Chapter 90
Chapter 90
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Translator: uly
Chapter: 90
Chapter Title: The Field Trip That Decides the Winner (7)
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Penheim Kingdom generally experiences distinct four seasons, but there are exactly two places where the weather never changes.
One is Senrir Lake, frozen solid year-round, where the Snow Duke and the Roshiar Knights are stationed.
The other is Peckda Magic Tower in the Batudis region, perpetually shrouded in fog due to Baldur's Nightmare.
The founder and chairman of the Royal Meteorological Society, Osborn, began his daily routine by checking the continent's weather every morning.
He opened the window of his office with a cup of black tea in hand.
"Ugh, honestly. I wish they'd clear out those damn telegraph lines."
The telegraph wires launched from Horus Lighthouse always blotted out the sky, and they grated on his nerves.
But what could he do?
There wasn't a single mage in the society bold enough to complain to Terra Ernisten.
Tsking to himself, he lit a cigarette as his assistant handed him the weather charts observed that day.
"These are the weather conditions for the Tesalon area and Penheim as measured by the observation ships."
"Another anomaly...?"
Osborn's brow furrowed as he snapped open the paper.
The weather lately had been utterly unpredictable.
Not only had sudden solar eclipses occurred multiple times since early in the year,
but Senrir Lake had thawed, sending demon corpses floating all the way to the Ravier Mountains, and the fog in Batudis was slowly lifting.
"Ominous. Any changes in the celestial bodies?"
"Peckda Star's luminosity has shifted slightly. Merak is still dimming."
"Hmm..."
"Oh, and there's word that Horus Lighthouse has appeared in the Batudis region recently. It's unconfirmed officially, but..."
"Sigh, got it. You can go now."
Dismissing his assistant, Osborn sat down and jotted his interpretations of recent phenomena onto parchment.
The monthly report was due.
With an unsettling aura hanging over the capital lately, delivering ill omens felt burdensome.
There was surely some friction with the Holy Kingdom.
But he couldn't omit it from the report.
His hand paused briefly with the quill, but he soon added one more line.
It was the first such request since the outbreak of that minor war.
The darkness in the dungeon was so thick that nothing was visible except each other's eyes.
It felt like even if someone died here, no one would notice.
Adella gripped her ice spike tightly and slowly raised it.
The woman who kept meddling between her and Louis had returned.
If left alone, she'd barge right into the canteen and cling to him again.
Her shrill voice held none of her usual naive demeanor.
"I don't know where your confidence comes from, but your greed is way over the top."
Crack, craaaack.
Frost formed on the ground with each light step she took.
Even without knowing the principles of magic activation, Adella—who had awakened her unique magic path—was undeniably the Snow Duke.
She was still inexperienced, but the [Ice Spike] she'd shown before had destructive power rivaling any ordinary spell.
"Baroness sticking to Teacher like that is rude in itself."
"What do you mean?"
"Don't you know there's a clear difference in status?"
She was referring to Louis's status and her own.
A commoner like Louis could never be allowed polygamy.
Besides, he was already deeply involved with her, a countess.
For a mere baroness like Liv to wedge herself in and flirt—that flew in the face of noble etiquette.
It was the kind of behavior that could get her ostracized from high society.
And Adella's confidence wasn't just in social standing.
"I've already done all sorts of that with Teacher~."
A twisted smile crept onto her usually cheerful lips.
The bone-chilling cold that froze even breath, and the domineering gaze looking down naturally.
All of it poured onto the pitiful baroness hiding in the shadows.
"Clinging on here will just make you look pathetic, Baroness."
But.
"Pathetic? Pfft."
Liv's eyes curved into a smile. She boldly stepped out of the darkness, her blue hair swaying, and stood before Adella.
She lovingly caressed her own belly and smiled innocently at her oblivious junior.
"Not really. Because Boss was very satisfied."
"Wha... what?"
"He even followed me to the magic tower. Said he was worried and sorry about it."
Her smile turned into a sneer.
Meanwhile, Adella's face stiffened.
She bit her lip hard, spitting out a choked voice.
"...You're lying."
"You should know better if it's true. Boss is amazing in bed. Oh, mine was on the sofa, but he didn't tire at all, really..."
"Liar!!!"
Boom!!
A blast of physical cold swept through the entire cave.
Adella advanced on the fallen Liv with murderous eyes, raising the spike in her hand.
"Liar... Teacher would never..."
Her trembling lips and the ice crystals forming in her eyes were truly pitiful.
But Liv didn't back down an inch.
Because she knew that feeling all too well.
Yet even so, she couldn't give up on Louis.
"If you can't believe it, go ask him. You know he can't lie."
"..."
"Boss can't lie."
The falling tears soon hardened into cold rage.
A searing injustice directed at the thieving cat before her.
"It's all because of you."
"..."
Adella mounted Liv's unresisting body.
She pressed the ice spike against her sunken belly and said,
"You seduced Teacher."
"..."
"You overstepped your place."
"..."
"You took everything from me."
"..."
"You're the bad one."
"..."
Liv said nothing.
"Get away from Teacher right now."
"No thanks?"
"Wha...?"
"If you wanna stab, stab. If you're prepared for that."
Instead, she grabbed the spike aimed at her belly with both hands.
And taunted the composure-shattered Adella.
"What, can't do it?"
Crunch.
Blood seeped from her lips.
Her heart ached more than the metallic taste and pain.
Adella took a deep breath.
Just a little force, and that fragile belly would tear apart.
She had to eliminate this vixen who dared seduce Teacher right here.
Her trembling hand tightened.
