IBWCD 32

Chapter 32

And Kalian paraded through the streets on his blessed horse, flanked by knights, for those who cheered him on.

It was supposed to be the saint’s day, but she hadn’t made a single public appearance since her death three years earlier.

In her absence, the High Priestess and dozens of priests greeted the Protector of the Empire.

And Evelyn took advantage of the congestion, blending in among the apprentice priests mobilized to keep the crowd under control.

Soon enough, they would be gone, and entering the temple would not be such a difficult task.

That didn’t reassure her, but Evelyn clutched the ring Kalian had slipped on her finger like a guardian stone.

‘He said it was no ordinary ring.’

It’s enchanted with a variety of spells to help her in times of danger.

Kalian’s concern for Evelyn, who would have to enter the temple alone, made her more determined.

Then.

“……!”

Evelyn’s eyes locked with one of the priests who was greeting the Emperor’s party across the street.

He was glaring at her.

‘What’s wrong with him?’

She wondered if she’d been caught, but when she looked closer at the shape of his mouth, she realized he was scolding her for standing there.

‘Did he mistake me for another priest?’

A shiver ran down her spine.

But she couldn’t pretend not to see him now.

Evelyn crossed the street calmly.

She passed the long line of knights on either side and approached the priest, who tugged her into the temple.

Then he pointed a stern finger at her.

“If I sent you on an errand, you’d be back quickly. What are you waiting for? Even a snail would be faster than you!”

‘An errand,’ she thought, ‘for a priest of her size?’

When she couldn’t say anything, the priest looked at her empty hands and sighed heavily, as if feeling pathetic.

“Michael, you useless brat, go back to your quarters. The Emperor is here, and you must keep an eye on “them” to make sure they don’t cause a ruckus.”

In an instant, the air froze and her heart began to beat uneasily.

‘What is he talking about, and where is my section?’

“This is going to throw off the plan.”

After confirming the Empress’s voice, she had to escape through the auspices of the temple.

But she couldn’t shake the feeling that “it” must hold some secret.

It was then.

“The priest there.”

As planned, Kalian called out to her.

As she cautiously approached, he ran his eyes down the hem of the Empress’s skimpy robes as she stood beside him.

“Would you please arrange Her Majesty’s dress as far as the dungeons? The other priests are too tall for her comfort.”

The Empress, unaccompanied by even a maid, appeared, as Kalian had expected, in a red, lacey, public dress.

Her headdress was so ornate that, from a distance, it looked like a colorful peacock perched on her head.

It was meant to show off her robustness, defying expectations that she would keep a low profile in the wake of the crown prince’s troubles.

What she didn’t realize was that she couldn’t walk down the stairs without a maid to hold her dress.

“Yes, then…”

Evelyn stepped forward at his request.

But the priest, who called her Michael, stopped her with one arm and shook his head.

“I beg your pardon, Your Highness, but this child is still too much of a probationer to be entrusted with such a noble task…”

“Rather fitting. I dare not ask such an impious favor of a faithful servant.”

The emperor interrupted. Now no one would be able to take advantage of her assisting the Empress.

“Yes, I understand, Your Majesty.”

Smiling, the officer stepped back, elbowed her in the side, and whispered in a gruff tone.

“Go to the processing room as soon as you’re done. I don’t expect any of “them” to come near you, but it never hurts to be careful.”

Evelyn asked cautiously.

“Speaking of the processing room…”

Her ring is enchanted with an illusion spell.

In their eyes, she would now appear to be a man with the most common brown eyes on the continent.

“Ugh.”

Luckily, the priest, Michael, seemed to be prone to mistakes.

Evelyn deftly grabbed the empress’s skirt as they made their way to the dungeon, having been given the location of the processing room by the pitying-eyed priest.

“Please descend with care.”

A deputy in white robes led the way.

They descended a deep circular marble staircase, passed through several corridors, and turned a corner to reveal an opulent space that was hardly a prison.

Reaching the massive doors, the Empress turned to Evelyn.

“Enough. For a priest, you’re quite good at passing yourself off as a man.”

