Chapter 58
***
In the past, I wasn’t very confident about obstetrics and gynecology.
Back then, I had only just started working in that field.
But it had already been seven years since I started caring for mothers at Limbus Fit.
By now, I was confident that, if not professor-level, I could at least call myself a specialist anywhere.
So, the moment I heard the prince consort had suffered four consecutive miscarriages,
“By any chance, where is Her Highness the prince consort now?”
it was hardly strange that my mouth started moving on its own.
“Huh? Lord Julian? Why are you asking that all of a sudden….”
“It just so happened to make me think of other patients I’m helping with something related.”
Miscarriage is a tragedy that can happen to anyone.
It could be stress, or it could just be bad luck.
But the story changes once it repeats twice or more.
Recurrent miscarriage.
It’s the diagnosis made when spontaneous miscarriages repeat two or more times.
The moment recurrent miscarriage is diagnosed, you have to start looking for hidden illnesses in the mother.
That was why I started asking the flustered youngsters more specific questions about the prince consort’s symptoms.
“Ah, before that. Could you tell me a little more specifically about Her Highness the prince consort?”
“More specifically….”
“When did the miscarriage usually happen? Before her belly started showing, or after?”
“Uh… I think it happened after her belly had started to swell a little.”
From Lady Heide’s words, it sounded closer to a miscarriage in the middle stages of pregnancy.
That lowered the likelihood of a chromosomal or hormonal issue for now.
Because those usually occur in early pregnancy.
That narrowed the possibilities a lot.
‘Cervical insufficiency, uterine malformation, and autoimmune disease.’
If miscarriages had repeated four times, those possibilities were likely.
Either way, they were conditions I could handle.
They were conditions I’d treated plenty of times in the red-light district.
“By any chance, is Her Highness the prince consort attending the banquet today as well?”
It was Freya who answered.
“Yes. Brother. I understand she’ll be entering together with His Highness the prince.”
“Together?”
“The Founding Festival is also a place to show that the imperial family is healthy and strong. Even if Her Highness the prince consort is unwell, she’d probably find it hard to miss this event.”
“I see?”
Could they have sensed something from my reaction?
Eri looked at me with half-lidded eyes.
“Teacher… no, Young Master. Don’t tell me you can already tell what’s wrong from just that?”
“Hmm. I think I’ve got about fifty percent of it.”
“As expected. How difficult does it seem compared to your usual patients?”
By usual patients, she meant the Limbus Fit patients.
She must have said it that way on purpose, thinking of all the people listening around us.
“If my guess is right, it’s low to moderate difficulty. Compared to that patient I saw two months ago, it won’t be especially hard.”
“What, so it’s nothing much? Do you need me?”
“The chances are low, but if you notice anything strange about the prince consort, let me know.”
Infection was probably safe to rule out.
Even with an infection, it’s rare for it to cause repeated miscarriages at such regular intervals.
Still, just in case, I gave Eri a heads-up.
Perhaps curious about Eri’s reaction,
Charlotte, who had been silent until now, opened her mouth.
“Don’t tell me you can figure something out just from that? Did I miss something?”
“This isn’t a problem or a case, Miss Charlotte. Playing with sick patients isn’t a good idea.”
She pouted.
Charlotte’s blond hair seemed to lose its shine somehow.
Just then.
—-!
A fanfare rang out through the banquet hall.
All conversation stopped at once, and hundreds of pairs of eyes turned toward the entrance.
The master of ceremonies’ voice filled the entire banquet hall.
— “His Imperial Highness, the 12th Prince Edmund Eschenwald, and Her Highness the prince consort have arrived——!”
The master of ceremonies shouted at the top of his lungs, straining his neck and raising his voice louder than ever.
As I worried about whether I’d have to bring him lemon-honey candy later,
the grand doors at the entrance opened.
Two guard knights entered first, followed by a young man who had changed his military uniform for formal wear.
12th Prince Edmund.
The young man, with his brown hair neatly slicked back, was obviously a former soldier.
As he walked, his left hand didn’t move, probably because he was used to resting it on his sword hilt.
“He’s right-handed. He isn’t moving his left hand because he’s used to keeping his sword on him at all times.”
Charlotte offered the same deduction beside me.
Everyone’s eyes were fixed on the prince.
But among them, I alone looked not at the prince, but at the woman behind him.
The woman followed half a step behind the prince.
A silver-gray dress, with a lace collar rising up to her neck.
I quickly scanned the prince consort from her face downward.
‘Purple, net-like spots above the clavicle, confirmed.’
