CH 123

It’s not long until Queen Amelie’s evening party. Thanks to Isabella’s skillful delivery of my letter, the preparations should be progressing steadily. Isabella also explained the situation to her, and through our exchange of several more letters, that girl made clear she wouldn’t rush ahead before the plan.

Hannah, the former maid of House Lingerburg, told us an account that would make most people angry. And the possibility of taking reckless action against the root cause of that anger jumps up. However, I couldn’t think of any other way for us to reverse the situation other than taking that risk and explaining the situation to that girl, and getting her cooperation.

She must have been driven by an urge to jump and act right now. But we must still be patient with her case. If you don’t make all the preparations and take all possible measures, you won’t be able to fight against those who are skilled at conspiracy and have much higher status among the Kingdom of Ploiss’s nobles.

No matter how much you say we have the King and Dietrich’s support, we are still children, after all. Without social credibility, few friends will act as instructed. There are no factions or subordinates, and neither the public-facing society nor the underworld is interested in us.

For those of us who are lacking in everything, there is no other way to turn this situation around than to deliver a well-aimed blow. So that girl has no choice but to let herself be moved. I think that my persuasion is effective, so she still won’t move recklessly and endures it. Today is a face-to-face meeting with her.

My body trembles slightly. What kind of feeling is this? Is it because I’m afraid to meet her? From the fear that I’ll fail to free her? Is it because I can’t forgive the criminals who are still living so carefree after doing all this?

It is but it also isn’t. It seems that everything is included, but it feels like a completely different sensation. All I can say is that I want to help her.

We’ll release her in our next operation. However, that doesn’t mean settling with Amelie’s faction or completely crushing the Nassam Duchy.

If we put forward as evidence the documents King Wilhelm and Prime Minister Dietrich gave us, we should be able to do considerable damage to the Nassam Duchy and the Siegen Marquisate, even if you can’t completely crush them. But I can’t do that. I guess they gave it to me in the sense that I could do my corroborative investigation and use only a small portion of this evidence that was passed to me in secret.

If this evidence is brought out in an attempt to completely destroy the Second Queen’s Faction and the Nassam Duchy, it will develop into a civil war that splits the Kingdom of Ploiss in half. What awaits beyond that is interference from surrounding countries such as the Kingdom of Frasia, the Principality of Aust, and the Kingdom of Hollant. If the Kingdom of Ploiss is shaken by a civil war, these neighboring states will intervene immediately.

So if I use all of this evidence to completely crush the Second Queen’s Faction and House Nassam, the Crown will abandon me. The Second Queen’s Faction and the Nassam Duchy will probably suffer some damage, but the faction will survive, even though they have lost power due to the King’s intercession. Conversely, if I used this evidence, I would be imprisoned or beheaded as an enemy of the state who had fractured the Kingdom of Ploiss.

There’s also the connection with Wilhelm and Dietrich, as they handed this information to me. With this fact, I wonder if can act rationally without running into actions that would collapse the foundations of this country in an instant even if I held down the evidence.

It would be fine if I could quietly collect only the evidence that was useful to me and suppress the Second Queen’s Faction, just as Wilhelm and Dietrich intended. That way, we can suppress their key players, who tend to run wild and would invite foreign interference to win a power struggle without dirtying their hands.

Conversely, if I try to use other evidence to completely crush the Second Queen’s Faction, the King will intervene and stop me from destroying them. And I will be disposed of as a dangerous child who can’t even make rational decisions and has a history of running even wilder than the Second Queen’s key allies.

From this, it is possible to read what Wilhelm and Dietrich are aiming for. They probably want to proceed with a peaceful centralization of political authority.

The current government of Ploiss has the King standing above the Feudal Lords. However, the authority of the Lords is so strong that they’re almost like independent countries to themselves. It’s a kind of gentle federal system where small countries gather together under one banner. Among them, the Ploissian royal family has the most authority and stands above them as a representative of this superstate.

