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Translated By Arcane Translations
Translator: FusionX
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“What about the Duke of the Southern Colony then?” the Crown Princess asked.
“I must respectfully decline, Your Highness,” the professor replied.
“…”
The Crown Princess’s face wrinkled in displeasure.
However, the professor standing across from her seemed unconcerned, silently staring back at the Crown Princess without uttering a word.
“May I ask the reason?”
“I have an illness that causes severe reactions when animal fur gets on me.”
“Ha… That’s quite a half-hearted excuse.”
“If you ask once more, I’ll provide a more plausible excuse next time.”
“…”
The Crown Princess clicked her tongue and rested her chin on her hand.
Due to Duke Lorraine’s rebellion in the Southern Colony, the position of Duke had become vacant.
News had arrived that they had captured one castle on the first day of battle, so completely suppressing the rebels would likely happen soon.
To prevent the catastrophe of the Imperial Knights occupying and administering the area, they needed to quickly appoint a new Duke in advance.
Since the Imperial Knights belonged to the Imperial Army, military rule absolutely could not be allowed.
“Do you have no interest at all?”
“If you offer me the position of Commander-in-Chief of the Imperial Army, I might reconsider.”
“…”
“That was a joke. Yes, I have no intention of accepting, no matter what conditions you offer.”
He was the type to make jokes very seriously.
“Then that will be all.”
“Yes. Thank you very much for the offer, Your Highness.”
“Spare me the empty courtesies and get out quickly.”
“Yes.”
The Crown Princess deliberately waved her left hand visibly as she turned her head away.
The Count stared at the Crown Princess’s left ring finger for a moment before turning around and leaving.
“Hah…”
As the door slammed shut, a sigh escaped the Crown Princess’s lips.
She had been searching desperately for someone suitable for the Duke position, but to no avail.
No matter who said what, the most suitable candidate was Count Bermanstein, so she had summoned him directly to make the offer, but was rejected as expected.
[T/N: pretty sure thats Ludwig lol]
It was obvious that he was worried about a situation where he accepted the Duke position in advance but then couldn’t reclaim the Southern Colony lands if the war dragged on.
If such a situation arose, there would be no benefits from the Duchy, but he would only face frequent attacks due to the enormous position.
Even though the suppression forces would soon recapture the remaining three castles and prevent such a thing from happening.
Charitably, one could call it a cautious personality; uncharitably, he was a coward.
“Tsk. To think the top professor of the Imperial University would have so little guts.”
Or was it that he lacked guts and that was why he remained a lifelong top professor?
The Crown Princess kept clicking her tongue as she tapped on the desk.
At that moment, the door opened and an aide entered with a worried expression.
“Hah… Your Highness.”
“What is it?”
“Are you still wearing that ring?”
Another person was nagging her now.
The Crown Princess turned sideways in her chair.
“I’ve told you many times. Disturbing rumors are circulating among the nobles. That through that ring, you and Schlus Hainkel have exchanged marriage vows…”
“It’s not true.”
“What’s important isn’t whether it’s true or not. It’s how others perceive it. The situation is quite confusing because of this now. His Majesty the Emperor is worried about the families who should be competing for engagement with you before your coming-of-age ceremony this year instead uniting.”
“That won’t happen. I will reveal the truth at an appropriate time.”
“That’s what I mean by the truth… Hah.”
The aide finally cut off his words.
He had said the same thing many times before.
The Crown Princess’s deliberate ignoring of this wasn’t because she didn’t understand the seriousness of the situation.
Being clever, she surely knew everything and was still acting this way.
The aide had never found her stubborn persistence so frustrating before.
“In the worst case, your coming-of-age ceremony might be postponed.”
“What? That can’t happen. Who said such nonsense?”
“His Majesty the Emperor said so.”
“…”
The Crown Princess pouted and tapped the armrest of her chair.
Seeing this, the aide sighed deeply again and took out an envelope from his chest pocket, placing it on the desk.
“What’s that?”
“It’s a request for an audience from Schlus Hainkel.”
“Schlus?!”
As expected, the Crown Princess’s face instantly lit up.
Seeing this, the aide heaved another big sigh.
“But… How did you know it was a request for an audience?”
“…”
“You opened it, didn’t you?”
“Yes, that’s correct, Your Highness.”
“Don’t ever think of opening letters exchanged between Schlus and me again. That’s an order. Understood?”
“I’ll keep that in mind.”
Watching the Crown Princess smiling as she opened the letter, the aide thought to himself that next time, he would need to get approval from the Emperor before opening any letters.
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I had certainly sent a letter to the Imperial Palace just this morning, yet a reply had already arrived today.
It wasn’t a letter from a palace employee informing me that an audience was impossible.
Judging by the crooked handwriting, it was clearly a personal letter from the Crown Princess.
