Chapter: 09
Servante remained seated even after his adjutants had left, lost in thought.
Why had he not known such an important piece of information—that Dennis had a twin? If anything, he was the superior who had been negligent in his duties. However, it seemed that even his adjutants only knew that Dennis had a twin and were unaware of the details.
‘It must be a male twin.’
That would explain why Count Vertir had sent his child to war. From the beginning, the military conscription law clearly stated that only one male from each family could be drafted. It was a law established by the imperial family because each household also needed a male heir to carry on the family line.
Servante pieced together the fragments of his disorganized memories one by one, as though he were looking once again at a painting that had always hung on the wall. Then, suddenly, he remembered the last words Dennis had spoken when leaving the military.
‘Commander, do you happen to remember the Founding Day banquet thirteen years ago?’
‘I remember attending.’
‘You helped us, Commander.’
‘I did?’
‘Yes. We were very young back then, and there was so much going on that we never got the chance to thank you.’
At the time, he had thought it was a rather unexpected thing to say as a farewell. Yet here he was, retracing its meaning all over again. Then Servante placed particular emphasis on Dennis’s use of the word ‘us.’ Before long, his memory began traveling backward to the Founding Day banquet hall.
While searching for Count Vertir, he had briefly stopped by a separate banquet hall prepared exclusively for the young children of distinguished guests. Without fail, he remembered Prince Elion bullying some young boys, and himself stepping in to help them.
‘That’s right. They were twins.’
He had heard that twins could look different from each other, but those two had looked exactly alike, both in appearance and clothing. However, he had never known that the twins were Count Vertir’s children.
‘Why didn’t I know?’
It was understandable, in a way. Whenever children around Prince Elion’s age gathered at large or small events, he never simply passed them by. Since he had often interfered in order to help them in his own way, the memories must have become mixed together.
Even so, it was rather unpleasant that his adjutants knew something that he, the commander, did not.
‘How did all of you know?’
‘Commander, we’re nobles too, you know.’
‘Ah…. Right. I forgot for a moment because of how childish you all act.’
‘Some families are acquainted with one another, and sometimes we hear things through other connections.’
Because noble society was smaller than he had thought, there were often times when one ended up acquiring information against one’s will.
‘Commander, you seem extremely perceptive, but you’re surprisingly indifferent to worldly affairs.’
Gael had made Servante realize something he had been overlooking. When he had been a soldier, he had focused solely on winning the war. Once he became fixated on one thing, he tended to immerse himself in it so deeply that he became insensitive to everything around him.
Now, however, the existence of Dennis had left his mind in turmoil.
He closed his eyes and carefully retraced his actions from the past. But every time, the puzzle pieces refused to fit together at the same point. Then, suddenly, the lingering image of that night became vivid in his mind.
The curved shadow reflected on the shower curtain.
At the time, he had been extremely flustered, and for a brief moment, he had even wondered whether Dennis might actually be a woman. But what if that suspicion, which he had dismissed as absurd, had actually been the truth?
“Could it be…. Did they really do something that outrageous?”
Had Count Vertir deceived the Emperor?
No normal parent would send their daughter onto a battlefield. Moreover, the person he had seen with Katarina earlier that day was a very sturdy man. Why would he do such a thing when he had a son like that? Besides, at the Founding Day celebration, both of them had been dressed in men’s clothing.
Servante felt as though the answer was within his grasp, only for it to disappear like smoke every time, leaving him clutching nothing.
‘No. Perhaps they took advantage of the fact that it would be such an outrageous thing—to deceive the Emperor and the entire world….’
Servante’s eyes narrowed, becoming sharp and fierce.
Suddenly, he remembered Sultan Palamas, who had offended him long ago.
‘He would strike like smoke lying low over golden sand, attacking the vital points, and sometimes approach like a beast that did not need to roar before ruthlessly slaughtering its prey. To move like that, he needed to have a short, agile body….’
With certainty, he had finally found Dennis—the Golden Marksman.
Thinking about it now, he and Palamas had been looking at the very same scene, yet had reached completely different conclusions.
“Son of a bitch…!”
Servante violently overturned the table in front of him. Rage surged through him as an inferiority complex swept over him like a sandstorm.
