Chapter 64: Conception Dwells in the Body that has Overcome Death

The two days passed quickly. It was the same day with no difference. During the day, I did not go hunting because I was worried that rain might pour out since the sky was cloudy, and in the evening I went to Wilhelm and waited endlessly before returning.

When I had free time with Valeria, I looked out the window at the broad birch forest. The white birch forest, which spread widely in the west and east of the Imperial Palace, was half-naked with fallen leaves. The cage Richton and I were kept in must have been somewhere out there. But I had never tried to find any traces of it. The inside of the forest felt like a bottomless black swamp, and I couldn’t get into it.

Knock, knock.

The door opened, and beyond it, Valeria came driving a tea cart. Soon, a snack was served on the table as a substitute for dinner.

“It’s almost time for your appointment. Will you be able to eat it all?”

“I don’t care, I’m not that hungry. You do your business. I’m going to eat slowly.”

Nodding her head, Valeria approached the fireplace where I was standing. The weather had been chilly recently, so I had been lighting the fire once in a while. Valeria sat on her knees in front of it, ripped a small piece of paper from her arms and tossed it.

At first, I didn’t pay attention because I thought it was a letter from an acquaintance. But it was a little different when I found a postcard that seemed to belong to Valeria at her feet.

<Conception[1] dwells in the body that has overcome death.>

It was a sentence that looked like a cryptogram[2].

“Valeria, what’s that?”

Valeria, who had been tearing the paper for a while, turned to me.

“Oh, it’s a letter. I’ve been receiving strange postcards every single day since a few days ago. I’m sure my name is put as the recipient, but… It’s all the same thing, and it’s creepy, so I’m going to burn them all.”

It wasn’t even a postcard. The front of the unwritten postcard was simply painted in black ink. In addition, the sender and the address were empty. It kept catching my eye and I couldn’t ignore it. I rose to my feet and approached Valeria. As she said, all three remaining postcards had the same words.

<Conception dwells in the body that has overcome death.>

A dead body.

“When exactly did it come?”

“I think it’s been about 10 days.”

Ten days ago, it was around the time when I was accused of being the assassin of the emperor. Postcards that began to arrive at Valeria from that time. The body that overcame death. A thought came to my mind.

“Have you ever been very sick?”

“Pardon? No. Not once I grew up, but I’m unsure about when I was very young.”

Then did I have it? There was a name that flashed across my mind. I stood up as if possessed and approached the table. I grabbed the knife next to the bread and cut my fingertips. Then, drops of blood that formed on the fingerprints were dropped on the bread.

“Miss?”

There was no change. Everything remained strangely the same. The round drops of blood fell gently on the surface of the bread. There were no rotting or burnt areas..

“Did you get a cut? The ointment….”

“It’s all right. I don’t need medicine.”

It was because of this.

‘Because of this, even if the emperor drank my blood, he was not injured and he was fine.’

It was not a lie that I had received Isla’s auditory hallucination from Vivianne, so the case of the emperor’s assassination could be overlooked. However, the red liquid in the glass bottle at that time was my blood. The blood that dissolved when it became mixed unless a specialized glass bottle was used. I felt so stupid that I realized it late. It was certain. I didn’t know why, but all of the Ingord poison in my body had been detoxified.

“Ha.”

How the hell? I rushed to the drawer and searched the bag I had brought from Ingord. It wasn’t much of a burden.

What I was looking for was a small glass bottle included in it. I thought I had swallowed it in my sleep, but the black liquid in the glass bottle remained the same. The antidote that Richton sent me. Then had my body been detoxifying on its own without me taking the antidote?

‘Hey, Susan, you look bright these days. I’m glad that you are feeling better.’

I often heard that when I was about to leave Ingord. Yes. If I thought about it carefully, the state of my body, which had been unstable, was starting to improve absurdly from one day. I used to collapse about once every three days, couldn’t sleep because of the nightmares that came every night, and couldn’t get a proper rest due to my sensitive five senses… How about now?

‘I thought it was because I got used to the poison. Since then, it has already been deciphered.’

What about the bet with Richton?

