After the Chaos
Seeing Lisianthus brood so uncharacteristically, digging himself into a pit of gloom, I brushed the moment off with playful banter to cut the tension. If he had shot back with something like, We aren’t close enough for you to joke with me like that, things would have turned terribly awkward. Fortunately, wracked with guilt as he was, he merely stammered and played along.
In truth, we had lacked crucial information from the start, and an unknown enemy had blindsided us. I was the one who drew up the plan, and I was the one who chose to take the risk. I hated the thought of an innocent bystander shouldering the blame and tormenting himself with regret.
In any case, having yielded to my rather stubborn insistence, Lisianthus proved his resourcefulness by procuring a spread of desserts. While munching on the sweets, I listened intently to a detailed account of what had unfolded after I nearly crossed the threshold of death.
The building that hosted the auction had collapsed entirely. The lively night market, once bathed in gentle revelry, had been reduced to shambles.
The patrons who managed to scramble out of the wreckage had scattered in every direction. Casualties were high, with scores of people injured or dead. The mere appearance of a swarm of demonic beasts right beside the auction hall had plunged the entire city into sheer pandemonium.
Raymon, who had rushed in to rescue me, dispatched his troops to search for traces and pursue the foe before the structure completely caved in. Yet they found virtually no clue regarding the mysterious girl who had ambushed us, nor any sign of the beasts. Flux, having barely crawled out of the crumbling building, hastily summoned the city guards in an effort to rein in the bedlam, but restoring order proved an uphill battle.
The southern region had enjoyed undisturbed peace for far too long.
Everyone knew that, slowly but surely, the demonic beasts breaching the barriers and encroaching upon human settlements had grown in both numbers and strength. Still, until now, it was a reality people could comfortably afford to ignore. Those living in a sprawling, prosperous metropolis had especially little cause to fret over beasts. With such high population density and security forces garrisoned year-round, any rogue monster was swiftly neutralized before it could inflict substantial harm.
The only ones genuinely terrified of demonic beasts were the remote, sparsely populated rural estates. Out in the countryside, beasts were merely one part of a desperate struggle—simply fending off starved wild predators during the spring famine was enough to stretch their meager resources to the brink.
It had even spawned a common jest across the empire: Only northerners and country bumpkins lose sleep over beasts.
To top it off, the south boasted the grand Southern Barrier and the venerable Southern Temple.
Even Flux, worried as he had been about the subterranean conspiracies targeting him, had never once anticipated a full-blown assault by a horde of demonic beasts. It was only natural. Humanity could hardly brace for a catastrophe it had never once witnessed.
Centuries had slipped away since the reign of the first emperor. Today, the only faction that still kept the grim resolve of that ancient era etched into its very marrow was the Castrein Duchy. No matter how much gold flowed through the coffers of House Cortez, they had never drafted protocols or stationed troops specifically to counter a sudden horde of beasts descending upon their peaceful metropolis.
The inevitable result was devastating damage.
The situation was so dire that Flux, who had been frantic with worry after watching me collapse in a pool of blood, had not even managed to show his face to check on me, even upon hearing I had regained consciousness. The entire citizenry trembled in unrest.
When news first broke that a fire had broken out at the temple and compromised the Holy Relic, people regarded it as an ill omen, yet none considered it an immediate, tangible crisis.
After all, the Offering Festival had not been canceled—what did a brief delay of an annual ceremony matter?
To the local populace, the Offering Festival had long ceased to be a sacred, solemn duty; it had devolved into little more than a colorful summer festival celebrated year after year. Even when word spread that the Imperial Princess’s Holy Sword had been stolen, people merely gossiped: What kind of reckless lunatic would dare pull off such a stunt?
Given the city’s immense wealth, rumors traveled at lightning speed. Ordinary citizens were well aware that illicit wares traded hands in the shadowed underbelly of the city. Most simply assumed that an influential, shadowy syndicate had set its sights on the sword and slipped it away in secret, and that the temple fire had merely flared up in the scuffle. That was the extent of their suspicions.
Then, without warning, a swarm of demonic beasts assaulted the heart of the city.
Though the monsters targeted a single building and receded like the ebbing tide shortly thereafter—and despite the casualties being miraculously low for an onslaught of that scale—the psychological shock dealt to the citizens was immense.
“Demonic beasts!”
“Those abominations only roam the frozen north! Why on earth are they in our city?”
“Nothing like this has ever happened before…!”
“What about the barrier? Isn’t there supposed to be a barrier? How did so many beasts break right through it?”
“O Heavens, look upon us with mercy…!”
The citizens were horrified, enraged, and gripped by raw terror.
They desperately craved an explanation—something, anything, that made sense within their worldview. Why? Why were we struck by a swarm of beasts out of nowhere?
Yet House Cortez was in no position to offer a definitive answer.
Even a swift official proclamation—stating that forces from House Castrein had arrived, that the situation was being monitored with utmost vigilance, and that another attack was unlikely to endanger the city—failed to soothe their frayed nerves.
The wealthy scrambled to protect themselves, hoarding exorbitant enchanted charms embedded with magic crystals to guarantee their own safety. Lines stretched endlessly outside the warp tunnels as panicked nobles and merchants vied to secure passage, paying whatever exorbitant fares were demanded.
