Chapter 33
Once again, his heart beat against his will.
His body was reacting instinctively.
Creak.
Feeling his heartbeat quicken, Jade turned his head.
Before long, the door opened, and two men entered.
They were Baron Baris Leon and Carlton Leon.
“A pleasure to meet you, Lord Stephen. Lord Jade, Lady Arrelia.”
Baris politely greeted Stephen, the eldest among them and presumably the bearer of the royal family’s message.
Stephen was a court mage, but held no official title.
Nor was he of noble birth.
But since Baris was certain to receive a title once the purge was over, he swallowed his wounded pride and bowed first.
Swish.
Yet despite his polite greeting, Stephen did not open his mouth.
Instead, he leaned his upper body back as though to show that he was not the representative.
At that, Baris belatedly noticed where they were seated.
He saw that Jade was sitting in the center instead of Stephen, whom he had thought was in charge.
“I don’t think we’re on sufficiently friendly terms for pleasantries.”
“……So Lord Jade is in charge.”
“More precisely, I suppose the term executor would be more accurate.”
“I believe we can forge a new relationship through conversation.”
Though much younger and merely a commoner, Baris did not speak condescendingly.
Jade had been the civil war’s greatest contributor.
Moreover, a high-ranking spirit mage capable of summoning upper spirits was treated as the equal of a Master, so Baris did not dare address him informally.
“A new relationship. From what I’ve heard, the Leon barony has no intention of forming one whatsoever.”
Flinch!
Baris flinched for a moment.
But the sign vanished in an instant.
What he did not know, however, was that
Carlton, who was still inexperienced, stood beside him.
“Someone who betrays once will find it easy to betray again.”
“No. We have absolutely no such intention.”
Baris firmly denied it.
Even if it was true, he could not admit it here.
Thus, Baris put on an aggrieved expression.
‘Was this all he amounted to?’
Meanwhile, Jade wore a strange expression as he looked at Baris and Carlton.
In Jade’s memories, Baris and Carlton had been terrifying figures.
And that had been the truth.
Here, a lord was no different from the king of a region.
It was only natural to fear someone who held the power of life and death over his subjects.
But the situation was different now.
‘If the merger with me had never happened, and if I had lacked my abilities and affinity for spirits, things would still be the same.’
It was no coincidence that Jade had fled to the Great Forest.
Now, he was here thanks to his special ability and affinity for spirits, but without those two advantages, Jade would still be a fugitive.
Perhaps he would not even have survived this long.
Yet what mattered in the end was the present.
‘What matters is that I’ve been given the chance to take revenge.’
Jade recalled the information about Baris that remained in his memories.
Most of it had come from his mother, and when he investigated it himself, ninety-nine percent of it proved true.
That was also why he had decided on revenge without hesitation.
Moreover, Jade had every right to do so.
‘Hundreds of women he had preyed on. And Jade’s mother was among them.’
An unremarkable lord in an unremarkable territory.
Nor was the family wealthy, and unlike other nobles, Baris did not even keep a single concubine.
Perhaps that was why he expressed his inferiority complex as twisted desire.
He had secretly preyed on the women within his territory.
The problem was what came afterward.
Even though he could have taken them as concubines, Baris did not.
Despite his family having few heirs, he prevented children from being born, fearing any succession disputes that might arise.
As a result, Jade and his mother could not put down roots and had to keep wandering throughout the territory.
“The Leon barony has always been loyal to the Polshtein royal family. Strictly speaking, what happened last time was not betrayal. The Second Prince is also a descendant of the Polshtein royal family.”
“That’s true. But the problem is that His Highness the Crown Prince has a different view from you, Baron.”
“……”
Baris was rendered speechless.
Ultimately, Crown Prince Lloyd held the authority to decide.
Thus, Baris looked at Jade with wavering eyes.
Because Jade was the one who knew Lloyd’s intentions.
“Let me ask you one thing.”
“Go ahead.”
Feeling anew the misery of a nobleman who held a paltry little fief, Baris answered calmly.
But inside, he was burning with rage.
“Do you know Helen?”
“……Who is that?”
“As I thought, you don’t remember her.”
Jade’s expression briefly turned hollow.
His mother was the woman who had been treated like a plaything, become pregnant with Jade, and spent her entire life fleeing and hiding.
Yet the man in question could not even remember her name.
Even though his mother had lived her whole life in fear.
-He was utterly despicable! How could he not remember a woman he slept with?
-There were so many of them that he might not have been able to remember each one. Even before the civil war, there were more than one or two women he had preyed on. There are probably more whose identities were never revealed than those who were.
Silestin vented his outrage in Jade’s place.
It was simply too absurd.
Elestra, by contrast, was not particularly surprised.
She had seen nobles behave this way until she was sick of it, so there was nothing surprising about it.
-Well, I suppose it doesn’t matter. Even if he knew, the outcome wouldn’t change.
-Let’s wipe them all out! Leave it to me!
-Then what about the lord’s castle? There won’t be any territory left.
Jade chuckled inwardly.
Because he knew all too well what would happen if Silestin cut loose in earnest.
So Jade stopped him decisively and took out a letter in Lloyd’s own hand from subspace.
