Chapter 66 (1/2)

“But what will you do? You can’t exactly hide out here forever, and if our opponent is Prince Lucien, it’ll get out sooner or later, won’t it? My home? It’s only a matter of time before my connection with the Second Division gets leaked.”

Frowning, Irene suddenly took the opportunity to interrupt the conversation.

In short, ‘you guys are troublesome, could you hurry up and leave?’ No, that’s just my imagination, right? But on the other hand, she wasn’t wrong.

“If I had to choose the most pressing issue, I suppose it would be escaping from the Imperial Capital. It was for that reason that I had Miss Aira come here as well. However…”

“The problem is Tetra’s Heart, is it not?”

Arc’s words were sensible, but he hesitated to say that last bit. Regnum took over and did it for him.

Tetra’s Heart.

When I thought back, my understanding of it was vaguer than I expected.

The magus sealed by the imperial capital, Tetra. Earlier, Arc said that Lucien was trying to make me into a vessel. And Lucien said that he would use me to deal with the seal’s imminent dissolution.

After that,

“Lucien said that at this rate, the Imperial Capital is sure to be blown to kingdom come.”

“What!?”

Irene leapt to her feet with a shocked cry. It was probably her first time hearing about it.

Though Aira didn’t get up, she looked over at me with an astonished expression. It certainly was shocking to hear.

“What’s that all about!? What are you talking about!?”

Irene glared at me. Even so, nothing more came out of my mouth. I’d only heard that much in the first place, after all.

Seeing my perplexed expression, Irene s.h.i.+fted her sights to Arc.

I suppose she went with Arc, and not Regnum, because of their master-disciple relations.h.i.+p.

“…Once you hear it, there’s no going back, but you could say that that s.h.i.+p has sailed… Though what I can tell you will turn out to be fairly ambiguous. I’ll explain it simply. First, about Tetra. What do you know about her, Irene?”

“…Eh, um… The legendary magus who laid the foundations for magic roughly a thousand years ago?”

“Well, that’s true. That magus is sealed underground, below the capital. The seal is the issue here, you see, and there are a variety of rumors about it. She was far too dangerous. She became something inhuman. She became a human sacrifice. And so on.”

The talk, which had started with Tetra’s relations.h.i.+p with this whole business, was incredibly disturbing. Even the agitated Irene had to sit down, for the third time.

“It was around that time that the ancient dynasty fell, as you know, so even the literature isn’t definite on this. Anyway, as eras pa.s.sed, we came to construct the Imperial Capital on top of that seal. At first, of course, no one knew how inappropriate it was to build here. That, we learned fairly recently.”

“Recently?”

“That’s right. It was maybe twenty, thirty years ago. In any case, when the seal was discovered, it as already at its limit. There was an enormous magical power ama.s.sed inside the thing we call the Heart, and it was just short of going on a rampage. No one knows when that will happen, either. It might be now, it might be a little later down the line. And so, we began the search for some way to deal with it with all haste.”

When he said ‘Might be now’, everyone aside from Regnum inhaled sharply.

Sure, there weren’t that many who could keep their cool after hearing something like that. It was like standing next to a volcano on the verge of erupting.

“What I learned from ransacking the literature was, the Tetra-like thing inside continuously emits magical power. That’s why it would be better to take Tetra out and put her inside something else. But the question was, what container, and what method? Setting aside the method, the container is already here — ”

Arc looked at me.

It matched up with the bits and pieces Lucien said.

When I gave him a tiny nod of understanding, Irene and Aira looked at me in shock.

Regnum picked up where Arc left off.

“That is how it is. I say this with full knowledge of how awfully selfish it is, but a.s.suming you fled the capital like this, eventually the capital would be in danger.”

Of course, he stopped short of saying ‘So, what will you do?’

Still, saying that much, he’d as good as told me to ‘do something about it’.

However, as Regnum himself said, that’s too selfish. If I’m being cold about it, it’s not like I really knew what would become of the capital.

But — I looked at Aira, Palmira, and Irene in turn.

My feelings were complicated. Irene, of course, lives here.

Palmira despised the capital, but now, I don’t know. Aira will remain at the mansion, I’m sure.

“If so, then everyone should abandon the capital and flee.”

Perhaps because of my gaze, Palmira made a rather basic proposal.

But that wasn’t it. It was because Palmira’s feelings about the capital were mixed, to a certain degree, that she could make the suggestion.

Even I thought of that right away. I wasn’t surprised to see Regnum shaking his head.

“That cannot be done. Of course, it seems there were some in favor of the idea, but the Empire is already too big for such a plan to be feasible. It is impossible to abandon the capital, whatever the reason. At present, with the three superpowers in balance, that degree of weakness could quite possibly spark the worst war in history. Furthermore, it would be a difficult proposal to advance internally. Although it might have been workable when the seal was discovered, it probably is already too late, even if we were to use the relocation of the capital as a pretense.”

I had a hunch that there were probably various other reasons for it.

If I were to take a rough stab at summing it up, I’d say the Empire was just too big. And it would make too huge a mess to settle issues of that degree.

“Then what will we do? Don’t tell me you want to make Big Sister a sacrifice — ”

Knock-knock.

When Aira was about to say the words that everyone was thinking of and no one could say, she was interrupted by a knock at the dining room door.

Everyone turned in that direction.

“May I come in? Master, Lady Allie from the mansion is here.”

Miss Patsy entered the room.

The moment she came in, I felt as if there was something stiff about the expression that accompanied her report of Allie’s arrival.

Hey, what’s wrong?

“Did something happen?”

asked her master, Arc, with an uncharacteristic seriousness. Her state was probably odd enough for him to pick up on it.

Beside him, Regnum wordlessly stood from his chair.

“That is, she’s not in a normal state… she’s injured…”

“Pardon me.”

As Miss Patsy’s voice failed her, Allie pushed her way past her into the room.

Everyone present inhaled sharply at the sight of her.

The maid uniform she usually wore with perfect flair was frayed and torn in several places.

And what was most eye-catching was her hand, and how she had it pressed against her side. The fabric around it was stained the black of dried blood, clear as day. Despite maintaining her usual composure, it hurt to look at.

No, she wasn’t in normal condition at all.

“Head Maid!”

In the middle of this, Aira, whose a.s.sociation with her was as deep as mine, or deeper, screamed and ran over to her.

But Allie held her back with a hand and turned her firm gaze toward us.

“The mansion — was attacked. Right now, Lord Vyde and the First Platoon are engaged in battle.”

“What did you say!?”

Shocked by her brief report, I shot up from my seat.

Allie didn’t say anything. But there was no mistaking Lucien’s hand in this.

An army, or —

“What about Leon!? What happened to him?”