Chapter 34
#34화 Crown Prince Alondre (3) - How to Immerse Yourself in the Role
Kalastia, the capital of the Aizern Empire.
More than a few hundred staff members were staying in Geumun Palace, where the crown prince resided, and lately they had all been suffering from a strange ailment.
It had a name: the “It’s All My Fault” disease.
“As His Highness’s attending physician, I failed to prevent harm to his royal body. What use is there for this old man to live!”
“Illness comes from an unclean environment. This is all due to my incompetence as the head maid. I humbly request permission to relinquish all my titles and wealth and return to life as a commoner!”
“Ah! If only my sword had truly reached the next realm, I might have been able to cut down even the sickness plaguing His Highness! And I call myself the crown prince’s guard and martial arts tutor? I’m ashamed beyond words! I’m not even as good as a kitchen knife!”
The great demon watching the scene offered this assessment.
“What is wrong with them? They’re scary….”
Lucidra seriously got the chills.
No, people can get minor colds and the like as they go through life, can’t they? Was there really any need to make such a fuss over something that small?
What was even funnier was the crown prince’s response.
“Cough! A ruler is one who bears responsibility. If there is any blame, mine is greater, so do not speak of this any further.”
With that veiled threat—basically, “Keep this up and I’ll take it as you’re taking veiled shots at me”—his subordinates promptly shut up, and after about three days in bed, the crown prince got back up as if nothing had happened.
Lucidra was at a loss for words.
In fact, even back when the crown prince’s first avatar, Bern, was destroyed, Lucidra had secretly been hopeful.
The destruction of the avatar would deal a fair amount of damage to the original body as well, and then she could tempt the weakened crown prince into forming a new contract.
In the end, that hope had failed because this crown prince was so strange she even wondered whether he was human, but now she felt that was actually a good thing.
‘…If this much of a scene happened over nothing more than a simple cold, then what if this human had gone down coughing up blood?’
No joke, the palace might have turned upside down.
They would definitely have launched a massive investigation to find the culprit, and Lucidra’s existence would naturally have been exposed as well.
Imagining hundreds of overzealous fanatics with murderous eyes chasing after her, Lucidra shuddered.
“Why? Can demons catch colds too?”
“It’s not that. More importantly, is it really okay for you to already be up?”
“I’m still a little short of full strength, but office work is fine. For the time being, I’ve decided to skip crown prince lessons, so I can use that time to handle the backlog. Even so, if the amount gets too large, I won’t be able to keep up.”
“No, I thought you said you didn’t want to work. Then just keep faking illness and rest.”
At Lucidra’s words, the crown prince looked at her.
With features like a statue’s and that deep gaze, even Lucidra the Great Demon didn’t feel her heart flutter... not even a little.
His face was practically shouting, ‘Oh please, was that really worth saying?’—so how could she possibly be moved?
“What’s with that look?”
“Trying to dodge work with a fake illness is only a temporary fix. In the long run, it chips away at your reputation and the trust people place in you.”
“And then,” the crown prince added.
“Strictly speaking, I don’t hate work itself. I just hate doing nothing but work.”
“So you’d make a new identity with an avatar and go off to enjoy yourself?”
“Hmm. The life of an adventurer was truly exhilarating.”
“But you’re terrible at acting.”
He flinched.
The crown prince’s body stiffened.
At the first crack in the iron wall that had always been this man, a smile appeared on the demon’s lips.
“Whenever you talk, that signature ‘high-and-mighty’ look of yours keeps popping up, and sometimes your way of speaking even reverts to normal.”
“Mm.”
“And if you’re going to pose as a common adventurer, why are you being so unnecessarily detailed about magic? From what I can tell, the knowledge you taught that girl Blanca was information that was almost unknown among commoners.”
“Mmm.”
“And at the very end, you even blatantly blurted out that you were an ‘avatar’.”
“Guhk.”
The crown prince let out a dying gasp as though he’d been struck in the chest by an arrow, then hurriedly made excuses.
“But still. Just disappearing without saying anything there would be way too trashy, wouldn’t it? She might end up carrying that guilt for the rest of her life. I can’t reveal my real identity, but if she at least knows that body was fake, then she’ll be able to clear up her misunderstanding.”
“Hmm.”
Lucidra let out a brief snort.
The crown prince wasn’t wrong. At the very least, he had put in every ounce of sincerity he possibly could.
The problem was that, to Lucidra, that woman Blanca seemed to have taken it in a different sense.
‘Well, does it matter? Leaving her be sounds like it’d be more fun. Besides, if the misunderstanding gets deeper and someone gets burned, that’s this human’s problem, not mine. Yep, no problem.’
Having reached a thoroughly demon-like conclusion, she snapped her fingers.
From her usual revealing outfit with its strange glossy sheen, she changed into a white shirt and black suit pants, then addressed the crown prince with the air of a salesperson introducing a product.
“In that sense, how about entering into a new contract with me, Your Highness the Crown Prince.”
