The man who nearly tumbled off his horse approached the emperor hurriedly.

As the imperial knights around tried to stop him, the emperor stood up with a serious expression.

“What is the matter?”

“A, a monster has appeared. There’s a monster in the forest.”

Still in shock, the man repeated the same words incoherently.

The surroundings became noisy. While some responded to the word ‘monster’ with “Isn’t that a lie?”, others who saw the man’s pale complexion became serious.

I stood up and moved a little closer to where people were gathered.

Then I could hear their conversation more clearly.

“Officer Stevens. Speak calmly and properly.”

At the emperor’s words, the man took a deep breath. As his panting breath, like someone having hyperventilation, gradually subsided, he spoke again.

“There’s an abnormally large animal in the forest. My fellow officers and I shot arrows, but even though it was clearly fatally wounded, it charged at us. Fortunately, I barely escaped, but the other officers…”

“What happened to the officers!”

The expressions of those who realized things were going wrong hardened.

Officer Stevens, forgetting his dignity, sat down on the ground and almost sobbed.

“They were attacked by that monster. I couldn’t bear to see what happened. I escaped the forest thinking I had to report immediately. I’m sorry.”

“Oh my.”

I tilted my head at the emperor’s rather dry reaction. It couldn’t be helped, as the emperor didn’t look surprised throughout the officer’s report about the monster.

His reaction was clearly different from others.

The emperor calmly observing people who were panicking and agitated seemed very out of place.

“Where exactly did you see the monster?”

“I, I’m not sure. The forest is so vast, and I was too confused when we were attacked…”

“Was it unaffected even when others attacked?”

Another strange question.

Unaffected by attacks?

Was that expression used in this context?

However, among the confused people, it didn’t seem like anyone noticed that the emperor was suspicious.

I began to have reasonable doubts.

The emperor clearly wanted Dietrich as his son-in-law. To maintain the imperial family’s pride, he announced the shocking reward of marriage to the princess under the pretext of a hunting competition.

Such an emperor wouldn’t sit idle and watch someone other than Dietrich Delgado take first place.

‘Could this be the emperor’s doing?’

Judging by the emperor’s ridiculous acting, it seemed highly likely.

‘It looks like he needs some acting lessons from the duchess.’

The emperor’s acting, pretending to comfort Officer Stevens with a stiff face, was incomparably worse than the duchess’s.

“Unaffected… Yes. It seemed so.”

“Good. Then I’ll deploy the imperial knights immediately. Everyone, don’t worry.”

He nodded to the imperial knights waiting nearby.

All the knights except for the minimum force needed to protect the emperor gathered before him in an orderly manner.

“Find the injured and rescue them. Bring everyone back safely.”

“Yes! Understood!”

The imperial knights, shouting vigorously in unison, turned around. Then they mounted the horses prepared on one side and disappeared into the forest.

“A monster. My goodness, it’s unbelievable.”

“Could Officer Stevens have exaggerated out of fear? According to him, it means a monster has appeared inside the imperial palace grounds.”

“That’s right. Isn’t this a big deal?”

“More importantly, we need to find out which family’s son the injured officer is. Surely it’s not my son, is it?”

The hunting competition, which had been full of laughter, was instantly covered with worry.

“Your Majesty! I sincerely implore you to deploy more knights immediately.”

Then Duchess Leriana’s plea, almost like a scream, was heard.

A dark shadow fell over her face. It was because of Yurian, who had gone hunting in the forest.

The duchess was restless, worried that something might happen to Yurian.

Watching her biting her trembling lips tightly, I stared at the forest with an uneasy heart.

The path leading into the deep forest grew darker with no sunlight penetrating, making it difficult to see inside.

In fact, I wasn’t worried about Dietrich and Yurian.

If things were progressing according to the original story, Dietrich and Yurian wouldn’t be hurt in today’s crisis.

After all, the original story hasn’t even begun yet.

What I’m more worried about is…

‘I hope Dietrich doesn’t just kill the monster and take first place.’

If that happens, the emperor’s scheme will be completely successful.

If Dietrich encounters the monster, will he pretend not to see it and pass by?

Well. If it’s a dangerous situation, he probably won’t be able to resist dealing with the monster.

I clasped my hands together and fervently wished.

Please, please escape the forest without encountering the monster.

Please don’t come in first!

[This is the timeline separator]

“Dietrich. Where did you rush off to earlier?”

The two people, riding horses provided by the imperial family, galloped side by side through the forest.

The path wasn’t smooth, with dead trees and branches piled up here and there.

