CH 46

(Haron’s POV)

Each time Haron answered with ease, the Duke’s brow furrowed even more.

“…I’ve already given you enough leeway and it seems that you’re going out of your way to be even more insolent. You know better than anyone else that there’s nothing that I wouldn’t know.”

“Have you been watching me?”

A smile slowly appeared on Haron’s face.

It was a warm smile like a calm, breezy day. However, the atmosphere that they exchanged was very cold and sharp like ice picks.

“Yeah, you’ve grown up, and you’ve worked hard for Blake Family. I thought I’d respect you a little, but it appears that it’s too much for you that you started to betray my kindness.”

Haron wanted to question the venomous words that were said by the Duke.

Respect? Kindness?

‘Maybe the Duke and I have a different understanding of what those words meant.’

Haron, who didn’t take it seriously, turned around. But the Duke grabbed him by the shoulder.

“Are you treating my words as a joke?”

“…”

“You know that my words will put all of your servants and knights in danger?”

The Duke said in a threatening voice.

However, the reaction that came back from Haron was a teasing sneer.

“Do you think that I’m still the same person who stupidly used to listen to you? Are you still using those same pathetic methods to coerce me to listen to you?”

“What…!?!”

“Unfortunately, I’m not the same little kid who used to be afraid of those words now.”

Haron’s purple eyes were shining exceptionally brightly. The Duke flinched back because his smile appeared both beautiful and somehow creepy.

“…You must have gone crazy.”

“Think as you please. Anyways, thanks to the Duke, I have nothing else to lose.”

After all, there were only a few knights on his side that continued to follow him. He really felt sorry for them to be involved in this mess because of him, but…

‘If I fall for his threat again, then nothing would change.’

Haron looked at the knights waiting for him from a few steps away. He smiled softly as he saw the two were still fighting, nudging each other with their elbows.

The Duke gritted his teeth when he saw Haron’s back, while smiling without hesitation as if he didn’t care about what he just said.

“Hey.”

“Yes, Duke.”

The aide who was listening to them from the side, answered quickly. The fact that the Duke’s current mood was not very good and could be felt, even if he closed his eyes and listened to the conversation between the two, was not a good sign.

“Call the Tower.”

“What kind of request would you like to make?”

“Find the maid.”

The Duke spit out words one at a time as if he was spitting them out in a sullen voice.

“The silver-haired maid that I met back at the lord’s estate. Bring that girl to me.”

* * *

(Lucia’s POV)

“We are very grateful for all of your donations and your grace. Please come inside.”

The old priest bowed his head and greeted Lucia and Shud when they visited the temple.

“This place is empty too.”

Lucia clicked her tongue and muttered.

They tried to visit all of the temples that were located within the lord’s territory, and they even visited the nearby temples from other territories and investigated all of them.

Since the Scripture itself was the most important object in the temple, they had to donate a lot of money to loosen up their guard so then they could have time to enter the temple to investigate it from the inside.

This was the last temple in the territory.

“You’ve already spent a lot of money, will you be okay with that?”

Shud asked carefully, as if weighing her heart. But Lucia answered in a normal and indifferent way.

“It’s okay. I’m just a woman with nothing but money.”

It wasn’t important to lose that much money now.

The problem was that we hadn’t been able to find a volume of the Scripture with the necessary information even after several days of hard work.

“Shud, don’t you remember exactly where you saw the book and how much information it had?

“Yes, my father was such a faithful believer that he even sent a delegation to temples all over the continent to rent out even just one volume of the Scripture. I saw the Scripture when I went there with him, but what part of the country it belonged to…”

He frowned and dragged out his last words. It’s strange to remember such a pattern among so many volumes of the Scripture, but it made no sense to even remember where it was seen.

“Now what? It seems like it would take too long to search the temples of other territories one by one like this.”

“Well…”

Shud patted his chin for a moment and pondered.

After a while, he opened his mouth in a cautious tone.

“Do you have any contacts in the capital?”

“Connections? Why all of a sudden?”

“This is strictly confidential, but…”

He tilted his head towards Lucia’s ear.

“As far as I know, there is a copy of all the volumes of the Scripture within the Empire located in the capital.”

“A copy?! Why now-!”

“Shh!”

Shud quickly cut off her words. Then, he slowly moved his eyes and looked around.

“It’s not something to be said out loud near a temple.”

The Scripture is a sacred book. The news of the existence of a copy of all the volumes of the Scripture is, of course, top secret. Because there would be nothing good for that information to be exposed not only to the believers but also to the non-religious Imperial members as well.

“Then, if I am able to go to that Great Hall, would I be able to see all the manuscripts of the Scripture?”

“There’s no way. That’s why I asked if you have any connections in the capital?”

