IWRYWYM Ch. 112 — Goddess of War
Elisha took down the wall only after all the rebels within the rim of the water she had set were dead.
The water stopped flowing. Droplets that had been floating in the air fell. But instead of wetting the floor, they simply disappeared, returning to where they belonged.
However, the blood trapped inside the water barrier fell like a red carpet in front of the party. As Elisha was about to take her first step, Spot came quickly, kissed her, and rubbed his face to hers.
Elisha then sped up on top of Spot.
“Catch them! Don’t miss!”
There were no rebels around the Imperial Knights as those who couldn’t keep guarding in front of the water wall eventually left their positions and headed towards the monsters.
A knight who seemed to have quite a position on the rebel side shouted and tried to come this way, but it didn’t work out.
A Forge exploded with the sound of an explosion.
The bodily fluid that it spewed out was scattered around.
“No! No! Who told you to blow it up!? Didn’t I tell you not to deal with Forges like that!?”
It was too late to shout.
“Heuk! I can’t see… P-Please help me!”
Those who the Forge had poisoned struggled in agony. Whenever a Forge fluctuated, the rebels decreased by a handful, looking like food placed in front of the angler, seemingly would be eaten within a short time.
Elisha advanced along with the Imperial Knights, leaving them behind.
Traps in the way were either broken or pushed out of the way.
Horseshoes continued to knock on Korobo Forest.
Everyone said that Count Guillaume would be different from Viscount Tara. Count Guillaume and Viscount Tara had the same influence among the western nobles, but above all, Count Guillaume was a man Duke Verdin trusted and entrusted with work.
Many believed that he, who had been complementing the duke without any problems, would relieve the duke’s troubles again this time.
Of course, their predictions were correct in terms of results alone. It’s just that the direction was the other way around.
Guillaume County differed from Tara Viscounty as it fell much sooner into the hands of the 2nd Consort without much fighting…
In Tara Viscounty, she’d left most of the nobles alive and handed the punishment to the emperor except for that man who dreamed of revenge by mentioning the event on Pavezzo and the young children who rushed to contribute.
It’s not that Elisha was discriminating between the two. She’d never had a bad feeling about the count that she’d seen in the duchy during her trip to the west. But he was too loyal. He chose to die as a vassal of Duke Verdin rather than protecting the estate as a lord. Count Guillaume, who chose to explode with Elisha but failed, committed suicide.
Elisha couldn’t let his men join the radical master’s will to explode the county. Clearly, if she left them alone, they would continue to make trouble.
So she cleaned up the county before those sent by the emperor arrived.
Viscount Tara continued to tremble as he rode his horse.
“This is Korobo Forest, right?”
Hell spread throughout Korobo Forest.
The person answering seemed to think the same thing as his face distorted. He seemed to be barely holding back the urge to vomit right now.
Looking at this, he could see why Count Guillaume’s forces had been gathered to attack lost their momentum so quickly.
Of course, the biggest reason was that the 2nd Consort had defeated Count Guillaume, and the county had fallen into the hands of the emperor.
“They must be glad to have seen this,” Baron Hux said, barely swallowing his meal. If the reinforcement had insisted on going to the count’s castle where the 2nd Consort was located to restore the castle without withdrawing the banner of rebellion, they would’ve experienced this themselves.
“Just what kind of person…?” Baron Hux didn’t exactly say who, but Viscount Tara understood at once.
“I understand that. How can someone who can do this not be scary?”
Being able to do this was scary enough, but what’s scarier was that she didn’t lose her cool after doing this.
Although Viscount Tara was afraid of her actions in the viscounty, he didn’t resent her.
He could only blame himself for being caught in the middle.
“Will I be able to see the 2nd Consort if I go to the count’s castle?”
Baron Hux was young, and of low rank, so he’d never been to Barossa, and he’d never seen the 2nd Consort because he couldn’t stand at the center of the Western nobility. Maybe that’s why, even if he was so scared in Korobo Forest, he kept talking about the 2nd Consort.
It was admiration. Well, how many people in the empire didn’t?
The moon of the empire, who didn’t jeopardize the empire by pulling troops from its borders or conscripting the people of the empire and using them as soldiers, simply brought only the knights of the noble families to silence the rebellion alone. She was the sun’s companion.
Following “the summoner of water spirit”, the 2nd Consort was once again imprinted on the people of the empire with a new look.
“She must’ve already left for the Verdin Duchy.”
“Then do you think she should linger? The West is now raging, so she’s fighting it before it spreads further. If she takes a wrong step or is late, there will be an all-out war until one side is annihilated.”
The starting part of the West was crossed because of Tara Viscounty. And with the collapse of the county now, there was still a line left if the western region was divided vertically. The duke would surely gather all his remaining power to resist at the beginning of the two pieces.
“Didn’t His Majesty say that those charged with rebellion can remove the charge if we make a contribution? But this does not apply to those who are with the duchy now. Since they’re the center of the western aristocracy, even if they change sides, His Majesty won’t accept them. Their clan will be exterminated as punishment. Baron Hux seized your last chance well.”
Baron Hux nodded up and down broadly.
Long after leaving Korobo Forest, they arrived at the county. Their journey was so smooth that they wondered if battles had never occurred here. Baron Hux and Viscount Tara entered the wide-open castle.
