Chapter 38

The gangsters ruling the back alleys of the capital market were caught off guard.

“Hey, hey.”

“Who is that?”

“Isn’t that a knight?”

“What’s a knight doing here?”

Yesterday, an abomination had appeared, causing all sorts of high-ranking officials to come in a frenzy, and today, from the early morning when the sun hardly shone, a knight in full plate armor was clanking around the market.

Even the shop owners just unfurling their stalls and the pickpocket kids held their breath, wary of her.

“You lot, I have a question.”

“Run!”

Soon, Tenitia spotted the gangsters peeking out from the alley and marched over confidently.

Feeling an instinctive danger, the gangsters scattered in all directions, but they couldn’t outpace a knight who could accelerate to over 30 meters in a second.

They tumbled to the ground, knocked down, kicked in the back with steel boots, or grabbed by the nape, rolling on the floor.

“Ahh! Lady, please save me! Lady!”

“I’ll walk on my own!”

“Oh, I swear no one is dead!”

“Uh, excuse me, which knightly order does the lady belong to… my apologies.”

The honorable knight did not negotiate or converse with the market gangsters.

Respect was a knight’s virtue, but it was one that needed to be kept only for knights of equal rank, their soldiers, women, and clergy.

“Profit!”

Whack!

There were those trying to resist with daggers and hammers, but seeing their knives and hammers shatter and break in the fist of a gloved hand made most of them shut their mouths.

And Tenitia began making them look as if they deserved mercy.

“Ahh! Lady!”

“What are you asking me to hit without even asking?”

“I’ll tell you anything! Human trafficking? We don’t do that. No? Ahh, no, we did it once, just once.”

“Ahh! No, that’s a lie; my friend is lying. We’ve done it several times. They said there’s often a use for corpses, so we sold them all.”

“Please just let me go! I’ve committed a deathly sin.”

If you’ve committed a deathly sin, you should die, right?

Tenitia’s combat boots flew mercilessly.

An instinctive hostility towards infiltrators and criminals.

The exhilarating feeling of secretly dealing with infiltrators who conspired with the royal family.

And the commendable thought that Duke Valen, who had kicked the groin of her junior Bonnel, was stepping up to confront the empire’s dark deeds.

These three emotions mixed in the heart of the young knight, making it race with excitement.

‘This must be guided by the light.’

“Speak as you know!”

Soon, Tenitia extracted most of the information that could come from the gangsters’ mouths and frowned.

“100 people?”

She had expected a decent number would come up, but a hundred was more than she anticipated.

“Are you saying you killed or sold off that many people?”

“Every time there’s a rebellion, about ten die. Add in the kidnappings and other stuff, and easily over ten a day.”

As she crushed the boastful leader underfoot, Tenitia thought.

Things were turning out bigger than expected.

The knight’s heart thumped rapidly.

* * *

Valenciaunos headed to the guard post near the slums.

It was where the most disappearances and deaths occurred.

Not a single person welcomed the visit of the ‘royal lady.’

“Huh?”

The guard post was empty, and she saw thuggish-looking men and guards tipping drinks in a nearby tavern in the middle of the day.

“Those tax-stealing bastards!”

Valenciaunos acted out of anger.

Bang!

He strode into the tavern and slammed a guard’s face onto the table.

“If you want to live, answer me as I ask. First, what are you doing on duty? Second, what’s your relation to the lump in front of you?”

The man referred to as a ‘lump’ frowned.

“Why has a high-ranking official come here? We’re discussing work, so let us be.”

“What business do you have discussing work with a guard?”

“Ah, you must be the new commissioner. Sir, I can throw some money your way…”

Bang!

Valenciaunos struck the ‘lump’ on the head with the sword hilt.

The ‘lump’, hit like an egg, smashed his face into the table.

Drip, drip.

Valenciaunos poured alcohol over the ‘lump’s head and asked the trembling second guard.

“Have you witnessed any corpses recently discovered or thrown into underground sewers? If you don’t answer correctly, I’ll toss you both into the latrine nicely.”

Damn infiltrators.

