It took less than an hour for Lucas to flee Canta as if running away. Caesar let out a deep sigh as he watched the carriage of the Pelur royal family disappear into the distance.

‘He did something crazy.’

There was a world of difference between imagining the situation and actually experiencing it. It seems there was a part of him that believed such a terrible thing wouldn’t actually happen, even though he had imagined it.

‘He did something completely insane!’

With this, the Pelur royal family would not be able to avoid the world’s condemnation.

Even if they could silence the nobles of Gania, they couldn’t silence the nobles and royals of other countries, and their employees. What happened today would spread across the world very quickly, as if on wings.

It was obvious what kind of articles would appear in tomorrow’s newspapers without even looking.

[What did the Pelur royal family do to the Franche royal family!] [The horrific truth pulled from the well!] [Has the crown prince of Gania strayed from the path of humanity?]

His head ached.

‘Should I have tried to stop it somehow? But would it have been stopped even if I tried?’

He wouldn’t have been able to stop what Floyd had set out to do. Looking at the situation earlier, Floyd and Roxiana had prepared very meticulously.

They gathered people who wouldn’t keep quiet, led them to the well, pulled out the bodies of the Franche royal family, and pinned all the blame on Lucas.

In that perfect play, Caesar could only play the role of a spectator.

‘Rather than trying to stop it and becoming estranged from the Grand Duke, it’s better to keep quiet. It would have happened no matter what I did.’

He couldn’t gauge what would happen next.

He recalled Roxiana’s face as she watched Lucas with a smile. A flawless smile, as if painted, without a single flaw. And the calm, burning resolve in her unwavering eyes.

‘This isn’t the end.’

She looked pleased, but inside she must have been burning black. How much effort must it have taken to smile while feeling pain as if her insides were being turned inside out?

Caesar banged the back of his head against the chair repeatedly.

“My lord.”

At Annas’s call, who couldn’t bear to watch anymore, Caesar abruptly stopped moving and stared at Annas.

“It’s going to get noisy. The fact that the princess of the Franche royal family survived will spread throughout Canta in less than a week. A spark will ignite in the hearts of the Canta people who had given up after losing their king.”

Gania will be pointed at for this incident, but that’s all. They won’t collapse from just this. Lucas will also receive protection while sitting in the crown prince’s seat, even if he gets reprimanded by Joseph V.

“As the regent of Canta, I’ll be in danger. Seeds of rebellion will start sprouting here and there, so increase security and don’t neglect surveillance.”

“Should we deal with them as soon as they’re detected?”

“No.”

Caesar rubbed his face with both hands.

Originally, when rebels were detected, it was important to publicly execute them to prevent the remaining rebels from moving recklessly. However.

“We can’t predict how the princess will react if we treat the Canta people carelessly.”

Why?

It’s clear that Roxiana must have received Floyd’s help to get to this point, and it would have been impossible without Floyd’s power. So why does Roxiana feel so frightening?

Is it because of her composure in front of her undead family members? Because of the intense will that filled her eyes? Because of the perfect smile she wore in front of Lucas?

Whatever the reason, it felt like the moment he upset her, the tip of the blade she held inside would be pressed against his throat.

Ridiculously, he was scared.

“The princess has no power, my lord.”

“No power, you say?”

Caesar recalled Floyd, who hadn’t taken his eyes off her from the moment she appeared.

“The princess has the Grand Duke. The Grand Duke will draw his sword against the empire for the princess. And.”

Floyd’s knights.

Arsen, Adrian, Cain, Hexten, Kirshan. Each famous in their own right, admired by many knights, they were all watching Roxiana with the same expression.

‘Ah, that’s what it was.’

The reason Roxiana felt frightening.

Not just the Grand Duke, but even his knights were looking at Roxiana with respect in their eyes.

Roxiana, who had lost her country, lost her family, and was even branded a slave and sold, had earned their reverence in less than two years.

That’s exactly what was frightening.

“The Grand Duke’s five wings will move for the princess.”

Annas thought Caesar was overestimating Roxiana too much.

“So if we detect rebels, keep them locked up for a few days, treat them well, and then send them back. I’ll look for a way to quit this damned regent job.”

+++

When Roxiana woke up, the first thing she saw was an unfamiliar ceiling.

Roxiana, who had wandered the Ider Palace with her family in her dream, couldn’t accept reality even after waking up, and for a while, she just blinked blankly.

Where is this? Why does her chest ache so much? Why does she feel like her whole body is about to break?

After pondering like that for a long time, she finally realized the reality.

