HSMDW 7

Chapter 7

Could it be because she was a person of the Sun?

Den, Aden de Biplten thought as he turned away from the woman.

She was a woman with such a peculiar scent that it was enough to make him take notice.

“Then what will you do if the Duke refuses the marriage?”

He had no intention of refusing.

Of course, at first, he had thought she was a woman from the Blue Noz, so naturally he had intended to reject her.

There had been countless women whom the three families had pushed into his bedroom, and every time, those women had been left to spend their wedding night alone.

They said that more than one woman had fallen ill after spending the night waiting in the darkness for the head of the Red Delrose, whose face she could not even see. But that was none of his concern.

“I have completed my report.”

The knight who had summoned him, Aegis, bowed respectfully.

Aden did not know why he remembered the face of that woman named Illin, who had looked startled when she heard someone call out, “Captain!”

Aden narrowed his eyes.

“Your Grace?”

In a place where there were no members of the other families, he was not the captain.

Known as the Faceless Duke, he was Aden de Biplten, Duke of Biplten, at least before the knights of the Red Delrose.

They were the ones who did not avert their eyes from him.

“Aegis.”

“Yes.”

Aegis bowed his head.

“Is there anything to report concerning the Blue Noz?”

At his words, Aegis tilted his head.

“……There is nothing unusual. Ridan of the Blue Noz has come to the estate, though.”

He had come to the estate?

Aden narrowed his eyes.

“Shall I investigate that woman from earlier?”

At Aegis’s suggestion, Aden raised a hand to stop him.

“There’s nothing to find. That woman is a person of the Sun.”

“A person of the Sun?”

Aegis’s eyes widened.

Of course he had assumed she was from the Blue Noz because of her clothes.

Besides, the thing she had been wearing on her head, that ‘Ataz,’ was a sacred bridal relic that the Blue Noz had passed down through generations.

There had been no reason to even consider that it might be a misunderstanding.

“So that explains why Ridan came to the estate.”

The reason they had been able to move faster than even the Dazzling Ello and the Green Milre was because an elder had come to the estate.

It could only look as though they were openly trying to bring that woman into the Blue Noz.

Unpleasant.

Aden narrowed his eyes.

After Aegis finished his report and withdrew, Aden fell into thought.

---

He had only become aware of the existence of his new bride a few days ago.

Millo of the Red Delos, who operated the Esid Merchant Guild, had suddenly contacted him.

He had not even sent someone to deliver the message. Instead, he had insisted on coming to meet Aden personally and speaking to him directly.

Only after Aden returned from his campaign did he finally open his mouth.

“Her name is Illin de Arlen.”

Aden had never imagined that any woman would respond to such absurd conditions for a bride, so Millo’s words sounded completely out of the blue.

“Are you planning to change your alias?”

In order to bring supplies into the Empire, it was obviously wiser to send someone from Biplten rather than find a separate person of the Sun.

Wasn’t it already difficult enough to find someone who could travel back and forth to Biplten while keeping silent about the territory?

Millo himself was one such case.

In the Empire, he used the alias Millo Esid.

He had temporarily changed his surname from his winter one.

The newly chosen name was rather feminine, though.

Aden tilted his head slightly.

“No. I mean the bride.”

Millo handed him a letter.

The sender’s name was Illin de Arlen.

For once, Aden looked genuinely taken aback.

“……Someone actually responded to the bride recruitment?”

“Yes. Surprisingly enough.”

The letter Millo handed him was shorter than he had expected.

The neat handwriting immediately caught his attention.

[It is a pleasure to make your acquaintance. My name is Illin, of House Arlen.]

Normally, what followed should have been a long, tedious discussion about the weather.

Letters that came from the Empire rarely varied. They almost always began by talking about the weather.

Be careful not to catch a cold in this chilly weather.

What a ridiculous thing to say.

If someone could catch a cold merely because of the cold, how could they possibly survive in the winter territories?

[As I could not think of another way to contact you, I am reaching out through the Esid Merchant Guild.]

But the woman named Illin quickly got straight to the point.

Aden liked that more than the contents themselves.

“How did this woman find out about the Esid Merchant Guild?”

Had information leaked?

Aden’s blue eyes turned toward Millo.

Millo replied with a serious expression.

“I don’t know. I investigated House Arlen, but there was nothing unusual. Ah, there is one thing, but it’s not particularly important.”

Aden continued staring at him, asking silently what it was.

Millo answered with an awkward expression.

“The Viscountess is said to be insane. Apparently, she says quite a lot of nonsense.”

It really was nothing important.

Aden lowered his gaze back to the letter.

[I am fully aware of all the conditions stated in the bride recruitment notice. Unless there is a reason for me to be rejected,]

The letter was rather audacious.