Together with the emperor’s people, who would soon cross the portal, they would stabilize the castle and strengthen the territory. They chatted casually but didn’t forget their plight. When the emperor’s people came, they would have to lie flat and stick their noses on the ground.
“I’m sorry I couldn’t serve you until the end.”
Duke Verdin looked down at Count Guillaume’s knight commander, Nickel, kneeling before him.
“The 2nd Consort will be suspicious if you avoid it. Why did the plan of not running away and remaining in the count’s castle until the end fail?”
Nickel hadn’t been in the county, either, so he didn’t know for sure.
He’d been watching from a distance. If they succeeded, he would announce success, and if they failed, he would immediately follow the will of his master, telling the duke to strengthen the defense of the duchy as much as possible and never take the 2nd Consort lightly.
“He’s not someone who would go in such a vain way,” the duke murmured and put his hand on his forehead.
He waved his hand and left the conference room. He didn’t know how on earth they’d gotten to this point.
Then he saw Anne walking from the other side. Right, I think I know why things happened like this.
“I knew this family would be shaken by a woman’s mistake. But I thought it would be the second. I didn’t know it would be you.”
“Keep quiet. You and your family shouldn’t go wild as if you can still benefit. I didn’t forgive you. I just gave you a chance to be punished because you begged.”
At first, the duke had thought it was a masterpiece designed by the emperor or the 2nd Consort. When Anne told him to use the 2nd Consort, he’d clicked his tongue toward the second daughter-in-law. How much he’d freaked out when he heard it was real?
Count Dout said he would take responsibility for it and spared no effort for it, and the duke tried to let it pass because it wasn’t good for the duchy to punish him, a leading family in the West and a supporter of the duke.
But things got bigger. He hadn’t known his second daughter-in-law, who was like a worm, would have many helpers.
Strange rumors began to spread. The duke then decided to abandon Count Dout and his first daughter-in-law. However, just at that point, the rumors suddenly accelerated, incomparable to before.
The duke realized that it was a masterpiece Count Dot had created to attract the entire West so that he wouldn’t die alone. But it was too late.
Shortly thereafter, a catastrophe occurred in the foothills of Pavezzo, and the opportunity to withdraw was lost forever. Even if he wanted to hit Count Dout or those who sympathized with him, the situation had come to this. He couldn’t undermine the power to fight the emperor.
In the end, they’d gotten here because of the situation. Duke Verdin was considered mediocre among the successive dukes, but he was never of a low quality in his family, who controlled the West.
For Duke Verdin, this situation was unfamiliar and unbearable. Anne lowered her eyes and head as if she realized it was time to obey.
“I know what your husband is up to. If you don’t quit right away, you and your husband will never be able to set foot in the western territory again.”
Anne realized that regardless of how things went, her father-in-law would never forgive her and her family. And there was her husband, whom she horribly disliked but was bound to be on her side in the end.
The duke passed by Anne and disappeared to the other side. Anne straightened her back and chewed her lower lip. People who knew about the evidence of the contract with the desert tribes criticized Anne for leaving such a thing, but what’s more unbearable was…
They questioned how she could leave such an important thing in the hands of the maids and treat them as fools.
Wasn’t it ridiculous for mere maids to touch their master’s things?
Having to think about such a case in itself made her seem like a ridiculous master. However, Anne hadn’t left the envelope anywhere. She had put it in her safe, and a quick-witted maid noticed where her safe key was and opened the box.
Anne gave a fair punishment to all the members of the dukedom who did not speak about the maid’s existence until the end, and eventually, the maid confessed because she couldn’t stand other people being harmed by her.
She said she had no regrets until she died.
Anne couldn’t figure out what was going on. As she recalled that day, she walked through the hallway with darkly somber eyes and stood in front of her room. She could feel a presence inside.
It was someone who made her frown.
“The duke’s castle is in this state because of someone. But that someone is walking around doing fine. How shameless.”
Her husband, Patrick, teased her and sat on her chair, feet on the table. The things she used were badly crumpled and spilled by his feet.
“What are you doing?”
“What do you mean? Is it strange that a husband came to his wife’s room?”
Patrick, who was frightened of Anne while acting selfishly, had been ignoring her, starting with the time when the 2nd Consort visited.
Anne was looked down on because she’d made a mistake, but the 2nd Consort’s ability was so great that everyone other than her seemed relatively insignificant. Then, when this happened, Patrick blatantly threatened Anne and treated her rudely, saying that she was a girl who would eat the family.
“Well, what about you? I just saw the duke, and he warned you. Probably only the beasts that can’t speak in this duchy think you’re not involved in Jonathan’s disappearance.”
“How can you say that!? Oh, I wish I was alone! I’m doing this for you and those in-laws!”
Patrick got up, his face was red from being stabbed. He slammed the door shut and left. Then, while sprinting away, he almost ran into a maid who’d just brought tea.
When the maid shrieked in surprise, Patrick’s expression changed, and he pretended to be serious. He poured a cup of tea at will from the teacup on the tray, then pretended to be sipping, scanning the maid up and down her.
The maid avoided his gaze, and her expression hardened.
“You have to be careful. If it were not me but other nobles, you would’ve been punished just by almost bumping into them.”
Patrick gripped the maid’s shoulder lightly and walked away. The maid, Annie, turned her head and stared at his back.