Ah, right. She found her family. She saw her family die before her eyes. They no longer moved.

She didn’t wail like before, but tears she couldn’t hold back flowed quietly. She felt a hand wiping away those tears.

“I was going to ask if you slept well, but it seems you didn’t.”

A low, deep voice settled down as if comforting her.

Roxiana turned her gaze from the ceiling to him.

“What about Robert? Was Robert also in my dream?”

“Robert is waiting for you to wake up. There are many people besides Robert who will be glad to see you.”

“Ah…”

Roxiana recalled her knight she had seen before fainting. And his grotesquely hoarse voice.

The last time she saw Robert, he had been stabbed in the neck. It seems he survived that attack but lost his original voice.

When she saw the face she thought she would never see again, something seemed to snap. She had tried not to cry, but the moment she saw him, her sadness overflowed and she ended up crying like a child.

“What about… my family?”

“They’re lying in Adelia’s coffin. We’ve loaded the coffin onto a carriage so it can be moved anytime.”

“What about Lanian?”

“I’m sorry. We haven’t found him yet.”

A few days ago, Arsen reported that they couldn’t find only Lanian. Floyd hesitated for a long time before informing Roxiana of this fact, and Roxiana didn’t expect Lanian to be alive. As Arsen guessed, she thought he had just flowed somewhere through a hole in the well by chance.

She didn’t want to have hope. Even a small hope creates a huge hole the moment it collapses, so she didn’t want to have any hope.

Knowing that the expectation that Lanian might be alive somewhere would rot this heart black, Roxiana wished for nothing.

She only hoped to find Lanian’s body that might be wandering somewhere.

“Did he go… far?”

“Since this is where he was born and raised, he’s unlikely to have gone far… Though such cases do happen occasionally, we’ve widened the search area. We’ll leave personnel to continue the search even after we return. Caesar also said he would help.”

Floyd sat on the edge of the bed.

He stared at the shadow Roxiana’s long eyelashes cast under her eyes as he spoke.

“You can end it here, Princess.”

Roxiana raised her eyes.

“You can stop here. Gania will take a big hit because of this incident.”

Roxiana shook her head.

“No. This is just throwing a pebble into a large lake. Ripples will form, but they’ll soon subside. I haven’t done anything yet.”

“You’re too harsh on yourself, Princess. To say you haven’t done anything.”

“Do you think I’m terrible for being so greedy?”

Floyd smiled.

Even in the dark pain, his smile was radiant. Roxiana felt some of the despair weighing her down dissipate.

“I think it’s beautiful.”

“Pardon?”

“I think it’s very beautiful.”

At these unexpected words, Roxiana blinked. Floyd gently took the ends of her hair and wrapped them around his finger. His lips briefly touched her hair before pulling away.

“I can only think such thoughts about you, Princess, so feel at ease and do what you want to do.”

+++

Floyd left the room, telling her to prepare to meet Robert and the others. Even after he left, Roxiana sat blankly, staring at the edge of the bed where he had been sitting.

‘What was that just now?’

The many thoughts that had been filling Roxiana were consumed by the sentence he had uttered. The many worries, despair, and pain trembled at his words and then scattered.

‘He must have just… said it.’

Floyd was always like that. He would use outrageous methods to pull Roxiana out of despair.

So those words must have been said for that reason too. To pull Roxiana out of her terrible sadness and loneliness.

If so, it worked.

The pain of seeing her family die once more, the anxiety and worry of not finding Lanian, the concerns about what to do next – all of these flew away for a moment.

Roxiana slowly took a deep breath and then got out of bed.

It was entirely thanks to Floyd that strength returned to her body, which had been as limp as water-soaked cotton. She couldn’t find a way to organize her pervasive grief, but now she had the strength to move and think again.

The absence of her family still hurt, but she now had the energy to move her hands to bring down the iron hammer on the guilty ones.

‘He said there were many familiar faces.’

Roxiana examined her reflection in the mirror. Her eyes were swollen from crying too much, her skin was dry and rough, and her hair was a tangled mess.

‘To say I’m beautiful even looking like this…’

No matter how you look at it, she wasn’t beautiful.

Indeed, his words must have been an absurd strategy to give her strength. Roxiana shook her head vigorously to remove his voice clinging to her ears, then headed to the bathroom.

She didn’t want to show such a terrible appearance to the people who knew her past self, to the people she would be glad to see. She wanted to let them know that she was fine, that she was doing very well, that she was living a life no different from when she was the princess of Canta. That would put them at ease.