They were the ones trying to demolish homes simply because they didn’t like them.

The landlord couldn’t just stand by and watch that.

* * *

Lady Sorelazie plunged into this adventure with inner satisfaction.

It was an opportunity to obtain research samples regarding erosion and ancient artifacts without Jeilliris’s prior approval.

Being of royal blood, the nobility had a higher erosion rate to match their talents.

The prevailing theory had firmly established that erosion susceptibility is closely linked to mana receptivity.

“Thanks to that, these commoners’ bodies can’t host the ancient artifacts properly.”

“Indeed, indeed.”

“Lady Sorelazie’s words are correct.”

The soldiers in the morgue abandoned any thought of rebellion just at the sight of her mage’s robe and bowed to her in submission.

“However, logically speaking, shouldn’t we be suspicious if the corpses come out looking like this?”

Lady Sorelazie detached a finger from a corpse inside a paper bag.

A sharp sound was heard.

The corpse was completely drained of bodily fluids and had withered to resemble a mummy that was hundreds of years old.

Dozens of such corpses lay in the morgue.

“So they were tangled up where the underground sewer rises to the surface?”

“Yes, yes.”

“It seems too many surged up at once for the slimes to process.”

Lady Sorelazie had to suppress the urge to retort that since when did slimes have it so easy.

The genius mage had long felt like the only person among goldfish.

It was useless to say anything if they still could not realize the seriousness of the situation.

It meant that corpses were pouring in at a rate that slimes couldn’t handle.

* * *

“Duke Valen.”

“Yes, Your Majesty.”

Jeilliris had recently developed a preference for wearing black clothing.

They say it doesn’t show bloodstains easily.

Seeing the platinum hair flowing lavishly over her black dress made her look like a meticulously crafted doll.

“That attendant poisoned my carriage. How shall I execute him?”

An attendant was kneeling under the platform, held by the knights.

I cast a disdainful glance at the attendant.

Sometimes harshness was necessary.

An assassination attempt could not be tolerated.

“Behead him and have him sent to Wyvernfit. No, it seems unnecessary to even behead him.”

“Wyvernfit? Oh, that’s good. Indeed, you are as clever as my blood kin.”

“I thought it best to ensure these creatures used for war remember how to hunt people.”

As the emperor gestured, the knights moved.

The attendant squirmed, screaming and cursing, but was eventually dragged out of the hall.

In these turbulent times, public execution could not be entertained, so this was the best method to make an example and avoid wasting manpower.

Above all, this wasn’t Jeilliris’s idea.

We were twins.

It was easy to compare.

The best way to elevate Jeilliris in this situation was to lower myself.

I needed to make it easier for people to find fault with me compared to Jeilliris.

“I wish Your Majesty would include my name in this execution method. I’d like the offenders to know whose idea cost them their lives.”

That way, people would think Jeilliris was far better than her brother.

That was my duty.

It would allow me to repay a little of the unpayable debt.

“Very well, very well. How splendid.”

As Jeilliris, who had been smiling in satisfaction, soon lost her smile.

I adjusted my posture slightly and listened attentively.

Her golden eyes pinned me down with a draconic air.

“However, I hear your name has been coming up in my ears quite a bit lately.”

“Yes?”

“Did I give you leave, and now there’s chaos all over the capital? If you wish to hunt humans, you’d do well to go into the slums.”

Jeilliris said this with a look of disbelief.

What in the world were Tenitia and Sorelazie doing, she muttered.

“Your Majesty, in fact….”

“I know.”

“Yes?”

“I know what you are pursuing. Didn’t you report to me that infiltrators had appeared? They spread like a plague, and the capital, which has been in chaos for the past year, will be easy pickings.”

However, Jeilliris said, starting off with, “But…”

“Didn’t I give you leave? You have only a few days left, so take it easy.”

“Your Majesty, if they continue to offer sacrifices like this…”

The emperor said indifferently, “The divisions will increase, their power will grow, and they will crawl out of the darkness.”

As if knowing everything.

“I am waiting for that.”

“Yes?”

