Chapter 6.2

It couldn’t have been even five minutes since the judge gave the order to “bring in the criminal.” For a judge, keeping the imperial family—especially the Crown Prince—waiting would be a significant burden.

A woman with a haggard face shuffled into the courtroom. Her wrists were shackled, but her ankles were free. She was barefoot and wearing a yellowish prison uniform instead of the bloodied clothes she had originally been caught in.

Leticia was shocked to see how much her face had changed in just a few weeks. After being hit by her own reflected curse, her hair color had turned strange and her eye and forehead had been deformed; now, she looked as if she had aged twenty years.

‘Is it because of the torture…?’

She had suspected as much when the Tower Master expressed a desire to join the interrogation. Teresa de Tesseia, the deceased, was a member of the imperial family, and the investigation into the killer of royalty was bound to be brutal. Baroness Perdoba was not merely a “suspect” but a target whose guilt had been finalized.

Leticia felt no pity. She had lost her mother because of this woman. Leticia didn’t even know what Teresa’s face looked like. No amount of the woman’s suffering could ever compensate for what was lost.

‘All because of petty jealousy…’

She could understand envying someone, but she could not fathom letting that jealousy destroy both oneself and others.

“Leticia…”

As the prisoner stood in the dock, a remarkably clear voice drifted out.

The judge was the most startled. Baroness Perdoba was a criminal, and the name she spoke belonged to Young Lady Tesseia. A mere criminal like the Baroness had no right to utter that name so familiarly.

The judge flinched and opened his mouth to warn her. However, his words were scattered before they could be formed by an ensuing scream.

“Leticia…! Leticia!! Letisha!!!!”

At her spasmodic shouting, Terdis pulled Leticia into an embrace, while Aaron and Carlyle signaled the soldiers guarding the courtroom.

Baroness Perdoba gripped the railing surrounding the prisoner’s dock with her shackled hands and shrieked with malice.

“You disgusting brat!! Born from devouring your own mother! Who do you think you are, digging up the past! Everyone had forgotten!! Everyone thought Teresa was a filthy woman and forgot about me! You ruined everything!!”

“Silence her!”

At the command of a man who appeared to be the leader, three soldiers lunged at Baroness Perdoba. As they tried to suppress her and cover her mouth, she let out a piercing scream and thrashed about.

“Aaaaaaaagh!”

Leticia gritted her teeth at the woman’s spiteful shrieks of perceived injustice. She had intended not to watch the execution, but at this moment, she felt as though she wanted to stab the woman to death herself.

“Shut up!”

This was in the presence of the Crown Prince. The soldiers’ spines chilled as they caught sight of His Highness looking down into the courtroom with a deep frown. It was certain they would all be reprimanded for this after the trial. The hands of the soldiers, who were already far from kind, grew even rougher.

Leticia did not look away, even as the soldiers struck the Baroness. Just as everyone expected her to collapse and fall silent, something bizarre happened. Something resembling an insect’s leg suddenly poked out from her wide-open mouth.

“Huh?”

The soldier closest to her stared in a daze for a split second. Baroness Perdoba’s body bloated grotesquely before her entire form tore apart, and hundreds—thousands—of monsters burst out.

“Aaaagh!”

The monsters had bat-like heads, grasshopper-like bodies, and membranous wings. Though they initially seemed to scatter, they swerved in mid-air and plummeted toward Leticia.

That was when Terdis scooped Leticia up and sprinted toward the aisle. The monsters gave chase, unable to catch up to him.

“Leticia!”

Aaron, Cesare, and Godfrey rushed forward. Sebastian was a step late, conjuring flames from his hands to blast the swarm, but only five or six fell. Thousands still remained. Carlyle called for the knights, his face pale with horror.

On the second floor, the imperial Guards had already evacuated Crown Prince Edward. Even as he ran, surrounded by guards, Edward worried for them.

“House Tesseia! The Tesseia family must not be harmed! They are all of imperial blood!”

