Chapter 77

Chapter 77. Contract (1)

The Royal Academy, as I had said before, occupied an enormous area in the southern part of the capital.

There were vast exercise grounds and buildings, as well as warehouses and laboratories. It had many different facilities, but the largest among them was the enormous forest and park that took up one-fourth of the Royal Academy.

This place served as a resting area for students and was also used for various training and practical exercises.

Once night fell, that vast area had no lights at all, and only the sounds of insects and small animals could be heard.

Tonight, even those faint sounds could not be heard.

Instead, only soft footsteps sounded.

And a low hum.

It was the sound flowing from Valea’s mouth as she walked ahead.

As I followed behind her, my mind was extremely complicated.

I was certain things had passed smoothly. Yet after going home and returning, she had brought up a troublesome subject.

Something about the baron. Had I been found out?

Or had I left behind some room for suspicion?

No, there had certainly been room for suspicion.

It was true that the baron had wanted to kill me.

On the day the baron died, I had separated from the others under the pretext of hunting.

However, the distance had been too great, so it should have been difficult to suspect me.

On top of that, my current self was not supposed to know that the baron had wanted to kill me.

Had she noticed something? Or was she only trying to ask?

But she would not have brought me to such a remote place at night just to ask an ordinary question.

Step, step.

We had passed through the well-maintained park and were now entering the dense forest.

Tap.

I stopped walking. It felt like I should not follow her any farther.

If something had gone wrong, I had to prepare for Valea’s inherited ability.

“I do not think we should go any farther. I heard that even during the day, students are not allowed to enter the forest recklessly on their own. They also said we should avoid walking around this part of the park at night unless necessary.”

At my words, she also stopped and turned around.

She opened her mouth with a slightly disappointed expression.

“We only need to go a little farther.”

I shook my head.

“I am rather timid.”

At my words, her face became slightly sullen.

“Were you not someone who went hunting all night?”

“Even hunters become frightened when there is something to fear.”

At my brazen words, she pouted.

“Then, well, I suppose it cannot be helped.”

When she also gave up on going farther in, I opened my mouth.

“What did you want to ask about the late baron? I know almost nothing about him.”

At my words, the corners of her eyes curved softly.

“Let me see.”

She tapped her foot.

Tap. Tap.

Each time she tapped her foot, mana spread out from the ground.

“No one is following us, and no one is watching.”

She looked at me and smiled.

“It is just the two of us.”

Damn it. Was this already inside her domain?

Sweat formed on the back of my neck.

She opened her mouth.

“What I wanted to ask is……”

Her smile bloomed brightly.

“Did you kill my father, Young Master?”

There was no roundabout wording, and there was no aristocratic rhetoric. She asked me directly.

“Pardon?”

Startled eyes, and a bewildered expression.

It had been a while since I had managed my expression like this. Okay, I did not give her any room to see through me.

However, to suddenly throw out a question like, ‘You are the culprit!’

Among the possibilities I had expected, this was close to the worst.

Did she really know something? If so, there was no answer.

The save point was too close, so there was no way to fix this.

The atmosphere was chilling, but for now, I had to pretend not to know.

“What are you suddenly talking about……?”

“You really are amazing. Even I cannot tell whether it is acting or real.”

Of course. How much had I practiced after dying back then?

My acting right now was close to perfect!

“No, I think you need to explain in a way I can understand before I can answer. Leaving aside how absurd this is, surely there must be a reason you are asking whether I killed the baron?”

“Hmm. That is true. My explanation was lacking.”

She nodded at my words.

Uh. Surely not.

“Originally, when you came to our house, my father intended to kill you.”

No, wait.

“My father loved your aunt. Mm, since you are an illegitimate son, should I call her Duke Gresia’s second wife?”

She shrugged.

“In any case, my father loved that second wife. It did look like he had gone somewhat mad, but it was true that he loved her. Thanks to that, both of our baronesses had their minds thoroughly shattered.”

I opened my mouth and stared blankly at her lips.

What in the world was she thinking? Why was she spilling everything?

“I suffered too, you know. Before that, there had at least been proper reasons for things, but this time, he kept going on and on about killing you without any sense of order. It was terribly hard for me too.”

No, I did hear her voice saying she did not want to before she killed me. But after that, she still participated in killing me!

“On the day you arrived, we had prepared to kill you, but you were nowhere to be seen all night, so it was canceled. We met in front of the door in the morning, remember? I had stayed up all night then.”

“No, what kind of nonsense is this……?”

I shook my head with an expression of incomprehension.

It was a fine expression and performance, but it was not enough to stop her words.

“My father did not give up and ordered me to kill you on the road to the capital, or if that failed, even during academy classes. That was one of the reasons he sent me to the Royal Academy.”

She shook her head.

“But after leaving home, I had no reason to listen to my father.”

Then she made an expression as if asking me to pat her head.