[I will become your bride.]

---

As Millo’s investigation had shown, House Arlen was a truly insignificant family.

It was a quiet place with almost no outside activity, and the most unusual thing about the family was the Viscountess’s illness.

To make matters worse, because the Viscountess had fallen ill, her daughter, Illin de Arlen, had been unable to enter high society.

As a result, Illin was barely known by face.

She had secluded herself in the estate so thoroughly that it was difficult to obtain even a portrait of her.

A portrait from when she was very young would be meaningless anyway.

[Silver hair reaching to her waist, deep violet eyes, and a slender figure.]

That was the entirety of the description of her appearance.

If the information was accurate, then from Biplten’s perspective, she was almost an ideal bride.

A woman from a prestigious family with close ties to the Atenble Imperial Family would only be troublesome.

There was only one suspicious point.

“She isn’t connected to any intelligence organization.”

Aden tapped the desk lightly with his index finger.

It was a habit he had whenever he was deep in thought.

Even so, a mere viscount’s daughter had somehow discovered the relationship between the Esid Merchant Guild and Biplten.

It would be impossible unless one of the three families was behind Illin de Arlen—or unless someone within the Imperial Family or another powerful faction in the Empire had their hand in it.

Aden looked down at the additional information Millo had gathered.

At least, she had no connection to any of the three families.

If she were a Biplten native who had gone out into the Sun, the investigation could not have come back this clean.

Even if a person of the Sun might not recognize them, there was no way someone from Biplten would fail to recognize another person from the winter territories.

“What kind of woman are you?”

He muttered in a low voice.

I will become your bride.

The voice of a woman he had never even spoken to seemed to echo inside his head.

Wasn’t it rather audacious to send a letter as though she already knew everything about his circumstances?

In any case, he needed a bride.

And now, an ideal candidate had appeared at just the right time: a woman with no connection to the three families and an insignificant family of her own.

Furthermore, she was not famous even in the Empire, so there would be no troublesome complications.

[I am fully aware of all the conditions for the bride recruitment.]

The timing and the conditions were almost too perfect.

The corners of Aden’s lips curled upward.

Millo had said that even at the Esid Merchant Guild, this woman named Illin had cornered him with flawless logic.

“Marriage……”

His prospective bride was a woman who had somehow managed to pry into Biplten’s secrets through an unknown route.

Yet she was willing to travel all the way to this distant winter territory to marry him.

Moreover, a bride entering Biplten came alone.

The position of Duchess might be attractive, but that was only true when Biplten had connections to Imperial society.

In reality, it was little more than a title in name.

Then what exactly did she hope to gain by coming here?

The Biplten ducal family had long since been completely removed from high society.

Had Aden ever earned someone’s resentment?

If he had to name someone, perhaps the Imperial Family.

They were displeased that the Biplten family had never bowed its head to the Imperial Family first for generations.

An assassin from the Imperial Family?

Even if he tried to force himself into making such a far-fetched connection, it made no sense.

They were people who could aim for his life under far more plausible pretexts.

This was simply too sloppy.

“Millo.”

Millo, the head of the Esid Merchant Guild, who had been waiting outside, immediately entered.

“Give me your orders.”

“Bring the bride here.”

Aden placed the letter inside a drawer as he spoke.

Millo looked startled.

“She is a woman whose identity we don’t even know yet. The source of the information she possesses is unclear—”

“That’s precisely why I’m telling you to bring her here.”

Aden smiled leisurely.

Leaning back in his chair, his relaxed smile resembled that of the Sun’s messenger.

He lounged there as though no one could ever threaten him.

But when prey appeared, that expression would change completely.

He was a man who could ensnare his prey with nothing more than his eyes.

Millo bowed deeply to his lord.

“Understood.”

After Millo left, Aden rose from his seat.

He was not the kind of person who avoided a challenge from his prey.

He could find out for himself.

How had she learned about Esid and Biplten?

And if that method had exposed a weakness on their side, he could simply seal it.

The decision of the new bride to come to Biplten was quite welcome.

For Aden de Biplten, this winter territory was the perfect battlefield.

---

On the day he first met that audacious new bride, Aden was on the battlefield.

“Your Grace! The enemy is approaching!”

He straightened the sword in his hand.

The ones who had boldly attacked Biplten’s walls for the first time in more than ten years were monsters with considerable power even within the Biplten territory.

The red-scaled Mollie tribe had been Biplten’s longtime enemies.

They were the least intelligent of the monster races, but their combat abilities were exceptional.

Of all times, Mollies when the bride is arriving!

The elders of the three families, who could not even wield a sword, had gone into an uproar the moment they heard that the Mollies were attacking.

What are the Delrose knights doing?!

What were they doing?