“Knights have already been dispatched! Please prioritize your own safety, Your Highness!”

‘Forget my safety!’

The monster was pursuing Lady Tesseia. Though she hadn’t been officially recognized as a Saintess yet, the empire would be in a difficult position if she were to die. Furthermore, setting aside political issues, she was Cesare’s younger sister—the sister he felt so much debt toward for not being able to protect her during her childhood abuse.

‘I hope they’re both safe…!’

However, he was the empire’s only Crown Prince, and it was right to prioritize his own safety for now. With a bitter expression, Edward exited the courthouse following the knights’ guidance.

***

“Young Master!!”

In the heat of the moment, an old title seemed to have slipped out. The House of Lyon’s knights were waiting in the hallway outside the courtroom. The moment they saw Terdis burst through the doors, they threw him a sword.

Terdis, who had placed Leticia down behind him so quickly it was almost imperceptible, gripped the scabbard, drew the blade, and slashed straight ahead.

“Gasp!”

Leticia trembled behind Terdis. Before her eyes, she saw countless monsters being slaughtered. Terdis’s sword strikes were so fast they were a blur to the naked eye. Instead, she could only see the monsters being cleaved in two.

Thousands swarmed them, but Terdis shielded Leticia with one arm while cutting down every monster in their vicinity. Though each creature was the size of a calf, not a single tentacle or leg touched Leticia’s body.

She was carrying the magic tool Carlyle had given her for protection, but seeing the endless wave of monsters made her skin crawl.

It was only for a brief moment that the monsters were able to get near Leticia and Terdis. Soon, the dozens of knights who had been waiting outside the courtroom doors began hacking through the monsters, creating a human wall.

Since House Lyon had even brought mages, magic was added to the fray, leaving no room for Aaron or Cesare to intervene.

‘Thank goodness.’

Aaron, who had borrowed a sword from the court knights, looked on at the scene with relief. He had been terrified when he saw the thousands of monsters fly up to chase Leticia, but the situation was quickly brought under control.

The Crown Prince and his retinue had already fled, and his brother-in-law and his wife seemed to have been evacuated by soldiers in the chaos.

Cesare was suspicious of how Baroness Perdoba could have turned into a monster. It was hard to believe it was a side effect of the curse. The Tower Master had already analyzed that curse; if such a mutation were possible, he would have noticed and given warning.

“Is everyone safe?”

A court official ran up, his face ashen. He was accompanied by dozens of knights, likely by the Crown Prince’s order. However, the situation was already over. The wide hallway floor was littered with the remains of the unidentifiable monsters.

One of the knights brought Terdis his fallen scabbard, and Terdis sheathed his blade. Still holding the scabbard, he checked on Leticia.

“Are you okay?”

He knew she wasn’t physically hurt because he hadn’t allowed her to be. Leticia barely managed a nod, her shock still evident. Although she had been tormented by Godfrey and Sebastian within the family, she had never encountered magical beasts or monsters.

While the hunting dogs couldn’t be compared to these monsters, she felt that without Terdis, she would have been eaten alive or torn to shreds. Seeing her fine trembling, Terdis pulled her into a tight hug, unconcerned by the eyes around them.

“…What happened to His Highness?”

At Cesare’s question, the court official recognized him and spoke deferentially.

“His Highness evacuated through the back exit.”

With the Crown Prince gone, the two Dukes present were the highest-ranking individuals. Aaron seemed to sense Cesare’s look and nodded.

“Young Duke, Leticia seems very shaken, so take her back first. Our house will handle the cleanup here.”

“Are you sure that’s alright?”

Carlyle, who arrived late and caught up to Aaron after hearing the shouting, asked. He was deeply shocked by the fact that someone had tried to kill Leticia yet again.

Cesare glanced at Leticia. Since Leticia was being held by Terdis, she had her back turned to him.

“It’s fine. We’ll need to report to His Highness too…”

“My lady!”

From the courtroom, one soldier came running with a drained face. He suddenly knelt as if prostrating three or four steps away from Leticia and cried out: “Please help! My comrade is dying!”

