“The lady remains unchanged, it seems.” His Royal Highness the First Prince watched Lady Robur depart with a gentle expression. The last time I’d seen him had been years ago at the Academy. I’d always thought of him as a man with a cold gaze and an expressionless face, but it seemed he was capable of looking tender after all.
“A master of escape... A flawless, decisive swing toward flight. It’s almost refreshingly clean, right off the starting block.” Young Lord Robur sighed with an air of exhaustion. Rumor had it he was lenient toward his talented former step sister, yet harsh toward his own wicked, incompetent, low-magic biological sister. It didn’t really seem to be true.
The rumors about the lady had to be the same. Seeing them together twice proved the truth was different.
“Let go, Mihail! I have to chase that worthless girl!” Was Duchess Robur possessed by a demon? She struggled and tried to attack with magic, glaring at her son with a terrifying expression.
When the duchess showed signs of using magic, the prince and the young nobleman had conjured wind and water around them. Perhaps sensing their counter-magic stance, the duchess tried to suppress her uncontrollable rage, huffing and puffing to disperse her magic power. The rumors about her were completely wrong too.
Her husband was the head of one of the Four Great Ducal Houses and one of the most powerful figures among all the successive generations of captains of the Royal Mage Corps. Her son possessed a brilliant intellect and had displayed magical talent since childhood. Blessed with such an exceptional family, the duchess was the belle of society. Or that was what I’d believed long ago, before I’d received the sacred beast’s blessing.
Even then, Laviange Robur’s incompetence had already been the subject of rumor. People talked about how, a number of years ago, upon first meeting her former fiancé, the second prince, she’d behaved quite rudely. The duchess had reprimanded her, and in that moment had accidentally injured the rebellious lady with magic. The story of how she then voluntarily banned herself from using magic had reached even my ears, though I was already largely withdrawn.
I’d heard many people were sympathetic to the duchess—believing that such harshness toward herself was unwarranted for the sake of an incompetent daughter who had been rude to royalty.
But now I couldn’t help but wonder how much of that was actually true. I had my own motives for accompanying the lady, but the personality she’d shown me so far was completely different—violent and terrifying.
“Duchess Robur.” The young lord addressed his own mother by her title. His voice was so freezing cold it made me tense up.
“Mihail, you...” Duchess Robur sounded like she was practically wringing her voice from her throat, and I could feel the rage in her voice. Their eyes were the same color, and yet one gaze was cold and the other was boiling with rage. I could practically feel the temperature difference between them. Yet one thing was the same: Neither showed any trace of familial affection. These two looked so unlike the young lady who had just been smiling with such tender affection moments ago that one might doubt they were truly blood related.
The young lady possessed such warmth and loveliness, and at parting, she had even flashed a sparkling smile befitting her age. That was a side of the lady that was different from the rumors. Could that be the “cuteness differential” described in those popular novels circulating in the streets?
I’d sent my own fan fiction to publishers before. I’d be so happy if the author saw it. That was the feeling I had. The reply to my work had been written in the acknowledgments section of a later published book. Seeing it had felt like floating on air—and since it started with “To all of you,” I learned then that there were other readers like me.
Truthfully, I’d started getting interested in writing original novels too. Seeing the illustrator featured in a recent new release I’d bought made me harbor ambitions that someday my novel might be illustrated too.
Just like with novels, people who drew pictures based on the illustrations would appear. In fact, I’d started practicing drawing a little myself. I was sure more kindred spirits would join us, so someday we could gather...though that might just be wishful thinking.
“No more delays. As the next head of the household, I am taking you to the manor’s dungeon. The current head’s decree will follow shortly.”
At the sound of Mihail’s icy voice, my body jerked, and I snapped back to reality. I should have told them I’d made a deal with the priest... Oh! I’d forgotten to ask the lady about Heinz!
“A decree?! Don’t be ridiculous! I haven’t done anything! Besides, I’m the duchess! I’m your mother!”
While I’d been flustered, the tension between mother and son had only grown worse, until finally the duchess cast a Fireball spell. But the fireballs dissolved into mist one after another.
“I don’t know what you did, but I can handle any basic magic,” Mihail said.