On the other hand, in neighboring countries, the authority of the Heads of State is strong. Even though they are neighboring countries, the degree of change differs depending on the state, but considering the history of Earth, you could make the argument that from now on, governments will start to shift their political systems through centralization of power, to an absolute monarchy or a dictatorship.

Under such circumstances, only the Kingdom of Ploiss will be left behind by the surrounding countries under the current system. In order to avoid that, Ploiss also needs to proceed with centralization. But if I suddenly say that I will take away all the feudal authority, the nobles will protest all at once.

Therefore, they plan to use me as the hammer to strike the Second Queen’s Faction, the nail that sticks outs the most. If they see my skill at that time and I try to crush them at once, I will be cut off.

The Second Queen’s Faction will probably obey me if I give them some damage and put restrictions on them, but if I suddenly try to crush them, every member will rebel. If that happens, the Nassam Duchy and the Second Queen’s Faction will rally support and divide the country into a civil war. Authority must be gradually reduced or confiscated. A reform that suddenly overturns everything is impossible.

For me, that Wilhelm and Dietrich are trying to reform the government in that fashion isn’t important. I don’t intend to oppose or be hostile to them, but I also don’t want to actively cooperate with them. As long as it’s not fatal to me, the leaders should consider the shape of the nation from time to time and reform it as they see fit.

The important thing is that Wilhelm and Dietrich’s cooperation is essential to get that girl back, and in order to get their cooperation, I have to work for them to some extent. If they want to use me to keep the Second Queen’s Faction and the Nassam Duchy in check, I have to play that role. If that’s how I can save her, I’ll be their jester and perform as long as I need to.

Conflicted, I left home for the place where I would meet her.

I don’t have much time until the evening party. Everything should be ready. There’s nothing wrong with that… or so it should be. But, I’m restless. Am I really really okay? Am I missing something? What have I forgotten? Did I overlook something?

I know it’s useless to be impatient, but I can’t help but feel impatient. Is there any way to calm down? If I, the spearhead of this whole operation, panic, the turmoil could spread to the others.

That’s it! Let’s practice that new spell. If this magic casting fails, nothing will come of any of this planning. It’s a spell that plays an important role in this operation, but it wasn’t developed for this time, it just happened to be useful.

This spell can be said to be a kind of barrier that prevents vibrations within a certain range from being transmitted outside that area. It is different from simply shutting off the air. It seems that Wind magic already had a spell to make a vacuum within a certain radius. I’ve never met whoever made this, but…

It’s also different from the magic that would be called your so-called Wind Cutter in a game. Those may be similar in terms of the idea of shooting a vacuum to slice things with the pressure differential, but it is considered a different kind of spell that maintains that vacuum in a certain area, not fire it.

So with all this said, I was trying to develop a way to detect and block the energy waves and vibrations within that radius, keeping them from escaping to the outside. What does this all mean?

Sound is a wave. Sound travels through the spread of waves traveling through the air. Then what if that wave and vibration were blocked? Of course, no sound is heard. What would happen if you surrounded yourself with that barrier?

The answer is simple: all the sounds that go out from my side are blocked by the barrier, but I can hear the sounds coming in from outside it still. If I try harder, I might be able to block out the light as well. Light is also a wave. If you could block light too, do you think it would be like stealth camouflage? Probably not. If the light waves were completely cut off, wouldn’t it look like a gaping black hole? I won’t know until I actually try it…

The magic I developed is like reacting to the sound coming from inside and creating a vacuum layer to block it from escaping. Therefore, it is not possible to completely block all sounds within it, and it also blocks outside sounds to some extent.

If it were to respond to light, it would be possible for the light to refract as it passed through the vacuum space, making it look strange, but it wouldn’t be the kind of thing that would completely block it.

Why did I develop such a spell? It doesn’t take much to think about it. Because there is no place to talk secretly even if you want to talk secretly. I don’t think there will be any spies when I return to Manor Carruthers. So it shouldn’t be too much of a problem if my family asks me to talk.

