Chapter 37
After managing the banquet full of brainwashed individuals, the two returned to the temple with Count Lort.
Normally, nobles of the Empire cannot be taken without the Emperor’s consent, but in this case, it was related to religion, and with clear evidence and the scene in hand, Astair had personally enforced the arrest.
Afterward, Astair entered the temple building with Lancelot to confine the count in the underground prison. Elsez, left alone outside the temple, sat on a nearby chair waiting for them.
“What a truly spectacular day.”
Leaning her tired body against the chair, she closed her eyes briefly. Then she remembered that Leti had been unusually quiet all this time.
Fiddling with her brooch, Elsez called out to Leti.
“Leti. What are you doing?”
“Resting. I’m tired.”
“Tired from what?”
“You were hugging those two guys and all. It was exhausting being in the middle of that.”
“Hugging… Well, it’s not entirely wrong, I guess.”
That sounded a little weird when said out loud…
Scratching her cheek awkwardly, Elsez thought of the masked man when she heard the words “those two.”
“By the way… who was that man?”
A royal?
Or just a mage?
No, more than that…
“Why does he feel so strangely familiar?”
As Elsez pondered the masked man, Astair and Lancelot emerged from the underground.
Astair didn’t notice Elsez and was giving instructions to Lancelot.
She quietly watched until their conversation ended.
“Astair… he can make that expression too.”
Perhaps because it was a serious matter, his expression while talking to Lancelot was cold, unlike when he usually interacted with Elsez.
It reminded her of the way he had killed someone without a blink when she saw him again after three years.
When Lancelot gestured toward Elsez, Astair finally looked back at her, and his face relaxed back to its usual self.
Elsez approached him teasingly.
“Hmm. That scary expression a moment ago, Your Excellency… it feels unfamiliar.”
“Didn’t you know? I only smile like this in front of you.”
He smirked as he replied, and though his words were loaded with meaning, his handsome face made them sound lighthearted.
“By the way, weren’t you supposed to go home?”
“Wow, I didn’t expect such stinginess. After surviving life-and-death situations together today, you’d just leave without saying a word?”
“That’s not what I meant…”
“I know. You meant for me to go in first and rest, right?”
Astair, slightly flustered as he tried to clarify, noticed that Elsez was joking and let out a soft laugh.
Elsez got up and walked toward him, asking,
“What about the newspaper?”
“As expected, he denies knowing anything. He even tried to threaten me, saying that if His Majesty knew he’d been caught like this, it could cause international trouble.”
“Even after barely surviving, he hasn’t come to his senses.”
Muttering with furrowed brows, Elsez suddenly looked serious as if recalling something, and asked,
“Torture… wouldn’t be allowed, right?”
Lancelot, standing nearby, looked shocked, then composed himself and said,
“Such inhumane acts are not permitted in the temple.”
“Just joking, just joking.”
Astair, listening to their conversation, laughed.
“Young lady, you have a surprisingly fierce side.”
“Is that an insult?”
“No, I find it… charming.”
Elsez might have thought it flattery coming from someone else, but from him, it felt genuine.
Astair signaled Lancelot to leave first.
After bowing to them, Lancelot walked away.
Astair then continued the conversation he had started.
“With Valentin’s testimony, the recovered dimensional shards, and the nobles with traces of mind-control magic, it’s useless for him to deny anything.”
“All that hard work paid off, then.”
“Yes, thanks to you, young lady.”
“And you still don’t know the masked man’s identity, right?”
“Yes, he kept dodging any questions on that front as well.”
After a moment of thought, Elsez recalled the man’s eye color and asked,
“Your Excellency, is there a magical tool that can change eye color?”
It was impossible to simultaneously cast attack magic and alter one’s appearance, so the only possibility was a magical artifact.
“I’ve heard of such tools, but they’re unstable and rarely distributed because they can cause eye damage as a side effect.”
“So unless it’s a desperate situation worth risking one’s life, people hardly use it.”
“Exactly. Plus, they’re hard to acquire.”