The duchess flew into a rage at her son’s words. Wait, something terribly unpleasant was emanating from her. That ring on her left middle finger? Looking closer, I could see a peach-brown ring there, with a black mist clinging to it.
“What...is that?” I gasped. It was so sinister—yet no one else had seemed to notice the ring at all.
“It’s all that worthless girl’s fault! No, if you trace it back, it’s auntie’s fault! Yes, auntie is the one who should be punished!” The unpleasant aura swelled, and the black mist coiled around the lady.
“Auntie?” the first prince asked.
“You mean grandmother. But why?” said Mihail. He and the prince exchanged subtle glances, looking puzzled, and their eyebrows and eyes were both exquisite and beautiful. I gasped.
This was... Yes! This was the real-life version of that male-male romance novel series that had driven some readers wild! There was a lily series too. In fact, it was that author who’d popularized the idea that “lilies” meant lesbian relationships in the first place.
“Roses” had begun to appear lately as well, and this, too, originated from that author! I’d been curious about that kind of thing in literature, romance between two men, but seeing these two made me understand. Long live roses!
“Something’s wrong with her eyes,” Mihail observed. “She bears an unsettling resemblance to my sister.”
“Could it be...depravity?”
What on earth? I wondered. Even from my somewhat distant position, the roses seemed to pull back another step.
The prince whispered something inaudible even to the young nobleman beside him. What language was that? With divine protection, even the faintest whispers reach me, which often left me bewildered.
“Besides, my father-in-law and your grandfather won’t stay silent!”
Everyone turned to look at the duchess again. I’d forgotten she was there for a moment. I sensed a dissonance in her heart—she’d called the former head of the house her father-in-law and the former head’s wife her aunt.
But I trembled in fear as the black mist swelled up behind her, engulfing her and everything else.
“Grandfather is no longer the head,” Mihail told her. “He is forbidden to intervene in the affairs of the current generation.”
“No! My father-in-law desired my union with the Robur family! Yes, he wanted me as his daughter! This time, I will punish all of you! Auntie, that worthless girl, all of you!”
As if echoing the lady, the black mist tightened and coiled into a smaller form. Its darkness deepened, its shape...
“Why...” the young noble murmured in a daze, the moment it transformed into a pitch-black human form. Had others finally seen it too? Its entire body was pitch black, its face unrecognizable. The silhouette resembled a girl with long hair. It clung to the lady from behind, like it was embracing her.
The prince remained silent, his expression more grim than I’d ever seen before. Just as I was wondering if he and Mihail had seen the shadowy girl too, a shaky voice began to laugh.
“Aha ha ha ha! That’s right! She deserves punishment!” the duchess shouted in unison with the shadow-girl, her face contorted with delight.
A chill ran down my spine. Instinctively, I covered my face with my arms and rolled away from the spot. I sensed water splashing where I had been, and simultaneously heard the sizzling sound of something burning and melting. There was the echoing sound of feet stomping on the ground, and a crowing sound like that of a chicken came toward me.
“Is that a basilisk?!” shouted the young lord, hurling a water orb toward the approaching footsteps behind me before dashing toward me.
Terrified and lying flat on the ground, I could only sense what was happening through sound and movement. Whatever it was seemed to flinch from the attack and retreat. A basilisk? Not a basilisk?
The prince rushed over silently, deploying a cube-shaped barrier spell—something more difficult to create than a magical shield. The basilisk, still letting out that chicken-like cry as it approached, leaped over the cube just before it would’ve run into it, passing right over us. I sensed it by the sound and vibration.
When I felt my safety was secured and looked up, I found myself sandwiched between the two roses! It was truly inappropriate to feel my heart skip a beat at a time like this. But then I noticed the weeds where I’d been standing only moments ago had melted and scorched. I shuddered. If my instinctive perception abilities hadn’t been heightened by divine protection, then I would’ve...
Outside the unshakable transparent wall, the two women were still laughing. And then a long-tailed, long-toed creature with a cockscomb appeared... Was that a green lizard? A lizard, really?! I didn’t know much about magical beasts, but the one that spat acid at me was definitely a green lizard.