Chapter 90: [Chapter 090] You. Thug. Your older brother. Crazy guy.
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Even in the dead of winter, only the chirping of crickets echoed through the garden. Epero lowered his eyebrows as if trying to suppress his embarrassment, watching my face and smirked.
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"Can't you hear? Your face..."
"Your Highness."
I hardened my expression, looking almost like a governess.
"Do you think I'll just sit back and let Your Highness be rude to me?"
"What?"
I straightened up from the position I had bent down in to look at the fireflies. And I looked straight up at his face.
"What can you do about it?"
He mocked me cheerfully. I immediately widened my eyes and opened my mouth.
"Of course, I can't do anything right now. Your Highness, I want to be friends with you."
"So?"
"So I'm giving you a chance."
"Huh, a chance?"
"Actually, you want to stay in Ronta, don't you?"
His bright, always confident face turned ashen in an instant. Epero fluttered his long eyelashes and raised the corners of his lips even more than before.
"Actually, you don't want to go back to Elacon, do you?"
The affectionate mother-son relationship between the Empress and Epero was famous. Moreover, it was impossible for him to come here so quickly, as if he had been waiting, without his own will.
"Who's here in Ronta? What do I have to gain by staying in Ronta?"
Epero's face turned slightly red.
"Why not? Aren't you third in line to the throne of this country? With the Empress firmly in her position, what can't Your Highness get if you just put your mind to it?"
"You're more naive than you look, Madam."
Even as he said that, Epero's face looked terrified as soon as I mentioned the succession to the throne.
"Or maybe you really are naive. Come to think of it, everyone involved with you is a claimant to the throne. It seems like you're trying to make a fresh start with a handful of Acacia land as collateral, but wake up. "
"What am I supposed to do with a handful of Acacia land?"
"As if I wouldn't know that there's a mana stone mine on that land. That's why you couldn't capture Noebian Trovica. Do you think he would make someone an empress just because he dragged them into bed? That's ridiculous."
The earrings dangling from Epero's ears jingled as he shook his head. I moved my gaze to the sparkling earrings and then quickly closed my mouth, about to gasp. I seemed to have accidentally discovered something incredibly important. If there was a precious mana stone mine in the Acacia estate, that would be a huge deal. It's no exaggeration to say that the power of Elacon, a country of mines, comes from mana stones. Those who can freely use magic are only found in legends, but mana stones can be used as an energy source to develop various industries. Even the empire of Ronta, with its vast land, has mana stone mines as rare as hen's teeth, and they are precious things that can only be used by the royal family or the royal academy.
"...You seem to know a lot."
To get more information about the mana stone mine, I pretended to know and followed his words.
"People like you are obvious. You marry an old man to clean up your status, and when he dies, you steal his title and use it as an excuse to find a better man, something like that. Ronta is a good country to do that right now. Coincidentally, first the Grand Duke, second my brother Roan, and third... incredibly, His Imperial Highness. Good heavens."
Epero slapped my forehead with his long fingers, which were adorned with rings.
"Are you fourth? I guess you're casting a wide net, hoping to catch at least one. Did you plan to lure me in by sending a letter and making me think that you called me? What are you going to do if I tell His Imperial Highness that you sent me a letter and called me here?"
I wanted to slap Epero hard. I had to endure it. I'm an adult, and Epero is just a minor who is about to become an adult.
"Then I'll tell Her Majesty Grace that you ordered me to do so."
It worked perfectly. Epero, who had been letting out a sly, deflated laugh, stiffened his lips like stone.
"Are you angry because you mentioned an innocent person? If so, then you understand my feelings exactly. Why would I bother calling you, 'young' Prince Epero, who hasn't even reached adulthood? As you said, even if it weren't you, there would be plenty of people who would want to get close to me to get the Acacia estate. And it was you who asked me to be your attendant."
Bianca had said that no matter how young boys are, they can't stand being treated like children. Epero, who had stiffened and was only looking at my moving lips, began to move after I continued.
"Rather than making false accusations and insulting me, why don't you try seducing me? As Your Highness said, there seems to be a great benefit for those who get the Acacia estate.
"Ha."
The young prince's confident face turned an odd shade of red. He couldn't dare accuse me of being rude. After all, it was Epero himself who had been rude first. He glared at me, but the emotion in his eyes was not contempt but interest. I was equally interested. There's a mana stone mine in the Acacia Barony. That would explain why Noebian had searched so hard for the Acacia Baron's will. Couldn't he find the will and have Gaspard forge the handwriting? A shiver ran down my spine, but I met Epero's gaze and smiled with my chin up. If he becomes interested in me and tells me more about the Acacia Barony, that would be even better.
"If you apologize for being rude to me and ask me to be a true friend, who knows?"
"..."