“What are you saying?”

Before Terdis could frown, Aaron stepped forward. The soldier bowed his head touching the ground and said: “He was stabbed in the belly by a monster! If we wait for someone from the temple to arrive, he’ll lose his life! So please…!”

He had clearly heard rumors that Leticia manifested saint’s power. At the soldier approaching on his knees begging, Terdis turned Leticia behind himself.

“If you’re doing this because of circulating rumors, stop. My wife doesn’t know how to use the power.”

“B-but there might be a possibility of saving him! Please at least try!”

“Though the situation is pitiful…”

“Ter.”

Leticia behind him tugged at his arm.

As he said, though Leticia only felt the presence of divine power filling her body, she didn’t know how to use it to heal people. But whether she refused or failed, if the result was poor, she would be criticized.

‘Then…’

She thought it better to attempt saving the person. Because she couldn’t pretend not to know if she had the power to save someone.

“Though I might fail, I want to try.”

At Leticia’s words, Terdis glanced at the soldier kneeling some distance away. The soldier, perhaps hearing Leticia’s small voice, lifted his head with shining eyes. Terdis said with a displeased face:

“Where is that soldier?”

***

Watching Leticia and Terdis move, Cesare thought this was strange. The monsters that burst from Baroness Perdoba’s body had clearly chased Leticia.

‘There were injured soldiers?’

Well, perhaps a few hundred monsters broke from the swarm to attack soldiers. Since Leticia’s safety was priority, he went straight there without even looking at how the soldiers’ fight went.

The injured soldier lay collapsed in a place somewhat away from the nobles-only passage. Lying lengthwise on the floor in the middle of the courtroom, another comrade was pressing his wound site with hands. As if truly deeply stabbed in the belly, blood pooled abundantly around.

As the earlier soldier said, the situation looked urgent. He was trembling, and with pale complexion, seemed about to die at any moment.

Leticia, shocked at the sight, left Terdis’s side and hurried to his side. Cesare found this whole situation improper. Young Duke Lyon seemed to feel the same, sticking right behind Leticia.

‘This situation isn’t impossible.’

He didn’t mean Baroness Perdoba transforming into thousands of monsters. That was an abnormality, but he was pointing to someone requesting Leticia’s help immediately after that incident.

Rumors that she manifested as a saint spread widely in the capital, and a soldier knowing this could request help. But something grated on Cesare’s nerves.

So he left cleanup to Godfrey and chased Leticia. Godfrey too was scheduled to soon assume the imperial Knight Commander position, so this much would be nothing.

Leticia crouched beside the injured person. The one staunching the injury’s wound seemed flustered, sweating coldly.

“M-my lady…”

The soldier was pressing the injured person’s belly with both hands. Despite this, blood continued flowing out. Leticia bit her lips thinking that perhaps organs might be visible below his fingers.

‘This isn’t time to be afraid.’

Just seeing blood everywhere recalled moments of being injured. When falling down stairs, she hit her head and immediately lost consciousness, but when hunting dogs tore her limbs, she was conscious.

Because then too, if she’d lost consciousness and not protected her throat, she would have been bitten to death. Just smelling the soldier’s blood now made her afraid as memories of that time surfaced.

‘When afraid…’

Words saying to think only of what must be done surfaced. Not concentrating on emotions, just focusing on the next action, then the next.

Leticia thought of the divine power filling her inside. It seemed like water filled to the brim that could instantly pour out if she just slightly opened the cap.

‘Will just pouring out divine power work?’

When concentrating on divine power like this, nerves also heightened to surrounding energies. All living beings had innate energy, and around here, three had powerful energies. Aaron was still in the corridor area, Terdis behind her, Cesare opposite.

And… the collapsed soldier’s energy was weakest here. The other soldier pressing the wounded soldier’s injury was slightly better level than that.

‘Well, ordinary people don’t possess such strong power. Normally it would be about this much.’