“I intend to clean up the capital on a large scale. The late emperor focused more on lineage management in his later years than on rule, hence various serious issues emerged here and there. Why do you think I haven’t ordered Sir Barbatos to clear the red-light district yet?”

Her eyes glimmered with insight.

“Fundamentally, there are too many people in the capital. The surrounding land has its limits, causing issues in sustaining the population, leading to fierce competition over limited resources like bread, water, and space.”

Her gaze matched her status as an emperor.

“After securing funds by sweeping away the red-light district, I will demolish the slums and begin reconstruction projects. I’ll build workshops and multiple communal housing, sending the expelled poor to the border high nobles, who claim a shortage of tenants.”

She spoke as if no obstacle could interrupt her flow.

It was a mark of sheer confidence that it would inevitably happen regardless of any interference.

“When they arrive…”

“They’ll have to feed the army that has just been organized in addition to the poor. The liars who claimed tenant shortages won’t dare speak differently now.”

The excuse of not being able to increase conscripts due to a shortage of tenants was commonly used logic among them to bolster knight and mage forces.

“That’s why, Duke, even if several hundred people go missing each day in this capital, you needn’t worry. I am waiting for them to gather, confident enough to leap out.”

I was at a loss for words, staring up at my twin.

Jeilliris had always been Jeilliris.

Her coldness was not honed in battle; it was revealed in battle.

But perhaps she liked the dazed expression on my face, or maybe she planned to tease me from the start, Jeilliris continued speaking.

“However, what you say is not entirely wrong. If you wish to forgo your leave and work, I welcome it. Wouldn’t it be better to wipe out the infiltrators and sweep away the slums before summer ends? To send them off in the frosty autumn would mean much bloodshed, and we wouldn’t have enough manpower to burden the high nobles.”

“How many do you intend to kill?”

“Just sitting and waiting isn’t my style either. If you gather evidence through your efforts, I will provide support. If, by chance, you end up returning unable to discern life from death at the hands of the infiltrators, I will personally strike your neck.”

* * *

“Did you really say you’d personally strike my neck?”

“Yeah.”

“Then it’s practically permission for me to move.”

“Does it work that way?”

“It does. If you realize you’ve wronged me, you might just want to brace for it.”

Lady Tenitia began to move separately to extract information from the Black Iron Knights.

I heard that the head of the Silver Knight Order was also being quite alert regarding this matter.

So, I was on my way with Lady Sorelazie to check out the slums.

“Do you think there might be some magical significance to their defenses or positions?”

“Historically, there have been many cases where sewer passages were used like magic circles. There probably will be such effects in the underground sewers around here as well.”

“What kind of magic?”

“Mainly pest control, harmful mold suppression, green skin spore extermination, bandit deterrence, stuff like that.”

“Let’s skip the last one. Right, the infiltrators might also be using the sewers to draw something like Omakseong?”

“Exactly. So you finally get it. My lips are almost worn out.”

Truly a genius mage.

“From a defensive standpoint, there likely needs to be something over here.”

As we turned the corner of the alley, something certainly peculiar appeared.

“Hello? Have you seen this friend?”

A bright, clear voice.

“If you do, please report it to the Theological University.”

A friendly demeanor towards the people near the slums.

Lightly curled bright brown hair framed a face with deep and kind brown eyes.

He had a tall stature similar to mine, evoking the image of a sincere and kind dove.

“Theological university student?”

With an oddly youthful charm, he wore the typical black robe with golden buttons of the Theological University and was circulating pulled montages printed on cheap cardboard.

Given the historical enmity between mages and priests, Lady Sorelazie’s expression soured at the sight of him.

“Let’s hurry. I must have come to the wrong place.”

However, I, like a rooted tree, stopped in my tracks and gazed at the university student’s ears and jawline.

Though his hair color and eye shape had changed from before my return, I could recognize him right away.

“Saint?”

The black goat of the angry god, La Matheos Tumor.

He was what the world called the Black Saint Matheos.

A pillar of the empire that had captured and burned countless infiltrators, black magicians, heretics, and quack sorcerers.

He had also played the role of an antagonist repeatedly on behalf of Jeilliris.