Chapter 814

Reasonable violence is always enjoyable.

Not only does it relieve accumulated stress, but it also provides emotional satisfaction from doing the right thing.

Therefore, as modern individuals, everyone should occasionally recharge their vitality for tomorrow through reasonable violence.

That’s what I was taught.

So.

—

“Marquis Median! What on earth are you doing?!”

An old man, trembling naked on a bed more luxurious than the furniture in my mansion. He was some kind of count, but his name wasn’t particularly memorable.

“Put some clothes on. It’s disgusting… No, just stay like that.”

I didn’t want to look at the naked, obese old man any longer, so I turned my gaze slightly to the side and extended my right hand toward him.

“Once you burn, you might look a bit better.”

The count, who had framed innocent people for death and “sponsored” their wives and daughters, was burned alive along with his accomplices.

—

“Wait, wait! There must be some misunderstanding!”

The baron involved in illegal slave trading desperately tried to deny it, claiming it was all a misunderstanding.

It was obvious he was trying to buy time to destroy evidence.

“You don’t need to explain. I’ll hear the explanation from the ‘slaves’ our people rescued.”

“Wha…?!”

Of course, the baron’s desperate attempts were too late.

I had already anticipated his moves, so while attacking the castle, I sent a special forces unit to raid the slave storage. A simple pincer operation.

“Queen Astika! We’ve rescued all the illegal slaves as ordered!”

“Excellent. Well done.”

The paladins and combat priests from the Astraea Church, summoned by Adamante, were more competent than I expected.

By the time I dragged the baron, whose limbs were shattered, out by his hair, they had already burned the slave warehouse and freed all the slaves who had been forcibly abducted.

Not just that. They even found all the related documents and captured the accomplices on their own.

Their efficiency was so impressive that it seemed like they had done this many times before.

“Ooooh…! Queen Astika, you honor me with such words…! This is the greatest honor!”

…Though their attitude was a bit overwhelming.

—

Whether it was the shock of his crimes being exposed or the sea of blood he witnessed while leaving the lord’s castle, the baron I dragged out had already rolled his eyes back.

His back was soaked in blood, and the intestines of soldiers who had died earlier were tangled like vines on his shoulders and waist.

“With the evidence so clear, there’s no need for a trial. Burn all these vermin.”

I threw the unconscious baron to the paladins, who quickly tied him to the execution pyre.

“The Saintess has seen me!”

“No! She saw the pyre you built!”

They were as ecstatic as old maids catching a wedding bouquet.

“Mercyless judgment! Death without repentance!”

“Raise the torch! Sing of Astraea’s glory! The holy war has begun!”

Madmen.

—

Well, that’s how I swept through the eastern regions.

Leading the fanatics of the Astraea Church like my own soldiers.

What a bunch of lunatics.

I could understand the ones who trembled in fear, but I couldn’t fathom what the ones who charged at me were thinking.

Cornered rats might bite a cat, but the gap between me and them was more like an ant and an elephant.

“P-please spare me, Marquis! I’ll repent, I’ll repent!”

“That might be a bit difficult. Should’ve lived a better life.”

“Castration! Burn him!”

A man who was delighted when we raided in disguise, thinking goods would fall into his lap, but begged for mercy when we revealed ourselves.

“I-I was wronged! I didn’t know that woman was a witch!”

“You knew she was an evil person, didn’t you? So you’re not wronged.”

“Servant of the witch! Burn him!”

A man who made absurd excuses, claiming he was innocent.

“My backers are the Duke Bien! Do you think His Grace would tolerate such atrocities?”

“Duke Bien? What can he do? Answer me. What can he do?”

“Astraea is with us! Burn him!”

A man who didn’t realize Duke Bien wanted to purge him, trying to use the duke as a shield.

“Astraea’s bitch…! Could there have been a traitor?”

“A traitor? Well, maybe—”

“Heretics! Burn them all!”

The remnants of the Evil God Worshippers I thought I had eradicated.

“You’re all deceived! A madwoman who can’t even perform miracles, a barbarian like her, how can she be a saint?”