“This was sent by His Highness the Crown Prince.”
“……Yes.”
At a glance, it was clearly a luxurious, sealed letter, but Baris’s expression darkened when he saw it.
Because he could easily guess what was written inside.
Yet he could not simply refuse to read a handwritten letter addressed to him, so Baris knelt on one knee and received it respectfully.
“Please read it.”
Gulp.
Still a noble of the Polshtein Kingdom, Baris received it with due ceremony, swallowed dryly, and slowly broke the seal.
Then, with a tense expression, he slowly read through Lloyd’s letter.
“There’s something I’m curious about.”
“Go ahead.”
“Why did you drag this out? It seems the main family’s punishment was decided long ago.”
Baris asked, his face stiff.
Yet the aura he gave off was ominous.
He looked ready to draw his sword at any moment.
“It was because of me. I wanted it that way.”
“You?”
With Baris having cast etiquette aside, Jade replied with a sardonic smile.
Baris then retorted with a gaze that seemed capable of devouring him.
“Yes. I wanted to erase the Leon barony with my own hands. And if possible, I wanted to make its end as miserable as possible.”
“Why?”
“For my mother, who spent her whole life living in fear because of you before she died.”
“What?”
Baris’s eyes flew wide.
Carlton, who had only been watching warily from the side, was no different.
The father and son were shocked because Jade’s meaning was unmistakable.
“I did hold out a little hope, but as expected, you let me down. But it doesn’t matter anymore. I’m going to wipe it all out anyway.”
“Attack!”
Crash!
At Baris’s shout, every window in the reception room shattered.
The knights who had climbed down the castle walls surged inside through the windows all at once.
Yet despite the knights’ sudden appearance, neither Jade nor Arrelia was surprised in the slightest.
“As expected, you had no intention of accepting this quietly.”
“Still, I didn’t expect you to attack so openly. It’s not as if you’re unaware of our strength.”
“They’re buying time. The two of them escaped long ago.”
“Oh my.”
Arrelia opened her eyes wide.
The real Baris and his son had vanished while the knights who had invaded through the windows surrounded the three of them.
Yet even knowing that, Jade did not panic in the slightest.
“Well, it doesn’t change anything, though.”
“That’s right. There are two Master-level powerhouses here.”
It was the knights who were surrounding them, but they were also the ones on edge.
Most of them had witnessed the martial prowess the two had displayed in Molton territory, so they merely surrounded them without daring to charge.
They knew all too well that they would be the ones to die if they attacked.
Baris had also known from the beginning that the knights could not kill the three of them.
“How could they be so ignorant that no tracker in the forest is as skilled as a spirit mage?”
“They must think they’re used to the Great Forest.”
“The real expert is Lord Jade, after all.”
“I wouldn’t go that far. I just know a little.”
“I think you know more than those father and son.”
Arrelia gave a playful smile.
Unlike the relaxed pair, cold sweat beaded the faces of the knights surrounding them.
Even though neither of them was doing anything, everyone was extremely tense.
“That’s true.”
“They seem to have left the lord’s castle by now. Shall we go after them?”
“W-We can’t let you!”
“We have to stop them somehow!”
No sooner had Arrelia finished speaking than the knights shouted themselves hoarse.
Yet few of them actually charged.
The knights were people too, and they did not want to die.
Slash!
So Arrelia killed every one of them without distinction.
At the same time, she sent them all off cleanly.
They were seasoned veterans who had fought monsters in the Great Forest and protected the territory, but they were not remotely on Arrelia’s level.
“Rainy told me that new wine should go into new wineskins.”
“She wasn’t wrong.”
With a single sword stroke, more than twenty knights died instantly.
As a result, the reception room became a sea of blood in an instant, but no one paid any attention to it.
“I’ll take care of the lord’s castle.”
“Please do.”
Stephen said it in a reassuring tone.
His usual foolish demeanor had completely vanished, leaving him looking serious.
“Be careful.”
“Nothing will happen. I’m going with her.”
“I’m honestly not very worried. You two are the heroes of this civil war, after all. It would almost be rude for me to worry about you.”
“Exactly.”
Arrelia grinned.
Since she knew Jade’s abilities better than anyone, Arrelia was not tense in the slightest.
In fact, she alone could have handled the Leon barony’s entire force.
“Silaphe.”
While Arrelia spoke with Stephen, Jade quietly summoned Silaphe.
Soon after being summoned to the middle world, Silaphe immediately carried Jade toward the window.
Silaphe moved at once, knowing how Jade felt.
“I’m coming too!”
Gallop, gallop!
All of Baris’s party rode horses across the forest without a carriage.
Since Jade’s sudden arrival had thrown all their plans into disarray, they had no choice but to travel with only the minimum number of troops.
Carlton found that terribly regrettable.
“There’s no time to be angry. We need to move as quickly as possible—so they won’t even dare pursue us.”
“Understood. But, Father……”
“We’ll talk about that later.”
“Yes.”
Baris, who had read the situation with uncanny speed, cut his son off.
He saw no need to discuss the matter here, where there were so many listeners.
Besides, survival—not Jade—was what mattered.
‘They said they met in the Great Forest. Then we absolutely have to put as much distance between us as possible.’