They were slaughtering even the monsters that the knights of the three families cautiously avoided.

It was the duty of each family to scatter the monsters before they could gather their forces, yet every one of them was neglecting their duties as though they had formed some kind of alliance with the monsters.

The Blue Noz cannot approve of this succession ceremony! A family head who cannot even protect his people…!

The Dazzling Ello feels the same way.

The elder from the Green Milre said nothing, but he repeatedly nodded his head all the same.

The succession ceremony had to be held once every three years.

It was the only power the elders of the three families possessed that could suppress the Red Delrose.

Come to think of it, the succession ceremony was ultimately the cause of all this trouble.

The succession ceremony required the sacred relics held by the three elders.

Their method of pressuring the head of the Red Delrose had always been the same.

Aden’s sword swept horizontally through the air.

―Kreeek!

When he was young, he had thought that simply swinging a sword would be enough to vent his anger.

That was why he had trained with the sword so relentlessly.

But anger was not something to be vented.

Its very source had to be burned away.

Aden raised his elbow and struck one of the monsters with tremendous force.

“To dare lay a hand on House Biplten in the winter territories…”

He let his anger seep into his low voice.

There was a reason the Biplten family had remained the master of Biplten territory for so long.

He drove his sword into the ground.

The snow that had accumulated for so long that the ground itself could barely be seen began to disappear in an instant.

The snow around him melted and evaporated in an instant, white steam rising into the air.

Biplten was a place where even the breath one exhaled froze into frost before falling.

But the area around him was different.

White steam rose like sunlight, filling the surroundings as though proclaiming his anger.

―Kreeek!

Just then, one of the Mollies leaped toward him.

Its instinct told it that a knight without a sword was easy prey.

But it could not withstand that brief burst of heat and collapsed face-first onto the ground.

―The Duke of Biplten?

Among all the creatures of Biplten that had succumbed to the blizzard, there was only one who could rebel against its climate.

The head of House Biplten who had completed the succession ceremony.

Unease spread among the monsters.

―Isn’t that man a knight of the Red Delrose?

―Why…?

―Could it be…?

They said monsters of the Sun could not speak.

Perhaps it would actually be more difficult to control them if they could.

Aden drew his sword and watched the monsters.

―Could it be that the captain of the Delrose Knights is the Duke?

He calmly waited until the monsters reached the truth themselves.

There was no impatience.

After all, by tomorrow, the Mollies gathered here would be buried beneath the snowstorm, and no one would even be able to find their corpses.

He raised his sword again.

“Your Grace, I see a carriage!”

It was around the time he had almost finished clearing out the Mollies in the vicinity.

A knight of the Red Delrose shouted.

A carriage?

Aden’s gaze turned toward the distance.

His eyes, accustomed to snowstorms, quickly caught sight of a carriage with plain, undecorated fittings.

It was a desolate place where life pulsed and dying creatures cried out in agony.

And in the midst of it all, the carriage seemed strangely calm, as though it were carrying nothing at all.

“They’re being chased!”

If not for the Mollies running after it.

Aden’s lips curled slightly.

“Aegis. Which road is that carriage coming from?”

This area was under the jurisdiction of the Red Delrose.

And as he had expected, the carriage was speeding along a road owned by the Red Delrose.

The carriage road was completely clogged with red-scaled Mollies.

There might have been room for excuses outside the walls, but the carriage road was different.

This was an obvious intrusion.

―Crash!

The carriage shook violently and plunged into a mound of snow.

A coachman jumped down, and Aden saw him confront the Mollies.

The coachman was… from the Blue Noz.

Aden narrowed his eyes and looked away.

That coachman was capable of protecting himself, anyway.

And if the carriage belonged to the Blue Noz, there was no reason for him to rescue it.

Eek!

Aden’s head snapped around.

He thought he had heard incorrectly.

His eyes locked onto the carriage.

There was something inside.

That was no cargo wagon.

Could it really be?

Even to someone with senses as sharp as his, the faint sound was confusing.

As if entranced, he moved toward the carriage.

He reached the carriage at almost exactly the same moment its door opened.

“!”

The person who came rushing out without even screaming was strange.

Very strange.

Something incredibly thin and delicate crashed into his arms.

A pale wrist was exposed as it pressed against his chest.

She was startled, yet she could not even scream, and he could feel her thin breath catch in her throat.

The arm pressed against him was pale and slender, utterly unsuited to Biplten.

An arm that looked more fragile than the young branches of a tree enduring the bitter winter wind.

When the startled woman took a step backward, the thing that had been resting on her head fell to the ground with a soft thud.

“……What is this?”

Aden muttered without realizing it.

The fierce blizzard of Biplten descended upon them.

As though it intended to snap the delicate thing standing before him in two.