“Well, show me your holy mark.”

“Blasphemy! Burn her!”

Heretics who called me a fraud because I couldn’t perform miracles.

“You want to see a miracle? I’ll gladly show you.”

I showed them Astika’s miracle.

It wasn’t hard.

I couldn’t make the lame walk, but I could make the walking lame. I couldn’t blow a trumpet to bring down a castle, but I could punch it to collapse.

They were so moved by the miracle I showed that they repented and willingly confessed their sins before climbing onto the pyre.

As I piled up corpses like firewood wherever I went, even lords started fleeing before I could reach them.

“At this point, shouldn’t I be called Kagan instead of Queen? I’m single-handedly accomplishing what even Or-han failed to do—conquering the eastern empire.”

“Conquering? Lady Pailoon, this is a holy war. Queen Astika, the sword of Astraea, is personally purging the corruption that has seeped into the empire.”

“Ah, is that so? Let’s go with that then.”

Freide, who always teased me, chuckled at Adamante’s correction and shook her head.

Her tone, which sounded condescending compared to how she spoke to Bethania, suggested that Bethania’s status was higher than I had thought. Far above a mere judge.

“I never imagined the lords near Landenburg were so corrupt… We should have been watching not just outside the barrier, but inside as well.”

Nigel seemed shocked that the nobles near his hometown were all scum.

To be precise, we had selectively targeted the worst of the worst, but the sheer number was beyond expectations, so it must have been embarrassing for Landenburg’s vassals, who prided themselves on managing the east.

“Why so gloomy? Just let it go. It’s not your fault or Ludwig’s that they were rotten.”

I patted Nigel’s shoulder to comfort him.

“As Lord Hasalleur said. As a tribal chief of the borderlands, repelling the invasion of the Ai-shan with the weak westerners is an unparalleled achievement.”

Jahan, seemingly concerned about Nigel’s expression, awkwardly tried to comfort him.

“Weak? Who lost three battles out of three?”

It worked. Nigel, provoked by Jahan’s words, forgot his gloom and started arguing.

“That was due to geographical advantages and the disparity in mobilization. In local battles, we—”

“Don’t use the words I taught you as excuses. What does it matter if you win local battles? In the end, you lost the war and had to retreat.”

“That’s…”

“And don’t say ‘we.’ You’re not a Ka`har of the Ai-shan anymore. You’re a knight of Hestela, just like me.”

“I only pledge loyalty to Lord Hasalleur, I don’t particularly want to be a knight…”

“And that Lord Hasalleur is the future queen of Hestela. So you are a knight. What else would you call someone who pledges loyalty to the queen of a kingdom?”

“No, that’s…”

Jahan hesitated, unable to refute.

The “Hasalleur” he served and the Hasalleur Nigel served were entirely different entities, a secret only we and Jahan knew, so he had no way to counter Nigel’s argument.

‘They’re having fun.’

If their argument had turned into personal attacks, I would have intervened, but it seemed fine to leave them be.

It felt more like a friendly spat than a serious fight.

[That, that bright girl. How dare she say such things…!]

Hersela seemed quite displeased.

After learning that Nigel had “eaten” Jahan while drunk, Hersela treated Nigel as a hypocritical flirt.

Like a cat on a hot tin roof, pretending to be noble like a knight but actually a bundle of desires.

She must have felt like she lost someone she considered a brother. Childish, really.

“When did they get so close? They’ve been acting suspicious since returning from the Sky Mountain Range… Miss, what happened there?”

Leonor, sitting cross-legged beside me, tilted her head as she watched Nigel and Jahan argue.

“Something did happen.”

Something that would make Cascador howl in despair.

“What? What happened?”

“It’s a bit hard for me to say. Ask Nigel later.”

I pushed Leonor’s curious face away and shrugged.

I had no intention of answering.

Confessing your own drunken mishaps is just admitting to a dark past, but hearing it from someone else turns it into gossip.

If you’re curious, find out for yourself.

“Hehe…”

Her mischievous grin suggested she already had an idea.

—

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