However, for Dietrich and Nocturne, who were expert riders, this level of rough terrain was a piece of cake.

Dietrich kicked his horse’s flank. His horse then began to slightly outpace Nocturne’s.

Dietrich’s silver-gray hair fluttered here and there.

He looked almost like a god guarding the forest.

However, Dietrich’s beautiful appearance had no effect on Nocturne.

“Answer me, answer!”

Nocturne shouted, catching up to Dietrich who had skillfully dodged his words.

Even the good-natured Nocturne was losing patience with Dietrich’s taciturnity.

“I was going to say I saw you meeting that maid.”

“Why are you so interested in Heidi?”

Ah, there it is.

As expected, Dietrich always showed an immediate reaction whenever the name ‘Heidi’ was mentioned.

Nocturne noticed that Dietrich shared an unusual emotion with Heidi.

It was difficult to deceive Nocturne, who was second to none in perceptiveness.

Among the many eccentric magicians, Nocturne was quite an oddball.

Although he didn’t know what kind of emotion Dietrich shared with Heidi, it was clear that he had quite a personal liking for her.

Otherwise, Dietrich, who was cold to a frightening degree in everything, couldn’t react so humanly.

“I think the order of your words is a bit mixed up? It’s not that I’m interested, it’s that you’re making me interested.”

“Lose interest. It’s none of your business.”

“Oh really? Well, we’ll see about that.”

Nocturne, after dropping a meaningful comment, changed the subject.

The forest was quiet without a single sign of life.

He looked around alertly as he rode. There were definitely no people.

“I looked into that sacred sword you mentioned before.”

Dietrich slowed down as the topic of Harpe came up. He had been thinking Nocturne would tell him about it since he had just returned from the northern expedition.

He pointed at the sword at Dietrich’s waist and smiled meaningfully.

“That thing’s a magical artifact, you know?”

“This sword, you mean?”

“Yeah. The magical power contained in the sword itself is tremendous. It wouldn’t be an exaggeration to say it was made by the greatest archmage of the era.”

Nocturne was genuinely impressed.

One day, Dietrich suddenly came and showed him a sword, claiming it was the sacred sword of the Delgado family, and made an abrupt request that sounded more like an order.

[Look into this sword for me.] […So suddenly? Is this something you need to come to the magic tower for before dawn even breaks?]

Thanks to his sleepless friend, Nocturne, who loved his morning sleep, was forced to wake up.

Still, Nocturne was surprisingly sincere about friendship.

Although Dietrich’s request was quite bothersome, he thoroughly investigated the sacred sword and discovered some surprising facts.

The sacred sword of the Delgado family contained magical power that even he, one of the top talents in the magic tower, found astonishing.

Moreover, the magical power in the sacred sword seemed to be sealed with an unfamiliar magic that he had never seen before.

“The magical power in that sacred sword is enough to blow away the entire empire. Of course, you’d have to break the magic seal containing that power first.”

“Is that power sealed?”

“Yeah. It’s tremendous magical power, but it’s sealed so it can’t be used recklessly. Well, it would have been nice to find out who did it, but that was beyond my ability.”

Nocturne, who had been speaking calmly, suddenly flared up.

“And you know what, how could you just show it to me briefly and then take it away after asking me to investigate? You should know it was extremely difficult to find out even this much.”

“Thank you.”

After a brief thanks, Dietrich slowly stroked the scabbard with his finger.

‘Magical power.’

He had expected Harpe to have some special power, but to think it was a sword with magical power.

He needed to look into it more.

As Dietrich thought this, he suddenly narrowed his eyes.

“Wait a moment.”

And almost at the same time, Nocturne’s playful lips also hardened.

Thump. Thump.

Heavy footsteps loud enough to shake the forest were heard.

It wasn’t the sound of a normal animal’s footsteps. But this wasn’t the Dark Forest near the magic tower where strange animals appeared.

This was the imperial palace forest, which should be strictly managed by the imperial zookeepers.

“Something’s coming.”

“Yeah. The sound doesn’t seem normal.”

Nocturne whistled lowly and lightly flicked his fingers.

Then a gust of wind began to swirl through the forest.

Woong.

The wind hitting their ears blew away all the dense leaves.

Sunlight that had been blocked by the trees began to penetrate.

And the huge animal that appeared before the two was.

“Holy shit!”

As Nocturne cursed, Dietrich’s brow furrowed.

It was a black bear, easily three times the size of a normal bear, with traces of strange magic emanating from it.