Evelyn’s face paled as she finally heard the Empress’ voice.

She lowered her gaze, holding her breath as best she could to avoid showing embarrassment.

It was enough.

The nasal tone, a tone lower than a normal woman’s, the languid way she spoke with a slight lift at the end. An unusual way of pronouncing certain words.

‘This must be the voice I’ve been looking for…!’

As soon as she was out of the prison with her back turned, Evelyn began to run the way she had come.

“Ha, ha…”

Perhaps she was running too hard, her heart was pounding wildly, and the voice of the Empress she had heard earlier began to ring in her ears.

‘The Empress was really behind Louise? Why? What does the Temple have to do with her?’

The relationship between the temple and the imperial family is known to be acrimonious.

On his way to the throne, the Emperor purged the Empress and all of her children.

The Grand Vizier, who abandoned his status as the Fourth Emperor in order to survive the bloody catastrophe and embraced the temple.

‘They can’t be on good terms, so why…?’

Moreover, the Empress was a woman who was hell-bent on consolidating her imperial power.

She wanted to lay the groundwork for her crown prince to take over the empire with ease.

While the crown prince’s behavior was unsettling, it didn’t make sense for the empress to be involved in the affairs of a temple that was at odds with the emperor.

‘What the hell is going on?’

Evelyn tried to make sense of the situation, but it was impossible.

The more she thought about it, the more question marks grew in her head, and just then, the hallway ended.

‘They said this is the processing room… I just need to find out what “it” is.’

With her mind made up, Evelyn opened the door to the processing room at the end of the hallway and gasped at the sight before her.

“It’s a prison…?”

The room, which must have been half the size of the dungeon in the Count’s manor, was crammed with people.

Evelyn wasn’t the only one surprised.

They were all silver-haired, green-eyed women, some of them young girls, not even adults.

“What the…?”

A cold sweat broke out down her spine and her clenched fists shook.

She had expected the unthinkable to happen in the temple, but she thought it was limited to her mother and her.

‘What the hell are they doing? You don’t see many people with silver hair and green eyes like this.’

Evelyn swallowed back her anger and anxiety as she entered the cell.

The darkened floor and walls were caked with moss in the joints. It was obvious at a glance that the place hadn’t been maintained in a long time.

Gritting her teeth, she turned her head toward a small altar, where a small wooden box and a rusty candlestick sat.

Inside the box was a key of pure gold, with a small engraving on it.

A large circle with a cross over it, a sinister symbol.

It was the same marking on the vial the Countess kept her potions in.

“This confirms that the shrine is connected to the purification ritual.”

Tearing her gaze away from the altar, Evelyn slowly surveyed the prison, and the women bowed their heads deeply.

Somehow, they seemed to avoid making eye contact with Evelyn. Even from a distance, she could see their faces were pale with fear.

‘It’s a characteristic of people who have been abused, scars all over their bodies…’

She clenched her jaw and looked for a long time, but she couldn’t find her mother among the dozen or so women.

A mixed feeling of relief and despair slammed through Evelyn’s heart, and she sighed.

“Ha…”

‘What was she going to do now?’

Her heart throbbed in her chest, but her purpose was to find her mother.

Besides, the priest named Michael might have returned by now.

Perhaps the priests, realizing she was a false priest, would be scrambling to find her.

Part of her wanted to tell them of their atrocities, but she couldn’t risk embarrassing Kalian by making a scene without a plan.

Now was not the time, she thought, steeling herself to turn away.

“I… priest.”

A voice, weak and thin as a dying candle, grabbed her ankle.

She lowered her head and saw a girl clutching a cage. Behind the kneeling girl lay a woman.

Evelyn stepped closer to the bars. The girl looked at Evelyn with desperate eyes, then shook her head.

“Today… is the day of my sister’s blood blessing, and I need you to help me do it in her place.”

“… Blessing with blood?”

“Yes, my sister is sick, she can’t eat or drink, and at this rate… won’t make it through the day.”

‘Why?’

Because the girl’s teary eyes reflected her own past.

“Please have mercy on my mother, it doesn’t matter to me, please have mercy on her.”