Chapter 61
Chapter 61
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Translator: uly
Chapter: 61
Chapter Title: Rocania Count
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Count Rocania was a man who loved generously. Of course, people called it womanizing, but wasn’t love something that grew better the more you gave?
He had his own ironclad rules.
He never raped a woman, and he wouldn’t begin a relationship until they both loved each other and had agreed to his particularly “abundant affections.” In other words, they had consented not to interfere if he took up with this woman or that one.
Naturally, the women who permitted such arrangements were given stable homes and money. And the children they bore—how adorable they were.
Even if the world pointed fingers at him, he considered himself blessed in his own way. He had family here, family there.
Of course, there were fights between his legal wife and his mistresses, but he could mediate those. He just saw it as his responsibility for all that love he spread around.
It was during one such mediation that a certain son caught his eye—Fabian.
“You bastards!”
Caught his eye? No, more like stabbed it right in.
That boy was like a sharp awl.
The red-haired boy was beating his nobleborn legitimate siblings like they were stray dogs.
“Hey, you punk, if you keep hitting them, they’ll die!”
Count Rocania had to pull Fabian off them. Yes, among all his beloved children, Fabian stood out the most.
“You should just become a knight!”
A cute rebellion against his loving father, yet eyes that still craved affection.
Fabian got a little sister partly because of that attitude. Fabian was so endearing that he visited often, and she came along.
He grew up bit by bit, and one day declared he would become a knight.
He must have remembered the words his father spoke when he was young.
Watching the little kid swing a sword was unbearably cute. Even when he became a proper young man, the count still saw that little boy in him.
Count Rocania wanted to make his son’s dream come true. So he pulled some strings to get him a knight’s position in the Crown Prince’s Palace—not a high post, but an honorable one.
When Fabian was knighted and first called him “Father” with such a mature air, Count Rocania nearly burst into tears.
He was a man who tried not to show tears to his children.
When that boy, whom he’d thought so steady and reliable, left behind just a single letter and never returned, he wept openly for the first time.
[I apologize for the first time.
Father, forgive me. Everyone in the imperial palace is tormenting Daphne.
I must save Daphne from that man.
Daphne doesn’t even know how she’s been treated and foolishly thinks he’s a good person.
That poor woman doesn’t know what true love is. I want to protect her.
I want to have toward her the sense of responsibility you taught me.
So, my respected father.
Cast me aside.]
The escape was bound to fail.
That’s why he could never return.
The count couldn’t even recover Fabian’s body.
He wanted to kill the emperor. But the emperor had suddenly suffered a fall from his horse and secluded himself. Frantic to find his son, the count never considered that the emperor’s condition turning strange so suddenly was suspicious. He just focused on searching during what he thought was the emperor’s weakened state.
Much later, what he found was Fabian’s necklace. A locket with a family portrait he always carried close to his heart.
Fabian had grudgingly let them draw it when he said he didn’t want to, but apparently kept it on him always. Clutching the locket given to him by a fellow knight who’d been close to Fabian, he mourned his son’s death over and over.
He never should have taught the fool about responsibility.
Never should have let him take up the sword like his father. Should have broken his spirit and told him to live like a wastrel.
Should have made him despise his worthless father, chasing after this woman’s skirts and that one’s.
A vision of the young, innocent child flashed by. His beloved child, so precious he could have tucked him into his eye without pain.
“Father.”
The hesitant voice calling that title, as if it were a sin. The gestures, the tone, the smile. It all stuck in his eyes, refusing to fade.
Who said paternal love couldn’t match maternal? In agony like his guts were being ripped out, he sobbed and writhed.
Sorrow turned to hatred. He wanted to kill the emperor.
But the emperor was dying under Callista’s watch. No need for revenge there. Still, preparing for any contingency, he gathered small forces under his command.
In his childhood, that red-haired boy had been so lovable that he’d compared Fabian to a red gem, Symer.
That’s how the Children of Symer were born.
