Chapter 145
As expected of Mr. Penguin!
As subjects of the Empire, it is only natural for them to revere and follow His Imperial Majesty the Emperor!
Your Imperial Majesty's prestige has transcended the Empire, inspiring the Sky Island Governor-General, and has reached all the way to the Demon Realm to persuade Mr. Penguin!
Pastel, who thinks only of His Imperial Majesty the Emperor every hour and every second, cannot help but be deeply moved once again by this perfectly natural miracle!
Sooo!
"Your true intentions are suspicious. I had kept in mind the possibility that the Governor-General might hold a grudge against the Imperial Family. However, considering the circumstances of the past, I believed it would be difficult to achieve, which was why reconciliation was offered. If you have been secretly building a friendship with the Demon King from the start, that is a different story."
Hwaaah!
I didn't do anything wroooong!
Pastel became a white mouse in front of a cat. She was already a money-loving mouse to begin with, so nothing much had really changed.
"It's a misunderstanding! My heart will forever think only of the future of this Empire and the safety of His Imperial Majesty the Emperor! In the past, present, and future!"
Mr. Penguin looked down at her even more suspiciously.
Uwaaah!
The flattery might have been a bit too much!
What do I do! What do I do!
This was truly a situation where anyone looking would have no choice but to judge that she harbored impure intentions.
To know the identity of the Demon King and yet not make an accusation when granted an audience with His Imperial Majesty the Emperor!
This insolent Pastel!
Turn into a Cherry Blossom Steamed Bun!
Uwaaah!
I don't want to be a Cherry Blossom Steamed Buuuun!
Please make me a Cherry Blossom Corn Salad insteeead!
At least match the character count...!
Pastel fell into a state of panic. Her head spun round and round in a jumbled mess.
Emergency Escape! Emergency Escape!
Now that she was under firm suspicion, no excuse she made would work. Furthermore, since it was a situation where Mr. Penguin had been hiding his identity and she had coincidentally found out, it couldn't help but be really, really suspicious.
Ugh!
An excuse inherently utilizes the loopholes and blind spots in the opponent's logic.
In a situation like this, where loopholes and blind spots were rendered useless in the face of established facts...
I just have to destroy the opponent's premise!
Pastel put on a smart expression.
She is truly smart right now!
One! Two!
"Actually, the Demon King is fake!"
Mr. Penguin flinched.
"Pardon...?"
Seeing that reaction, Pastel instantly became triumphant.
Puh! Puh! Puh!
Because Pastel is very, very smart, she would never fall to such a crisis!
"What do you mean by that?"
"Exactly what it sounds like. The Demon King we supposedly discovered is actually fake. It's just an entity that Ellie and I made up."
It's true!
Ellie believes it to be so!
Whether Pastel believed it too was unknown, but if the Princess said so, it couldn't be denied!
"Pardon?"
Mr. Penguin was bewildered.
Pastel stealthily clasped her hands behind her back and raised her chin. She looked up at Mr. Penguin arrogantly.
"I'm disappointed. Judging by that reaction, it seems you didn't know. Is the Empire's intelligence-gathering ability only at this level? With such capabilities, how could you possibly serve Your Imperial Majesty and protect the Empire?"
Mr. Penguin was half in doubt about whether this was a lie, but he couldn't refute it.
"Use your head, your head."
Pastel tapped the side of her head. She put on a pathetic expression, much like how Ellie looked at Dustin.
"Your Imperial Majesty already hinted that there was a Demon Spy. Even if I didn't hear who it was, there was a high chance they would attend the meeting, so I merely threw out suitable bait."
Pastel let out a deep sigh.
"What am I to do if you react immediately like this. After the meeting ended and enough time had passed, you should have first checked my attitude and position through a proxy. And then you could have done an interrogation, an arrest, or whatever else. Otherwise, you just get completely figured out like this."
She nonchalantly held up one finger.
"One, coming right after the meeting to find me means you had no other intelligence network for the cross-verification of the betrayal."
Another finger unfolded.
"Secondly, therefore, there is a high probability that you are the only reliable intelligence network currently maintained around the Princess and the Governor-General."
Another finger unfolded.
"Three, despite that, the standby troops are sufficient to improvise against Governor-General Kraft should she resist or escape."
Mr. Penguin was left speechless.
Pastel kept her hands behind her back and leisurely strolled around the secret room.
"I understand. Because of a limited budget, you can't expand your intelligence network as you please, so you take a gamble by directly testing your opponent using the troops you do have as insurance. To meet tight annual performance quotas and protect what little budget you have, you realize it can't be helped."
Mr. Penguin performed a gesture of frustration.
"Your speculations are excessive, Governor-General."
"I'm sure they are."
Pastel chuckled.
She only turned her head to look at Mr. Penguin.
"To check if there's a rat, you first have to poke around the rat hole. If you haven't found the hidden Demon King yet, it's much better to declare that the Demon King is here and investigate the onlookers."
She smiled brightly.
"The Princess happened to be anxious about the railroad development, so I egged her on a little to make her create a fake Demon King. The Princess is in a position where she's crushed by pressure, after all. It's perfectly easy for her to rationalize the catastrophe she'd have to face if caught as her own sacrifice for the Demon Realm."
Mr. Penguin thought for a moment; then his expression hardened.