But, for example, inside the school, in the royal castle, or in a situation where you don’t know whose eyes and ears are whose, there’s always a risk involved with having a secret conversation. So, for quite some time, I’ve been doing trial and error to see if I could create magic that would prevent the content of my conversations from leaking out. If there was such a thing, it would have been useful in various ways like in the secret talks with Simon.

That’s how I focused on Wind magic that creates a vacuum. Based on this, I thought that I could create a soundproofing zone by improving it, so I started to research. There are various problems if you just generate a vacuum space normally.

First of all, if you completely surround yourself with a vacuum, you won’t be able to hear the outside sound even if they can’t hear the sound from there. Even if you don’t have to worry about being heard by outside parties, you can’t hear sounds or conversations from outside either. It’s very inconvenient.

Then I asked myself, “What will happen to the inside if it is surrounded by a vacuum for so long?”, and a new problem arose. Since the vacuum and other fields are designed so that air does not flow into them, the surrounding air will not enter so the vacuum won’t break. What if that field completely surrounds you? Of course, you’ll eventually run out of oxygen. It does not stand up to long-term use.

That’s why I came up with the idea of a vacuum that reacts to only outgoing sound waves inside the barrier, and it blocks them so they don’t pass through. With this, only the sound that is going out from there or about to reach outside parties will be blocked.

As expected, it is impossible to block only outgoing sound while the outside sound is coming in one-way. Therefore, if the sound is always traveling freely inside the barrier, the outside sound will always be blocked. This method of soundproofing is like creating a vacuum membrane that only blocks sound waves exactly when they’re about to escape, so they aren’t heard from outside.

It’s not perfect yet, and this function isn’t perfect, but it’s a good stopgap for now. I’ve been researching it for a long time because I didn’t want to be overheard by outside parties, but this time it should be very useful.

…… Okay, I’ve calmed down a bit. Let’s do a final check while we’re calm. Only this time I can’t fail…

2 and a half months have passed since school started. Today, an evening party hosted by Second Queen Amelie will be held at the royal castle. It has not yet been announced what the purpose of the event will be.

It’s like she’s hosting it because she wanted to have a night party for its own sake. They put up some pretext, but in the end, they just wanted to show off their power at an evening party, or they wanted to connect with other families they invited, and so on.

Even so, you still need a reason for public perception. If you keep throwing flashy parties for no reason, you’ll get a lot of backlash from various places. That’s why every party has such a purpose from the start. However, this time, it’s still hidden.

As far as I’m concerned, they probably don’t have anything better in mind. I can only assure you that if I let this party go as they’re planning, it won’t end well.

Today, I will definitely rescue Alexandra. I’ve done everything possible for that. If it doesn’t work out tonight, I might throw everything away and kidnap Alexandra and then run away. Of course, it’s best not to fail, and I don’t intend to fail, but I’m prepared for that.

“It’ll be alright, Miss Flora… you’ve taken every possible measure today, haven’t you?”

“Katharina… thank you…” I said.

Katharina’s words calm my heart. It seems that there was unnecessary tension because it was my first evening party. My social debut was a long time ago, and I’ve been to small social gatherings several times since then. But it is all as Sir Caan. It’s the first time I’ve attended a night party dressed in a fashion suitable for Margrave Carruthers’ daughter, as I am now.

That day when I made my debut in society… I was Sir Caan, but I ran into a lot of trouble by wearing a bright red dress with a tight skirt… thanks to that, I was able to meet Alexandra, so those memories are just a joke.

“Fufu…” I chuckled.

“Miss Flora?” Katharina asks, looking at me strangely.

“It’s nothing… come now! Let’s go!” I said.

“Yes!”

To the field of the decisive battle. I pass in front of Helmut and board the carriage. All that’s left now is to let things play out. Just do your best and wait for destiny!