Chapter 46

But as she thought she was almost there, she let her guard down.

“Deon… Deon Arc del Brezina.”

As the smile quickly evaporated from Emily’s lips, a damp voice spilled out. What is this spine-chilling sensation?

From the days of the trial, the youngest prince became quite irritating. Became quite nerve-wracking.

Is this worrying out of necessity before the uprising? Or perhaps…

Emily, while listening to her son’s screeching wails, gnawed at her thumbnail. At this point, I need to think about it from another perspective.

Until now, Emily’s energy was directed toward the First Consort, Blake.

The reason was the Duke of Tanium was adamantly backing her and she gave birth to two princes.

Therefore, she paid no attention to the idiotic Third Prince, who had a vegetative Empress as his mother, and the useless count on his mother’s side.

On top of that, all of the rumors circulating in the imperial palace about Deon Arc del Brezina were about him being a kind and innocent prince.

How convenient! Emily had thought of tempting him and using him for the day Daniel became the Emperor of the Brezina Empire.

Whether to use him as a hostage in a hostage exchange or to name him as the commander of the border area’s army, she had planned to let him live in either case.

But if all that innocence was just his acting?

Is there anything backing him? What if he’s just been on a platform looking down at us, mocking and playing with us this entire time?

His proud face presenting such an excellent idea without any hesitation at the trial grounds would not leave Emily’s retinas.

He looked exactly like a child suitable to become emperor.

Grind. As Emily grated her teeth tightly, blood flowed down from the tip of her thumb’s fingernail.

It was red.

The same color as the sofa her son was gripping tightly to as he flailed, same as the liquid the ‘ingredient’ was spewing out while being restrained by the gag, becoming mummified.

She always bit her fingernail when she was nervous or when she didn’t like something.

When she bit her nails as a child, her mother, Marchioness Herimond always slapped the back of her hand mercilessly.

So as to whether that habit changed or not, no, as one can see, it didn’t.

Emily simply didn’t bite her fingernails in front of her parents.

“Hahahaha! A success, a great success! You did well, Your Majesty!”

Daniel panted laboriously. The color of the magic circle and light of life in the young ‘ingredient’s’ eyes vanished like smoke.

Gillian was greatly pleased; he grabbed the shriveled-up ingredient and hopped off towards the storage room.

Since a body entirely drained of its magic easily becomes ash, there was the need to be careful while handling it.

“Wait.”

Stopping Gillian, Emily walked towards Daniel and roughly opened the curtains.

Crash! At the end of the turbulent noise, Daniel’s eyes stared across the room from him.

“Gasp…!”

The moisture had completely evaporated from the dried-up mummy and it looked awfully grotesque. Retch. He spewed out everything from his innards.

After staring down at his tragically-shaking back, Emily held his chin and forcefully tilted it up.

“Now, Daniel, look. Don’t avert your eyes, look directly at it. This is the kid you took a life away from.”

“Ah… Ahh…”

“In your stomach, resides the life of that child. You devoured him all.”

Emily rubbed Daniel’s stomach with her fingertips. The startled Gillian lost his balance and dropped the ‘ingredient’.

Poof. Maybe only coming up to about Daniel’s waist, the ingredient turned into ash and disappeared without a trace.

Daniel only swallowed his breaths. Emily embraced him in a loving manner and said.

“You did well, my son. My Emperor.”

Be proud. And rush to become an even more perfect and proud son for this mother.

As I did for my parents.

* * *

The day Deon would go to see Kathia again was two days later.

Meanwhile, Kathia was writing down the content of the Tale of Spírĭtus before they met again. To be cautious, she wrote vaguely in English.

Because time was of the essence, the first part of the story that had already passed was lightly scribbled. It was mostly about small and big historic events.

The writing was actually no different than reality, it felt terribly peculiar. She realized once more that she was inside a novel.