Chapter 57
"Hey, Monica. You conscious?"
Monica, who was sprawled on her back in the fountain, answered in a faint voice while gasping for breath.
"...Barely."
"Wow, impressive. Your magic is almost completely drained."
"...Yeah. It's been a long time since I used this much."
In combat, Monica generally minimizes her magic consumption and uses precise control to shoot her enemies.
However, to destroy the barrier Louis Miller had created, she had no choice but to use magic at maximum power.
Summoning the Spirit King was a major spell that consumed seventy to eighty percent of Monica's total magical power. It was not something she could casually use whenever she pleased.
For now, Monica wanted nothing more than to surrender to her exhaustion and fall asleep, but she still had things she needed to do.
"...I lost, huh...?"
Casey gave a weak laugh from atop Nero's shoulder.
"...So you weren't an ordinary person after all, Monica... Heh, I chose the wrong person to ingratiate myself with."
"Casey..."
Monica slowly hauled her heavy body upright and looked up at Casey.
Casey wore a lonely smile, her face showing neither hatred nor anger, but the resignation of someone who had given up on everything.
"Don't make that face. I'm the bad person who tricked you, after all."
Casey had been kind to Monica so that she could get close to Felix. In fact, it had worked. By staying near Monica, Casey had been able to learn the student council officers' schedules.
Monica had been used by Casey.
"...Even so, I..."
Monica clutched the front of her clothes over her chest and desperately forced the words out.
"Casey... you invited me out to eat and to the school tour... and that made me happy."
Even if Casey had done those things to use Monica, Monica still could not bring herself to hate her.
She was the one who had stuffed fried fish into a bun and eaten it with such gusto, looking so happy.
She was the one who had casually smoothed things over whenever Claudia and Lana became confrontational.
She was the one who had said she was good at embroidery, then unfolded a beautiful embroidered handkerchief and smiled shyly.
"No, Monica."
Casey closed her eyes and slowly shook her head.
"I'm a heinous criminal who tried to take His Highness's life... You have to hate me properly."
Monica did not know how much of Casey's behavior had been an act.
Even so, she could not believe that all of it had been a lie.
If Casey and her entire family were found to have plotted the assassination of a member of the royal family, they would likely be executed.
(...Execution.)
A chill swept down Monica's spine.
At that moment, Nero looked up at the sky and clicked his tongue.
"Hey, Monica. A nasty one just showed up. I'm gonna hide."
Nero set Casey, who was still too numb to move, down on the ground and quickly turned away. He had probably transformed into a cat in the shade of a tree.
She had known that sooner or later, "that person" would come after she tampered with the barrier without permission.
Though her body was swaying, Monica stood firmly on both legs and looked up at the sky.
Far off in the sky, she could see a tiny black dot. It was approaching at a tremendous speed... Were they even thinking about how they were going to land?
With a bad feeling in her gut, Monica took several steps backward.
And only a few seconds later, two figures came plummeting from the sky──spinning around and around with enough force to spear into the ground.
One of the figures, a beautiful woman in a maid's uniform, landed while spinning rapidly in an upright position, buried in the ground up to her knees.
Meanwhile, the other figure behind her swung a staff and managed to levitate himself at the last possible moment, avoiding being driven into the ground.
"Youuuuu damn stupid maid! How many times have I told you to improve your landing method?!"
"I have named it the Rotary Landing Method. It has high attack power and is extremely stylish."
"With you buried up to your knees, there is nothing stylish about it, you incompetent maid."
After clicking his tongue loudly, the handsome man with a monocle and chestnut hair in a braid──Louis Miller, the 〈Barrier Mage〉──looked down at Monica.
Then he pressed a finger to the space between his eyebrows and let out a deep sigh.
"...My barrier was in an awful state, so I came to see what was happening... As I suspected, you were the culprit, my fellow student."
"I-it's been a long time, Louis-san."
When Monica bowed her head, Louis bent at the waist and peered into her face with a suspicious look.
"...Your magical power is almost completely depleted? This is the first time I've seen you run out of magic. Even after slaughtering more than twenty wyverns, you looked perfectly fine."
Louis narrowed his grayish-purple eyes behind his monocle and looked back and forth between the destroyed fountain and Casey, who was sitting limp on the ground.
"Now then, the young lady over there... I take it she is a student of this academy. Is she an enemy or an ally?"
When Monica hesitated, Casey answered in a matter-of-fact tone.
"An enemy. A foolish enemy who tried to assassinate Prince Felix and failed."
"I see... Lin, restrain her."
At Louis's one-word command, the beautiful maid pulled her legs out of the ground with a pop and restrained Casey with her arms behind her back. Casey did not resist and meekly allowed herself to be handled.
"Now then, my fellow student. Would you be so kind as to explain the situation?"
"...T-the 〈Spiral Flame〉 had been planted in the west warehouse, where the fireworks were being brought in."
At the mention of the 〈Spiral Flame〉, Louis grimaced. He, too, understood full well how terrifying the magical device was.
Especially with fireworks nearby, its danger needed no explanation.
"...I thought my defensive barrier wouldn't be able to stop it completely, so I borrowed your barrier, Louis-san."
"I had set up a reasonably sturdy protective barrier around the large-scale barrier, you know?"
"...I summoned the Spirit King and broke it."
"I had also packed the large-scale barrier itself with decoy spells to prevent it from being rewritten."
"...Well, I'm good at seeing through things like that... Oh, but it took me almost a minute to see through the decoys. I swear!"
"A minute... You saw through those in a minute..."
Louis's cheek twitched at Monica's words.
He fell silent for a while with a deeply pained expression, then eventually groaned bitterly.