"I cannot believe you. A crisis-evasion excuse like that is something the Governor-General could have prepared well in advance."
"That much is easy."
Pastel walked toward the door.
Before opening it, she glanced back at Mr. Penguin.
"You know the Princess isn't very good at acting, right?"
A questioning gaze returned to her.
Pastel opened the door without explaining. She only poked her upper body out and looked left and right.
On one side of the corridor, Ellie was standing, poking the ground with her flat shoes. She looked back.
"Are you done talking?"
Pastel, having narrowly escaped death, instantly burst into a tearful expression upon seeing her friend perfectly alive.
"Ellieee!"
Hug meee!
"What is it? Did Redmond bully you instead of apologizing?"
"Yeah, yeah!"
He completely bullied me!
"Huh? Really?"
Ellie walked over. As she reached the doorway, Pastel hugged Ellie tightly and brought her into the Secret Room. The soundproof magic circle activated once again.
"I'm sorry, Ellieee!"
"Why all of a sudden?"
"Because Mr. Penguin Wanjeonwanjeon wickedly subjected poor Pastel to an interrogation, I ended up confessing that the Demon King is fakeee!"
Ellie's jaw stiffened.
Because Pastel was hugging her tightly, she couldn't see Ellie's expression, but a fear of a meaning different from Mr. Penguin's began to creep up.
S-she won't be mad, right?
"You..."
Ellie moved both hands and tried to break free from the hug. This meant she was mad and wanted to look the person in the face.
Gasp.
She seems really mad...!
Uwaaah!
Pastel hugged her even tighter.
Academic entrant Ellie groaned and struggled before giving up and whispering in her own ear.
"Aren't you going to let go?"
A very chilling voice.
Pastel froze right on the spot.
Ahaha.
She obediently released the hug and falteringly backed away.
And then, instead of the scary Ellie, she looked at Mr. Penguin. Her finger pointed nervously at Ellie, whom she was too scared to look back at.
L-look at the angry Ellieee.
The Demon King being fake is real.
Please believe me!
If you see this and still don't believe me, I'm really going to bawl my eyes ouuut!
Mr. Penguin performed an observation on the Princess, and his expression turned miserable. He made a gesture of frustration with both hands.
Ellie, who hadn't yet grasped the situation, opened her mouth, her voice angry.
"Pastel, how could you say-"
"Princess."
Cut off, Ellie flinched. Her angry expression gradually disappeared, slowly turning into a terrified one.
Transforming from the one scolding to the one being scolded!
Pastel cheered, yay!
"What were you thinking, causing such a ridiculous incident."
Mr. Penguin must have been truly angry, as his cheeks trembled.
Yeah, yeah!
That's right, that's right!
Ellie is bad! Ellie, who tried to scold Pastel, is completely bad!
Scold her! Scold her!
Pastel stealthily stepped back and opened the door. In an “I don”t know anything~' state, she backpedaled out of the Secret Room and shut the door tight. Both the suspicious Mr. Penguin and the angry Ellie disappeared from her line of sight.
Pastel threw both arms up with a bright expression.
"Yay! I survived!"
To make it out alive from such a extremely severe crisis!
Could I be a super genius?
Puh! Puh! Puh!
Pastel walked down the Corridor, hopping along and going La-la-la.
"I am the great Governor-General Pastel~."
Clap, clap!
"But that's too long to say, so it's Marquis Pastel~."
Whirl, Turn Around!
She stopped with a pose and pointed at the distant secret room.
"Crisis! Response! Crisis! Response! In front of the Empire's greatest schemer, nothing can be an obstacle!"
Ahaha!
Pastel scurried away just like that.
She exited the not-so-secret building where the secret meeting had taken place and got into her carriage.
"Depart! Depart! Run away!"
She shouted to the coachman and leaned deeply into the carriage sofa.
Ellie's anger will fade by tomorrow, right?
Still, it's a little scary, so I should make it so that the fragile Pastel is absent from work tomorrow due to catching the flu!
Your Excellency Pastel is scheduled to cough-cough tomorrow!
Is this what the life of a person in power is like, rejecting awkward visitors by claiming to be sick?
Bboo-bboo~.
Pastel's tension completely unraveled. Her tightly spinning head loosened up into a hazy, comfortable state.
Uwa.
Mr. Penguin is His Imperial Majesty the Emperor's spy?
During the meeting, he definitely hinted at a close relationship, saying he heard the information from Duke Nastasha.
A demon is secretly receiving consideration from the leader of the Republican Faction (an aspiring traitor).
But he was actually His Imperial Majesty's spy.
Uwaaah.
Duke Nastashaaa!
You're being read like a book...!
Pastel's body trembled in fear at the terrifying nature of the central political circles.
I haven't even properly tasted it yet, and it's already like this!
Pink-Pink Pastel shouldn't be in a place like this!
She threw the carriage door open and shouted again.
"Depart! Depart! Run away!"
The coachman looked back, looking perplexed.
"Governor-General, the other person hasn't arrived yet. Are we really departing like this?"
Uek.
Come to think of it, she had ridden here together with Ellie.
She couldn't just leave Ellie (who was really mad) behind, so they had to ride back together.
Gasp.
The great Governor-General Pastel faced Ellie a short while later.
Ellie was in a really, really angry state.
The character count doubled...!
Uwaaah!
Save me!