Childhood (5)
The Curse of Misfortune.
According to the information described in the original novel, it was a kind of magic woven from bitter, festering resentment so that the last princess of a fallen kingdom could curse the lover who had betrayed her even after death.
The problem was that, true to its name, the curse was terrifyingly powerful.
From the moment it took hold, the victim would begin to feel their strength ebb away little by little over the course of a month. Then they would grow listless and feverish, their body breaking down from within as a high heat came and went again and again, as though they had fallen prey to some wasting illness. In the end, they would quietly close their eyes before even a year had passed.
Because it was a spell that existed only to embody the caster’s malice, the Empire had long ago classified the Curse of Misfortune as forbidden black magic and strictly banned its circulation and study.
So even in the original story, Lia von Elleves had only been able to obtain a necklace carrying the Curse of Misfortune after paying a steep price, and then give it to Stella. It was from that incident onward that Lia von Elleves came into contact with black mages and began, in earnest, to walk the road to ruin….
“……”
Whatever the case, that wasn’t the important thing right now. What mattered was that the black clover mark, reversed to signify the Curse of Misfortune, was hidden on the back of Lia’s neck.
I had no idea how this had happened. I had definitely stayed by Lia’s side for the past month, not missing a single moment.
Could one of the assassins have done it just now, while I was off guard?
That suspicion flashed through me at once, but I quickly realized it couldn’t be true. Lia had clearly complained to me of some strange weakness. That weakness meant a month had already passed since the curse was inscribed.
So it couldn’t have been done by an assassin.
“Lady Lia.”
“Huh? Yeah?”
“Did anyone happen to give you an accessory sometime between about a month and two months ago? Before I became your knight, I mean.”
“A month or two ago…? Yeah, there was.”
“From whom, and what was it?”
If the accessory Lia had received was a necklace, and I could find out who had given it to her, tracking down the bastard who had placed this cursed thing on her would become much easier.
So I asked with some expectation, only to have the answer knock the wind right out of me.
“Um, well… a lot of things. My birthday’s in April, remember? And this year was the birthday when I turned ten, so Father and Mother threw a really big party for me. So many guests came, and I got so many presents. I think I received dozens of accessories just for my birthday in April.”
“……Ah.”
Dozens of accessories she had received. Which meant everyone who came to her birthday party that day and gave her an accessory was a suspect, didn’t it?
No, no, that wasn’t quite right. I couldn’t treat only the people who personally handed over accessories as suspects. If that many gifts had come in on her birthday, it would have been easy enough for someone to slip a small necklace in among them and have it delivered unnoticed.
So really, everyone who had visited Lia’s estate that day should be considered a suspect. How many could there have been? It was the grand birthday party of a count’s daughter from a fabulously wealthy house, after all. At minimum, there would have been a hundred guests, maybe more.
Tracking down every one of them and putting them under investigation would be… not impossible, but definitely an exhausting task.
I gritted my teeth without meaning to.
Then Lia, noticing my expression, spoke up.
“Cain, you look serious… What’s wrong?”
“……No, it’s just that.”
Should I tell her? Or not?
After wrestling with that question for a while and still not arriving at an answer, I first tightened my hold on the arm supporting her.
“For now, let’s go home. I’ll tell you once we’re back at the estate.”
“Ah, okay. But Cain, my legs have gone weak and I can’t walk right now….”
“I’ll carry you.”
Supporting Lia, I carefully bent one knee and knelt down so she could climb onto my back.
After waiting in that position with my back offered to her, I felt her light weight press against me, and then pale arms slipped around my neck.
I hooked my arms under Lia’s bottom and stood up in one smooth motion.
“I might brush against you a little while I’m moving, but I swear it’s not intentional, so please understand, Lady Lia.”
“Mm-hm… Ah, o-okay. I’m counting on you, Cain.”
“Yes. Then let’s go.”
＊ ＊ ＊
Because I was carrying Lia on my back, it took more than an hour before we could return to the estate.
By then it was 8 p.m.
Lia was tired, and before she could even eat dinner she had already fallen sound asleep, breathing softly. Once I confirmed that she was safely asleep, I returned to my room and dropped heavily into the chair in front of my desk.
I reached down with one arm and found the secret notebook I had kept hidden in the deepest part of my storage compartment, in a place nobody would ever find unless they were deliberately searching for it—the notebook where I had written down everything I knew from the original story.
I pulled it out at once, flipped it open, and found the section on the Curse of Misfortune, reading it slowly.
[Curse of Misfortune]
[A black-magic illness that afflicts Stella because of the “Princess’s Pendant” gifted by Lia von Elleves, the novel’s original villainess.]
[In the original story, the Crown Prince, who had fallen for Stella, simply cured her by taking the legendary panacea known as Dragon’s Tear from the imperial treasury and giving it to her.]
[Footnote: What is “Dragon’s Tear”? It refers to a single tear shed only when a sleeping dragon, the tyrant of the sea, sends off its human partner first. It can be obtained perhaps once in a hundred years, so its value is truly astronomical.]
