Revenge (4)
Revenge (4)
"Sylvia, just try to calm down."
"I am in a perfectly calm state right now."
Of course, my hands, which I had placed quietly on my knees, did tremble a little. I barely managed to calm them and put them back on my knees before they could smack my forehead, but the way Alice's eyes briefly flicked downward told me I hadn't been able to hide it completely.
Yes, to be honest... I wasn't calm at all.
"From what I can see, you don't look calm in the slightest."
Naturally, Alice's eyes were accurate. As they had been all year.
It was only natural that I couldn't calm down.
Hadn't Alice gone and done something even the Emperor wouldn't have thought of? It meant that while I was looping time dozens of times to gather this and that information, the Imperial Army had been turning some of the imperial capital's nobles and bourgeoisie upside down.
"There's no need to worry too much. I arranged it so we could sweep them all up in one go before any report could go up to Father."
"......."
For just a single moment, I suspected that Alice might have the ability to turn back time.
That this was the state of things before Alice had turned back time.
"You told me I'm the one who will become Emperor, didn't you?"
Alice spoke to me.
"Then I should be capable of at least this much. Don't you think?"
"......"
Mia Crowfield's face was now tinged with something beyond anxiety, almost approaching horror. It was the expression of someone who felt they shouldn't be learning anything more here.
"...... So,"
I needed about thirty more seconds to calm down before I could say that.
"So, what you're saying is that you've found something."
"That's right."
Alice spoke.
"The cell-based organizations weren't connected to each other, but there were threads above them, fine as a spider's web. It's only logical. I'm not sure about the children being moved around, but the drugs had to be produced somewhere and brought into the imperial capital. There are hardly any places within the imperial capital where you could grow poppies so extensively."
Even Mia Crowfield flinched at those words.
"Well, I know the reasons why the poppy source can't be eliminated. No matter how much magic has advanced, you can't stop producing painkillers. Even if it's bad for the body, there are plenty of situations where you have no choice but to use them."
Especially for the commoner class, who couldn't receive the benefits of magic. Or as emergency supplies for soldiers to survive the worst-case scenario where the mages had been wiped out.
"Are you suggesting... that it's flowing out of our territory?"
Mia Crowfield finally mustered the courage to open her mouth.
Her expression was stiff.
"...... It seems you trust your parents. Even though you thought there might have been drugs in my teacup just a moment ago."
"......."
It seemed Mia Crowfield had nothing to say to that remark from Alice either.
"Well, fine."
Alice let out a small breath and rose from her seat.
"You couldn't possibly know everything that happens in your territory, either. Even for me, not long ago—"
Alice bit her lip lightly.
"—there were things I couldn't even imagine. So I won't blame you."
"......."
And while Mia Crowfield had gone pale, she still rose from her seat after Alice, maintaining that stiff expression.
"If you want, I'll let you see, too. What's been happening here."
"...... If this is to sully the honor of House Crowfield......"
"There's no need to worry about that."
Alice smiled bitterly as she spoke.
"To be honest, the imperial house isn't that clean, either."
I had no choice but to silently agree with those words.
*
"Are you going out for a walk?"
As we stepped out of the drawing room, the countess, who had been sitting by the window in the parlor, rose. When I saw her expression, I couldn't help but be inwardly amazed. It was incredible that such a gentle smile was an act. Was that what nobility meant?
Not that the expression on one's face always looked positive, of course. Perhaps that was because I knew the countess's true feelings to some degree.
"Yes. Would it be alright if I strolled through the territory with Mia?"
"Of course."
At Alice's words, the countess glanced at Mia. Mia Crowfield, who had followed the two of us out of the drawing room, was still ghostly pale. Seeing that expression, the countess turned her face toward Alice as if suspicious. Though her expression remained that of a benevolent noble lady, of course.
"Our territory is—"
The countess's words, which she had been offering while following Alice, cut off.
This was because the door of the mansion we were heading toward burst open and a knight entered.
It was not one of the escort knights who had followed us. He wore armor emblazoned with the House Crowfield's distinctive crow crest.
A knight of Crowfield territory.
"My Lady......!"
But the knight who had burst through the door froze stiff upon seeing Alice and me standing next to the countess.
My gaze, too, went back to Alice.
But Alice remained as she was, a smile still on her lips. She didn't so much as twitch an eyebrow.
Her expression suggested she at least knew why that knight had come in.
"What is the matter?"
The knight's actions were sufficiently rude to be displayed before the imperial princess. But if a well-trained knight showed such behavior, it meant the news he had to report was equally urgent. That was probably why the countess had furrowed her brow but hadn't reproached him for it.
The knight took off his helm. The forehead of the handsome middle-aged man was drenched in sweat, plastering his hair to it.
As if having barely recovered his reason, he walked toward the countess with cautious steps. Then he raised one hand and placed it beside his mouth.
Even as she watched the countess lean her ear that way, Alice spoke to me.
"Then, let's go do what we came to do."
The countess lost her composure just before we exited the mansion.
"Your Highness!"
At that cry, Alice, I, and Mia Crowfield, who had been falteringly following behind us, all stopped walking.
"Just, what is this—what is the meaning of—"
Belying the frown she had shown the knight moments before, the countess ran toward us with a manner that violated etiquette in multiple ways, but—
"Your Highness."
Before that, a knight from our side approached.
The entrance of the count's mansion was already filled with our knights. That wasn't particularly strange. It was only natural for knights to arrive and wait first when their master was coming outside.
However, the atmosphere was entirely off.
No one had drawn swords, but the imperial knights and the knights of the county were on edge, as if they might draw at any moment. If I could have sensed killing intent, my back would have been soaked in sweat the moment I stepped out.
"All measures written in the Imperial Order have been carried out."
"Good."
Alice nodded at the knight's words.
Then she turned around and looked at me, who was almost right behind her, and at Mia Crowfield, who was hovering behind me. Paying no attention to the countess farther back, Alice spoke.
"Want to follow? You don't have to if you don't want to. I only wanted to know the truth, anyway."
"......."
I said nothing. Here, if I were to say something like, 'What will you do if His Majesty finds out about this?', it would only agitate the knights.
Besides... come to think of it...
Wasn't it stranger to think the Emperor didn't know about this?
At first, I'd thought I could kill the Emperor. Just half a year ago, that was. I'd thought that if necessary, I could loop time however many times it took, assassinate the Emperor, and make the story flow as I pleased. But strangely, as time went on, I felt as though the methods to kill the Emperor were vanishing from my mind one by one.
A feeling that he would know everything, no matter what I did... and that even if I prepared a surefire way to kill the Emperor, he strangely wouldn't be there when I did.
The anxiety that I, too, might have been caught up in the Emperor's schemes.
Alice was watching me silently.
"......I understand."
I gave that answer to Alice. The faintest hint of a smile brushed Alice's lips.
"I, I......"
Mia Crowfield anxiously looked back at her mother. The countess's shoulders were trembling violently. As if she wanted to kill the two imperial princesses right here and now.
But the knight who had spoken to the countess would surely believe it was 'the Emperor's command.' The Imperial Order would have been issued in the Emperor's name.
To refuse that command before the Imperial Army, whose centralization was nearly complete and which now wielded massive military force, was tantamount to asking for death.
Though, from a long-term perspective, resolving matters so heavy-handedly was also problematic even by the imperial house's standards.
What about the next Emperor, who would ascend after the Emperor who held all that immense power died?
I looked at Alice once more.
Looking at Alice's face, wearing that confident smile......
Uh, um.......
For just a moment, it crossed my mind that somehow, it would probably be fine, and that irritated me.