78.
Honestly, if it had been in the past, it was an offer I might have been tempted by.
Back when I desperately needed even a single helping hand, certainly.
But not now.
“Yes, if you’d only intended to look, you might have found the culprit already.”
“……”
“But you didn’t. You just chose the easier option. Not believing me.”
“……”
“Stop trying to do things now, Rohwinas. You’re in the way.”
I raised my hand and pressed hard against Rohwinas’s shoulder, pushing him away.
For a moment, he stood his ground as if he wouldn’t move, but at last, he slowly retreated.
I swept my fallen hair back behind my ear and straightened up.
“I’ll find that perverted bastard myself, so don’t interfere. Got it?”
“Do you think you can lay a hand on Peregrine?”
“Thanks to you, I’ve got a connection there too. Your ex-lover’s fiancée is there, isn’t she?”
Rohwinas exhaled as if he had heard something utterly absurd.
“Nonsense.”
With his back to the sunset-lit window, a deep shadow fell over Rohwinas’s face.
Within it, his emerald-like eyes gleamed faintly.
“This is my business too. So I have more than enough right to interfere.”
“Oh, really?”
“If there is another culprit, if you truly are innocent.”
“……”
“I’ll have to confirm it with my own hands.”
“Do whatever you want with that.”
Even as I answered so indifferently, rationally, another thought was quietly creeping in.
The man who was supposed to be Peregrine’s heir had a fairly terrible personality too, but,
of all people, the one holding the key was Meriana Peregrine.
‘No matter what I ask, she’s definitely not the type to answer obediently.’
But…….
‘If Rohwinas asks, her reaction will be different from the start.’
For a moment, I weighed my pride against the benefit, then made my decision.
“Maybe we can make a deal, at least.”
“A deal?”
“Like just now. We exchange one piece of information at a time.”
“You’re calmly making use of a mage of House Kanesion, and you still have more to take from me?”
I frowned.
“Wait, what did you hear from Margaret to make you say that?”
“Margaret did not break her oath.”
Of course, even an “oath” had loopholes. But I’d thought no one would bother digging into them…….
Since Rohwinas couldn’t possibly be the culprit, it seemed I had unconsciously lowered my guard around him all this time.
‘From what he said earlier, do those people not know they drank a potion too……?’
Of course, he might have known and said it that way just to turn my insides upside down.
‘Well, does it matter?’
If I could learn what was going on inside Peregrine through Rohwinas,
then in the meantime, I would have more room to focus on the antidote, so either way, it was to my advantage.
It was just as I turned away as though it were nothing.
A half-folded, crumpled piece of paper lay at my feet.
I lowered my head and picked it up.
“If you’re going to keep acting this recklessly just to get clues, ……Roxan?”
I sensed Rohwinas saying something as he approached me.
But.
I couldn’t take my eyes off the paper.
After reading it to the end, I immediately began gathering the papers of the same material scattered around me.
And I read through them thoroughly.
‘Large-scale gathering…… near the imperial capital…… ritual…… sacrifice…….’
“Kidnapping?”
At my murmur, Rohwinas lowered his head to check the paper in my hand.
His eyes narrowed at once as well.
To summarize only the important parts, the document was roughly as follows.
[A large-scale ritual is scheduled to be held near the imperial capital.]
[The quota of sacrifices must be filled by the appointed date.]
[The requirements for sacrifices are youth and purity.]
[The more sheltered and ignorant the human, the better; select sacrifices of a type easy to corrupt.]
[The objective is to refine humans and create something called crystallized stones.]
And…… a list of sacrifice candidates.
Parts of it had been crossed out, deleted, and torn, but among them, there was exactly one name I could clearly read.
Because it was someone I knew.
‘So, if it wouldn’t be too much trouble, may I ask your name and house?’
‘I’d like you to be my friend.’
Romi Ebisyu.
The hand holding the paper trembled finely.
My head was hot, and my heart was pounding.
‘I have to calm down.’
Rohwinas grabbed my wavering arm and pulled me toward him.
Half leaning against Rohwinas, I took a deep breath.
Rohwinas, who had taken the paper as if snatching it away, asked a moment later.
“Is there a name you know here? Is that it?”
“……”
Rohwinas clicked his tongue quietly.