“…ady”

What about this glass bottle he gave me as an antidote?

“…ady?”

What is the conception of the body that won death?

“Lady!”

I took a long breath. It felt like my brain, which was filled with chaos, was being stretched. Valeria knelt down in front of me with a worried look.

“Are you alright? It’s time for you to leave soon.”

As she said that, the clock’s hour hand had landed at 6 p.m. I was in a hurry, but I got out of my seat slowly. I would have to wait for Wilhelm again anyway, and I could organize my thoughts then.

I drank the cold water and left the room. Valeria, who was carefully following me, leaned towards me and said,

“You look a little strange today. I’ve never seen you like this before.”

“What if I look like this?”

“You seem to have lost your composure.”

That would mean that I seemed very relaxed before.

“I was always like this until I came to the Imperial Palace.”

Confused, distressed, tormented. Compared to my days in Ingord, the Imperial Palace was no better than a vacation spot. In fact, I obtained the status of being a guest of Wilhelm, and since all of Ingord’s poison was healed, there could be no more peaceful daily life than this. But it was not the latent rationality within me. My rationality hated this stability to the point it felt disgusting. My rationality did not come to the Imperial Castle to enjoy this peace. Rather, I…….

“Today, the servants of His Highness Wilhelm are nowhere to be seen.”

When I looked up, as she said, the door was vacant. However, I couldn’t break my promise because the servant was away, so I knocked and entered the room. Cain, who always waited for us, was also not in the room.

‘Is he going to treat me like I don’t exist anymore?’

At this point, I wondered how far he would go.

“L-l-lady?”

Naturally, it was time to lie down on the chair. Valeria called me in a quivering voice in shock. At that moment, I suddenly felt something that quickly crossed my mind.

I turned my direction to that strange feeling, which could not be easily defined, and approached Valeria. Standing next to the big bed, her head creaked toward me.

There was a vast terror in her blue eyes that could not be described in words. I stood next to Valeria who was filled with horror. What laid before us was, to our great surprise, the corpse of Count Belbourne, which had been mutilated.

“Ahh.”

It was for a very short moment. As soon as I recognized the body of the Count of Belbourne, I became aware of the strange feeling that crossed my mind earlier.

“Wilhelm.”

This was the trap Wilhelm had dug for me. A trap prepared only for me. Yes, Wilhelm, there was no reason for you to keep crouching in front of me.

“Madam, let me tell them about this….”

Valeria grabbed me by the wrist with her trembling hands. I shook my head, wiping my sweaty forehead. A large sword, that was lying next to Belbourne’s legs, was dyed red by the dried blood.

“It’s no use.”

I heard the door open. The door, which had never been opened in the past few days, had now opened. An unknown visitor approached our back. Judging from the sound I heard in succession, it was not one person, but several.

“Hmm? There’s a lady? Did we get the wrong room? It’s His Highness Wilhelm’s space….”

The voice that came right behind me cut off at some point. After a moment of silence, someone moved between us.

“Wait, someone’s down here.”

“Isn’t he the Count of Belbourne?”

But it was weird. I didn’t think I would feel this slight anxiety.

“Damn, the count’s arm… What the….”

“Serv-! Call the servant!”

The surroundings became noisy. The frightened Valeria slowly collapsed on the floor holding my hand. Wilhelm’s room was simply an abomination. It was natural. After such a cruel death, who could keep their composure?

‘But why wasn’t that the case for me?’

I thought this situation was just…. It was truly bizarre. Even though the unexpected, perhaps fatal, event occurred, on the contrary, a peaceful sense of security came to a corner of my heart.

As if I had been hoping for this situation. When I suddenly came to my senses, everyone’s eyes were on us. Valeria’s grip on me became stronger. Slowly pushing her hand away, I opened my mouth with a gentle smile.

“You think I should say something here, right? My maid and I just got in here. I had a previous appointment with His Highness.”

No one opened their mouth, and the atmosphere of the cold hardened room was not warmed up.

“Of course no one will believe it.”

I shouldn’t do this, but I couldn’t hide the laughter that came out of my lips. Haha! Finally, the end of a long and dragged out peace had come.