“Your manner of speech has changed. What are you proposing?”
“A kind of magic that lets you immerse yourself in the role more deeply. It helps prevent confusion between the original body and the avatar.”
Lucidra’s crimson eyes gleamed seductively.
The phrase “prevent confusion between the original body and the avatar” sounds good at first glance.
But in truth, it is not much different from the original body and the avatar each having separate selves.
Of course, the avatar is something that can disappear whenever the original body wants, so it can’t rebel against the original body or anything like that. Still, the avatar is also a being that carries part of the crown prince’s soul.
If, at an unguarded moment—like when the crown prince was asleep—you lured the “avatar” into forming a contract, you could create all sorts of amusing situations.
“Ah, if it’s that, I’ve already made one, so it’s not really necessary.”
Lucidra’s demon smile cracked.
Ignoring her, the crown prince calmly continued explaining the magic he had created.
“I added a little extra modification to the avatar spell. If I say administrator account and sub-account... that might be a little hard to understand. Put simply, I separated the consciousness of the original body and the avatar, and made it so information from the avatar can be viewed by the original body, but information from the original body doesn’t flow to the avatar. At the same time, the original body can interfere with the avatar, but the avatar can only ‘request’ things from the original body and cannot interfere directly. There are also restrictions on memory access.”
Lucidra blinked.
Blinking a few times, she asked.
“How exactly did you even...?”
“Well, I’d been lying around resting these past few days, hadn’t I? I tried tinkering with it in my spare moments. It was good rehab exercise.”
Rehabilitation exercise, huh.
Just from what she’d heard, it sounded less like a modification and more like he’d remade the magic from scratch.
“W-what do you mean, can you even do that? That’s not the kind of magic you can just fix that easily! More importantly, what about identity issues, self-confusion, all that?!”
At Lucidra’s hysterical reaction, her sales pitch tone long gone, the crown prince answered gravely.
“An actor who is immersed in the performance will sometimes forget that he is an actor, will he not? Yet deep within that actor’s consciousness, the actor’s own self still lives. If you apply that, it isn’t that difficult.”
“…Oh, I see.”
Lucidra gave up on thinking.
After all, this was a human who casually used—and even modified—avatar magic meant only for demons.
His mental structure was simply different from ordinary people’s, so there was no point judging him by ordinary standards.
“So, what are you going to do with the next avatar? Planning to bring Bern back to life or something?”
“Hmm, I thought I might casually drop by and say hello to Blanca, but no matter how I look at it, that seems like a bad idea. Blanca may not know, but the other adventurers think Bern really died, and on top of that, he died in the lich’s dungeon.”
An adventurer believed to have died in a lich’s dungeon secretly going to meet the hero who led the lich’s defeat? That would be far too suspicious.
The crown prince sincerely wished for Blanca’s growth and success, and he didn’t want her getting tangled up in unnecessary rumors because of him.
“Then it’s a new avatar. What are you planning to do this time?”
“I’m thinking of digging a little deeper into the Kingdom of Birka.”
What Bern had seen of the Kingdom of Birka was an absolute mess.
Especially the conduct of the royals and nobles who let dangerous threats like Goblin Lords and liches grow unchecked within their own territory—it was enough to make one suspect they were inventing a new suicide method for rulers.
“There was something interesting among the rumors Renya had been going on about.”
“A rumor?”
“There’s a house in the Kingdom of Birka that holds some of the greatest power and influence in the country, and the young lady of that house supposedly has such a terrible personality that the servants under her are replaced every other day. Normally, a house with that much authority would fill its staff with people they could trust just as much, but even that isn’t being properly maintained, so they apparently just keep stuffing people in however they can.”
“A spoiled brat who’s rotten to the core, or a wicked woman born to torment people. Either way, she’s not exactly a normal girl.”
“So, I’m thinking of infiltrating that house as a servant.”
“...The crown prince is going to become a servant in another country’s noble house?”
“That’s what roleplaying is like. Besides, when someone of uncertain identity suddenly tries to get close to nobility, the avenues are limited. This is quite a suitable opportunity, wouldn’t you say?”
“Moreover,” the crown prince added.
“After spending time with Blanca, I realized I seem to have a knack for raising talent more than I thought. If I can turn a foul-tempered noble young lady into someone with the makings of a wise ruler, that would also help normalize the Kingdom of Birka. Private interest and the public good would be aligned.”
“If another country is in chaos and disarray, isn’t that a good thing from the Empire’s crown prince’s perspective?”
“That’s far too short-sighted. If an undead army appears on the continent, or if something like a Goblin Kingdom gets established, that becomes trouble for us too. If there’s a spark next door, you put it out first; if you leave it alone and it spreads to your house, then what are you going to do?”
“Yes, yes, you’re so impressive.”
After replying with a sneer, Lucidra asked.
“So, have you decided on a name?”
The crown prince replied.
“Cedric”