Chapter 142
***
Red blood pooled in a circle. No glory, no honor, nothing that had been built up over half a lifetime. It was a lowly, shabby end, the likes of which Karzen had never imagined since he was born. How dare you abandon the Emperor of Delo to such an unceremonious death, how dare you.......
Karzen crawled slowly to Raha. Raha Delharsa didn't even look at him all the way. He wanted to force her gaze right now.
How dare she look away from him?
"Raha......"
The voice came out, breathy and ragged.
Even the splashes of blood on her neck and chest reminded him of the countless love bites the royal lord had left on her skin in the past. In the end, nothing of Karzen remains with Raha. All that Raha had allowed was a trace of the Emperor. To die a miserable death, worse than that of an abandoned soldier, was the end of Karzen's destiny.
Dare.
You dare.......
He wanted to grab her hair and scream, but no words escaped his lips. His body, which was slowly crawling toward Raha, slowly came to a stop.
Karzen remained still, and then died completely.
***
"Open the palace gates, it’s requested by Duke Blake, Captain of the Imperial Guard!"
Marquis Duke (Blake’s father) shouted loudly in front of the tightly closed palace gates. It was late at night. Countless torches, oiled with rosin, cast murderous shadows.
Duke Blake sensed that his life was short. The guards had been decimated, and the fearsomely strong monarch had been reduced to a pasty state. One arm was completely severed and dripping with blood.
If it weren't for him, the gates would have been open. The guards wouldn't have died like this, so the Princess’s rebellion would have failed. Blake held out no more hope.
Now that the gates were open, it was unlikely that reinforcements would be able to turn the tide.
The problem was that the royal lord, or rather the experimental slave, had fallen for the Princess.
Let’s go back a little further….
His master’s love for his twin. Karzen's feelings, forged from lust and hatred, violence and tolerance, had ruined Raha Delharsa.
Blake hobbled to find Karzen one last time. As soon as he entered the secret entrance Karzen had shown him earlier, he was speechless.
Aside from the devastation, it was the swarms of lights that attacked him. Barely able to parry them with his sword, he stepped inside and.......
He couldn't even close his eyes before he saw Karzen, dead.
The body of the Emperor lay stretched out beside him, covered in blood.
And Raha Delharsa, walking slowly toward the entrance, her legs shaking terribly, but her entire body covered in blood.
Blake Duke limped over to Raha. He approached with as much concealment as he could muster, but Raha, whose senses had developed by leaps and bounds while under the auspices of the insignia, glanced back.
That beautiful, cold face was not surprising. But even Blake froze for a moment, for the breathtaking resemblance of those ashen eyes.
Duke Blake's sword pierced Raha's stomach.
"..."
Almost simultaneously, a steady stream of light attacked Blake, kicking and punching. It was like a bunch of angry children clinging to the legs of a strong adult man and beating him.
In reality, their power had long since waned. It was a mere tickle to the sturdy knight, but Blake was already in a very bad shape.
He collapsed, coughing up blood, and Raha gasped. Her whole body ached like it was on fire. But only for a moment. In the blink of an eye, almost all the pain magically subsided. Perhaps it was the power of the insignia that neutralized the pain.
Her breathing seemed to slow to a crawl.
With a clear sense of mortality, Raha looked back and forth between the entrance and the tombstone.
The tombstone was overwhelmingly closer. If she stepped outside of it, she would be dead.
Raha walked slowly toward the tombstone.
The pieces of the tombstone crumbled and crashed to the ground. Raha wiped at her bleeding stomach, then laughed and withdrew her hand.
What's the point?
His eyes were ashen, but her hair was still blue. Raha remembered Shed’s azure eyes.
She owed him so much.
She may be cold, but she knew how to be grateful.
Of course, there's a part of her that took the kindness and sacrifice of others for granted. But even for such arrogant blood, Shed Hildes....... was the man.
She spent every ounce of luck she had in this life to meet him. Raha hoped the wise men would arrive before her breath was taken, even just one, somehow. She had asked Oliver to do her a favor, maybe he would come.
Perhaps the Duke was more sensitive than Raha had expected. With the limited information available here, Raha could only speculate.
