VL 04

Chapter 4

“No. No, wait… Are you seriously telling me we can just leave it like this? Doesn’t anyone else feel anxious?!”

When a man with loosely tied, linden-brown hair shouted in exasperation, the knights surrounding the prince’s coffin clicked their tongues in unison.

“There he goes, letting his chronic anxiety flare up again. How does that guy never manage to last a single hour?”

“Who knows? Someone, please just go knock Vernon out.”

“Even if he looks like that, Knight Vernon’s bones and muscles are absurdly sturdy, so you can’t even knock him out.”

“True…”

Ignoring the fact that his comrades were treating him like a mental patient, Vernon tore at his hair and poured out his anxiety.

“Seriously, is everyone actually fine with this? Damn it, what are we going to do if His Highness doesn’t wake up?!”

“Vernon!”

When Taylor Monterol, the captain of the Prince’s elite guard, raised his voice as if warning him not to behave rashly, Vernon quickly clamped both hands over his mouth.

His startled look lasted only for a moment.

Dropping his shoulders, he looked down at the face of the prince lying in the coffin and grumbled discontentedly.

“I’m anxious, so what do you expect me to do? I don’t know about anything else, but I have no idea if we can trust that woman—Arrow, or whatever her name is. What on earth was His Highness thinking trusting a woman like—”

“She is an apothecary carefully tracked down and scouted from the Western Continent.”

“His Highness looked into everything before doing it, so I suppose you must not trust His Highness.”

“That’s not what I meant—!”

“If you trust His Highness, shut your mouth and stay quiet.”

At Taylor’s sharp reprimand, Vernon babbled his lips with a disgruntled expression, then plopped down heavily right beneath the prince’s coffin.

Though his lips jutted out because he wanted to keep whining, he no longer looked as anxious as he had just moments before.

The sight was as pitiful as a puppy that had been scolded by its master, but no one bothered to comfort Vernon.

It was simply because everyone had already been tormented enough by Vernon over the past two days.

Last night, he had insisted on opening the coffin lid to check the prince’s breathing and had finally been grabbed by three knights. Early this morning, he had woken Taylor up, insisting that the expiration time of the drug’s effects must have been calculated wrong.

The real irony was that, despite being so jittery, his actual competence was top-notch.

Watching Vernon, Taylor swallowed a sigh and gazed at the Third Prince, Carden Rubert, lying inside the giant white coffin like a “real” corpse.

The sight of the prince clad in pure white burial robes inside the pristine coffin, surrounded by lilies symbolizing the imperial family, suited the moniker he so detested—”The Empire’s Finest Beauty”—remarkably well.

A face completely devoid of color, with golden hair resting neatly across his forehead.

Because even the fierce temperament that normally masked that handsome face was entirely asleep, right now he truly looked like a prince who had fallen dead asleep in a myth.

From the very moment he woke up from this death-like sleep and opened his mouth, he wouldn’t be “The Empire’s Finest Beauty” anymore, but rather “The Empire’s Finest Madman,” though……

‘……Horrible. I’ll need to clear away those lilies just before His Highness wakes up.’

Thinking of the prince—who would look around at the surrounding mess and mockingly ask if they thought he was some neighboring country’s princess—made his head throb.

Rubbing his eyes as if fatigued and glancing past the window, Taylor’s field of vision caught sight of a suspicious group crossing the corridor.

‘Is that…… the Empress?’

And right behind her.

Amidst the hem of a black dress, a familiar face came into view.

‘The Imperial Consort?’

How on earth could the Empress be dragging along the Imperial Consort, who was supposed to be locked away in the tower?

No matter how high-ranking the Empress was, she couldn’t arbitrarily pull out an Imperial Consort locked up for the crime of assassinating royalty. That wasn’t something even the Emperor could do easily.

Furthermore, the Emperor himself had been burning with rage over this particular incident.

After all, the official narrative was that his only cherished son had been poisoned to death overnight.

Taylor’s eyes narrowed.

An ominous premonition washed over him.

‘I thought the Empress would deal with the Imperial Consort inside the tower……’

She was the kind of woman who believed that troublesome tails could simply be chopped off and discarded. No matter how much effort and time she had poured into grooming and dressing up that tail.

That was why, even when he heard reports that the Empress had entered the tower last night, he had assumed the Imperial Consort was finally going to die.

If the Imperial Consort died, this incident would become airtight.

The Imperial Consort, having poisoned the Prince, would commit suicide out of inability to bear the guilt, and the Empress—who had placed her in the position of consort—would also find herself in a difficult position.

Just as he thought the first objective of this dangerous farce was about to be smoothly fulfilled, a variable like this popped up.

Not only that?

The Empress’s expression was calmly settled, nothing like someone facing a crisis.

‘……What on earth happened inside that tower?’

Taylor’s anxiety materialized into reality before long.

“Step aside. His Imperial Majesty the Emperor has ordered the Prince’s coffin to be brought in.”

The Emperor’s imperial guards, who had suddenly barged in, demanded the Prince’s coffin.

“Damn it, what on earth is happening? Why suddenly the Prince’s coffin……!”

“Shh, be quiet. For now, we must observe the situation.”

“You lot as well, don’t give the Empress an opening through needless rash behavior.”

Following the abruptly confiscated coffin of the Prince, his elite guard quickly moved their feet.

Ordinarily, when a member of the imperial family died, their coffin was enshrined in the highest chamber of the imperial palace chapel for a week.

That period was called the “grace period”—a time to wait and believe that since the imperial family carried the blood of the gods, they could resurrect even in death.

Of course, not everyone genuinely believed in that legend.

