Sister, I'm the Queen This Life (330 Chapters Left to Complete) - Chapter 427

If the conclave changes from requiring unanimity to a simple majority vote, Cardinal de Mare will no longer be able to continue his blockade. He had eleven votes. To block his opponent, he needed fourteen.

When asked whether there was any way to prevent defeat, Cardinal de Mare could not answer.

“If… if Cardinal Arcandele were to gain power, it would be difficult for Your Eminence to remain safe.”

Cardinal Fraverti continued cautiously.

“Black magic and its eradication… isn’t that Cardinal Arcandele’s specialty?”

Cardinal Arcandele belonged neither to the progressive nor the traditionalist faction. If forced to categorize him, he would be considered part of an emerging faction.

He rose to fame as a direct reaction to the resurgence of the Apostle of Acireto, securing his position by prosecuting heresies.

With no established faction of his own, Cardinal Arcandele needed to demonstrate authority to gain political influence. Removing the Archbishop of San Carlo on charges of heresy and installing his own man in that seat would appear as a perfect inaugural achievement early in his term.

“If you’re willing to take that risk, I cannot stop you. With the papacy so close, no one can stop you now. However… haven’t you formed a family?”

Family. Technically, the only family a clergyman could openly acknowledge would be his birth family—but that wasn’t what he meant.

Cardinal Fraverti himself had kept a long-term mistress. He even had children.

As a scion of a prestigious noble house, his mistress had practically moved into his ancestral home, raising five children and living as a daughter-in-law.

De Mare and Fraverti were anomalies. Ideally, clergymen shouldn’t have mistresses at all; if they did, they met discreetly for no more than a year or two before cutting ties and avoiding further entanglements with women.

If a child was born, those who cared would send the mother away to raise the child elsewhere, while the heartless would leave the child at a monastery, where they’d grow up like an orphaned friar. It was unusual for a man to father multiple children with the same woman and keep her close.

“If Your Eminence loses in a vote, that family will be dragged down with you.”

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