Raha sat with her eyes closed, breathing heavily. After a brief lapse of consciousness, Raha felt a hand on the front of her stomach. The hand of a boy, not very big, not yet grown, was trembling.
"Oliver?"
"Princess..."
"The wise men?"
"In front of the palace gates, just moments ago, the Marquis died."
"Really? Then....... I'd better get out of here."
Oliver grabbed Raha as she started to get up.
"If you leave this place, you'll stop breathing in less than ten minutes."
"Is .... that short?"
Oliver bit his lip and nodded. Raha's shoulders slowly slumped. This was big, and there was a very good reason she needed to meet with the wise men right now.
Oliver asked, his eyes almost tearful.
"Do you have something to say?"
Raha nodded slightly. Delharsa was a descendant of the Eye of the Expanse. According to the laws of the Empire, and the oaths made between the Imperial Family and the wise men, certain words of the Emperor must be transmitted to the wise men to take effect.
Each and every one of these words carried great weight.
"...... please speak."
"These words have no effect unless spoken directly to the wise men."
"So......."
Oliver spat out the words slowly, as if he were spitting out his heart.
"Tell me."
Some epiphanies-no, most epiphanies-come out of nowhere, like a meteor. This was strange. Why was it that the lights that were constantly attacking Blake Duke, the ones that were clearly hostile to Karzen, were the ones that were....
Why wouldn't they lunge at Oliver?
Like the Emperor, Raha could guess who these malfunctioning light clusters were not attacking.
The ones with the eyes of the expanse.
Judging by the fact that the swarms of light were not attacking, even though she herself was blinking now, it seemed that the one with the Eye of the Expanse had not attacked even once.
And the other was.......
The wise men.
Raha suddenly remembered his conversation with Duke Esther.
"What does the stars mean? The way you wrote it at the end, I don't think you meant to reveal it."
"Yes. If all goes well, you can forget about the stars."
"But there are eight wise men."
"..."
"Everyone knows the constellations are eight."
"..."
Oliver stared at her with sad eyes. At the same time, the questionable words of Duke Esther slowly flashed through her mind.
"After all, Esther is naturally connected to the Holy Land, and he has a strong relationship with the wise men. The first Duke of Esther’s name is even carved with the sages on Clock Tower Street......."
"That sculpture is not of Esther."
If the sculpture, which was said to be of the first Duke of Esther, was actually a wise man.
"Are there nine wise men?"
Oliver nodded slowly.
"Are you......a wise man?"
"I am ......princess."
Like a lie, all the puzzles she had been putting off fit together.
How a simple doctor could create a myrrh that unraveled complex magic. How a simple doctor could give up the path of a sage to become a mere doctor. And most of all, how such a small creature could have such genius medical skills. Raha, how she's made herself into such an excuse for a person.......
Raha muttered slowly.
"..."
"...Nonsense."
"..."
"It doesn't make sense......."
Raha couldn't believe Oliver's words.
She knew he couldn't be lying, and she knew what he had done, but she still couldn't accept it. The wise men of Delo were staunchly on the Emperor's side, so they rightly sided with Karzen. But.......
The stars in Duke Esther's letter was clearly a reference to the wise men. They had decided to side with her in this rebellion.
Raha didn't understand.
"Princess is the one with the eyes of the sky."
"...."
"The wise men have chosen you from the moment the former Emperor ceded the throne."
At the words that Karzen had never been Emperor to the wise men, Raha felt a deep reflexive repulsion, unable to contain the words that were forming in her mouth.
"Now?"
"..."
"What the hell....... why. Why now?"
"The former emperor was a legitimate emperor to the sages, Princess."
"...."
"Sages honor their oaths. Wise men do not block the emperor's choice."
"...."
"Until the former Emperor tried to kill you, the Eyes of the heir.....that is."
"......Ah. Right. You mean the time when the former Emperor lost his leg."
"Princess."
"That's right, that's right, that has to be the way….”
There was nothing to be sorry for. It was natural for the wise men to treat her more than anyone else as a vessel for the eyes of the expanse, but they still sided with her in the end.
"So that's why you're my doctor. The Eyes of the Sky needs to be monitored.”
****
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