Chapter 37
The distance was a bit farther than she thought. She had only meant to take a quiet walk there, but it ended up becoming a full-on, serious stroll.
“That child is still so full of energy.”
Even Taryn, who had been diligently keeping up, seemed a little tired now. Watching the round back of the young attendant trotting ahead, she muttered under her breath.
While Aneth was debating whether to encourage her or suggest resting for a bit, the training grounds came into view.
“Hup! Haah!”
Shouts rang faintly from the distance.
Last time, a knight had come to greet her in front of the main gate, but today there was no one.
“I’ve heard the training grounds are always open. But if you wander in carelessly and get swept up by the sword energy of knights in training, no one will take responsibility. So even the curious attendants are careful not to go too close.”
The attendant, sensing what Aneth might be thinking as she eyed the empty entrance, explained softly. With a gentle smile, Aneth gave her a little signal.
Go on, open the gate.
The child’s eyes lit up at the thought of opening it herself. Placing both hands on the center of the heavy double doors, she pushed with all her might.
With a groan, the massive doors split apart. From inside, sharp cries burst out. The training ground was a circular space open to the sky, and the shouts that had sounded muffled outside now crashed into them with a booming force.
Each knight was focused on his own training, so no one immediately noticed Aneth’s arrival.
Meanwhile, she quickly began searching for Marquis Rezern.
“Ah, over there…”
Just as Aneth spotted him, the attendant and Taryn, who had followed her in, all turned their gazes in the same direction.
At the far end, opposite the entrance, there was a sense of something enormous moving.
“Woooow…”
The attendant gaped, jaw nearly unhinged, words tumbling out in awe.
It was a sight that deserved such a reaction. When watching duels between active knights, sword aura sometimes seemed to ripple the very air, extending its reach so that strikes landed even beyond the blade’s length.
But what surrounded Cesar now as he swung his sword wasn’t mere sword aura. It covered a much wider area, and rather than feeling like force he commanded and suppressed, it seemed more like energy he had drawn out and was shaping into use.
Whatever the method, it was power drawn from deep within, channeled into his left hand, while his right wielded the sword. As they combined in perfect harmony, Aneth turned her body, intending to move closer—
“Ah! Your Highness the Crown Princess, greetings! What brings you here?”
A loud voice rang out. Before she could take even one step forward, knights quickly surrounded her.
And at the same time, Cesar in the distance stopped his movements.
“I came to see my father.”
“Why ask something so obvious?”
The knights saluted her respectfully from where they stood. They were generally bright and good-natured men, so although her way had been blocked, she wasn’t annoyed.
Though the little attendant, who had been so eager to follow her deeper inside, looked terribly disappointed. Unfortunately for her, the knights caught that expression, giving them perfect material to tease her later.
“Your Highness the Crown Princess, what brings you here?”
From far away, Cesar somehow realized what was happening. He stopped training and ran over at full speed, wearing an expression Aneth remembered well from before. Yet his words were perfectly formal as he greeted her.
“Now that I’ve moved into the Imperial Palace and live closer to Father, I feel like I see you even less than before. That’s why I came.”
The moment she saw his face, Aneth felt an overwhelming sense of reunion, as if it had been far too long. Her nose nearly stung with emotion.
No, no—she scolded herself. It wasn’t as if he had been far away, or that they’d reunited after hardship. She mustn’t get all teary-eyed like a fool.
Even though she’d been living comfortably in the palace, she didn’t know why such a sudden rush of emotion had welled up.
“Ah, this child works as an attendant in the Crown Princess’s palace. She’s been dying to meet you, Father. Go on, greet him.”
Flustered by her own emotions, Aneth hurriedly deflected the conversation. Suddenly thrust between the Crown Princess and the Grand Knight Cesar, the poor child stiffened like a statue, stammering and barely managing a greeting.
“To think I’d see Your Highness out here on a casual outing…”
Though he spoke formally, Cesar’s expression remained the same familiar one, which reassured her. Clearly, life in this new environment hadn’t been easy for her until now.
“Your Highness, may I have a word with you?”
His polite tone was something she didn’t particularly like, but she tucked away those feelings and followed as he led her away.
The knights, watching him take Aneth before they’d even had the chance to properly greet her, looked on with wistful eyes.
Cesar brought her to the very spot where he had just been training. Removing the sword from his belt, he set it on the ground and guided her to sit on a bench nearby—clearly wanting to talk comfortably.
“Father, are you worried?”
If the Crown Princess, his daughter, came all the way to the training grounds with her nose pink from holding back tears, of course he’d worry something was wrong.
Aneth stared at Cesar’s face, wondering where to begin. Then suddenly a thought struck her.
She realized she had been so caught up in her own feelings that she’d overlooked something important. Her brows furrowed involuntarily, though she knew such an expression would only worry him more.
“Father, how is your health? You started coming here not only because the Knight Commander was absent, but also because of your body, didn’t you?”
Why hadn’t she thought to ask about that sooner, when she’d come here partly because she wanted to see his mana?
“So that’s what had you worried?”
Though Cesar didn’t show it outwardly, she now realized he had been tense all along. The way the strength drained from his shoulders, his arms relaxing at his sides, revealed it.
Was this what it meant to be a father—that even the smallest worry could weigh on him so heavily? Her heart ached.
“It’s not something to brush aside so easily, you know.”
When she deliberately pouted, his smile softened into something warmer.
“I’ve been managing it consistently. My body is still being kept in check.”
Still. That word lodged itself sharply in her chest.
“I was only worrying before, but now I’m curious. What exactly is that power—the one that once made you so strong, but now threatens you like this?”
Could the secret behind the strength that ultimately drove its wielder to ruin lie here?
“There was a time when magic was widespread. You liked reading, so you must have come across those stories often.”
She wasn’t much of a reader now, but the old Aneth had been frail and thus loved books. She read anything and everything—novels, history, economics. And in all those fields, there were countless accounts of the age when magic flourished.
“I read that it declined suddenly and rapidly.”
“Yes. For reasons not well known. Many blamed the monsters. After we eradicated them completely, those events followed.”
“It was a time ripe for misunderstanding, then.”
Magic disappeared with the monsters… Could it be that mana, having fulfilled its purpose, was consumed and vanished?
“If that were the case, it wouldn’t make sense for it to have existed even before monsters appeared.”
So that was why the true reason was unknown.
In any case, what was known was that mana, once abundant and freely circulating, stopped its activity and disappeared.
“So mana doesn’t just vanish… it affects the body too?”
“They say it explodes.”
“…Explodes?”
“Yes. Sometimes only the power explodes. Other times, the body itself explodes.”
He explained it so calmly that she almost let it pass without realizing the horror. But how—how could such a thing—
Aneth’s eyes widened, her brows knotting together. Cesar might delay such an explosion and keep mana from fading completely, but he couldn’t erase the danger entirely.
This wasn’t something she’d ever read about. If she hadn’t known, and something had happened to him…!
Wait—could it be that my own “explosion” was for this same reason?
Worry for her father mixed with the shock of what she’d just learned. Her eyes still trembled.
“It may be a shocking thing to hear, but that’s why I couldn’t keep it from you.”
It was a truth he would have told her sooner or later. But that also meant it might not be the ultimate reason for his downfall.
Though she couldn’t make sense of it yet, she forced herself to accept it as another possible cause of ruin and calm her heart.
Her father—could vanish so violently. To know that in advance, to accept it, to remain serene… It was a cruel, unbearable thing.
“Somehow, I feel like I’ve been seeing you more often lately.”
As she sat there, clutching Cesar’s hand in her turmoil, a familiar voice suddenly drifted toward them.
