Chapter 139

“Shouldn’t heading back to the monastery be enough?”

As they slipped out of the morgue, Anais lowered her head and murmured.

It was the moment I realized she hadn’t fully grasped the situation yet.

Still, this was progress compared to her past, when she used to struggle against her wrongful punishment as if caught in a trap. Volunteering to enter a cloistered monastery was a step forward.

But returning to the monastery wouldn’t suffice now.

With dozens of fatalities and the deterioration of relations between the Empire and Chinguk, the situation had escalated.

Knitting lace or some other simple activity in the monastery wouldn’t pay for her sins.

Though sending her to a monastery might be possible if I somehow managed the proceedings, I had no intention of wasting my political capital on Anais.

“Anais. Did you just say you’re going back to the monastery?”

“I’ll talk to Her Imperial Majesty myself… That should be enough, right?”

Anais spoke with an uncharacteristic calmness.

When I didn’t respond, she started discussing the procedures. She talked about discussing exile with her father and volunteering to return to the Wirral Monastery where she had lived recently, claiming that living quietly there would be enough.

Moreover,

“For about six years… or no, until either you or Siena is convinced, I’ll stay at the monastery then quietly disappear to some backwater country. I’ll live silently there, not making a peep, and eventually die. Isn’t that enough?”

She even went so far as to determine her own sentence.

‘I can’t allow that.’

It wasn’t just out of disdain for Anais.

While she might be treated as a disgrace in Chinguk forever, in politics, anomalies cannot be ruled out.

“It’s not possible.”

“What?”

“Going to the monastery—it’s not possible. There’s always the possibility that someone in Chinguk might want to use either you or Her Majesty the Empress as leverage.”

“What are you talking about? Mother herself said clearly… We are already—”

“Indeed. Chinguk’s court might see you both as traitors. But even someone exiled for ten or twenty years can make a comeback if there’s justification. In this case, it would be more accurate to say you’d be used as a pawn. We can’t allow that.”

As I spoke, panic spread across Anais’s face.

She probably wondered why I was troubling her when she was simply following orders.

Still, I couldn’t send her to a monastery.

“Then where exactly are you planning to send me instead?”

“Anais.”

“Are you sending me to a work camp? I’ve heard that Victoria’s relatives work at the rope factory. Is that where I’m headed? Or the knitting factory? That could work too. It’s not something to boast about, but I happen to be handy with my hands.”

“Yes. Princess Siena told me. You apparently commissioned intricate silk lace for your own undergarments.”

“What do you mean by that? …Anyway, do as you wish. I would’ve worked without pay at the monastery anyway.”

Anais muttered this, then looked up at the sky with a forlorn expression.

A face full of regret, and yet she was only eighteen.

However, the place I had in mind for her wasn’t a penal colony. More frankly, where she was sent mattered little. My goal was to ensure that Anais could not be politically exploited, whether in the Empire or in Chinguk.

To achieve that, Anais would have to die.

‘I promised to keep her alive, so actual execution is out of the question.’

But she would have to die socially.

For that, I had something planned for Anais.

“There’s something I need you to do. It’s not too hard.”

“What is it?”

Anais looked up at me with anxiety. After looking briefly at her weary face, where tears had dried, I issued the specific command.

It was shockingly simple.

—

The next morning. Covent Square.

In the middle of the square, at the heart of the city, stood a massive pot.

This was prepared at my request from Victoria.

Since the incident with Health Syrup, horrifying events often occurred in this square. This was where Mrs. Chandler died after drinking an entire bottle of the syrup, and where Victoria’s maternal uncles were burned at the stake. Each time, tens of thousands of citizens gathered to watch the executions.

‘But this is the first time with the pot, right?’

The pot looked capable of cooking about 500 portions of stew. It was huge, rough, and made of iron. Standing on three sturdily attached legs, it didn’t need additional support. Beneath it, a substantial amount of firewood was stacked.

However, the fire wasn’t lit, and the pot was empty.

A somewhat lackluster setup for capturing attention.

Yet, people were starting to gather.

“It’s unclear… What exactly is going on?”

It was because Anais stood next to the pot.

Anais didn’t have the appearance fitting for a hermit. Being a mixed-race girl with Eastern and Western features made her stand out. Not just that—she was strikingly beautiful. Moreover, next to the pot hung a public notice detailing her crimes.

It was inevitable that an imperial princess standing by a giant pot would attract attention.

I looked at the steadily increasing crowd and instructed Anais.

“Get inside the pot.”

“What exactly are you planning to do?”

“You just need to stand inside. If standing is too hard, you can squat. It’s less demanding and less humiliating than wearing a sign around your neck and touring the state. Once the punishment is over, you’ll wrap things up at the Imperial Palace.”

