Episode 45
I made an exaggeratedly worried expression, though I truly was concerned to death.
“It’s consuming your life, Brother.”
Ren’s eyes widened in surprise.
I desperately grabbed his hand.
“Help me, Ren. My brother must not continue to use that sword. He’s reached his limit.”
“That damned old man…!”
Although this caused the previous Tower Master, whose guilt was unknown, to be cursed, Ren lightly hugged and patted me nonetheless.
“I’ll do my best in the casting. I’ll hurry.”
Two days later, at the Magic Tower.
The Magic Tower Master, Len, had spread out the design schematics for the demonic sword ‘Belih’ and was tearing his hair out.
“Damn it! So how much more time do you need?!”
The Tower’s blacksmiths, who had been forcibly summoned for the first time in a long while, bowed their heads deeply before the Tower Master, who was much younger than them.
“We apologize. But with Lord Moghold absent now, there is no blacksmith who can use attribute infusion magic. It will take at least several months…”
Before the blacksmith could even finish speaking, Ren kicked back his chair, stood up, and walked toward the furnace, which was billowing with hot steam.
‘There’s no way Louise can hold out in the imperial palace for several months.’
Len was a genius wizard when it came to mental arithmetic, memorization, and intuition.
As long as he had his body, he could solve most magic with just a wave of his hand, so he had never been greatly interested in creating magical tools.
This naturally included the demonic sword, once called the flower of the Magic Tower’s forge.
‘I should have shaken that old man down and taken the summoning orb before he left.’
Staring into the seething molten metal, Ren felt a deep regret.
“What about the records left by the previous Tower Master?”
“He wrote them down so simply that no one can decipher them…”
“That damned old man!”
The moment Ren shouted that, a nearby magic stone chunk suddenly flew up toward his head.
“What the…”
Ren caught it with a thud and yelled in disbelief.
“Have you lost your minds? Who does something like this during a meeting?!”
A small old man suddenly appeared in the air and grabbed the Tower Master’s earlobe.
“Who said anything about being in a meeting? From what I saw, a green youngster, who calls himself the Tower Master, was just shouting.”
“…Old man?”
As Ren turned to ask, the chunk of magic stone finally thumped against the back of his head.
“Ow! Seriously!”
“You insolent brat! Do you think attribute infusion magic will just fall into your lap because you sit around as Tower Master, nagging only the blacksmiths?!”
“Ah, well, if you were going to go off wandering or roaming, you should have written it down properly before leaving!”
Wizard began to sneakily gather around the irritated current Tower Master.
To be precise, they were gathering to see the former Tower Master.
“Lord Moghold! To what do we owe this long-awaited visit!”
“We’ve been suffering so under the current Tower Master’s pressure…”
“Can’t you be quiet?!”
Ren yelled at the top of his lungs, but a faint smile lingered on his lips.
After all, he had just gained a mage capable of attribute infusion casting.
On the last day of the Harvest Festival banquet, Empress Dorotheo visited the Crown Prince’s chambers.
Crown Prince Hart noticed the unfamiliar coronet on the Empress’s head and smirked.
“A gift from Babenberg?”
“Yes.”
The Empress replied as if displeased.
The coronet she wore was decorated with gems crafted from processed magic stones, designed to emit a soft light even indoors.
Hart looked at the coronet and let out a small sigh of admiration.
“They say their skill in processing magic stones is on par with the Magic Tower, despite that barren land. It suits you, Mother.”
The Empress clicked her tongue at her son’s naive remark.
“As if that’s a luxury paid for with my own money.”
The young Archduke extracted enormous sums from the Empire under the pretext of defense costs, yet whenever he had the chance, he would flaunt his wealth with expensive gifts.
The Emperor was secretly pleased, thinking it resembled the duty of a vassal, but the Empress thought differently.
‘And all that gold comes from whose pockets?!’
But Hart just grinned, seemingly not feeling the slightest bit of seriousness.
“Still, it’s commendable that he shows sincerity each time. Well, though lately it seems he might have other intentions.”
The Empress gave a small, dry cough and lowered her voice.
“I’ve been thinking it over carefully.”
“Yes, Mother.”
“The Archduke is twenty-five. When you were that age, you were married and had a child.”