[According to the original text, it seems to be priced however one likes; if you think of it in cash value, it’s probably about 10,000 pounds. Or maybe more? But having money doesn’t mean you can buy one. There are plenty of wealthy old men in the world desperately hunting for a panacea.]
[Footnote 2: Perhaps for that reason, the Crown Prince, who took the Dragon’s Tear out on his own authority, was punished with a ban on leaving the palace.]
“What? He got grounded? That’s ridiculous.”
In a world where one penny was worth about 3,500 won, 10,000 pounds would come to roughly 800 million won. And yet the punishment for using a panacea worth 800 million won without permission was a ban on going outside. So that’s why people call them silver-spoon nobles.
I clicked my tongue at a Crown Prince I had never even seen before, then came back to reality with a low sigh.
The Curse of Misfortune… When the original heroine, Stella, was afflicted with it, the Crown Prince cured her right away with Dragon’s Tear, and it served as nothing more than a device to push the two of them into romance. But thinking about it again like this, it was a truly terrifying spell.
Once you were hit by it, you died within a year, and the cure cost a staggering 800 million won.
This wasn’t something my allowance or Lia’s allowance could possibly handle, and even if we had the money, the biggest problem was that we couldn’t just get our hands on it immediately. It was a panacea, after all. How many rich old fossils would be desperate to buy it?
If one ever came onto the market, I wouldn’t find it strange at all if the price jumped to 1.6 billion won, or even higher. In this world or the other, the thing called a “panacea” that could cure every known illness was worth exactly that much.
“Hmm….”
Obviously, I didn’t have 1.6 billion won—20,000 pounds. My father’s annual income was just under 10,000 pounds, so there was no way I personally had that kind of money.
And Lia’s situation was probably much the same as mine. No matter how beloved the rightful daughter of a fabulously wealthy count’s house might be, there was no way they’d simply hand a ten-year-old girl a fortune of 20,000 pounds.
“……”
Then what should I do?
The answer was simple. I had to choose a method that didn’t cost money—meaning, something other than the way Stella was cured in the original story.
That method was written on the next page of the notebook.
[Hypothesis 1. If, for some reason, I were to be afflicted by the Curse of Misfortune?]
[Since I can’t receive the Crown Prince’s help like Stella and use Dragon’s Tear, the right thing to do would be to find the person who was casually mentioned in the original story as “someone who knows how to break the curse.”]
[That person is located deep beneath the Reinhardt family territory, at the center of the labyrinth known as Lirintos.]
[That person is a maindevil who has devoted their life to black-magic research and possesses extensive knowledge… Grace…]
-Knock, knock.
A sudden knock interrupted my reading. Who would be visiting at this hour?
“Yes, come in.”
I spoke with a puzzled frown, and the door creaked open.
I turned without much thought, and then I flinched in surprise.
“C-Cain. You’re still awake?”
Standing shyly in front of my door was Lia, dressed in a cute pair of pajamas.
I checked and she was definitely asleep. When did she wake up, and when did she change into pajamas?
For a moment I was distracted by those adorable pajamas, but I quickly recovered and answered.
“Yes, I’m still awake. What brings Lady Lia to my room at this hour?”
“Ah, um, that… earlier, back outside the village.”
“Yes, outside?”
“Th-those weird people in masks just… popped out, right?”
Those strange cultists who had wanted to sacrifice Lia, I assumed.
“Hmm, yes. They did. Why?”
“So… I got worried that someone might suddenly jump out at me while I’m sleeping, and I thought maybe I’d be okay if I stayed with Cain.”
“……”
“I just wanted to stay for a little while. Would that still be okay?”
Lia mumbled an excuse while fidgeting with her fingers, her face flushed red.
I looked at her quietly for a moment, then nodded easily.
“Yes, of course. If that helps Lady Lia feel more at ease.”
“Ah… really? Thank you, Cain!”
She shut the door with a click and hurried toward me in tiny steps.
Before she could get too close, I closed the notebook I’d been reading, placed another book on top of it, and spread that open instead.
“Cain, what were you doing? Reading? Or studying history? Ah, I read this book too.”
“……”
She started firing off questions the moment she stepped into my room, and no matter how I looked at it, she didn’t seem at all like someone who had been frightened by what happened in the afternoon.
Still, that didn’t matter. I answered Lia’s questions at a leisurely pace and kept her company, and after about ten minutes had passed, I asked her casually, “By the way, Lady Lia, this is just something I’m curious about. Have you ever visited another noble’s estate?”
“Hmm… I did go once when I was little, but I don’t remember it. I was under five at the time.”
“Then would you like to visit one? For example, the Reinhardt barony where my family lives, or maybe a seaside estate that’s famous for being beautiful….”
“Yes, I’d like to. I’m curious what the Reinhardt territory where Cain grew up is like!”
It was meant to be a probing question, but Lia’s eyes lit up and she nodded her head vigorously.
Good. Since I had her agreement, I took both of Lia’s hands in mine.
“Lady Lia.”
“W-what?”
“Would you like to go on a date with me?”
“……E-eh, eeeh?!”
Lia’s face went bright red.