed. With the heavy drapes drawn shut, not even a glimmer of moonlight pierced the gloom.
In the pitch-black room, I quietly rose to my feet.
From the moment the Third Princess—the target of an active assassination plot—had lain down, I hadn't slept a wink. Thanks to that, my eyes were fully acclimated to the dark.
Moving across the floor was second nature. I made my way to my travel luggage and unlocked the latch without producing a whisper of sound. Daggers, wires, assassination needles, and a mask. I had already planned which tools to retrieve while waiting for Cecilia to drift completely off to sleep.
"...One in front of the bed."
One across each of the two windows, and five more anchoring the space around Cecilia's bed. I secured the razor-sharp wires between the walls, ceiling, and floor. Though completely shrouded in darkness, every coordinate was etched into my memory. A Wire Trap like this was more than sufficient.
With the trap in place, I drew the dagger strapped to my thigh belt, then pulled a second blade from my luggage. They were ordinary daggers devoid of ornamentation. But when it came to weapons, all that truly mattered was whether they succeeded in taking a life.
Having learned under Sylvia and Hannah, such pragmatism was second nature to me. During the rigorous special training at the Assassin Guild, I had always wielded blades of this sort. Both were honed to a razor edge—just the way I liked them.
One dagger in a forward grip, the blade pointing up; the other in reverse, the edge facing down. Once both weapons were firmly held, the rest was simple.
"Whew..."
I gave myself over to the dark. In the pitch-black room, exhaling slowly, I dialed every sense to its sharpest edge.
One minute, three minutes, five minutes.
Measuring time by the cadence of my breath, I listened for any footfall in the hallway, parsing every anomalous sound hidden beneath the nocturnal rustling outside the window. All the while, I calculated the enemy's potential numbers.
The carriages accompanying us were small. While the main carriage carrying Cecilia and me could hold around seven people, the ones ahead and behind could seat barely three. One was packed with Cecilia's luggage, and the other carried her personal escort.
The luggage carriage was almost certainly safe; there was no way the Head Maid would have left the Third Princess's belongings unvetted. Even if the escort carriage had been compromised, that meant a maximum of six adversaries. And assuming my read on Baron Stupido and his household was correct, none of the estate's staff were involved.
Thud.
A faint noise outside caught my ear.
The intruder was treading as lightly as possible, but concealing the full weight of an adult male was no simple feat. Whoever it was, they hadn't undergone the rigorous training of an assassin like me.
Step.
Step.
It wasn't just one pair of feet. Two.
I strained my hearing, focusing on the approaching footfalls, but sensed no third presence.
Two men.
I decided to act on the assumption of two targets. My grip on the dual daggers tightened, yet my breathing remained entirely inaudible.
"—Here."
"—She asleep?"
The footsteps halted right in front of the bedroom door, and two hushed male voices leaked into the room.
It was them.
"—Has to be. It's been an hour since the lights went out."
"—Piece of cake, then."
"—Yeah. The moment we finish her off, drop the dagger on the bed just like we planned."
I stared toward the door in utter disbelief.
These fools were laying out their entire strategy right outside the threshold. Were they brain-dead? Far from muffling their voices, they were practically holding a debriefing in the hallway. It was so insultingly amateurish that a flare of irritation rose in my chest, but I held it down.
They were marked for death anyway. This would be my first actual combat—my first time taking a human life—and I had a job to finish.
"—Moving in."
The latch clicked, and the door swung inward.
A sliver of hallway light cut across the floor. To their credit, they opened the door gently, unlike their careless chatter from a moment ago. Slipping into the room with cautious, muffled steps, they pulled the door shut behind them.
Both stood around 170 centimeters tall. Taller than me, taller than Cecilia, but by no means imposing in build.
"...It's dark."
"Keep it quiet."
I felt a sincere surge of gratitude toward the two idiots for walking into my dark domain and shutting the door on their own. The moment they closed it, their incompetence was glaringly obvious. They hadn't swung the door wide enough upon entry to clear the corners, nor had they bothered to light a lamp.
"The Princess should be over by the bed. Let's finish this."
Consequently, they hadn't noticed me in the slightest. I was standing directly beside the doorframe, tucked away in the blind spot where the hallway light had never reached.
They had no idea a maid was lingering quietly in the shadows with daggers in both hands. No inkling that the assassin about to snuff out their pathetic lives was already breathing right behind them.
The moment they took a step toward the bed, I moved.
Unlike those who had no right calling themselves assassins, my steps made zero sound. Not even the hem of my maid skirt fluttered as I closed the distance.
Step...
As they took another blind stride toward the obscured bed, I peeled away from the wall. Lunging forward in a blur, I drove the reverse-gripped dagger directly into the center of the rear man's nape.
"Guh—?!"
"What the—?!"
A strangled death rattle slipped from his throat as he collapsed. The man ahead whipped around in sheer panic.
Because the reverse blade was wedged deep into the cervical vertebrae, I couldn't wrench it free in time. Abandoning the dagger to tumble with the falling corpse, I brought the forward-gripped dagger in my other hand around in a fluid, vicious arc.
As he spun to face me, our eyes met—just in time for the blade to punch straight through his sternum and into his heart.
"A... maid...?"
"Shut up. Cecilia is sleeping."
Though his heart had been pierced, life hadn't fully left him, and words still tried to tumble from his lips.
Fearing his gasps might awaken Cecilia, I yanked the blade from his chest and immediately invoked my magic.
⟨ Silence ⟩
The moment the Low-tier Magic, Silence, took hold, every scrap of sound vanished. The dying gasps of the man stabbed through the heart, the gurgle of the corpse with a blade in its neck, the heavy thud of bodies hitting the floor—all of it was swallowed by absolute stillness.
"...Whew."
Two corpses on the floor. One maid standing above them.
A clean, undeniable result.
Only now did my heart begin to hammer violently against my ribs. Sweat broke out across my palms, and my breath turned shallow and rough as the realization settled in: I had just snuffed out two human lives in an instant.
As the adrenaline receded, a wave of disorientation washed over me at the weight of what I had done. But there was still work ahead. Now was not the time to rest.
My first kills. Two lives ended by my own hands.
Though my mind threatened to spin with turbulent thoughts, I couldn't very well leave rotting corpses in the room where Cecilia slept. Blood was still pumping steadily from the severed neck and pierced chest, pooling across the floorboards. Tonight's work wasn't finished just because the intruders were dead.
"...At least no one was hurt."
The thought brought a small measure of relief. Neither Cecilia nor I had suffered so much as a scratch.
"...Once we reach the Academy, I'll have to meet our contact right away."
I had anticipated enemy ambushes, but I hadn't expected them to strike on our very first night outside Hwanggeum-ok. While the Academy would likely offer better security, I still needed to report this incident to the Assassin Guild without delay.
"...Haaah."
Now came the chore of dragging the bodies outside, scrubbing the floorboards clean, and washing the bloodstains from my maid uniform.
I had executed the wetwork flawlessly, yet the mundane aftermath felt infinitely more troublesome. Surely I wasn't abnormal for feeling that way?
Still, Cecilia had gone to bed early, and the intruders had been kind enough to arrive ahead of schedule. At this rate, I would still manage to get a decent night's sleep.