"...From now on, if an incident occurs in which my barrier is rewritten, you'll be my first suspect."
"Eek?!"
"...I'm saying it isn't something just anyone could do."
It sounded as though Monica heard an extremely ominous mutter at the very end: "As if anyone could do that, damn it." But she pretended she had not heard it. Louis Miller put on airs of refinement, but he was actually a fairly dangerous man.
"I understand the general situation. By the way, has the Second Prince still not learned your true identity?"
"Y-yes! He hasn't... I think."
"Good. Then we'll secretly retrieve the 〈Spiral Flame〉. We'll take custody of the young lady as well. You will continue guarding the Second Prince..."
"E-excuse me!"
Interrupting Louis, Monica raised her voice.
At Monica's uncharacteristic behavior, Louis narrowed his eyes behind his monocle.
"What is it?"
"C-Casey... What will happen to her...?"
"...We'll interrogate her and drag out every last person involved in the assassination attempt. If she refuses to talk, we'll have to use mind-affecting magic."
Magic that forced confessions or interfered with the mind to make someone obedient was normally forbidden. However, its use was permitted under certain conditions, such as interrogating heinous criminals.
But Monica knew that mind-affecting magic could cause serious damage to the subject's mind──in the worst case, it could leave them a shell of a person.
Perhaps he had guessed what Monica wanted to say from her expression, because Louis looked down at her coldly.
"...You seem reluctant to use mind-affecting magic. But perhaps becoming a vegetable would be a blessing, wouldn't it? An attempted assassination of royalty means the death penalty is inevitable. She would suffer less if she were executed after losing her sanity."
Casey's face went deathly pale.
Monica swallowed the saliva pooled in her mouth, steeled her trembling body, and looked straight up at Louis.
"L-Louis-san, you're on the First Prince's side, aren't you?!"
"...Where did that come from?"
"Please answer me."
Louis studied Monica's face with a keen gaze, as if probing her intentions.
The 〈Silent Witch〉, who normally immediately looked away and lowered her head, was looking straight up at Louis now.
That fact suddenly piqued Louis's interest.
"Yes, that is correct. I am a schoolmate of Prince Lionel, so I suppose it would be fair to call me a member of the First Prince's faction. However, do not misunderstand me. It is not that I want the First Prince to become king no matter what."
"...Huh?"
Monica had been certain he would say, "Prince Lionel is obviously the one suited to be the next king!" So she was slightly deflated.
"I call myself a member of the First Prince's faction because I dislike Duke Clockford and the Second Prince."
"..."
That was such a Louis-like reason.
However, it was a fact that Louis was the First Prince's friend.
After confirming that fact, Monica made her next move.
"C-Casey is a member of the First Prince's faction with ties to Randall."
Louis's eyebrow twitched.
"If it becomes known that a member of the First Prince's faction with ties to Randall attempted to assassinate the Second Prince... that would put the First Prince's faction at a disadvantage, wouldn't it?"
If the attempted assassination of the Second Prince became known, the First Prince's faction would be placed at an overwhelming disadvantage.
When Monica pointed that out, Louis gave her a thin smile.
"I never thought the day would come when someone as indifferent to political struggles as you would propose such a deal to me... How cunning."
"Neither Prince Felix nor anyone else knows about the assassination attempt. Casey and I are the only ones who know."
"...So you want me to make the attempted assassination itself disappear?"
"..."
Monica had not gone so far as to expect something so convenient, but she desperately wanted to find some way to save Casey from execution.
Seeing Monica refuse to back down, Louis spoke in a tone meant to reason with her.
"The First Prince's faction is not a monolith. Even the First Prince and his mother are, to put it bluntly, people with no interest in the throne. They prefer to act honorably and would never want an assassination... but not everyone who supports the First Prince is like that."
At that, Louis paused and glared coldly at Casey.
"A fool who would pull an unnecessary stunt like attempting to assassinate the Second Prince must be purged discreetly."
"I-if you're going to settle the matter secretly, there has to be a way!"
Monica bit her lip hard and glared at Louis with tear-filled eyes.
At that moment, Louis Miller was secretly weighing his options.
As far as Louis was concerned, it would be cleaner, with no loose ends, to use mind-affecting magic on Casey, force her to confess the names of the extremists, and then have them quietly purged.
But if he did that, he surely would not be able to obtain Monica's cooperation in the future.
The power of Monica Everett, the 〈Silent Witch〉, was far greater than she believed. Losing her cooperation would be an enormous waste.
After weighing everything, Louis reached a conclusion.
"If the young lady confesses everything honestly, I promise I will not use mind-affecting magic. She will be sent to a convent and will never be allowed to appear in high society again."
That was the greatest concession he could make.
Monica bowed deeply to Louis.
"...Thank you, Louis-san."
"In exchange, you will continue to assist with your assignment as the Second Prince's bodyguard."
"Yes!"
At Monica's immediate nod, Louis narrowed his eyes behind his monocle.
One reason Louis had chosen Monica to guard the Second Prince was her distrust of other people.
She trusted no one and opened her heart to no one──and that was precisely why he had thought she would be suited to guarding someone.
A person who readily trusted others could not serve as a bodyguard.
"...You have let yourself be swayed a little too easily."
"Huh?"
Louis placed his index finger right against the space between Monica's eyebrows and peered into her face.
"You are Monica Everett, one of the Seven Sages, the 〈Silent Witch〉... Monica Norton, the student of Serendia Academy, is merely a false identity."
Monica's shoulders jerked.
"Be sure never to forget that."
"...Y-yes."
Louis stared down at Monica with a dark glint in his eyes.
Lin, who had been silently watching the scene, offered a thoroughly inappropriate observation: "This looks like the scene of a kidnapping."