The imperial palace’s audience chamber.
The place where the emperor personally met with his subjects or envoys from other nations.
“This is an item the late emperor entrusted to me.”
Vitalianus set the wooden box down on the table and pushed it slightly toward Sylvia.
Sylvia opened the lid of the wooden box before her.
“This is…”
Inside, she discovered the Imperial Seal.
The late emperor had entrusted the Imperial Seal to the Sword Saint.
Even going so far as to abolish the post of Minister of the Imperial Seal.
Why had he done that?
Somehow, Sylvia felt she knew the reason.
“I hear the date of the coronation is being arranged.”
“That is correct.”
“I will assist as well, so that the preparations proceed without issue. And please, speak to me less formally.”
“You have not yet ascended the throne. Once the coronation is over, I will do so.”
A quiet exchange passed between them.
The atmosphere was distinctly different from when she had faced the two previous princes.
“Originally, there would have been many things to discuss, but all my questions were answered on the way here.”
Vitalianus made a move as if to bring the conversation to an end.
“Won’t you at least have some more tea before you go?”
“No. Today, I simply… wish to rest.”
“I understand.”
The two of them rose from their seats.
It had been an exceedingly short and concise meeting.
The Sword Saint asked Sylvia nothing.
“And…”
Only then did he take out a single golden medal he had kept carefully tucked against his chest and place it neatly beside the wooden box.
An octagonal medal engraved with a roaring lion.
A mark of glory, the only one of its kind on the continent, bestowed upon a single person alone.
It was the medal of the Emperor’s Guardian Knight.
The Emperor’s Guardian Knight was, in other words, the Guardian Knight of the Empire.
The shield that protected the Empire, and the sharpest sword that symbolized it.
Vitalianus had laid it down.
The medal he had carried at his breast for his entire life.
A symbol that had weighed down on his heart just as heavily, yet filled it with abundance.
Only today had he set it down.
His heart felt that much lighter.
And just as much, it felt hollow, as though emptied out.
Sylvia looked at that Guardian Knight’s medal.
The Imperial Seal, symbolizing the emperor, and the medal, symbolizing the Guardian Knight.
She quietly gazed down at the medal placed beside the Imperial Seal.
Her eyes fixed on it, she spoke in a tone without rise or fall.
“I believe you may continue to keep this. Sword Saint Vitalianus Mahel. If not you, who else could serve as the Emperor’s Guardian Knight?”
The one surprised by those words was, rather, Vitalianus.
Of course, none of it showed on his face.
Then, as though he had realized something, he gave a small nod.
“Please rescind your command. I no longer have the qualifications to bear this medal.”
“If the Sword Saint is not qualified, then who could possibly be?”
“There will be someone. Surely.”
At that firm voice, Sylvia finally looked at the Sword Saint.
“…There is one person, but he is a man with no interest in such honor or the power that follows it. I do not know if he will refuse.”
Well, as far as the Sword Saint was concerned.
“If truly there is no one, would you offer it to me again then?”
“That will not happen, I imagine.”
There would be no occasion for this heavy medal to return to him.
* * *
Sylvia’s face, seen again after so long, had grown even more gaunt.
Even though she had returned alive from the threshold of death, her complexion was worse than it had been then.
“How insolent. Do you dare mock Us?”
Sylvia spoke coldly, with a cool, resolute, and dignified expression.
Seeing her like that, Hio applauded and gave her a thumbs-up.
“Oh, you really do feel like an emperor now.”
Only then did Sylvia relax her expression and smile bashfully.
“Really? I practiced a lot in secret.”
She was trying not to let it show, at least in front of Hio.
She covered the dark circles that had formed from sleepless nights with makeup and smiled brighter than necessary.
“But did something happen? You don’t look well.”
Instead, Sylvia asked Hio that.
At that, Hio sighed with a sullen expression.
“No, it’s because of some idiot who doesn’t act his size. Don’t worry about it.”
The needlessly large Death Knight had somehow managed to reverse-summon himself and hide away.
Hio shook his head, then looked at Sylvia and asked,
“More importantly, how are you doing? Do you think the nobles in the capital will listen to you?”
Sylvia had led the Eastern Alliance army, annihilated the leadership of the First and Second Princes, and even absorbed all of their forces, but that did not mean she could lead the Empire with that alone.
In the end, she would have to win over the nobles and fill the empty positions with her own people…
“As if.”
There was no way they would follow Sylvia’s words.
“Of course, on the surface, they swear loyalty. I’m the only remaining legitimate heir, and my coronation is close at hand.”
But what lay within them was something entirely different.
Sylvia had no power base in the capital.
The only card she held was the nobles of the Eastern Alliance, but to those who had maintained their authority in the capital for so long, the eastern nobles were no different from country bumpkins.
So they swore loyalty on the outside while harboring different thoughts within.
They made plans while waiting for the powerless emperor to ascend the throne as soon as possible.
How they could fatten their own bellies even more.
How they could seize even greater power.
“Who would swear true loyalty to me now?”
Who would sincerely follow an imperial princess who had been driven into hiding by the two princes?
They would only think of using her.
“So I just changed them all.”
As she said that, Sylvia smiled broadly, and a deep gray sheen glimmered in her eyes.
The corners of her mouth lifted, making her look both cold and sorrowful.
“I’ve had enough of being used, watching my every step, and living in hiding.”
So she had changed them all.
So that they would all sincerely pledge loyalty to her.
So that they would clear away their filthy intentions and follow the new emperor from the depths of their souls.
Sylvia quietly looked down at the Imperial Seal inside the wooden box.
“Even if I become emperor, living my whole life without a single person I can trust is… too cruel.”
She gathered all the nobles and asked their souls directly.
Under the new emperor, how would they lead the Empire?
The answers were a sight to behold.
There were far more positions emptied by war than expected, and just as much to feast upon.
Politics?
The Empire’s future?
As if any of that would enter their eyes.
How to expand their factions even further.
How to gain even more profit.
Those were the only things inside their heads.
“So I just changed them all.”
Sylvia smiled bitterly.
“What do you think? Scary, isn’t it?”
At that, Hio let out a deep sigh.
He activated Ghost Eyes and looked at Sylvia.
“Yeah… it’s really scary. So that’s why a fair amount of deathly energy had built up in your body again.”
“Hehe… Oh, and about this.”
Sylvia pointed to the medal placed beside the Imperial Seal.
“Hio, do you want to take it?”
He knew very well what it was.
The medal of the Guardian Knight who protected the emperor.
The symbol of the sword and shield that protected the Empire.
A medal that every imperial citizen, regardless of status, had to show respect toward.
In the game, it had been the Guardian Knight’s medal that Vitalianus kept at his breast until the very moment he died.
“Who offers a Guardian Knight’s medal like that?”
When Hio said that with a snort of laughter, Sylvia gave an awkward smile as well.
“More importantly, are you not going to keep any other guard knights at your side now?”
“No. Is there really a need? Everyone in the imperial palace will sincerely follow me now.”
“…When you put it that way, it sounds kind of scary.”
“Though I wonder what meaning there is in loyalty like that.”
“Then I know one decent knight. Want me to introduce him?”
“A knight? You, Hio?”
“Yeah. But he’s a bit shy.”
Hio moved his mana to summon the Death Knight.
“You’ve probably seen him a few times too.”
A Death Knight wreathed in black aura rose up at once.
Because of his massive build, he had an intimidating presence.
Sylvia stared with round eyes at the hulking figure that had suddenly appeared, then soon nodded.
She did indeed remember seeing him several times on the battlefield.
Still, wasn’t he a summoned creature, one summoned by Hio in that manner?
She did not need a guard knight right away, nor did she have any intention of taking one, so she opened her mouth to refuse.
“Hey, why not? Since you ran off on your own, I summoned you on my own. What?”
“Where do you get off glaring at your master like that? Ah, you don’t have eyes, do you? Sorry.”
But for some reason, the sight of him bickering with Hio felt far too familiar.
“His name is… Ter? Teddy? Mm… Ter sounds good. His name is Ter. What? Why? It’s a pretty name.”
His appearance, smeared entirely in black, and his gloomy soul were far too unfamiliar, but the awkward hand gestures he made when flustered.
The subtle hesitation in his footwork.
Every little movement was far too familiar.
And so Sylvia froze on the spot.
“Hey, hey, go over there a bit. Don’t cling to me. No, are you embarrassed because you’re all black? You know, that’s a rather dangerous and racist thought…”
It was not that she remembered every single action.
She simply knew by looking. He had been the person who had stayed by her side her entire life.
Rather, because she had searched only for his soul, she had failed to find him.
Even without looking into his soul.
Even if that soul had changed, even if his outward appearance had changed, there was no way she would not know just by looking.
How… How could I do something so terrible to my knight, even until the very end?
“Hio.”
Toward the two who were still bickering, Sylvia smiled brightly.
“I need a guard knight.”
Even when death had come for her.
It was the very same smile she had been able to make simply because he had been by her side.
“Will you become my knight?”
She smiled brightly at the knight and held out her hand.
* * *
“His name is… Ter? Teddy? Mm… Ter sounds good. His name is Ter.”
At those words, the black knight whipped his head toward Hio, but Hio merely shrugged.
His expression could not be seen, but perhaps because their energies were connected,
Hio could roughly sense what he wanted to say and the emotions he felt.
The emotions suddenly thrown before Sylvia were exceedingly complicated.
Fluster, with a bit of worry.
And shame.
Shame at himself, who had turned far too black to stand at the noble emperor’s side.
Shame at his weakness, which had left him no choice but to become such a being.
Would Sylvia find him unpleasant? A faint anxiety.
But.
“I need a guard knight.”
Sylvia’s radiant smile.
The glittering light hanging precariously at the corners of her eyes.
“Will you become my knight?”
And the moment he saw the hand extended toward him.
All of the knight’s tangled emotions vanished as if washed away.
His flustered manner disappeared without a trace, and he walked forward without the slightest hesitation.
The hand extended toward him. The knight walked toward it as if it were only natural.
He knelt before her and supported Sylvia’s pure white hand with his pitch-black one. He bowed his head.
Only one emotion could be felt from that knight.
Sincere loyalty.
For the sake of the one before him,
if it was what Sylvia desired, he would carry out anything without hesitation—an eternal devotion.
Loyalty that would not change even in death.
Sylvia tightly clasped the knight’s pitch-black hand.
That hand, far larger than her own.
Enveloping that hand, which now felt cold unlike before, she rose from her seat.
“I want to go see the garden.”
Toward Sylvia, who had abruptly stood up, Hio smiled and nodded.
In the end, he was this happy about it.
Hio thought he really was a foolish knight, just as someone had once said.
They left the audience chamber and walked side by side toward the garden.
Sylvia’s hand remained wrapped around the knight’s large fingers.
“You know, Ter.”
Even when Sylvia called him, no answer came back.
It was because his body could not speak.
Even so, there were things that were conveyed.
The eyes that turned toward her.
The head that lowered as if to say he was listening.
The movements that seemed to show all his attention was on her.
“There were so many things I wanted to say, but now that the moment’s here, I can only think of one.”
Still, no answer came back.
But it did not matter.
Had he not always been an utterly taciturn knight?
As always, she would speak, and the knight would listen.
That alone was enough.
“Thank you. For staying by my side.”
Sylvia smiled with incomparable clarity.
“I’ll keep being grateful to you from now on too.”
The emperor and her knight.
The girl who handled souls and the knight who refused death.
Everyone they encountered on the path lowered themselves close to the ground and cleared the way.
“Thank you. Theordo.”
Nothing would obstruct their path to the garden.
* * *
The Guardian Knight’s medal lay side by side with the Imperial Seal.
Looking at it, Hio smiled.
As expected, they suited each other better when placed together.
—I… I knew this would happen!
Purnel’s voice, boiling up from deep within his soul, interrupted him just as he was smiling in a good mood for the first time in a while.
“What now? Why?”
—What do you mean, why! Why haven’t you brought up the imperial palace library yet?
“…Ah?”
Purnel made a sound as if he were pounding his chest in frustration.
Of course, since he had no chest to pound, it had to be a sound he was making entirely with his mouth.
—Good grief! This is exactly why I pleaded with you so earnestly to stop spouting nonsense and bring up the library first! Aren’t you young? Are you already, huh? Losing your mind?
“I get it. I said I get it. I just have to do it sometime today…”
He was acting exactly like a ghost whose sentiment had dried up and cracked.
“First… while I’m at it, I should draw out some of the deathly energy built up in Sylvia’s body.”
He intended to summon the Reaper.
He had to draw out the energy that had accumulated in Sylvia’s body while she was taking control of the palace, and he also needed to properly research the skill.
The outrageous penalty that prevented him from using his other skills while summoning the Reaper, and for twelve hours after the summon ended.
Just what exactly was its effect, for such an enormous penalty to exist?
Since a powerful penalty meant a corresponding power, Hio was looking forward to it.
“Now then… Reaper.”
「Skill — ‘Summon Reaper’ has been activated.」
The instant the skill activated, the room began to darken rapidly.
The energy of death began to fill it.
The Reaper appeared behind Hio’s back.
A ghost that governed death.
And…
“…”
A blood-red scythe stopped right in front of Hio’s neck.
Killing intent spread thickly, as if it would pierce his throat at any moment.
Crimson eyes flashed amid the dense darkness and looked down at Hio.
Only then did the skill description suddenly come to mind.
Only now did he remember the one sentence that had been at the very end.
「Exercise caution. The Reaper’s scythe shows no mercy even to its summoner.」