Elsez then looked at Astair as if to explain why she asked, and said,
“The masked man… his eye color changed.”
She recounted their encounter on the way to the annex, initially mistaking him for a banquet guest, but later realizing he was a special guest of the count, and how his eyes had shifted from purple to red.
Astair’s expression hardened as he listened.
“Then someone is impersonating the crown prince.”
When they first met, his eyes were purple, but before the count, they were red—meaning his real eyes were purple.
“Oh, and…”
Elsez began to say more, but Astair met her gaze, and she smiled and shook her head.
“No, it’s nothing.”
Astair looked at her for a moment but didn’t press further.
The two headed toward the temple entrance where their carriage awaited.
Along the way, Astair kept glancing at her, concern evident in his eyes.
Noticing it, Elsez asked,
“Do you have something to say?”
Caught off guard, Astair briefly looked away before meeting her gaze.
Her clear, sparkling amber eyes troubled him.
He grimaced painfully as he spoke.
“…I’m sorry for making you see blood.”
Elsez widened her eyes at his strange apology.
Astair looked down, seemingly pained by the sight of her eyes, and continued.
“A few years ago, it was difficult for me to harm anyone, even villains.”
“…”
“There was someone who would take the lead in such matters for me.”
Elsez didn’t need to hear the name to know who he meant.
“…I realized, only after that person left, that stepping back just because you don’t want to harm others is ultimately hypocrisy.”
“…”
“So now, if something is difficult for someone, I want to take it on, just like that person did.”
Elsez listened quietly, finally understanding how he had become capable of harming people without hesitation over the past three years.
At the same time, she noticed the weight of guilt he had carried all this time.
“I’m okay. You’re here to share that burden with me.”
“…”
“So, that person probably never felt overwhelmed by the guilt of the lives they had taken in their care.”
She had never felt that it was heavy. Astair had never asked her to take on his share; she had done so as a friend and comrade over the years.
Astair gazed at Elsez and, with a bitter smile, muttered,
“…I hope my presence helped ease that person’s guilt, just as you said.”
“I hope I can ease your burden too, Your Excellency.”
Elsez said lightly, extending her hand.
Astair looked at her hand with curiosity and blinked.
“I mean, I’m counting on you from now on.”
Pointing to her hand, Elsez prompted him.
Astair instinctively took her hand.
It was warm. Naturally.
Elsez finally smiled.
Seeing that smile, a message from the Holy Empire flashed through her mind:
“The Demon God has been resurrected.”
He held tightly to the warmth in his hand, thinking, asking for the courage to enter the harsh fight once more.
Late at night, only the sound of carriages echoed through the streets.
Elsez recalled what Astair had said earlier.
“I have something very important to tell you.”
The “very important” topic was about the reward for this mission.
The temple had agreed to send her home by tomorrow with a reward far larger than she expected.
Muttering to herself, Elsez thought,
“Seems the Holy Empire really has a lot of money.”
“If they give a lot, it’s worth hugging that guy.”
Leti replied in a surprisingly serious voice.
Elsez grabbed the brooch housing Leti and said,
“Hey, don’t say things that could be misunderstood.”
Ignoring Leti’s innocent question about what kind of misunderstanding, Elsez looked at her right hand.
She recalled the memory of facing the masked man, the gaze he had given her as the magic circle faded.
She hadn’t told Astair about the sense of familiarity she felt from him, due to one possibility that crossed her mind.
“Could it be… him?”
The familiar face appeared above the man’s mask, and her heart sank.
At that moment:
“Miss, we’ve arrived.”
The coachman’s voice broke her thoughts.
“No… it can’t be.”
Shaking off the sudden thought, she got out of the carriage and saw the count’s mansion still lit despite the late hour.
It seemed Lenny and Mrs. Mars were still awake, waiting.
Elsez hurried inside.
Even after the mansion’s doors closed behind her, a gaze remained outside.
At its end, the masked man stood with the moon behind him.
His shadowed violet eyes glanced briefly at where she had been, then vanished along with the magic circle.