Petechiae.
She seemed to have tried to hide them as much as possible with makeup and the lace collar, but the spots were too large to conceal completely.
Next, my eyes landed on the hand wearing a ring.
‘Her fingers are a little swollen.’
Mild swelling, enough that the ring was digging in.
That made an internal disease more likely.
Finally, I checked with Eri.
“How is it? Does she look strange?”
“No? She looks fine.”
“As expected. So it isn’t an infection or a blood disorder.”
With Eri—our expensive bone-marrow-checking device—confirming it, we could rule out that problem too.
That alone meant I’d basically diagnosed eighty percent of it.
But I wanted to push the odds even higher.
‘I want to ask about her urine, but….’
I wanted to check for frothy urine.
But my social skills weren’t so destroyed that I could ask that in the middle of a party.
I knew enough to realize that asking something like that would send me straight to the guillotine.
So, with Charlotte’s help, I decided to check for other symptoms.
“Miss Charlotte. Are you planning to greet those people?”
Charlotte, who had been sulking and poking at her sorbet after I told her it wasn’t a case but a disease, looked up.
“Huh? Ah, yes. It would be rude to just give them a gift, after all.”
“Then, when you give the gift and speak with Her Highness the prince consort for a moment, please offer her the coldest drink possible.”
“Is that necessary?”
“It’s necessary for the diagnosis.”
“All right.”
Charlotte’s face, downcast just moments ago, brightened.
“But you have to tell me about the diagnostic process, okay?”
“It won’t be knowledge you need, Miss Charlotte.”
“But I can at least use the observation method as reference.”
“In that case… all right.”
Charlotte set down her spoon and stood up.
Charlotte immediately looped her arm through mine.
Hmm. It didn’t feel as soft as I’d expected.
It wasn’t nonexistent, but compared to Eri, it felt lacking.
With that indecent thought in mind, we joined the procession to present our gift to the imperial couple.
“Let’s go, fiancé.”
She somehow seemed unusually excited.
She was probably thrilled because the process of finding the illness felt like hunting down a culprit.
Gift-giving began with the lower-ranking houses.
Thanks to Charlotte, we were treated on par with a marquess house, so we stood at the back of the procession.
Baronet, baron, viscount…
The gifts carefully prepared by each young noble were laid before the prince.
Rare herbs, mana-stone crafts, finely worked jewelry.
Each family’s young scions showed the utmost sincerity they could afford with their allowances.
Charlotte, eyeing the gifts, whispered.
“Isn’t the gift we’re giving a bit too much?”
“Hard to say.”
Charlotte probably wanted to say just how much of an ecological invasive species the gun we were giving was.
But if my diagnosis was correct, the gift we were about to present was far greater than some mere ‘gun.’
“Thank you.”
“Hmm… Baron Aidel… I’ll remember that.”
“Yes, good work.”
At the very front of the procession.
The 12th Prince gave the same reply each time.
His voice was polite, but devoid of any emotion.
He’d lost four babies and was about to be forcibly separated from the person he loved, so it made sense.
The prince consort’s smile, too, was gradually crumbling as time went on.
Quietly observing this, before I knew it, our turn had come.
“Young Lady Charlotte Hausen of the Marquess House of Hausen, and Young Master Julian Schnabel of the Baron House of Nihirit.”
At the master of ceremonies’ call, we approached the prince.
Charlotte was the first to bow.
From the angle of her bow, to the position of her fingers holding her dress hem, to the timing of her upward glance,
everything was utterly flawless.
As expected, this was a person who really could do it, but just chose not to.
“On behalf of the Marquess House of Hausen, I present this gift, prepared while praying for Your Highness’s health and good fortune.”
Charlotte signaled to the servant.
What the servant presented was the gun I had prepared.
When the long gun case wrapped in red silk was opened, the 12th Prince’s eyes changed.
A special firearm for hunting magical beasts.
It was a custom firearm with a gold-plated mana-conductive barrel and a stock decorated with silver thread.
Ten bronze magic bullets were neatly arranged in a separate compartment, each one costing as much as a regular knight’s monthly salary.
At the appearance of a gift no man could possibly resist, even the prince, who had been expressionless until now, had the corners of his mouth twitching strangely.
“…That really is a fine item.”
Of course it was.
I’d spent my entire weekly income—earned by selling vaccines and insulin—to buy it.
“It seems the Hausen marquess house has more pocket money than I do.”
The 12th Prince gave a bitter smile.
We didn’t bother correcting that misunderstanding.