For someone who would soon ascend to the Emperor’s throne, her handwriting was still so…
Of course, I was in no position to criticize others.
“What does it say?” Emilia asked.
“It says I can come.”
“There must have been more than just that. It looked quite densely written.”
“Well, the rest was just idle chatter.”
“You’re lying. Are you saying the Crown Princess wrote trivial things in an official reply to a formal audience request?”
Emilia looked like she couldn’t believe it, it certainly wasn’t like the Crown Princess.
Even the permission for the audience was written in such a roundabout way that one could only understand it after reading to the very end.
I suspected she might have scribbled it while half-drunk.
For someone like the Crown Princess, that was entirely possible.
“What about the date?”
“Today…”
“What?! Really? Then we need to prepare quickly!”
“Today is fine. Tomorrow is fine too. The day after tomorrow would also be okay.”
“You scared me…”
“Let’s go tomorrow.”
“Alright. Should I come along?”
“If you promise to mind your behavior.”
“I won’t play around in the Imperial Palace…”
I knew.
Even though she joked around like this, she was someone who did her job properly when it mattered.
So was this her relaxed state now?
I didn’t think she was putting on an exhausting act of pretending to be relaxed by suddenly changing her attitude overnight.
It seemed she had judged me trustworthy enough after this recent kidnapping incident.
For Emilia, who had to act all day long, I could understand if she was just being comfortable in front of me to reduce the extreme energy and emotional drain.
“What would you like for dinner?”
“Do I have a choice?”
“No. Today it’s pasta.”
“…”
Why did she even ask then?
Emilia flashed a cute smile and disappeared into the kitchen.
There was still some time left until dinner so I went up to my room on the second floor for a while.
“Phew…”
After closing the door tightly, I opened the safe under the desk.
Inside was the broken pocket watch that no longer worked, I was considering moving it to the black steel safe.
It seemed foolish to let the black steel safe I had obtained from the Imperial Palace go to waste.
It was quite valuable in itself, so I hadn’t thought about what to put inside it.
In the case of Ms. Mary’s pocket watch, it would be the right decision to hide it in the safer black steel safe, as it would be a big problem if the Intelligence Agency discovered it.
I immediately picked up the pocket watch.
“What…?!”
At that moment, the scenery around me began to change.
A sensation indistinguishable from reality instantly invaded my brain.
Although the image was blurry, I could tell that there was snow piled up around and that an intact pocket watch was in Schlus’s hand.
I saw a woman walking from far away, I couldn’t see her face clearly.
“Ah.”
At that moment, the watch slipped from my, or rather Schlus’s, hand.
With that, I returned to reality.
That was the end of it.
“In Schlus’s memory… why on earth…”
My head started to ache.
What I had just seen was clearly a ‘memory of the original body’.
I called up the skill description again to see if I had missed anything.
The ability description at the end was still bothersome.
No matter how I looked at it, there were no other conditions.
It said that when certain actions were performed, it would show memories of the ‘original body’, meaning Schlus…
What I had just seen was undoubtedly Schlus’s past.
“Is this pocket watch connected to Schlus somehow?”
I examined the pocket watch with trembling hands.
Due to the blurriness of the vision, an exact comparison was difficult, but it was roughly similar in size and color.
However, it was unreasonable to conclude definitively that it was exactly the same pocket watch.
Since the condition was ‘when performing certain actions’, holding a pocket watch itself might be the trigger, not specifically holding Ms. Mary’s pocket watch.
“Could it be…”
It couldn’t possibly be the same as Ms. Mary’s.
How many people in this world could have memories related to pocket watches?
It couldn’t be.
What I was suspecting now was surely wrong.
To begin with, even their surnames were different.
Mary Ayle.
Schlus Hainkel.
Looking closely, even their cultural backgrounds were different.
Ayle was an English-derived surname, while Hainkel was German.
It was wrong from the start.
The hypothesis that I, or rather Schlus Hainkel, was Ms. Mary’s son.
Yes. It was surely wrong.
“Dinner’s ready, Schlus oppa!” Emilia called from downstairs.
“Oh! I’ll be right down!”
I carefully placed the pocket watch in the black steel safe and closed the door.
Soon, twelve magical formulas interlocked, locking it securely.
Now, even if a Majin came, she wouldn’t be able to open this.
“I will definitely deliver it.”
I had promised.
I had promised to deliver that watch to her son.
It was a person’s duty to keep their word once given.
I stared at the safe for a moment, trying to calm my complicated feelings, then turned away.
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[BRO WUT WUT WUT EYO HOLD ON A SECOND WUTTTTTT]
Imagine if Mary ayle was actually schlus mother
What a twist it would be if the bodies mother died and neither mary and him knew they were connected
Wot?????