For a long time.
For a long time.
For what felt like forever.
And—
"Guhk...!"
A pained groan echoed through the cave.
Liv despised Adella.
For being closer to Louis than anyone, monopolizing his love,
yet lacking even the courage to eliminate her sole obstacle.
That pure?
Was this truly the Roshiar heir to the Snow Duke's icy blood?
"You don't even have the guts to stab."
"Ah, ahhh...!"
The image of Liv with Adella's spike aimed at her had vanished amid a purple mist.
In its place appeared Liv behind her, stabbing Adella's heart with an identical spike.
"Does it hurt?"
"I...t hu...rts...!"
"This'll hurt even more. If you keep loving Boss."
Liv shattered the spike in her hand.
She grabbed the collapsed Adella's head and forced eye contact.
"What's the difference between you and me? Face reality, junior."
She had awakened her unique magic path.
She stood on the same starting line as Adella Sylvestra de Roshiar.
The backing of their houses differed in scale, but with Adella receiving no support right now, it made little difference.
If anything, Liv's greater mastery of her unique magic path made her the more self-sufficient mage.
"Boss was your everything? Same for me."
She refuted Adella's words one by one.
Just as Adella had run away from her family to stay by Louis's side—no, even longer before that.
Liv had nowhere to rely on.
Louis had fulfilled her wish, letting her meet her father.
If only in a fleeting illusion, he made her smile happily.
Give up on a man like that?
Not even over her dead body.
"I don't know where your confidence comes from, but your greed's excessive. Think you can monopolize Boss that easily?"
"Then for you, Baroness... it doesn't matter? If another woman... ngh... clings to him...?"
"Yeah. Doesn't matter."
"...!"
Liv never thought Adella would give up on Louis.
And she knew one more thing her naive junior didn't.
"Neither you nor I can fully hold Boss anyway."
Louis's past.
The path he'd walked, his true identity, his power, and finally, the one he'd loved.
Difference in status?
Smart as she was, Liv could only conclude the exact opposite of Adella.
Louis—Boss—wasn't someone a mere countess or a newly awakened ducal candidate could claim alone.
She'd read countless books in the library but never seen the word "hero."
But from fragments of conversation, she could infer it meant humanity's savior.
And even if she hadn't glimpsed his past like she had,
this woman, who had loved by his side longer, surely sensed it instinctively.
"Have you ever once felt like you completely had Boss in your hands?"
"..."
"Didn't he feel like something your arms could never hold?"
"..."
It was true.
Adella wore a frustrated expression.
Separate from her desire to monopolize him, she harbored anxiety about staying by his side forever.
That anxiety birthed uncontrollable impulses, leading to the canteen's destruction.
The Tree of Sephirot.
When the roots rot, the tree falls.
In the end, Louis had gotten truly angry.
Because they couldn't fully understand him, leaving deep wounds.
"I don't even need to kill you here. I'm confident."
"Confident...?"
"Yeah. No matter what woman approaches Boss, I'll be the one most loved."
Liv set aside her staff and instead pulled out the Louis lookalike doll she used as her token.
"If you lack even that resolve. If you can't stab me yet can't prepare to be his first."
She placed the doll in Adella's hand as she barely rose.
"Take this and get lost. Don't make Boss suffer needlessly."
After they wrecked the canteen, how had Louis been?
He'd sunk into despair without proper apologies, then gotten up to search for them one by one.
He, the actual victim.
"Think it over, junior."
"..."
"How amazing and kind Boss is. You thought you knew alone from the start, but..."
Now the whole world knows.
With that, Liv turned her back on Adella.
As long as she remained a whiny child, she had no right to stay by Louis.
Passing the princess and Kal, who had just finished off the wormbets, Liv exited the dungeon.
She immediately ran into the man she loved most.
"Ah, Baroness!"
"Boss. What brings you here?"
"Uh, well..."
He couldn't quite say it, but his intent was obvious.
He was surely worried about Adella.
As if he could compare her, a Ravier Mountains survivor, to a junior who couldn't control her emotions.
The results from the magic duel and canteen were the real surprises.
"Oh, right. I have a gift. Want it now?"
"Boss is such a bad guy."
"Huh?"
"Later. Give it later."
Liv lightly tossed her hair and passed him.
So that even he, fixated on Adella, might turn back at the scent wafting from her body, if only for a moment.
"No more should come..."
She murmured softly.
The field trip ended.
Fortunately, they secured the token, but Erzebet, receiving her score sheet, couldn't hide her gloom.
The grading rubric recorded everything from losing her backpack on day one to being ignored by her familiar.
She glared daggers at Piy and snapped.
"Piy! This is your fault!"
"Piy—!"
"What do you mean!? Why do you get a score sheet too? And why is yours higher than mine!?"
"Piy—!"
"Ack, aack!"
Kal, watching Erzebet fight her familiar, grew curious about Adella's score nearby.
But she had her head on the desk, scribbling—not on the score sheet, but another paper.
"Adella, whatcha doing?"
"Hm... a letter."
A letter? Oh, vacation's coming, so to home?
But everyone in year one knew the "secret" that Adella had almost cut ties with House Roshiar.
Curious, Kal asked,
"Who to?"
"...My sister."
"Really? The Snow Duke? What'd you write?"
"Nothing much. Just..."
Adella folded the letter, slipped it into an envelope, and said resolutely.
Her letter's content was simple.
A single, not-too-long sentence.
I, heir to Roshiar's blood, have mastered the family's unique magic path through bloodline succession, but my proficiency remains lacking.
"Help me out a bit."