Chapter 60
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Chapter 60
Late afternoon.
Afternoon sunlight fell across Lahedis's feet as he waited outside the Prime Minister's Office.
It was then, while leaning diagonally against the wall and gazing at the autumn sky beyond the window.
"Chirp!"
A small bird with pink-tinted feathers fluttered down and perched on the windowsill beside him.
The bird showed no fear at his movement, tilting its head and staring intently at him.
"Chirp! Chirp!"
It even crept closer to him, gazing at him with fierce determination.
'Is it asking for a snack?'
Watching the fearless bird approach me, I suddenly recalled last night's conversation.
[If you confine a child to a cage because the outside world is dangerous, do you truly think they'll be happy?]
[....]
[That isn't protecting them—it's your own selfishness.]
Kaltz's words, and also.
[No. If it were Rachel, he would surely support me.]
Vivian's words.
If this bird had caught someone's eye and been locked in a cage, it would never have soared through today's blue sky.
It would never have known how warm the afternoon sun could be, or how sweet the treats humans offer.
And I would never have met it here today.
"...."
Lahedis gazed quietly at the bird preening before me, then extended his hand toward it.
The bird promptly waddled closer.
But it stopped just a hand's breadth away, tilting its head while staring intently at him.
In that moment, someone's silhouette seemed to overlap with the bird's form.
"Sir Lahedis!"
The office door opened, and Vivian emerged.
Startled by her voice, the bird fluttered away at once, but it no longer mattered.
Vivian had arrived.
"What were you doing alone? You must have been bored."
"Not particularly. Are you finished with work?"
"Yes. Since it's my first day, they let me leave early."
The two of us stepped into the corridor together.
Vivian recounted in detail everything that had happened with Igraine and Roper.
"Oh, and those explanations you gave me—they helped so much. Thank you."
The smile never faded from her chattering lips, which told me she found this work quite enjoyable.
After talking about work for a while, Vivian seemed to run out of things to say and shifted to another topic.
"You must be hungry too, right?"
"You're the one who's hungry, aren't you?"
Caught red-handed, Vivian let out a sheepish laugh.
"To be honest, I've been craving ice cream since earlier. Let's stop by the Town Square on our way."
At my suggestion, he nodded readily, and a bright smile bloomed across his clear face.
Then he began to sing, adding a peculiar inflection to the word "ice cream."
Lahedis, who had been watching Vivian chatter away incessantly, suddenly recalled the bird he'd encountered moments before and let out a soft laugh.
'Now I see who she resembles.'
The two of them walked through the quiet corridor of the late afternoon and arrived at the entrance of the Imperial Palace.
At one side of the entrance, the carriage of House of Edelwein awaited them.
As Vivian descended the steps and caught sight of the carriage, something seemed to occur to her, and she turned to him with a shout.
"Whoever arrives at the carriage last has to buy ice cream for the other!"
Before he could even respond, she dashed off without another word.
Lahedis, exhaling a wry laugh as he prepared to follow the receding figure of Vivian, suddenly stopped in his tracks at the sight before him.
Within a landscape bathed in golden light,
Vivian ran forward, her rose-pink hair fluttering like flower petals in the breeze.
That scene, that figure—it was beautiful.
Beautiful enough to make his heart race.
Seeing her like this, certainty crystallized within him.
Rather than confining you to a gilded cage....
'I will transform this world you inhabit.'
So that you may dream of a far wider world.
Vivian, who had been running far ahead, came to a stop just before the carriage and gestured back to him.
"Lahedis, hurry! I'll buy for you today!"
Within that picturesque scene, Vivian smiles.
Lahedis, who had been gazing at her intently, soon dissolved into that landscape where she waited.
* * *
Orpen, returning from the hunt, came to a halt upon noticing something.
"Who are those two? I don't recognize their faces."
The chamberlain, following the Emperor's gaze, spotted Vivian and Lahedis and offered an explanation.
"It appears the Prime Minister was asked by the Duke to instruct a commoner, and that must be her."
"Ah, that girl."
Orpen recalled the information his spy had brought him days ago regarding House of Edelwein.
A child with whom Kaltz had formed a connection ten years ago when he went south for recuperation had recently arrived in the Capital.
'It seems the old man misses his dead grandson in his loneliness.'
As Orpen was about to turn his gaze away with indifference, he caught sight of Lahedis beside Vivian and froze.
Jet-black hair and azure eyes.
Though his face was not clearly visible from this distance, his hair and eyes bore a striking resemblance to Kaltz's—and they stirred a memory of someone.
His nephew, whom he had killed with his own hands ten years ago.
The specter of Leopfried.
'...Surely not.'
As Orpen recalled the existence he had long forgotten, his hands began to tremble uncontrollably.
He watched as the two of them boarded the carriage, then asked,
"Who is that beside her?"
"An escort from House of Edelwein, I'm told. The Duke seems to favor that commoner woman quite a bit—he's even assigned her personal protection."
"She bears a striking resemblance to the Duke."
"A distant relative, I heard. Nobility in name only, yet reduced to escorting some commoner woman... How pitiful."
At the words confirming this was not Rachel, Orpen's trembling hands gradually steadied.
'Yes, he's dead.'
He had even attended the funeral himself, claiming he wished to pay respects to his master.
Yet an inexplicable unease lingered in the depths of his heart.
Soon after, the Duke's carriage departed from the Imperial Palace.
As Orpen watched it leave, he finally recognized the emotion stirring within him.
An ancient feeling he thought he'd buried in Rachel's coffin a decade ago.
Fear.
The moment he acknowledged it, irritation surged through him, but he quickly recalled his plan and composed himself.
'Once I obtain the Demon King's heart, everything will be resolved.'
His plan was to release demons during the upcoming hunting festival to attack the nobility, using it as a pretext to reignite war with the Demon Realm.
Then, invading the Demon Realm at last, he would finally locate the Demon King's heart and absorb its power.
'Then Leopfried's ghost will no longer torment me.'
He smiled coldly and issued an order to his chamberlain.
"Summon Alberc."
First, he needed to ascertain how far the gateway to the Demon Realm had opened.
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