Hart shrugged his shoulders.
“But the Archduke has no family to nag him about marriage, does he? He’d probably just let the vassals’ words go in one ear and out the other.”
“But that child, Louise, is twenty-four now. If the Archduke has truly set his heart on her, why isn’t he being more proactive? Louise is also of marriageable age!”
“Well…”
Before he could finish his thought, the Empress spoke.
“I must understand the Archduke’s feelings more clearly. If he truly wants Louise, I need to make him a little impatient.”
Hart laughed as if he couldn’t dissuade her.
“Mother, Cyril still has feelings for him.”
“Let’s drop the talk of Cyril.”
Her pride was already wounded from what she’d heard from her husband.
The Empress cut him off ruthlessly.
“You didn’t marry your wife because she was the empire’s greatest beauty either, did you? An imperial marriage can’t possibly be about personal taste.”
Hart nodded helplessly.
“Shall I find out if the youngest is in a deep relationship with the Archduke?”
“Yes. And find a pretext to summon the Crown Prince of Flavi more often.”
At the Empress’s added words, Hart sneered.
“Isn’t the Crown Prince of Flavi too weak to use as a rival for the Archduke? Although his origins are a bit… when it comes to courting the youngest, you can’t leave out the Magic Tower Master, Len Daphte.”
“You don’t know what you’re talking about.”
The Empress coldly cut off her son’s words.
“The Tower Master is eccentric and suspicious. Women—especially ones like that child Louise, who have been neglected and are lonely—are drawn to comfort and sweetness. Where around here is there a pretty doll quite like that Crown Prince?”
Hart asked, sounding puzzled.
“Is he that beautiful from a woman’s perspective? Sometimes it seems the maids don’t even breathe when he’s around.”
The Empress laughed as if amused.
“Actually, he is, my son. Crown Prince Ernst has, how should I say it… a mesmerizing gaze. Sometimes it feels so deliberate it seems cheap.”
Not fully understanding his mother’s words, Hart replied.
“I’ll look into the Archduke. I’ll also summon and meet the Crown Prince separately.”
The Empress added with an irritated nag.
“How long will you keep handling even these trivial matters needing my advice? As the Empire’s successor, you need to get your act together.”
But perhaps it was because he had no real competitors.
Crown Prince Hart merely smiled leisurely with a relaxed face that showed not a hint of tension.
“Yes, Mother.”
Disgusted by the insincere reply, the Empress coldly left her son’s room.
Meanwhile, Rurik stood blankly by the window, watching the procession of carriages belonging to the external guests attending and leaving the banquet.
—Offer victory to the hungry sword!
Whenever his mind wandered for a moment, the voice he had heard when opening the book echoed in his head.
Of course, after visiting Louise, he had realized it was merely an auditory hallucination.
Rurik believed it wasn’t his true self, but no matter what he did, he couldn’t stop the sound.
‘It’s because of that book.’
He was curious about many things: the reason for the hallucinations, why his late father had kept the booklet in the deepest part of his study, why he had shown it to the Tower Master…
But, as expected, what he was most curious about was why that book, which was clearly related to ‘Belih’ to anyone who saw it, had never been shown to him even once.
‘The Tower Master won’t talk anyway.’
The Tower Masters had always been like the Emperor’s own limbs.
‘They swear an oath, staking their lives, to protect the Emperor’s secrets.’
Therefore, just because the current Tower Master, Ren Daphte, was close to Louise, he wouldn’t readily divulge what the Emperor had been hiding from him.
‘Then the only way left is a direct approach.’
Rurik had already reached that conclusion several days prior.
However, the Harvest Festival banquet was still in full swing, so he only now had a chance to execute his plan.
The Emperor would be in his study alone this evening, dealing with piled-up work.
‘Will His Majesty willingly hand over the book?’
Worried about that, Rurik went to see the Emperor.
He had even thought that if his father gave him the book, he would burn that unpleasant thing, but the response he received fell short of his expectations.
“You want to know about the demonic sword? What brings this on all of a sudden?”
The Emperor laughed heartily as if Rurik had made an unreasonable demand.
“What a predicament. The first Tower Master did leave behind a book with simple usage instructions for the demonic sword, but the previous Tower Master took it away long ago.”
