“Hm? Well, the Aram tribe is watching the border between Akeem’s territory, Canaan, and the Empire, but nothing noteworthy has happened so far.”
“There are reports of no missing persons, either,” Dirk added. “Prince Leon and Princess Shireen both signed a missive to the Empire, noting their trepidation at the recent increase in monsters. They’re planning on installing magical warding devices along the border, but all they got in return from the Empire’s so-called ‘representative of the goddess’ was praise for Bern, so we have no idea what they’re thinking.”
The Empire’s apostle told Akeem they would make Cecilia a Saint. But they hadn’t set foot in Canaan since then.
“They must’ve given up on infiltrating the empire and set their sights on some new plan.”
“I don’t know if they’re trying to create entire hordes of those beastmen, but I’m sure they’re up to something. I doubt the Empire has the nerve to challenge Bern to open conflict, but it’s not impossible, especially if they think making a Saint of your wife will let them steal her away and take you down in the process.”
Dirk was right. Bern and the Empire were pretty equally matched in terms of military power. Even if the Empire had some self-proclaimed “mouthpiece of the goddess,” Bern had me, the Hero, who wielded the divine sword. The balance of power is held even, for now.
And if you measured it by results, Bern was stronger. The Empire suppressed monsters by sacrificing Saints for divine authority. We, however, actually hunted down and killed such monsters ourselves. That won people over a hell of a lot faster. It was exactly why they didn’t want me leaving Bern, and why they used Akeem to go after Cecilia—to try to break me.
Cecilia said Akeem somehow knew information that only someone chosen by a divine relic would know. And he used that to lure her out and have the beastman attack her. That meant the Holy Emperor had to be aware that the Heroes had fated companions.
Cecilia was my sheath, my healing balm. My companion. She was the one meant for me. And if the bastard had figured out that much, it explained why their forces tried to capture the Fenrir before I went to slay the dragon. It all made sense.
They’d used the blood of a divine beast to create artificial beastmen, not to kill me but to pressure Cecilia until she would yield to accepting a man other than me. They took the goddess’s bond with the Hero and twisted it in a bid to separate her from the only man she could ever be with, before destroying Majaar and the rest of the world as they cursed her name.
But their plan had failed, so now they were trying to take her to the Empire and make her a Saint.
Or at least, that’s what I thought their new plan was.
“Lord Dirk,” Islan said, “surely making her a Saint is out of the question. She’s the princess of another kingdom.”
“Is it, though? Didn’t you try to do the same thing, Prince Islan? You tried to create a scandal to strip rank from my own sister-in-law, didn’t you?”
“Ugh, you’re awfully blunt, Lord Dirk…”
Islan wasn’t wrong. The fact that they were trying to take Cecilia from me was outrageous, but to take the second princess from another kingdom, childless and cast off from a previous engagement, and make a sacrificial Saint out of her was unprecedented.
There was no excuse for it, even if they intended to wage war on Bern in its capacity as Majaar’s protectors. I had killed the beastmen they’d created, so they couldn’t even claim that as their justification.
It would be another thing if it were Majaar behind it, since they didn’t worship the goddess. But declaring war on Bern, despite the fact that we also worshiped the goddess, and that our royal family had the golden eyes of the goddess herself, was simply unbelievable for a theocracy like the Egrich Empire.
Attacking people who worshiped the goddess above all else would be unthinkable.
“Is it because her father’s just a marquis, she had her first engagement broken off, and has no children?”
That must be it. They thought that if she caused any trouble, Bern would just let her go.
And even if I objected with everything I had, overturning the kingdom’s decision wouldn’t be easy. If they were trying to force Cecilia into a situation where Bern had no choice but to abandon her, then this plot wasn’t about killing me at all. It was about destroying her.
And if that was their real objective, then everything made sense.
They didn’t want to kill me. That was just an excuse. They really wanted to ruin Cecilia, to torture her, to break her little by little.
Otherwise, they wouldn’t be going this far to trap her.
“That’s probably it. ‘All are equal under the goddess’ sounds nice, but Cecilia isn’t of royal blood, and she’s not expected to bear an heir as the second princess. Making a Saint of her wouldn’t require a divorce either, so it’s free from political complications.”
“Killing the Hero of Bern is certainly a complication! You really think anyone else could replace him? Why wouldn’t they want his bloodline to survive?” Islan asked.
Wait, this isn’t what this is about. It’s not about me.
“Lucas may be perfect—I’ll give you that. But didn’t you also ignore the political ramifications of pursuing someone else’s bride? Any kingdom would go to any means to achieve its goals, Your Highness. This is no different. The only problem is the sheer magnitude of what they’re after.”
The Empire’s goal, and the Holy Emperor’s goal, was to destroy Cecilia.
“Those bastards…”
I thought back to when Cecilia began acting strange in the coliseum. It must’ve been because she’d heard something similar from the Aram princess and had come to the same conclusion as I just did.
There was no way a woman as strong as her would be scared of something like me dislocating the concubine’s shoulder. She wasn’t the kind of person who hid something just because she couldn’t fix it on her own.
She knew exactly what she was capable of and what was beyond her reach. And if there was even a chance someone else would be endangered, she never hesitated to ask for help, especially from me. She always chose the best course of action.
The only exception was when it involved her.
She was too quick to sacrifice herself if she thought it would lead to the best possible outcome. She’d throw herself into a fire if she thought it would accomplish something, just like she did during the Fenrir attack to buy time for others.
She was the kind of person who could make that kind of decision without even flinching, but now she was hiding something from me…
“Is she afraid I’ll find out?” The moment I said it out loud, everything clicked into place.
She was the one who’d said with a trembling voice, “I’m scared you’ll hate me because I love you so much.” She loved me enough to become my divinely appointed sheath. Cecilia reacted with raw sensitivity whenever I was concerned.