Leticia raised her gentle fingertips to cover the blood-soaked soldier’s hand. Faintly beginning white light traveled along her hand, passed the soldier’s hand, and poured into the affected area.

It wasn’t power transformation. Divine power, the god’s power, was power that manifested ability according to will, and the capricious goddess who chose her permitted her many things.

“U-uh…?”

The soldier trembling in pain felt pain instantly disappear and warmth in the wound area, his belly, and breathed comfortable breaths. For one dying, it was like a first comfortable breath.

Convulsions disappearing from the convulsing body and reason returning to unfocused eyes was instantaneous. The soldier who couldn’t properly see not even the comrade trying to save him, let alone Leticia, captured Leticia’s image in those pupils.

And as if terrified, tried to say something.

Crack!

A blade flying at her throat collided with the magical tool’s barrier, scattering sparks. The magical tool blocked attacks only once. Before Leticia’s eyes, the translucent barrier shattered completely.

“Tisha!!!”

“Leticia!!”

It was that very soldier who had been pressing the injured person’s wound. He didn’t care that the dagger blade cracked from the first attack. Even with the cracked blade, he could amply behead the saint.

However, the next moment, what was pierced through the chest was him.

“Tisha!”

Leticia captured that scene in her eyes and squeezed them shut. In urgency, it seemed Terdis roughly pulled her into his embrace.

The one who thrust a sword into the assassin’s chest was Cesare. Though he could have beheaded him, it was a judgment made instantly thinking Leticia’s shock would be great.

“Leticia, are you alright?!”

“Ah, ah… Yes.”

The magical tool that created the barrier… the brooch on her clothes had its magic stone part broken. If a strike powerful enough to break the magic stone, it meant the opponent was a skilled assassin.

On trembling Leticia’s cheek were blood drops that seemed to be the assassin’s. Terdis quickly wiped them with his sleeve so she wouldn’t notice.

“Tisha. Breathe. Slowly…”

“……”

Leticia was catching her breath with her face buried in Terdis’s chest. It was the first time seeing someone die right before her eyes. Also being openly targeted for her life with a blade.

When she glanced at the soldier who had been injured, he had a relieved face. At this, Leticia’s heart also calmed somewhat.

Because the person she saved wasn’t trying to kill her. Probably the assassin deliberately stabbed one of the soldiers in the confusion to make him an injured person.

The soldier who had knelt before Leticia begging had paled in shock at this situation.

“Why, why why… What?!”

“Restrain him.”

The one giving orders with a face containing surging rage was Aaron. The court official was clutching his hair at the unbelievable situation that just occurred.

No mid-level official would have the nerve to assert control in this situation. Already the court’s knights were restraining the earlier soldier following Aaron’s order. People also attached to the injured soldier.

Perhaps doubting whether even the just-dead assassin, the pleading soldier, and the injured person were accomplices. Because arranging the situation like this wouldn’t be easy.

Leticia hesitated after trying to say the injured person wasn’t an accomplice. Because he might have been used under threat. Interfering in an unknown situation seemed like it would trouble investigators.

“Cesare.”

Though sensing the assassin died, Aaron frowned looking at Cesare just in case. Because Cesare shook his head.

Though he knew they should keep him alive to interrogate, in a situation where his sister’s life was at stake, only one calculation was possible. That not beheading but piercing the heart was his limit of judgment.

“I’m sorry.”

“…No.”

“Duke Tesseia. We’ll depart immediately. Staying here longer doesn’t seem safe.”

Carlyle said with a face drained of color. He had been in the corridor area, belatedly hearing the two’s shouts and chasing after Aaron.

He was greatly shocked at the fact there was again someone trying to kill Leticia.

“Do so. Cesare, Godfrey. Take the knights and help escort House Lyon.”

“We’d be grateful.”

Normally he would have refused, but now wasn’t a normal situation. Though House Lyon’s knights were already many, if Sword Master Cesare or Godfrey approaching Sword Master level, they would be great help.

