#64. It Was Crimson.
Even upside down, Ambre looked like someone noble and lofty. With an utterly innocent expression, she asked her question, but Sugar yanked her own hair out of Ambre’s hand and clutched her skirt tightly.
“I don’t know. He hasn’t come home for days. I thought… you came to tell me about my brother.”
The child’s face, which had first shown disappointment, gradually turned to fear as she spoke.
These people said they knew her brother. They even came all the way to her home asking for his whereabouts.
As the image of that man with his face split open and bleeding flashed in her mind, the color drained completely from the girl’s face.
“Oh dear. We have no intention of hurting you. We’re only looking for your brother.”
It was the truth, without a shred of falsehood. But the girl’s pallor showed no sign of improving.
Ambre was about to speak again when Isaac interjected first.
“Let’s go back.”
“Really?”
“Yes.”
Even though his reply was firm, he didn’t move first. Ambre glanced once at Sugar, once at the inside of the house, and then took the lead in walking away.
As she passed through the door—unable to close properly because the knob was broken—Ambre, with her hood pulled low, called out inside:
“Someone will come right away to fix the door. They’ll only fix it and leave, so don’t be too scared!”
Right away? Isaac hadn’t yet had time to question her words when Ambre was already heading to a tiny neighborhood shop, the sort commonly found in places like this.
Not far from Sugar’s home, inside the shop sat an elderly man with thick, powerful forearms.
“Fix that house’s door properly, will you? The knob’s broken.”
Ambre tapped the counter with Tarenga’s crest as she spoke. The old man bowed deeply and immediately summoned workers.
Soon, several people marched off toward Sugar’s house. Watching them, Isaac asked:
“That shop belonged to Tarenga?”
“Yes.”
“There really is no place Tarenga doesn’t reach.”
“Well, that’s true.”
Smiling brightly, Ambre left the shop and asked:
“Don’t you think we should have pressed the girl more? Or searched the house? We might have found something.”
Isaac glanced back at Sugar’s home.
“If she’d hidden something inside, it would already have been taken by the people here. No matter how much they’ve fallen, nobles can’t fool the eyes of those who were born and raised in this district. Still, that girl definitely is hiding something.”
“Then… was she pretending not to know where her missing brother went?”
“No. Regarding her brother, she spoke only the truth.”
“And how do you know the child wasn’t lying?”
“It’s a secret technique, passed down through my family.”
It sounded like the words of a fraud, but Isaac swore to heaven it was true.
Among the arcane techniques handed down by the Arkendel family was the ability to discern lies and deceit. And since it was part of their vision, the opposite was also true—they could weave lies more convincing than the truth itself.
Shrugging, Isaac added:
“Unless that girl can lie on par with an imperial spy, all her answers about her brother were genuine. But if you can’t trust my word…”
“I trust you. Because Her Highness the Princess trusts you!”
Ambre replied brightly before he had even finished speaking, then tilted her head.
“Then what is the child hiding?”
“Hard to say. The family may be ruined, but they were nobles nonetheless. It could be a family matter, or else…”
When Isaac paused, Ambre impatiently tugged at his arm.
“Or else?”
“A problem with the child herself.”
While Ambre coaxed the girl earlier, Isaac had kept his eyes on her the entire time and noticed several peculiar things.
First, the child wore clothing that covered every part of her body except her face.
The weather was cool, but not so cold that she needed to be wrapped up like that indoors. Nor could it be excused by saying she was unusually sensitive to the cold, for at the border of her hairline, tiny beads of sweat had gathered, like on a baby’s skin…
Second, she was extremely wary of physical contact.
Even when Ambre had touched only the tips of her hair—where no nerves could feel it—her face had gone visibly pale.
Taking the two points together, if the girl was hiding something, it was most likely related to her body.
“Now that you mention it—her eyes.”
“Yes, I saw them too.”
“They seemed… familiar, didn’t they?”
“Not exactly the same color, but close.”
Back and forth they spoke, then simultaneously said:
“They were similar to your eyes, Sir Knight.”
“Faint, but crimson.”
***
“I can’t imagine why Marquis Heindel would meddle in such a trivial matter.”
Olivia muttered irritably, scratching at the corner of a document. Across from her, Cryer, who had been reading through records about Duke Volsheik’s sister who had supposedly crossed dimensions, lifted his head.
“Marquis Heindel?”
