“Ah, so you never noticed—I suspected as much. You truly are rather gullible.” Lydilia gave a wry smile.
“Let me guess,” Allen cut in. Even with the little information he had, he could easily conjecture. “You took over when Charlotte was imprisoned, didn’t you?”
“Precisely. I awakened myself inside her and made the necessary arrangements for escape.”
“What?! Does that mean you saved me, Lydilia?!”
Lydilia explained how she had magicked the soldiers into deep sleep then searched out a safe escape route. Once she awakened Charlotte, she herself had gone back to sleep. “I have been dormant inside you all along. However, I was dimly aware of what was happening in the outside world. Your predicament then had gone too far... I just couldn’t let you suffer. Forgive me for acting without your permission.”
“Please don’t apologize. If that’s true, you saved my life!” Charlotte’s face brightened.
“Indeed...? When you put it like that, you make me blush.” Lydilia averted her eyes bashfully.
“Now my sister’s escape makes sense...hm?” Natalia suddenly frowned and went quiet. She pondered over something for a little while, then she fixed her sharp eyes on Lydilia. “Then...there’s one thing I’d like to ask you.”
“Fine, you may ask it.”
“You said you’ve been watching the outside world from inside her body.”
“Yes, I was vaguely aware of it—it was like walking in a dream.”
“That means... That means, you...!” Natalia raised her voice, tinged with tormenting regret. “You must have known how the Evans household was treating her! So you looked on without doing anything to help?!”
“Indeed... That’s correct.” Lydilia said quietly, nodding.
Natalia caught her breath. Her eyes brimming with tears, she shook the saint’s body. “Why didn’t you come out back then...?! If you’d come to the surface, it would’ve been so easy for you to crush rabble like them!”
“Natalia...” Charlotte looked down; her little sister’s urgent protest was too painful to watch.
Her failure to save her older sister from her family had always tortured Natalia’s conscience. Allen, seeing that regret bursting out of her now, placed a gentle hand on her shoulder.
“No, Natalia,” Allen said softly. Charlotte had been treated like a slave at the Evans house. If the innate powers of the saint had awakened inside her, she would have likely faced much less oppression. However, it certainly wouldn’t have made her life any easier. “Lydilia kept herself hidden on purpose,” he said.
“Why...?!” Natalia shouted.
“Let me ask you another question,” Allen said, peering into Natalia’s face. “A young daughter of the duke, or a young girl who has the powers of a saint. Which one would people deem more useful?” It was a cruel question, but he had to ask it.
Natalia was startled.
On the one hand, Charlotte would have simply been a piece in the political game to further the clan. On the other, they could have the political influence of a reincarnated saint known by everyone in the kingdom. The difference in her value was more than clear. Although Charlotte had been loathed by the family as the child of a mistress, her enemies were merely the people of the household and the prince she had been engaged to. But if people had gotten hold of the fact that she was a saint reborn, she would no doubt have become a target for many more villains.
“In the worst case, they might have tried to wipe out Charlotte’s consciousness completely,” Allen said.
“Wh-What...?! Even though it’s her body?!”
“Because that would make her more valuable,” he said. If Charlotte’s personality were erased from her body, the saint in her pure form would be reawakened in the present world. For a political ruler, she would have been the perfect symbol to use for their benefit. Natalia paled as this dawned on her. Allen patted her head and turned to look at Lydilia. “So you stayed silent on purpose to protect Charlotte’s life. Isn’t that right?”
“Hmph... You’re quite a sharp one.” Lydilia grinned. With a casual wave of her hand, she set off a swirling gust of wind. “I excelled at magic since I was a small child. I was ten when they began to call me a saint.”
“So I’ve read,” Allen said.
By the time she was ten, Lydilia had already achieved numerous legendary acts. She developed a new system of magic and quelled a massive natural disaster that had been set off by a record-breaking torrential rain. She prevented the attack of a horde of magical beasts on the kingdom all by herself. Her name lay claim to more than a score of such deeds.
At the same time, the Kingdom of Neils, which was then a young nation, grew more and more powerful with her successes. Thanks to the saint’s achievements, the monarch gained popularity among the people and the kingdom established a significant presence among the surrounding kingdoms. The saint was truly worthy of being called a messiah.
“The king at the time gave me many missions,” Lydilia said. “I had to fly around the world to carry them out—indeed, I barely had any time to sleep.”
“But thanks to your work, the influence of the Evanses grew exponentially,” Allen said.
“Quite right. My clan was one of the poor nobility. My parents and my little brother were both delighted by their change of fortune. Thus I did my very best to fulfill my saintly duties...”
Her hard work, however, had been her downfall. One day, she suddenly fell ill and disappeared from the public. Allen turned over a page in his documents. “You caught a plague and became bedridden,” Allen said. “It says you appeared before the people from time to time after that...but unfortunately, the treatment failed, and you passed away at the tender age of eighteen.”
“Hm...that is the long and the short of it,” Lydilia said vaguely, averting her eyes. She seemed to be disappointed by her own fate.
But Allen sensed something odd in her demeanor. She...lied about something just now. He looked down at the papers and reread the passage about her death. He couldn’t find anything contradictory. Allen tilted his head in puzzlement.
Lydilia’s tragic tale brought a gloomy silence upon the room.
“I wonder,” Charlotte spoke up timidly, “did you really pass away so young, Lydilia? I got the impression you were much older...”
“This manner of speaking was requested of me, for it sounded more saintly. Now, try as I might, I cannot shake off the habit.” Lydilia chuckled cheerily.
“So...” Natalia said, clenching her fists, “You were protecting my sister by staying hidden?”
“You could say so,” Lydilia answered with a deep nod. She glanced at Charlotte in the mirror and went on, “I knew of Charlotte’s situation. However, she still had a future promised to her as the wife of the second prince. I supposed it was a matter of time until her circumstances would improve...but that conspiracy was the last straw.” She slowly shook her head, apparently referring to the false charges levied against her by the prince, her ex-fiancé.