Aaron regretted he couldn’t personally see Leticia off. Sebastian had an expression wanting to join too, but knowing he wouldn’t be much help, kept his mouth shut.

Leticia said nothing. She left the courtroom as Terdis led. No one could have expected such a trial.

‘Should I say the dream was right?’

The future shown by the goddess’s power saved her life. Otherwise, she wouldn’t have worn this protective magical tool.

Recalling the future that didn’t come, Leticia hunched her shoulders. She was still afraid, recalling the blade cracking as it collided with the magical tool’s barrier.

***

“Your fingertips are cold. Were you very frightened?”

Once inside the carriage, Terdis constantly massaged Leticia’s hands while checking her complexion. Molly, her maid, also looked pale with shock after hearing the news.

“I think… I’m okay now.”

Leticia felt it was a good choice not to have brought the servants along. In that chaos, they wouldn’t have been properly protected. It was common in aristocratic society for servants who fell behind to be injured or even killed.

Terdis wore a calm expression, but he was actually in a state of near-soul-crushing shock. Leticia had been in danger. Furthermore, it was Cesare, not him, who had killed the assassin.

‘How could this happen…!’

Leticia’s dream had come true. It would have been better if it had just been a random nightmare. He didn’t even want to imagine someone targeting her life. According to her dream, it was the Emperor of a foreign nation who wanted Leticia dead. Terdis gritted his teeth, thinking of the empire located at the northwestern edge of the continent.

The Sachsen Empire no longer shared a border with the Luendal Empire. Though there were two countries between them, it was clear they still harbored hostility and sought continental hegemony.

‘Since the plan failed, there’s a high chance he will target Leticia’s life again.’

Terdis decided he needed to stay even closer to Leticia than before. Just now, her life was at risk even though she had only stepped a small distance away from him to treat a wounded man. He checked the brooch on Leticia’s outer garment and thought he should gift her another one. The magic tool had performed its role perfectly.

‘I’m so glad… she’s safe.’

Leticia noticed the arm holding her was trembling slightly and glanced at Terdis. When their eyes met, Terdis smiled as if nothing was wrong.

“What is it?”

“Nothing. Thank you for protecting me, Ter.”

“Don’t mention it. My sword is always ready for you.”

As he whispered and kissed her cheek, Leticia kissed his cheek in return. She wanted to kiss him properly, but they weren’t alone in the carriage. Molly looked up at the carriage ceiling, while Terdis’s valet sat beside her, eyes darting around. Carlyle was looking out the carriage window at Cesare and Godfrey.

‘To be escorted by Sword Masters…’

He was thinking once again what a brilliant move it had been to bring a daughter-in-law from House Tesseia. Leticia still seemed uncomfortable around them, but even if she found them bothersome, it was clear they would be a source of strength for House Lyon.

‘House Tesseia is truly a prestigious family. The head, Aaron, is a Sword Master, and the Young Duke is one as well… though his second son hasn’t crossed the threshold yet, he is soon to be appointed Commander of the imperial Knights.’

Carlyle was already looking forward to a Sword Master appearing among the children born to Leticia and Terdis. His only concern was that the Emperor of the Sachsen Empire wanted Leticia dead because she was a Saintess.

‘The imperial family won’t be of much help with this.’

It might be unrelated, but he began to feel that the misfortunes of his own house, the House Tesseia, and the fact that the Crown Prince’s fiancée’s family was massacred for treason… might not be mere coincidence. If Baroness Perdoba turning into a monster and casting curses was part of their will to kill Leticia…

‘The death of Duchess Tesseia must also be their doing! That means…’

It could be that the Sachsen Empire was maneuvering to shake the two pillars of the Luendal Empire—the Ducal houses—and perhaps even the imperial family. In the case of the Crown Prince’s fiancée, the treason was discovered early, but he shuddered to imagine what might have happened if she had actually married the Crown Prince.

‘…I should consult with Aaron.’

He thought to himself, glancing at the two children who seemed to have regained their composure.