“Since I’ve received a good gift, let’s have a little talk. We don’t often get the chance to build ties with the Marquess House of Hausen.”
When the 12th Prince signaled to a servant, two chairs were quickly prepared beside him.
It was a courtesy befitting a marquess’s house.
Unlike other houses, it was a way of lending the marquess house some face through a brief conversation.
Of course, it also served as repayment for the expensive gun they’d given us.
“Thank you, Your Highness.”
Charlotte sat down naturally. I sat down after her.
Seen up close, the prince consort’s condition was even clearer.
The dark circles covered with powder stood out first, and the lip color created with rouge was far from a healthy red.
She looked like it was hard just to maintain a smile, suggesting that merely being in this place was already agony.
It was a face I had seen dozens of times in the red-light district.
The face of a mother who lost her child before even holding the child in her arms looked the same whether in the imperial capital or in D Sector.
The prince also seemed to know the prince consort’s condition, constantly glancing sideways to check on her.
Then, Charlotte spoke to the prince consort.
“Her Highness the prince consort, aren’t you thirsty after sitting for so long? How about a drink?”
“Thank you, Lady Hausen. I am a little thirsty, actually.”
With a strained smile, the prince consort nodded.
Charlotte signaled to the servant.
What the servant brought was a champagne glass set on ice.
The condensation on the glass made it look like a refreshingly cold drink to anyone.
But Charlotte didn’t stop there.
“Congel.”
Charlotte murmured the chant in a voice only I could hear.
After cooling the glass even further, she handed it to the prince consort.
The prince consort took the glass.
And her thin, pale fingers wrapped around the cold glass.
Charlotte and the prince consort continued their small talk, glass in hand.
That went on for thirty seconds.
‘Good. As expected.’
The moment the prince consort set the glass on the table.
Her fingertips, now turned white, came into view.
Raynaud’s phenomenon.
It’s a symptom in which the fingertips or toes turn white because of cold or emotional stress.
It’s also a symptom commonly seen in autoimmune diseases like rheumatic disorders.
I put the clues together.
‘Four consecutive recurrent miscarriages. Purple spots above the clavicle. Finger swelling. And Raynaud’s phenomenon.’
At this point, it was easy to guess.
Because this was a lineup of classic symptoms that any doctor would recognize, regardless of specialty.
‘I’d say I’m ninety percent right.’
Of course, I’d need to run tests to fill in the remaining ten percent.
I’d need to do a Wassermann test, a coagulation time test, and a urine protein test.
But,
‘I can’t resist the theatrics.’
A doctor who speaks with certainty based on deduction before even running tests.
I just can’t resist the Sherlock Holmes act.
Of course, Sherlock was right beside me right now.
As for the rest, maybe the misunderstanding-protagonist correction would handle it on its own.
I’d lived that way until now, and it had worked out well.
‘Let’s go.’
This time too, I decided to make a big move.
I took a breath, steeled myself, and then opened my mouth.
“…Looking at this gun reminds me of when I caught that bastard down south last time.”
“Your Highness.”
“What is it, Young Master Nihirit?”
“Actually, this isn’t everything I prepared.”
The 12th Prince’s hand stopped on the barrel.
“I prepared a separate gift for both Your Highness and Her Highness the prince consort.”
Curiosity rose in the 12th Prince’s eyes.
He already had an impressive gift in the gun—there was more?
That was roughly the feeling.
“Hah. I know the Hausen marquess house has more pocket money than I do, but what else have you prepared?”
Expectation was mixed into his voice.
It sounded as if he expected me to have prepared a transforming combination robot.
By contrast, the prince consort didn’t seem to care much.
For someone for whom simply sitting here was torture, what meaning could a gift possibly have?
I smiled, looking at the excited man and the indifferent woman at once.
“I’ll give the two of you something to celebrate.”
“…Something to celebrate?”
The 12th Prince tilted his head slightly.
He looked like he couldn’t immediately grasp what context the word ‘celebration’ was meant in.
So I said it plainly.
“I mean I’m going to give the two of you a baby.”
The 12th Prince’s head froze.
He remained exactly as he was, as if time had stopped.
Even the prince consort’s indifferent eyes wavered for the first time.
The reactions of the two servants standing behind the 12th Prince were worth seeing too.
One of them started trembling so badly the tray shook, and the other stared at the person beside them as if doubting their own ears.
And the nearby young nobles who’d been listening in were staring at me, their mouths hanging open as if their jaws might drop.
At the center of all those gazes.
Only Charlotte was looking at me with an expression of intense excitement.