“I did well, did I not?”

You did do well, but why are you hitting me in the back of the head now?

“Fortunately, my father died along the way, so his orders ended. It was extremely fortunate. You were frightening at a glance, Young Master.”

Perhaps Valea’s domain-declaration ability allowed her to grasp the powers around her, just as I could sense mana well.

“Nothing happened, Father died, and I was freed. Everyone lived happily ever after! Before I returned home, that was the situation.”

That had also been my situation. That was why I had left Valea alive without killing her.

“But when I diligently returned home and checked, it turned out Father had not simply died.”

Well, unlike what had been publicly announced, he had burned to death underground.

“The actual cause of death was that he burned to death in the underground storage room. My mothers and the vassals roughly think it was suicide.”

“Ah, it was suicide? No, suicide is not the issue…….”

Trying to cut her off midway seemed unreasonable. For now, I decided to listen to what she had to say.

She raised a finger and emphasized,

“How. Ever!”

What did she mean, however?

“I found sword marks and signs of a fight on the burned corpse.”

“That……!”

That was dangerous. Startled, I had almost shouted that something was wrong.

There was no way traces would have remained. I had confirmed that everything had burned thoroughly.

“It was burned very well. The gold ornaments all melted, that woman’s portrait burned away, and only a few bone fragments of my father’s body remained.”

“That is why everyone still thinks Father burned to death.”

Huh?

“I secretly searched through Father’s bone fragments and found fracture marks and sword marks, but the traces were faint, so I thought it would only cause controversy. Since everyone was convinced by the fact that he had burned to death, I did not tell anyone else.”

Secretly searching through her father’s bone fragments was not something a noble daughter should do.

More importantly, she had not told anyone else?

“According to what you just said, it sounds like he simply burned to death. And even if there were signs of a fight, claiming I caused his death is far too extreme an assumption, is it not?”

From a dumbfounded expression to a slightly angry one. I raised the tone of my voice a little too. Mm. That was good.

“That is true. However, I told you because of my inherited ability. Among my abilities, I have one that lets me understand traces of mana that remained inside my domain—no, inside the house. In the burned underground storage room, your mana traces remained, Young Master.”

Surely Valea’s inherited ability, which allowed her to dominate a certain area, did not include even such a power.

This had become troublesome, but first, I had to say something.

“No one would believe that story. Did you think you could frame me with a claim like that?”

At my words, Valea’s face became dejected.

“That is exactly right. Who would believe such a story? I could not even tell my family.”

Since I knew her true nature, even seeing her dejected expression only made the back of my head grow stiff with tension.

Still, first, I needed to see whether I could take one step back.

“Do you have anything else to say? I feel unpleasant after being misunderstood. I will return now.”

After saying that, I turned around. Then I took one step.

Rumble, rumble, rumble.

The brick path I was about to return along surged upward.

A long stone wall over four meters high blocked my path.

As expected, it would not work.

I turned back around.

“It cannot be helped. Even if no one else believes it, I know. I do not understand how you returned to the house at that time, found the basement, and killed my father, but I believe you killed him.”

In the end, it was the worst conclusion.

With Valea’s personality, evidence or confirmation from others was not necessary. Even if I had an alibi and even if the sequence of events did not fit, it was over if she believed it.

“Even if I hated him, even if I sang every day that I wished he would die, he was still my father. I should avenge my dead father.”

The ground began to writhe.

The trees lined up behind her swayed and came closer.

The air became sharp, and breathing grew difficult.

This place was inside her domain.

I took out the dagger hidden at my waist.

WOOOONG!

Red sword aura burst from the blade.

She had called me out to talk about her dead father. There was no way I would have followed her without preparation.

Even if I could not prepare armor or anything else, I had prepared at least the dagger.

“Goodness! You can emit mana outside your body! If it is to that extent, would there be enough time if you ran all night?”

Seeing the sword aura bursting from the dagger, she tilted her head.

“What are you doing? This is inside the academy! An unauthorized duel is grounds for expulsion!”

I felt like this had mostly gone wrong, but I decided to keep acting until the end.

The save point was too close for me to give up everything and kill myself.

Giving up all the academy classes and meeting Valea midway on her way to the academy was not easy, and it was too late to go to the baron’s territory before she departed.

Since this was inside the academy, killing Valea here and hiding it also seemed difficult.

In any case, I had to settle this first.

The ground beneath my feet sank deeply.

I launched my body upward.

Stones shot out from the surrounding wall.

I deflected the flying stones with my sword.

Seeing that, Valea opened her mouth.

“Struggling is useless. This place is my kingdom, declared as my domain. Within this place……”

I had heard this before I died. There was no need to hear it repeated again.

I kicked off another flying stone.

Standing near the undulating forest, Valea was looking at me with a pitying expression, and I launched myself toward her.

It was an inherited ability I had already experienced once.

This time, I had no intention of losing.