“…”

“Get in.”

Eventually, Anais reluctantly climbed into the pot.

At the same time, a murmur spread across the square.

Anais kept her eyes tightly shut, maintaining a straight posture. She was probably hoping that this shameful time would pass quickly. It seemed like she thought this punishment was lighter than expected, proof that she didn’t understand its meaning.

—

What is this exactly?

Already two hours into standing inside the pot, Anais sighed softly.

When Allen first instructed her to enter the pot, it was truly painful. She thought, “Do I really have to endure this kind of disgrace?”

But was it because of the shocking experience in the morgue yesterday? Or perhaps because this was a relatively mild punishment compared to the deeds of Allen Medoff?

It was exhausting, but not so tormenting that it felt life-threatening. She managed to ignore the curious looks of the people gathered in the square.

‘He’s probably just shaming me.’

If that was the goal, it was successful.

How could it not be embarrassing to stand motionlessly in a giant pot, the kind you’d see in military kitchens?

‘Mom… Senior Leon.’

Thinking of her mother’s silent sobbing face and Senior Leon’s grotesque smile, Anais forced herself to endure. Compared to the shock of that day, murmurs from unknown citizens meant nothing.

They would probably all gather around for a look and then leave.

That much was surely—

“Light the fire!!”

As she had just thought she could endure it, a cry spread from some direction.

Surprised, Anais turned toward the voice.

To find the person who screamed this.

With so many people jostling about, it wouldn’t be easy to find him, but she had to. Light the fire? With a person in the pot? That was basically a command to kill her. In some ways, this method was more horrific than an execution by fire.

Surely, she had misheard, right?

But no, it wasn’t so.

—

“Light it, light it, you bastards! Fire! Fire! Fire!”

“Yeah!”

“Light the damn fire… Boil her! That woman deserves it!”

One man in the crowd pushed his way forward and was struggling.

The man, in disheveled clothing and hair, looked like an outcast, someone not often seen at the center of the city.

While the police held him back, he thrashed and screamed at Anais.

…His wife liked the syrup, eating five spoons every morning and evening, adding it to tea and sprinkling it on bread, then one day she clutched her chest, thrashed in pain for an hour, and died…

So, you have to die too!

What kind of royalty is this woman anyway!

“Take him away!”

After fiercely resisting, the man was finally dragged away by the police.

“Hmm…”

Anais looked blankly at the scene.

She understood that people could die from consuming the syrup. She had known it was dangerous since long before.

But meeting a victim’s family was new and strange to her.

And the more alarming thing was that she herself was exposed to potential violence now.

Perhaps Allen Medoff intended to take advantage of this atmosphere to really set fire…

“I won’t kill you. I promised.”

Allen Medoff’s quiet voice reached her.

Though she wanted to trust him, how could she trust the words of this man? Anais instinctively crouched inside the pot and looked fearfully at Allen Medoff.

“…What if.”

“If I intended to kill you, I would have brought you out here in the evening, after your family’s title was revoked. Then someone might have attacked you. But my goal is to showcase this situation to Chinguk’s envoys or embassy personnel.”

“What does that mean?”

“In the East, there was a punishment called ‘boiling execution,’ which involved cooking criminals alive in pots. It’s an ancient practice, but it happened until a thousand years ago. Officials from Chinguk will understand the implications of putting a person in a pot.”

“…?”

“If Chinguk learns about this, no one will propose to use you for any schemes. It will be seen as a vulgar and disgraceful act.”

So that was his intention.

Anais stood still for about ten minutes, mouth agape.

Pang!

Her thoughts were interrupted by a stone thrown from the crowd.

Fortunately, Allen Medoff deftly blocked it before it hit her, but it was a very frightening moment. Anais looked around, trembling with fear at the thought that all these people might be her enemies.

“What did I… do?”

Anais whispered, searching for signs.

Allen Medoff didn’t respond. He merely nodded upon noticing the arrival of the representatives from Chinguk, seemingly satisfied. Reflecting back, Allen was a drug dealer who dealt something far more insidious than the syrup.

In that moment, Anais keenly felt the absurdity of dealing with such a man.

Shaking, she hurriedly hid her trembling hands and lowered her head.

—

The punishment finally ended two hours later.

As Anais clung to Allen Medoff’s forearm and stepped out of the pot, her face was deathly pale. It wasn’t because she was uneasy about receiving help from her enemy or because she was heading to the palace to finalize her family’s disgrace.

Rather, what tormented her was the weight of her own actions.

Of course, there was no way to undo what she had done.

---