As he spoke, Shud let out a deep sigh.

“No, pretend you didn’t hear that. Well, even if you do, you won’t be able to have a lot of connections. It’s a book that ordinary people wouldn’t even know about, so they can’t show it to anyone. At least unless someone has a connection with the imperial family or the Great Hall of Fame…”

Shud’s voice gradually grew smaller and smaller.

Leaving him mumbling to himself, Lucia fell into thought.

“If it’s a connection from the capital…”

It was also true that as soon as she heard those words, a person immediately flashed through her mind.

“There is this person with very good connection.”

* * *

On their way back from the temple tour, the two of them stopped by the village market to shop.

“I hate carrots. Let’s take them out.”

“That’s not possible.”

“I don’t like beans either. Why are you buying the things that I hate?”

“Wow… Well, what kind of thing does Miss Lucia like?”

“Cake.”

“…That’s not possible.”

Lucia narrowed her eyes at Shud’s resolute answer and looked at him intently.

‘Vegetables? Good. Healthy food? Great. But I don’t need to be healthy. It’s the body of a Devil, so even if I didn’t do anything, I would still be healthy! Just let me eat something delicious!’

Several times she tried to persuade him by saying so, but Shud remain steadfast in his decisions.

“Tina sees and learns from your behavior.”

“Tina is at the academy. Besides, she’s healthier and eats a lot more variety than me.”

“Of course. Tina is just a child, who was never a picky eater even when she was young.”

A proud smile filled Shud’s face. Oh, this younger brother is a real siscon.

After a few more arguments like that, the shopping trip was over. Shud, who was usually docile, became stubborn during times like this.

In the end, she was in the middle of moping around because she couldn’t get what she wanted.

As they entered a road with few people nearby, Lucia felt a strange aura nearby. There was no one there when she looked back, and this happened several times.

She kept her gaze straight ahead and whispered in a low, quiet voice.

“…Shud.”

“Yes.”

“Do you notice something strange?”

“Um, it seems so.”

“Then let’s run in three. One, two-.”

At the count of three, they started running towards the inside of an alleyway.

As they started to run, she could feel the trail chasing after them.

‘It doesn’t seem to be an assassin.’

‘If it was an assassin, Shud and I wouldn’t have noticed them in the first place.’

In addition, if their targets began to run, the assassins would have taken a shortcut that would block them from the front rather than follow them from behind straight away.

Or maybe they would have taken a step back for a while and tried again later for a better opportunity instead of chasing after vigilant targets.

Most of all, they seemed too strong to be an assassin.

‘But they’re not just thugs or anything like that.’

If they were mere thugs, they wouldn’t even have thought of hiding themselves. Lucia felt troubled while running.

‘I can definitely feel the presence of someone following me, but strangely, I haven’t seen anyone yet.’

‘No way….’

After thinking about it, Lucia hastily took the shopping bag that Shud was holding.

Then she took out a bag of beans from inside and threw it at her back, where she could feel the presence.

“Ugh!”

“Argh! What the hell!”

Suddenly, the voices of bewildered people appeared out of nowhere.

‘As expected.’

As soon as she realized that she was right, Luica stopped running.

Beans scattered in the air collided with something transparent and flew to another place and crushed as if they had been stepped on.

Shud, who was next to me, asked me in a confused voice.

“…What the hell is going on here?”

“People who used invisible magic are following us.”

“Invisibility… Magic?”

He tilted his head as if he was hearing an unfamiliar story, then looked back at me with suspicious eyes.

“If you had noticed, there would have been other ways… Did you throw beans on purpose?”

“No, I didn’t.”

‘How nice would it have been if we bought a cake.’ Lucia thought.

Still, with Shud’s eyes full of doubt behind her, Lucia went over to the place where the beans were trampled and crushed, as she said.

“I don’t know where the wizards are, but why are you following us?”

“…”

“I know that you’re here, so unlock your invisibility magic or I’ll pour flour and oil this time.”

“Ok, I got it! I got it!”

At the end of the remark, two people appeared out of thin air. One woman and one man. As expected, both were wizards who used transparency magic.

They groaned and illustrated a scene of stepping on beans as they started slipping and falling.

Lucia smiled at the sight, and Shud bit his lips while holding back his laughter.

“What the hell, are they wizards? Do you know them, Lucia?”

“I don’t know. I’ve never seen… ah.”

She thought it was her first time seeing them. But there was a mixture of faces that she was familiar with.

“You remember me, don’t you?”

Luica approached the male wizard and asked, while staring him in the face.

The wizard nodded slowly with an embarrassed look on his face as if he was ashamed of himself.

“Long time no see, miss.”

He was a magician from the Tower who visited the estate with the Duke two years ago.