The common folk, however, enjoyed no such luxury. The vast majority could never afford the steep fees of the warp tunnel to flee and start anew elsewhere, nor could they dream of buying magic crystals inscribed with protective wards. Left with no other recourse, they huddled in corners and whispered among themselves.
“Come to think of it, the temple caught fire and the Offering Festival was pushed back!”
“I heard something went wrong with the Holy Relic, too!”
“That’s it! The barrier failed because of the relic, and that’s why the beasts got through! As l-long as the Offering Festival is held properly, everything will be fine, right?”
“R-Right… Her Highness Princess Titania slayed the beasts at the Imperial Palace with her sword, didn’t she…?”
“You fool, didn’t you hear that very sword was stolen?”
“At least the Young Duke of Castrein is here in the city. We have no choice but to trust in him…”
The populace was desperate for something to cling to.
Even if that beacon was a half-burned temple currently undergoing emergency repairs.
The Southern Temple, whose standing had plummeted and whose credibility was on the brink of ruin, suddenly found itself showered with desperate hopes from every corner of the city.
Chief Priest Cronen, who only the night before had been fleeing the auction house in an undignified panic, had donned pristine white vestments at the break of dawn to preach before the gathered masses.
“This is a trial bestowed upon us by the gods, a stern reminder of how far we have strayed from honoring their holy name!”
Standing barefoot with bare hands to project humility beneath the soot-stained outer walls of the temple, he addressed the bewildered throngs. Like drowning men grasping at straws, people had flocked to the temple with no real grasp of the situation, clinging to the vague hope that sanctuary might be found within its sacred grounds.
And there stood Cronen, posing as their savior.
“Have faith! We shall be delivered from harm! Trust in the temple, repent of your sins, and unite as one to help us restore the barrier and conduct the Offering Festival without flaw! Look upon this tragedy—see what calamity struck the very instant the temple’s holy perimeter was breached!”
With an amiable smile that contradicted the venomous edge in his voice, High Priest Ilian recounted the scene to me, sounding as though he wanted nothing more than to grind the man to dust between his teeth.
“Haha! That fellow Cronen certainly knows how to wag his tongue.”
Barbara quietly chided him. “Your Eminence, your choice of words is far too vulgar before Her Highness.”
High Priest Ilian chuckled heartily, looking like a grandfather playfully scolded by his granddaughter. “Oh, dear me, vulgar? Cut an old man some slack, Miss Barbara. At least give me credit for not saying what an unsightly spectacle it is to watch him flap that filthy trap of his.”
“You just said it while excusing yourself,” Barbara pointed out, her expression completely flat.
“Eh? Come now, Her Highness might not swear out loud, but surely she shares my sentiment about wanting to bash that pompous bas—ah, stop glaring at me! All right, all right, I'll behave. In any case, the real problem is that people are actually buying Cronen’s rhetoric and taking comfort in it. After all, telling folk to trust in the gods, find peace of mind, and pull together isn't wrong in itself.”
I hastily piped up, looking at High Priest Ilian as he helped himself to snacks.
“Your Eminence, you are a High Priest of the Holy Temple. Wouldn't the people place far more faith in you than in that scoundrel Cronen—a man so wretched that feeding him to horses would be an insult to the horse? If you stepped forward right now, wouldn't they listen?”
“Haha, Your Highness. Even a stray dog commands respect on its own street. Think of all the grease Cronen has spread over the years—the sheer volume of coin he’s showered and pocketed, the endless glasses clinked, the letters sent to weave his monstrous web of connections. Besides, the Offering Festival falls strictly under the southern temple’s jurisdiction. Even if I were to bare my face before the crowd and roar, ‘Hear me!’ there is nothing I could legally enforce. It is far better for me to remain out of sight, unnoticed by their faction, and catch them red-handed when they inevitably trip over their own schemes.”
Listening to his explanation, I let out a long, heavy sigh.
I had narrowly crawled back from the jaws of death after an attack by demonic beasts, yet we hadn't unmasked a single enemy. And to figure out what was really going on, I would still have to carry through with the Offering Festival…
One thing, at least, was crystal clear: the Empress would be dancing with joy once word of this reached her ears.
When the beasts overran the auction house and Raymon carried my unconscious body away, most civilians had already fled for their lives. The chaos had been so absolute that many people had no idea what had actually transpired. Even so, there was no hiding the sight of Raymon rushing away with a bloodied woman cradled tightly in his arms.
As a result, a fresh wave of ominous murmurs had begun circulating regarding the festival: Did something happen to the royal princess who traveled all this way? What if she cannot perform the Offering Festival?
Truly, once an incident erupted, groundless rumors bred like weeds, driving even the most levelheaded souls into a frenzy.
Yet the threat I needed to brace for right this second was not the Empress.
“Your Highness! Lady Bibi is calling!”
…It was Bibi!
My eyes widened in alarm as Debbie’s cheerful voice rang out.
Her big blue eyes were brimming with fat, trembling tears. I froze on the spot, stiff as a frog struck by lightning.