What would be the possibility of living if she lost this? Her strength is gradually draining… perhaps like this…

“Scáthach!”

At that moment, she heard a man’s voice that should not have been heard.

Surprised, Scáthach lifted her head, and the branch fell completely.

(This is a time divider.)

The admiral’s unauthorized departure[Dash]Attila called it a suicidal act[Dash]the operation was completely halted.

Some of the Blahnath Division’s elite began to search along the Drnérgang River to rescue Cassard, and the rest of the army retreated to Even Baher.

With a disappointed heart, holding whiskey mixed with hot water in his hand and shaking it, Attila called the man who was standing by the table with his head bowed down like a criminal.

“Rakan.”

“Yes, Your Majesty.”

“You don’t have to act as if you’ve committed a crime because it’s not that you’ve made a wrong judgment about your subordinate, but that your subordinate is insane.”

“……I’m sorry.”

“At this point, I even suspect this is a trap.”

“Yes?”

“Sending a beautiful spy to seduce him, then throwing himself into the river for a double suicide, I suspect something like that. Unless he’s mad, jumping there, a mad man…! Haa, really…”

“I have nothing to say but… ”

“It’s not that you’re sorry, but that he’s crazy.”

Attila ruffled his golden hair roughly and slammed his head down on the table. If he had not been the emperor, he would have gone to find Cassard himself.

Waiting like this for the search party without getting drunk was unbearable.

“If he dies like this, I won’t even hold a funeral, that doglike bastard!”

Rakan hesitated for a moment, then looked up at the distressed Emperor Attila.
Just a moment ago, what Lakan had been apologizing for was an apology for the conduct of a superior officer who had unilaterally left during an important operation that could have been the last strategy.

In Lakan’s apology, the admiral’s death was not assumed.

“Your Majesty, the flow of the Dener River is fast, but… I don’t think the admiral will perish if he falls into the river.”

“I wish that were the case, but the lower reaches of the Dener River are all part of the Tesia Empire’s territory. If he is not found near the river, I’ll have to consider him dead in another sense. Damn it! That madman, I should have just left him in Evan Baher!”

Lakan shook his head. He felt the same way, even if it meant killing every Tesia citizen he met, he seemed to think that he would return alive.

Apparently, Emperor Attila, who had never gone into battle with Duke Cassard de Blahnath, did not know about that monsterlike strength and survivability.

Even though he had studied together at Ecol Parsad, he thought he would know to some extent.

If he had seen Duke Blahnath in a battle where life and death crossed, he would have known how many enemies he could trap with just one gun.

If he had seen the boldness and superhuman strength of him who had rushed into the battlefield and finally came out carrying two isolated wounded soldiers, he would have thought that the river would do that to the admiral…?

Among the soldiers who had gone on a mission with the admiral, it was said that even bullets avoided the admiral.

Lakan didn’t know what he was thinking, and Attila continued to speak, tapping his whiskey glass with his fingertips.

“And… if you think about it, Duke Blahnath is not the kind of person who falls into lust like that.”

“Yes.”

He had to agree as it was true. He pretended not to know about what happened in the private room, but he couldn’t not know about it.

“Isn’t that nurse suspicious?”

“Yes?”

“When did they become like that again? She came to the field hospital as the last in the class, and before that, there was no interaction except for the work in Lindcoem?”

Lakan could not hide his dumbfounded expression, recalling that innocent young lady. That woman is suspicious? From the Lindcoem prison, the Duke tormented and swung her around…

Ah. Could it be…?

Revenge? Is she seeking revenge?! If someone were to buy a woman who is resentful of Duke Blahnath as a spy to harm the Duke…

In fact, her being Duke Blahnath’s concubine was a rather wellknown story within Lindcoem. Even the fact that she left the area as if being driven out.

“Perhaps it’s not entirely an impossible story. She has a reason to call it revenge, after all.”

Lakan couldn’t deny it, seeing Lakan’s bright blue eyes turn cold.

“Tell me more.”

“You are well aware that the incident of the previous Duke remains an unsolved case, Your Majesty. The fact that Skaha was the suspect at the time.”

As Attila nodded, Lakan recited his speculation in a calm tone.

“Since we didn’t share the investigation with the police, Skaha still appears as a prime suspect in the police’s official records. The Duke did not exercise his judicial power… So from Skaha’s point of view, the reason she can’t return to Lindcoem is because of the Duke, and she might think that he still holds her leash.”

Attila’s eyes dimmed. Because what Lakan had guessed and what he had thought were not much different.

“But a woman with no proper family wouldn’t have planned this all by herself.”

“Yes. It seems reasonable to think that there was some opportunity or backing after she left Lindcoem.”

Does this fit so easily? He began to feel pity for his dear friend who had fallen helplessly for that suspicious woman.

“Lakan, it seems there’s something you need to do for me.”