Nowadays, most people simply regarded it as an old custom meant to mourn the death of an imperial family member.

Even so, traditions passed down for hundreds of years tended to be observed even without belief.

Especially during the grace period, the corpse of an imperial family member could not be touched carelessly. The rationale was that the deceased needed to be able to fully reclaim their physical vessel when they returned.

Prince Carden had planned to exploit that exact legend.

If a story that had been considered merely a custom for hundreds of years actually came to pass right before their eyes……

Not only would it put to rest the long-standing controversies surrounding the Prince’s lineage as the offspring of a concubine, but Carden himself would become a living legend.

Who would dare deny the blood of the gods who had returned from death?

‘I will become Emperor, Taylor. And a very powerful one at that.’

Carden hadn’t smiled even a little when he said those words.

He had merely been as calm as someone talking about an absolute, certain future.

Taking this opportunity, his plan was to not only shake off the Imperial Consort clinging to him like a leech, but also dent the prestige of the Empress.

And yet……!

Grinding his teeth, Taylor followed the imperial guards into the First Audience Hall, where the Emperor was waiting.

Dozens of candleholders burned brightly beneath the lofty ceiling, testifying to the authority of the imperial family.

Ministers and high-ranking nobles, who had already heard the news, lined up on both sides, filling the space. Their gazes moved in unison, following the pure white coffin.

Seated upon the gorgeous imperial throne, the master of the empire also stared at the approaching coffin with a haggard face from which the grief had not faded.

Thud.

The Prince’s coffin, made of white pine, was placed right in the center of the audience hall.

“……Carden.”

Chanting his son’s name in a gloomy voice, the Emperor slowly walked up to the coffin.

“Carden……!”

Tears dropped one by one from the Emperor’s distorted eyes.

The Emperor did not hesitate to weep even with numerous subjects watching, bursting into tears.

Though aged, his hands—still as pale as snow—clutched at the burial robes of his son, surrounded by lilies.

“This father…… failed to protect you.”

At the low lament, even the surrounding ministers lowered their heads with solemn expressions.

The Emperor’s weeping lingered within the solemn audience hall for a moment.

Taylor watched the spectacle with a blank expression.

The sorrow of a father who had lost his son.

At least in the eyes of the people gathered here, that is what it would look like.

Wiping away his tears, the Emperor returned to his seat, supported by his adjutant.

Anger flashed briefly across his face, but quickly wiping the expression away as if it had never been, he turned to look at the Empress.

“Just this once, Empress. I hope you keep your promise.”

“……Yes, Your Majesty.”

A promise?

What promise?

Taylor and the Prince’s elite guard exchanged glances with one another in unison, but not a single person had any grasp of how the current situation was turning out.

Meanwhile, the Empress stepped down the dais and spoke in a loud voice, mindful of the onlookers.

“Imperial Consort, step forward.”

“Yes, Your Majesty.”

The Imperial Consort, who had been standing behind the Empress, walked forward obediently. Her expression was calm enough to make it hard to believe she was someone who had been locked in a tower.

The moment he saw that sight, Taylor’s anxiety grew even thicker.

“You claimed to Me that you did not poison the Prince. And you boastfully swore that you would personally prove it. Is there anything false in My words?”

“Her Majesty the Empress’s words are the truth. I did not poison His Imperial Highness the Prince. And I intend to prove it right here in this place to clear myself of the charge.”

……Insane.

What on earth is going on?

The faces of the elite guards watching from behind stiffened all at once.

The crime of assassinating royalty was a grave felony that could even warrant summary execution.

According to the plan, the Imperial Consort should have been beheaded within three days at the latest.

If she died and Carden miraculously resurrected, the sequence would be for the Empress to shoulder the stigma that the Imperial Consort she had chosen had tried to kill the Prince.

It was a matter of just safely getting through today. But all of a sudden, she claimed she would prove her innocence!

‘Something has gone wrong.’

Feeling a sense of ominous dread, Taylor hurriedly stepped forward, dropped to one knee, and spoke.

“Your Majesty, I am Taylor Monterol of the Golden Lion Order, the elite guard of His Imperial Highness the Prince. Please grant me the opportunity to speak as well.”

The Emperor nodded with a deliberately depressed face.

“Granted.”

“The Imperial Consort was arrested right at the scene where His Imperial Highness the Prince was assassinated. To claim she is innocent is utter nonsense! Please behead that criminal right here so that His Imperial Highness the Prince’s unjust grievance does not become any more profound!”

At Taylor’s insistence that she be executed immediately, the Empress momentarily raised her voice.

“Silence! To speak of executing a member of the imperial family for a crime not yet established is the height of audacity!”

“However, Your Majesty the Empress. By what means does the Imperial Consort claim she will prove her innocence? Up until the very moment before the two of you partook in teatime, poison was discovered in a teacup that had held no poison whatsoever! One of the two who drank that tea died and the other survived, so isn’t the culprit obvious?”

“The proof is to be provided by the Imperial Consort, not by your tongue.”

The Empress gave an icy reprimand before turning back to look at the Imperial Consort.

Mokyeong, who had been waiting, walked calmly forward and spoke.

“Thank you for granting me the opportunity to speak, Your Majesty.”

Mokyeong paused for a moment.

As she slowly looked around at the figures gathered in the First Audience Hall, all sorts of gazes—ranging from mild curiosity to overt disgust and contempt—were pinned on her.

In effect, everyone was looking at her as if she were the culprit.

The corners of Mokyeong’s lips curved up just a tiny bit.

Good.

Only with this level of difficulty was it actually fun to overturn the tables.