“Yes. The one who came to pester you before.”
“Oh, the one who demanded I be sent back.”
“Exactly. He argued so stubbornly, and I yelled right back—‘It’s my choice!’”
Olivia lifted her chin arrogantly, and Cryer asked, barely suppressing his laughter:
“And this time, what is it about?”
“He claims that among the staff of the Princess’s Palace, there is someone of improper conduct.”
Even as she said it, Olivia gave a dry laugh, picking up the edge of the file.
“He actually submitted a petition to His Majesty the Emperor, insisting that the servant be expelled and replaced appropriately.”
“A petition… to replace a palace servant?”
“You heard me right. It says exactly that here.”
The document bore Heindel’s crest, looking all the more absurd today. Olivia tossed it aside and pressed her temples.
“Has some misfortune befallen House Heindel recently, or…? No, I shouldn’t say that. But really, why is he doing things so unlike him?”
If he were normally the type to spout nonsense, or if his house had been minor, she might have dismissed it as a plea for imperial attention. But this was that Heindel House. That Bonita Heindel.
She wanted to ignore it, yet stirring up needless trouble within the Empire was unwise.
Especially when she already had an enemy in an ancient god—too powerful to face directly, forcing her to wrestle with its wretched mage-subordinates instead.
Was it not said that the most frightening enemy is the one within?
Even if war broke out, she would expect loyalists to die for the Empire. But a man who had gone missing kept pricking at her like a thorn under her nail.
Cryer picked up the file she had pushed aside and said:
“Usually, when someone suddenly acts so out of character, it means one of two things. Either they’ve been given a death sentence…”
“What?”
“People act strangely when their days are numbered.”
“A death sentence…?”
Her eyes widened like a startled rabbit, ears pricked. Cryer smirked and continued:
“Yes. Either they’re terminal, or they’ve finally completed preparations for some grand plan.”
“Neither option is something I want to think about.”
“Weren’t you the one who said before he rarely left his estate—almost reclusive? Yet he still fulfilled his duties, didn’t he?”
“Yes. Heindel House is a great house, with many obligations. He never shirked them.”
“As the saying goes: the more one possesses, the more one must do.”
That line had once stood out in bold letters in a Volsheik history book.
At his words, a manic gleam flashed in Olivia’s blue eyes, followed by brittle laughter.
“Exactly! The more you have, the more burdens you must bear! That’s the very foundation of the Empire! That’s why I! Yes, I! Dig through mountains of paperwork every single day, tearing them down piece by piece!”
Her voice rose louder and louder, until she sounded almost deranged, laughter spilling in.
Anyone who spent even a day or two in her office would understand perfectly why she was like this—endless waves of documents, ceaseless duties, bearing down on her to the marrow.
And she was not alone; in Volsheik, it had always been this way, generation after generation.
“What crime did our ancestors commit, that the Volsheiks must endlessly endure regression, possession, reincarnation, dimensional travel—every manner of burden—and on top of it all, manage the world’s affairs?”
She muttered bitterly, staring at the mountain of paperwork before scratching at the shadow that clung beneath her like a tattoo.
“All this has to be finished today! Even if the world ends tomorrow, there are people living today, so it must be done today!”
“You’ll collapse if you go on like that.”
“Collapse? Do you not see where I’m sitting right now?”
With her injured leg, Olivia had sunk deep into the sofa, piled with documents she used as a desk. Her eyes reddened as she shouted.
Cryer said nothing more. Like calming a restless cat, he placed his large hand gently over her eyes.
A familiar scent, warmth, and darkness enveloped her.
Her ragged breathing gradually steadied, and Cryer whispered:
“What are you thinking so much with that little head of yours? Your forehead is burning.”
“It’s just a headache.”
“With this much heat, you should rest a little.”
Perhaps she had already forgotten her vow never to lean on him again. Or perhaps she simply no longer noticed his presence as she once had. Either way, Olivia rubbed her face against his cool hand and sighed.
“Even if I rest, the work will still be there. There’s no one else to take it on. I can’t drive another secretary to tears—especially not one I had to force into the job because no one else would do it.”
Ordinarily, being a secretary so close to the emperor or princess would be considered the highest honor. But not in the Volsheik Empire.
If the royals themselves were worked to the bone, what of those who served them?
As Olivia’s long sigh brushed against his hand, Cryer asked half on impulse:
