Fon Maeshul.
When I arrived at that restaurant, which I too had visited quite often, I had naturally expected Yulie to be there. However, the person smiling brightly beside her was outside my expectations.
Yusepin.
From Deculein’s perspective, a named character belonging to the highest risk category more than anyone else. Though this was my first time facing her directly, I had seen her several times through a monitor, and I knew her settings inside and out.
“You must have drawn quite a bit of attention on the first floor when you arrived.”
I briefly wondered whether I should sit or not.
But I couldn’t just leave like this. Thinking about it, meeting her now might actually be better.
Yusepin was a named character who might unleash a lethal strike at any moment.
Better to stumble once in an unexpected, everyday moment than to take a critical hit at a decisive instant.
I sat down and looked at Yulie. Yulie looked at me too. Her gaze seemed quite flustered, and I felt something apologetic in it as well.
Even though Yulie had nothing whatsoever to be sorry to Deculein for.
“Yulie is my younger sister, but she is truly beautiful, and though you are a man like me, you are truly handsome.”
Jaiteu, who had entered after me, said this and that, but none of it entered my ears. I looked only at Yulie.
“How is she? How is Yulie today?”
Yusepin suddenly asked. I came to my senses and nodded.
“She is beautiful.”
For a moment, my gaze was drawn away.
She was someone whose stunning beauty stood out even in her usual makeup-less armor.
Today, she was more beautiful than anyone I had ever faced in this world.
Was this the effect of that unfamiliarity?
“Hahaha! Of course. Whose sister do you think she is!”
Jaiteu guffawed.
“By the way, it has been nearly three years since the engagement. When would be a good time for the ceremony?”
And though the appetizer had not even come out yet, he spoke while picking up his knife and fork. He looked ready to slice up and eat even the table itself.
He truly was an impatient gentleman.
“M-My lord—”
“This is a conversation between the elders of the house.”
The startled Yulie tried to say something, but Jaiteu’s pot-lid-sized palm stopped her.
“Yulie, you stay quiet.”
“······.”
Just as Yulie pouted her lips in silence.
A faintly spreading red current caught my eye.
「Villain's Fate」.
At first, I thought it had manifested from Yulie, but as expected, that could not be.
It belonged to the woman sitting beside her, smiling gently at me—Yusepin.
“Deculein, when would you prefer?”
At Jaiteu’s words, Yusepin chimed in as well.
“Yes. Please tell us. We will follow Professor Deculein’s opinion.”
Yusepin was truly the textbook example of duplicity. Without revealing even a hair’s breadth of the murderous intent hidden in her heart, she spoke so kindly.
The manifestation of 「Villain's Fate」 was nothing more than dust if one did not look closely.
No, that current had already disappeared.
It was a mask that deceived even the eyes of the Trait.
“Bitro Sygien. Grucious, Kigirln”
The door opened and the chef came in. He babbled some alien language as he served the appetizer.
Jaiteu stabbed it with his fork and ate it in one bite. It was gluttonous, yet his dignity did not falter. In the way he did not drop a single piece, there was rather the unique bearing of a martial artist.
“······I intend to leave it entirely to Yulie.”
“What do you mean by leaving it?”
Jaiteu asked, having swallowed it all.
I chose my words carefully. Yet all five of my senses were focused solely on Yusepin.
I know Yusepin’s other side.
Perhaps I am the only one who knows.
Beneath that beautiful shell exists a monster that would even devour demons.
She is a cold-blooded, cruel sociopath who does not discriminate between means and methods. A serpent wearing human skin, and a supreme powerhouse on par with Jaiteu.
However, in this world, there is only one person—
her younger sister Yulie—whom she truly loves.
Therefore, she is Deculein’s enemy. She also has more than enough ability to kill him. The organization ‘Shadow,’ which spread like a spiderweb across the underworld of the entire continent beyond the Empire, is all hers.
This is no mere metaphor; literally, all of it is her ‘possession.’
Why such a Yusepin had not killed Deculein and left him alone until now······ I do not know. Only Yusepin herself, or perhaps the author, would know.
“Deculein. What are you thinking so deeply about?”
“······I was contemplating for a moment.”
This death variable was especially threatening. Because it was killing intent that Yusepin, who was skilled at hiding herself, had momentarily failed to restrain and let slip.
I do not know the way to overcome this death variable, either. Yusepin was ever-changing and unpredictable, a truly shadow-like existence.
“I know.”
Just one thing.
From now on, I would show the sincerity of no longer harming Yulie—whom you love. Not Deculein’s sincerity, but my sincerity, Kim Woojin’s.
“You know? What?”
Jaiteu asked back.
“I know that Knight Yulie has no conviction in this engagement. If Knight Yulie does not wish it, I have no intention of forcing the marriage.”
“······What do you mean by having no intention of forcing it?”
Wrinkles formed between Jaiteu’s brows.
“In society, I am the dissolute spendthrift who squandered 200 million in one night in Ruthen. Even now, if I break off the engagement, everyone would blame me.”
“Then, do you mean you deliberately scattered money at that auction? For Yulie?”
“It is not quite like that.”
I shook my head.
“Do not worry. Even if Knight Yulie wishes to break off the engagement, the relationship between Yukeurain and Phaireulden will remain firm.”
Yulie lowered her head. I thought she was moved······ but her two hands were trembling violently. Rather, she looked like she was desperately suppressing her anger.
Even beside Yusepin, the red current of 「Villain's Fate」—no, a faint speck of dust—flared up and then subsided.
It was the wrong answer.
I moistened my parched mouth with cold water.
“Tsk-tsk. That won’t do, that won’t do. How can you speak of breaking off the engagement so lightly?”
“My my. To think you had such thoughtful consideration. Professor Deculein, you are quite the wonderful man~”
Jaiteu hardened his expression and shook his head.
Yusepin was smiling, but she did not truly accept my sincerity.
“Calling off the engagement for such a trivial reason—the elders of the house would never permit it. Rather, seeing that you have such a heart, we only wish to be with you more.”
“······.”
I swallowed a sigh inwardly.
Certainly, a broken engagement between nobles had too many mutual constraints. Especially when it involved a great house whose affiliates numbered not thousands or tens of thousands, but millions.
The elders of Phaireulden, whom Deculein had buttered up in advance, would be bewildered, and Yeriel, too, would probably say,
“Didn’t you bitch and whine about wanting to get engaged? Break it off? Go ahead, do it. You take responsibility for everything. ······What? Cooperate even if we break it off? I don’t want to. Why should we help that margrave? Don’t you know we’re strangers if we break it off? Hand over that 200 million!”
I could easily imagine it.
“······My lord.”
Then, Yulie spoke.
It happened to be when the main dish, the steak, arrived.
“Please leave the two of us alone. I beg of you.”
Yulie looked at me with transparent eyes. Sensing her earnestness, Jaiteu said,
“If you permit it, Deculein.”
“I do not mind.”
“Very well. Let it be so. Yusepin.”
“Yes~”
The two rose from their seats and went outside. No, as they went out, only Yusepin poked her head back in from the threshold.
“Have a good conversation~”
And so Yusepin left.
No, she pretended to leave.
I know her personality. Naturally, she must have employed some trick for eavesdropping.
However, fortunately, Yusepin did not know. That I had her personality figured out.
“······You’ve become a bit more intelligent.”
Yulie muttered first. She bit her lip hard, making it stick out like a duck’s bill.
“Intelligent, you say.”
I nodded. Indeed, previously, he had not been the least bit intelligent.
I know Deculein’s one-dimensional evil deeds. Not just from the game, but from gathering all the rumors heard in this world, the contents were······.
Even before the formal engagement, mobilizing his family’s connections to urge the engagement, promising all kinds of vested interests to Phaireulden to persuade the vassals and elders, making them continuously pressure Yulie,
excluding her from activities at the front lines under the pretext that ‘battle is dangerous,’ and jealous of Yulie’s fellow knights, eventually expelling them, and threatening the superior who reprimanded Yulie with his family’s authority, causing Yulie to be isolated within the Imperial Knights,
eventually Yulie herself quit the Imperial Knights, suffering serious damage to her career, and then he shamelessly promised her the position of commander of the Hadekain Knight Order, owned by Yukeurain, and when Yulie refused, spreading all sorts of bizarre rumors throughout high society,
and even so, when Yulie did not give up and rose through her own talent, this time employing schemes to prevent her from joining another knight order, obstructing everything she tried to do,
tormenting her, making her cry, and enraging her like that, until Yulie asked Yusepin for help,
tormenting her again, making her cry again, and enraging her again,
mistaking the emotion called affection for a cursed desire to ‘keep her only by his side’—all those devil-like acts of trying to destroy everything around Yulie so that she could lean on no one but himself.
I know.
Therefore, I understand Yulie’s hatred.
She hates not me, but Deculein.
I asked nonchalantly as I cut the steak.
“It seems you cannot break off the engagement on your own. No, from now on, neither of us can do as we please. We’ve come too far.”
“······.”
“Then you should have refused from the very beginning.”
Yulie trembled. Then she glared at me with eyes filled with fury.
“Now, finally, are you starting again?”
Her voice was trembling.
Perhaps because of how much she had suffered until now, she seemed on the verge of tears.
“What do you mean? Do you mean to pressure your new knight order? I heard it’s doing quite well these days.”
The knight order ‘Freheim,’ which Yulie herself had founded with her comrades. It had only been a year, but with several knights who had been won over by Yulie’s character, it was weaving its own success story.
“Ah, really!”
Yulie turned her fork around in a reverse grip and stabbed the steak hard.
“You really, forcing your way even into this kind of place!”
Chomp chomp—
And then she tore off the whole piece and shoved it into her mouth.
Sauce splattered on her lips, her dress, and the table.
“I did not force this meal. Jaiteu—”
“You forced it to happen and now—!”
Chomp chomp—
Yulie was deliberately doing things I hated right now.
To think there was such a petty revenge in this world.
Chomp chomp—
However, surprisingly, it was working bit by bit. The sauce flying every which way was clouding my mind. It was striking at my mental fortitude.
“Stop—”
“This is how I always eat!”
“······.”
“Ah, it’s delicious!”
I closed my eyes. Chomp chomp, smack smack—even that sound alone made my brows twitch, but I regained my composure and opened my eyes.
“Yulie, I will not do that anymore.”
“I won’t fall for it!”
“I know that until now, I have bound you, and your family has also bound you.”
“······What?”
The violent forking finally stopped. Yulie glared at me, sauce and grease smeared around her mouth.
“What are you trying to say right n—”
“I am saying that I have done many wrong things until now.”
I picked up a napkin. Yulie’s face contorted strangely.
“However, it is not just me. Your sister and your older brother are also overbearing.”
Yulie clenched her teeth.
“······No. They—”
“If you say they are not overbearing, then what is the reason they prevent your broken engagement?”
To me, it was already a setting I knew inside and out. I probably knew the house of Phaireulden better than Yulie herself.
Yulie was a woman who always sacrificed herself for her family.
“Of course, it is because you want the marriage!”
“I said I would follow your will. Does that also feel false to you?”
“······.”
Yulie closed her mouth. And she looked at me. As if trying to see right through me.
“That’s right. I am not honest.”
“······?”
“I have no faith, nor do I have firm convictions.”
Yulie’s face was a mixture of surprise and bewilderment. Those round eyes and cheeks of hers were cute.
“You are nothing like that straitlaced ideal of a person you desire. You are the very archetype of a mage, one utterly unsuited to you.”
Deculein’s ego would have flatly rejected any words that damaged him.
He would never have said them with his own mouth, not even if it killed him.
If he had been Deculein, that is.
“But Julie, do you not desire the position of ‘Guardian Knight’?”
“!”
Julie’s eyes flew wide open. Her face was one of sheer shock and terror, as if screaming, How did you know?!
For this wish must have been a long-cherished desire she had never spoken of to anyone, one she had kept only to herself.
“How did you…”
“To become a Guardian Knight, you need your family’s consent, but your family will likely obstruct you.”
“No, no. That is not true. My family—”
“To become a Guardian Knight, you must leave your family. You know that as well, which is why you have hidden it all this time, is it not?”
“…”
The Guardian Knight was the pinnacle of knights, the highest honor a knight could grasp. In other words, the Empire’s Greatest Sword.
However, a Guardian Knight had no family.
They could marry, but they could not belong to any house. They were knights who guarded only the “Empire.”
The problem was that, even if it was glory for the person themselves, from the family’s perspective, it was nothing more than an honorary post with no real benefit.
For guarding the entire Empire meant having no involvement whatsoever in disputes between families and territories. They did not even possess any political voice.
It stood in opposition to the Freyden family, who harbored strong ambitions in central politics.
“Yes, this will do.”
I smiled faintly, as if a good idea had occurred to me.
“Let us maintain the engagement, but refrain from marrying. I sincerely wish to let you go, but given the various interests entangled in this situation, I cannot. So use my name as a shield until you wish otherwise.”
“…?”
“If you are with me, and if that relationship appears amicable, they will not go out of their way to block your path.”
“…”
“Until then, I will maintain the engagement and wait. I have no suitable spouse in mind anyway.”
I added a mischievous remark, as if joking.
“And who knows? As time passes, your heart may change.”
Only then did Julie’s expression turn serious.
“…Just what are you plotting? Why are you saying such things now?”
“It is not a plot. If you wish, I can even swear an oath.”
When I brought up an oath, Julie was shocked once more.
“There is no need for that! I do not seek anything from trust. I am merely… curious about what you want. If perhaps it is my, my body, no, if that is what you mean! Absolutely not!”
A faint blush rose to Julie’s cheeks.
I understood very well what she was worried about.
“…What I want.”
There was nothing I wanted.
I merely wished, just like you, to spend time like this and break off the engagement.
I did not want to make you kill me, nor did I want those around you to kill me.
Even so, if you insist on doubting my sincerity.
Then it would be right to give you an answer befitting that doubt.
“Who knows.”
I looked at Julie. Julie was tense all over.
Only belatedly did I realize how quiet this restaurant was.
There was no noise, no disturbance.
Only the gulp of Julie swallowing.
And the faint presence of a shadow hiding somewhere, relaying the conversation taking place here.
“Who knows…”
For Yusephin, who was surely listening not far away,
I prepared my line.
“Yes. This will do.”
However, let us not misunderstand.
This was a performance to win Yusephin’s favor, a means to eliminate that death variable.
It was nothing more than that.
“Once a day.”
…Surely, that should have been the case.
Yet my voice was strangely tinged with sincerity. I stroked my chin, pondering the reason.
“No, once a week.”
Strangely enough, in front of Julie, I could do anything with ease.
I could smile, I could be at peace, and I could allow myself to be even slightly disheveled.
What was the reason?
It was simple.
“If you truly cannot find the time, then once a year is too much, so even just once a month…”
Deculein truly loved this woman.
So much so that even that affection remained as part of his personality.
“…Smile for me. That is all I wish for.”
I said with a gentle smile.
And then, there was silence.
“…”
Julie said nothing. She merely blinked.
After staring blankly like that for a long while, she innocently asked back.
“Th, wha, eh? Shmile?”
It was not even really a question. The broken words spilling from between her foolishly parted lips, and the final squeak in her voice, were cute.
“No, what…”
Julie only moved her lips before lowering her head deeply. As if static electricity had sparked somewhere, her hair puffed up.
Her honest reaction, like a startled animal, was cute.
“…”
However, there was no agreement in that silence. Nor was there affection.
It was a cold burden, and a frigid stillness.
I did not mind.
And yet, an unconscious sigh slipped out.
At my sigh, Julie reacted noisily. The crown of her bowed head flinched. Between her snow-white strands of hair, her pretty part flushed red like a tomato.
I handed her a napkin. Julie glanced up, then quietly wiped away what had gotten on the corner of her mouth with it.
“Haha.”
I simply laughed. Julie slightly furrowed her brow and grumbled.
“What, what are you laughing at? I won’t be fooled!”
“Fine. Believe it or not, do as you like. I will do as I told you.”
Even if you say that, I will not be fooled. I will not be fooled. Absolutely…
Julie muttered to herself.
Clink, clink.
After that, there was only the sound of utensils moving.
No, there was one more thing.
[ Villain’s Fate: Death Variable Overcome ]
◆ Reward Acquired: Shop Currency +2
At last, my currency balance had exceeded 10 won.