“Nothing good comes from getting tangled up in filthy business like this.”
I pushed Rohwinas away and stood straight.
“……I have to go.”
“Roxan.”
Rohwinas called me in a voice softer than before.
“Do you want help?”
The moment I heard those words, someone came to mind.
I turned around without answering.
It seemed this man being caught by the duke had been an unexpected situation for them.
Once they confirmed the anomaly, they were certain to check the documents they had hidden here first.
So I had to erase the traces of having searched the room. I knew that. I knew, but.
Rohwinas suddenly turned his upper body and began tidying the bookshelf.
“I’ll clean up here.”
“……”
No words of thanks came out.
After sweeping the important documents together and stuffing them into my clothes, I headed for the window. I threw it open just like that and stepped onto the windowsill with my left foot.
“Roxan.”
When I looked back one last time.
“You can’t do anything on your own. You know that, don’t you?”
Instead of answering, I leapt out the window.
* * *
“Ah, you startled me!”
Daena, shocked, staggered and barely managed to keep her balance.
“My lady?”
“I-I just missed my footing. You can go back now!”
Daena drove out the servant who was about to enter the room and slammed the door shut.
There was already a prior guest inside Daena’s room.
In the middle of a room that was less antique than charming, yet somehow gave off a subtly avant-garde air.
A woman stood there brazenly, still wearing muddy shoes, her hair disheveled, cheeks flushed, and just now catching her rough breath.
“Are you crazy? What are you doing here?”
Before she knew it, Daena had grabbed the woman’s arm and was smacking her on the back.
Normally, the woman would have whined, ow, ow, making a fuss about how much it hurt……
But she seized Daena by the shoulders.
Large, vivid golden eyes stared at Daena.
“Where’s Romi?”
“What? Ah, Romi? Why are you suddenly asking about her?”
“Have you heard anything?”
Daena’s expression shifted ambiguously.
Asha barely managed to keep her patience as she listened to her heart pounding in her ears.
“Did something happen?”
“Not exactly……. It’s just that I haven’t been able to reach her since the day before yesterday. I sent her a letter, and normally she’d write back right away. But…….”
“Okay, I understand.”
Asha walked toward the window she had come in through, then turned back.
Then she spoke to Daena, who was standing there blankly, as if she couldn’t grasp the situation.
“Just in case, you stay at home for a while too. Don’t go wandering around.”
“Why? What…… what’s going on right now?”
Daena took a step forward.
“Where are you going?”
“Home. See you later.”
Asha smiled faintly and leapt lightly out the window.
Daena rushed to the window and hurriedly stuck her head out.
She saw Asha slide down along a tree branch and land on the ground.
“Wh-who said we’d see each other later?!”
Daena shouted in a fit of temper, then belatedly clapped a hand over her own mouth.
But unable to hold back, she shouted again at the back of Asha’s head as she climbed over the wall.
“But where are you really going? You are going home, right?”
Asha vaulted over the wall and disappeared.
Daena gripped the window frame, biting her lip at an ominous feeling she couldn’t explain.
“Miss, what is all this commotion?”
She remained that way until a maid flung open the door and came inside.
* * *
Isitan was brushing a horse’s mane when he suddenly sensed someone’s presence and turned around.
Before their eyes even met, he heard her voice.
“I found the pervert who fed someone the elixir—the man connected to that pattern…….”
“…….”
“I searched his house. And by chance, I found something.”
Isitan set down the brush and slowly walked toward where Asha stood.
Her hair was disheveled, the tip of her nose reddened.
She was trying to speak as calmly as she could, but an anxiety she couldn’t control was seeping into her voice.
“There’s going to be a large-scale ritual. And a sacrifice—they said they’re going to offer a sacrifice…….”
“How much time is left?”
“……Three days.”
“That’s enough.”
Beneath the sky where dusk was falling.
With the light at his back, Isitan’s face was hard to see clearly.
But Asha felt something within that deep shadow—a tranquil gaze.
It resembled darkness so very closely, and yet it was something that did not waver even within the dark……
His calm voice rang in her ears.
“Because we’re going to save her.”
Asha let out a breath and, without realizing it, reached out her hand.
Then, as if he had always been within reach whenever she stretched out her hand,
Isitan’s arm quietly supported Asha.