Count Rocania sought to dismantle the imperial family and the emperor piece by piece. He began subtly spreading word of Emperor Belenus’s atrocities.
Belenus was a usurper who assassinated his brother.
Belenus was a sadist who abused his wife.
Belenus tried to force himself on a young girl.
Belenus always sends the young to die on the battlefields.
Thus, he was a tyrant who didn’t love his people!
Dissatisfaction with the imperial family swelled. They vented their fury over the endless hundred-year war, and just then, the crown prince—who had to inherit power—faced demands for a test of his abilities.
They demanded he end that hundred-year war, so off to the battlefield he went. A pitiful wretch cold-shouldered by his own father, but his imperial blood made him a fine target for revenge.
Count Rocania prayed for the crown prince’s death on the field.
His revenge was nearly complete. But while sorting Fabian’s belongings, he felt a twinge of unease.
“I must save Daphne from that man.”
Hm? What’s this?
“Daphne doesn’t even know how she’s been treated and foolishly thinks he’s a good person.”
He’d been too distraught to read it properly then, but something was off. That seductress’s daughter could never think well of the emperor.
Hadn’t he dragged her here by force, claiming he’d been tricked into sowing his seed, and made her a maid without touching her body?
No way that girl saw the emperor as a “good person.” Count Rocania racked his brains as if struck on the head.
What if the emperor hadn’t killed Fabian?
Come to think of it, things at the palace had been odd. How could the emperor kill Fabian after his own accident? The timelines didn’t match.
Even if it was a preemptive order, something still felt off. The emperor would have demanded the count’s cannon-making techniques in exchange or wiped out the Rocania family in some show of authority.
So why kill Fabian and bury him in secret? In desperation, he approached one of the crown prince’s knights.
He offered a fortune and demanded the truth.
“I’m sorry, Father.”
Thinking the crown prince would die in battle, the knight spilled everything.
“His Highness the Crown Prince hates anyone approaching that woman. He kills them all if they get too close.”
“……Wasn’t it an order from His Imperial Majesty the Emperor?”
“Both His Imperial Majesty and His Highness the Crown Prince gave the same orders. Truth be told, His Majesty had forgotten about the girl shortly after bringing her and lost interest. It was His Highness who took an interest.”
“……Then, that day, Fabian?”
“I wasn’t part of the operation, so I don’t know. But that locket came from His Highness’s palace.”
Count Rocania was dumbfounded. So the real enemy was someone else. He recalled the crown prince’s charming facade. That stupid seductress’s daughter had liked the crown prince, oblivious to who he was.
And Fabian had liked her.
“Ah……Asherad…….”
His eyes blazed with vengeful fury. No matter how much honor his warrior house had lost, he knew revenge. Realizing the true foe, he resolved to take it out on Asherad.
But he couldn’t kill Asherad now.
Paradoxically, the battlefield was where Asherad was most guarded. No assassins could slip in.
Pondering what to do, Count Rocania ultimately supplied Asherad with cannons.
Revenge shouldn’t be simple. He hoped the hundred-year war would end in victory, bringing him back to this hell.
Once Asherad ascended the throne, Count Rocania approached him.
“Your Majesty. I have a report regarding the Children of Symer.”
Count Rocania smiled at Asherad.
“What is that?”
“A seditious group that the late emperor secretly ordered me to track.”
As if it were some longstanding faction, the count reported on the Children of Symer to Asherad. I lost my beloved son, so I’ll destroy everything of yours.
The count smiled softly.
* * *
Daphne heard Count Rocania’s story. Some parts she could understand, others not.
“Count, before that……one thing.”
“…….”
“Why would Asherad get close to you, Fabian’s father?”
At that, Count Rocania laughed.
“Because there aren’t many nobles who’d shower illegitimate brats like him with love.”
“…….”
“That’s the fatal flaw of Emperor Asherad. That monster doesn’t know parental love.”
At the count’s sneer, Daphne’s heart plummeted. An emperor ignorant of parental love. She felt like she’d glimpsed one vast facet of the enormous Asherad.