"Maybe I'll share some of the rights to the Acacia Barony with Your Highness."
If you pressure the Crown Prince, and he wants to use me more, it would be even better.
"I can also help you stay in Ronta, not as a foreigner."
I could even build up my own power and use you to take down the Crown Prince when it's revealed that he's my enemy.
"You asked me what I could do earlier? I don't seem as easy as I look."
As my voice became increasingly secretive, Epero leaned closer and closer to me, listening intently.
"Do you think I schemed to make Noebian Trovica, the man who didn't want you in Ronta, the Grand Duchess?"
When he bent his body to match my height and came close enough so that the distance between our faces was less than a span, I said in a playful voice.
"Not at all. It was me who banished him to the north."
His curly red hair and blue eyes, which lost their light along with the disappearing fireflies, had the exact same color as Crown Prince Bardenal's.
"Are you starting to think that we could be friends?"
In those blue eyes, I saw a shadow of desire that he had been trying to hide. People who decorate themselves excessively and act brightly tend to have darker sides.
"...What do you want?"
Finally, a somewhat polite answer came back. I stroked his curly hair with my gaze, praising a dog that had fetched a ball, and smiled benevolently.
"It's simple."
And leaning in close, I pressed my lips right next to his ear.
"I just want to distinguish between my enemies and my allies."
"...What's your goal?"
Ah, what is my goal? What I want is to distinguish between my enemies and my friends, but ultimately, what do I want by doing that? Without realizing it, I turned my head towards Roadne, where the conversation could no longer be heard. But there was not only Roadne, but also Victor, in that place. Seeing Roadne looking down at us with sunken eyes, in the deep garden without fireflies, I paused for a moment.
"When... did the two of you become close?"
Victor's short Imperial language pierced the cold silence. I glanced at Epero.
"Ah, it's only natural to have a conversation with a beautiful lady in such a dark place."
Epero covered up the conversation we had just had as if with a black cloth.
"Your face is extremely to my taste, so..."
His rippling blue eyes softened as if nothing had happened, and he calmly uttered a lie. He said things like how he couldn't help but approach her because the lady's face was too beautiful at night. He had been so good at spouting such cute words.
"Epero."
But Epero's wit to avoid the moment ended there.
"Shut up."
It wasn't the usual casual, offhand remark. Roadne was 'ordering' Epero to shut up with the utmost sincerity. I had seen that face before. It was the face he had shown to 'Blier' when he was cursing Adrien. Epero looked at Roadne with a bewildered face. He, who had usually been slick, was at a loss for words at such a serious and stern warning.
"As the aide of His Imperial Highness, and as the proper proxy of the Acacia Baron. And..."
Roadne, who had been staring at Epero as if to pierce through him, turned his gaze to me. I quietly received his gaze. It was a little burdensome.
"...my closest friend. If you make any more inappropriate remarks or if I hear anything like what I just heard again."
"Brother?"
"I'll smash your head without warning."
It was too brutal to be a warning for a friend. His face looked like it wouldn't get a single scratch even if someone stabbed him with a sword. The atmosphere here, which had been superficially maintained, turned into an icy sheet. Victor, who was having trouble following the conversation because it was too fast, cautiously approached me.
"Madam."
But it was Roadne's low, sunken voice that came first.
"It's late. You should report it to His Imperial Highness and leave the palace."
It was said just before Victor's arm extended to escort me.
****
In the end, only Epero and Victor were left alone in the garden. Victor watched for a long time as Roadne quickly disappeared from the scene, and the noblewoman followed him almost as if she were being dragged. Then he turned his gaze. Epero was also looking at the same place. Victor knew how much Epero respected and admired his older brother, Roadne, so he understood the expression he was making. It was a kind of empty, absurd expression.
"You're even more of a bastard than him."
Epero chuckled at Victor's comforting backhanded compliment. His brother was scary, really scary.
"When you were whispering to that lady just now... Your brother was freaking out. His eyes."
"I know."
Epero had never seen anyone who had captured his brother's attention like that. Usually, Roadne wasn't interested in anyone except the Crown Prince Bardenal or the late Queen Retinia. Both of them were people Epero didn't particularly like.
"'Then I'll tell Her Majesty Grace that you ordered me to do so.'"
A woman like a Crown Prince, who casually brings up other people's weaknesses. Epero easily found the common ground between people who interested Roadne and blew a strand of his curly hair in frustration.
"Is he smitten with her?"
"What if he is?"
Though he wasn't smitten at all, Epero replied irritably. He wanted to separate her from his friend before he got unnecessarily attached to her. Victor's thick eyebrows furrowed at Epero's words, as if he had already become attached.
"You're a thug. And your brother is a madman."
"And you're a moron," Epero retorted without hesitation, to his stupid friend who didn't understand his concern.
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