For a moment, Servante scattered his memories in every direction. From the beginning, being manipulated by mere suspicions instead of physical evidence was not his way.
“All I have to do is confirm it with my own eyes.”
Dennis had already been enduring her mother’s scolding for two hours.
This whole mess had started when her meeting with Alfonso reached the ears of both families’ parents.
“This is all your fault.”
Her mother, Tania, shouted as she glared at her husband, Vertir.
It had not been enough that he had raised Dennis like a boy and even taught her how to shoot. He had also disguised her as a man and sent her onto the battlefield.
As a result, her daughter’s chances of getting married had been ruined.
“Tania, I’m sorry. But…. What else could I have done?”
“Let’s be honest with each other. You could have begged His Majesty the Emperor back then. But instead, you turned Dennis into this because you wanted to show off the reputation of the family of the Golden Marksman—no, not that. You wanted to boast about your own abilities, didn’t you?”
“I regret it.”
Vertir had realized it too late.
He had used the urgency of wartime to send Dennis onto the battlefield, and behind that decision had been his desire for the world to revere his family.
“What are you going to do now? Dennis is going to have a hard time finding a normal husband now.”
The trembling voice of Alfonso’s mother echoed in Tania’s ears.
‘How could a count’s daughter say that she was going to shoot her husband’s private parts with a gun? Did you actually teach her anything at all?’
That was not all.
Although Alfonso’s mother was a foreign noblewoman, she was also a famous figure in Solencia’s social circles. If she started spreading rumors, there was no doubt that stories about Dennis would spread throughout the entire empire.
Dennis quietly rose from her seat and began backing away, trying to escape the heated argument between her parents.
No matter how many times she was scolded, her resolve would not change.
Assuming that she was back in the middle of the Sekari battle, she slipped out of the mansion without revealing even the slightest trace of her presence.
Of course, getting Misha, who clung to her like a shadow, to leave her alone was impossible.
“Misha, it’s hot today. Shall we take a walk along the oak path?”
“Miss, do you really feel like taking a walk right now?”
After turning the entire household upside down, she wanted to leisurely go for a walk?
“Misha, do you know what I realized on the battlefield?”
“That you decided to rebel at the age of twenty-four?”
Dennis burst out laughing at Misha’s answer. It wasn’t entirely wrong, especially since she had actually followed through with it.
“Let’s go.”
“Really?”
“I know Madam well. When she’s angry, it’s always best not to attract attention.”
And so Dennis headed toward the path lined with oak trees with Misha.
It was a hot summer afternoon. The sun was scorching, and the current of the river flowing in the distance shimmered brightly.
The occasional breeze gently fluttered the hem of Dennis’s skirt and the hair that had now grown long enough to fall past her shoulders.
If she had not gone to war, as her mother had wanted, she would never have dreamed of becoming a useful person.
She would never have compared every man she met to Servante, either.
But when she was with him, Dennis had finally felt respected as a human being.
Not the satisfaction of marriage being the goal of her life, but the satisfaction of being able to accomplish something through her own abilities….
She would never have another opportunity like that again, but there was one problem.
Her soul still remained on the Sekari battlefield—or rather, by Servante’s side.
“Miss, did you perhaps have a man you liked in the military?”
Misha suddenly asked as they walked beside each other.
“Huh?”
“You did.”
It was almost impossible to fool Misha, who had grown up with her like a sister since childhood.
“If you can’t give up because you miss him, go find him and confess your feelings.”
“What? How could I do that?”
If she could have done that, she would have done it long ago.
There were more complicated interests tangled up in the situation than she had expected, making it impossible.
“Young Master Dan is supposed to have gone to war, right? Then, Miss, you can just start over.”
At Misha’s words, Dennis’s mind flashed brilliantly for the briefest moment.
But Commander Servante de Rojas was not exactly an easy man to deal with….
Just then, a familiar scent drifted across the tip of Dennis’s nose.
‘This cigar scent…?’
In front of a car parked among the bushes surrounding the river, Servante was smoking a cigar.
He was staring sharply at the two women walking along the path in the distance, yet there was a smile playing at the corners of his mouth.
