CHAPTER 161…………………………………………
“It seems there’s been some kind of misunderstanding. I’m told that the person who can clear up Your Highness’s misunderstanding has just arrived outside the hall.”
At Claire’s polite report, hands folded before her, Melissa’s face twisted.
She was already flustered by the failure of her plan, and now, hearing that someone had been brought in who would paint her as a complete liar, anxiety surged.
“Someone who’ll clear up my misunderstanding? What do you mean by—”
“Please see for yourselves. The unchanging fact that His Highness the Crown Prince is the dragon’s contractor.”
With a gentle smile, Claire slowly turned her body. Everyone’s gaze followed her toward the doorway.
Moments later, the thick stone doors opened, and Alicia appeared.
“Isn’t that Lady Lennox?”
“But… who’s the child beside her?”
Standing next to her, hands clasped behind his back like an attendant to a superior, was a young boy.
Mysterious silver hair, radiant golden eyes, delicate yet distinct features.
The child was Rune.
He was the most definitive witness who could prove that Theodore was still under contract with Silund.
As Rune strode boldly into the hall, Alicia called out clearly behind him.
“Dragon Silund is entering!”
A wave of murmurs spread instantly. The faces of the imperial family on the dais turned deathly pale.
“What? That child is a dragon?!”
“No way! I can’t believe it!”
“There’s no way Lord Silund would look like that…”
As Rune surveyed the chaotic reactions, a halo of light rose around him.
When the child’s form stepping onto the carpet transformed into that of an adult woman, everyone gasped.
The ability to freely alter one’s appearance belonged only to dragons.
Rune soon shifted again, now appearing as a white-haired old man, and arrived before Theodore. Theodore hesitated briefly, then dipped his head slightly in greeting.
“Kid, it’s been a long time since you greeted me like that.”
“…I’ve been in a child’s form all this time.”
Apparently finding it awkward to deal with him as an old man, Theodore replied gruffly.
Rune smiled warmly, like a grandfather indulgently watching a grumbling grandson, then his expression hardened. Fixing his gaze squarely on Melissa, he spoke.
“I am Silund, the dragon who has protected this nation and its lands for hundreds of years.”
His slightly raspy voice resonated with authority throughout the hall. The people listened in reverent silence.
“I heard that there was a human who dared spread false rumors about my beloved contractor, so I came here myself.”
“…!”
Melissa’s shoulders jolted.
So it wasn’t true—neither the loss of the blessing nor the breaking of the contract.
As her vision swam and she staggered, Rune declared without hesitation.
“Theodore Johannes Tricen is my most cherished contractor. Our contract remains valid until the moment Theodore loses his life, and neither of us has any intention of breaking it prematurely!”
After roaring this out, Rune swept a cold glance over the imperial family and added,
“I hope there will be no more doubt cast upon me, swayed by malicious words.”
With that, the suspicions Melissa had raised against Theodore collapsed completely.
The blessing and the contract had been proven alive and intact, in the most vivid way possible.
The mouths of the imperial family clamped shut. The people nodded as if bewitched.
“O-of course, Lord Silund!”
“It’s an honor to meet you!”
“To think I’d live to see Lord Silund with my own eyes! It feels like a dream…”
He was the dragon revered like a god, the legendary guardian of the Empire.
Facing in person the being they had only seen in murals, they couldn’t help but be overwhelmed.
“Then, I’ll be off.”
After giving Claire and Theodore a playful wink, Rune vanished like the wind.
The people, still wrapped in the afterglow of meeting a dragon, stared blankly at the empty space he had left behind.
From the dais, Claire glanced sideways at Melissa, who stood frozen like a statue. She looked badly shaken—but unfortunately for her, this was only the beginning.
Up until now, they had merely been defending against Melissa’s attack.
Now, it was their turn to strike.
“I, too, have something to say to all of you today.”
Theodore’s low voice snapped the crowd back to attention and drew their focus to him.
He lifted his chin proudly and proclaimed,
“I am arresting the current Emperor and Empress, the Linderman family, and their fellow traitors on charges of assassinating the former Emperor and Empress.”
Before the people could even react in shock, the Emperor sprang to his feet, face flushed crimson.
“What nonsense is this?!”
Pointing accusingly at Theodore, veins bulging in his neck, he shouted,
“What have we done?! Just because you have a dragon backing you, you dare act so arrogantly! I can no longer overlook this! On charges of insulting and slandering the Emperor—!”
“Do you recognize this, Uncle?”
Without batting an eye, Theodore coolly cut him off.
What he pulled from his chest pocket was a document painfully familiar not only to the Emperor, but to several others as well. Their faces turned pale all at once.
“This is the confidentiality pledge you signed back when you were Tobias Linderman, with the Bolton Marquisate and five other families—including the now-destroyed Muton Ducal House.”
“Don’t be ridiculous! We never signed anything like that!”
The Empress shrieked in denial.
No matter how thoroughly they had searched the Muton ducal estate, they had never found it—so how could it be in Theodore’s hands?
She wanted to bite her tongue and collapse on the spot, but she had to keep her wits about her if she hoped to escape this.
“How dare you bring such blasphemous false evidence to pin this on us—!”
“This pledge was written one year before my parents’ deaths.”
Unmoved by her frantic resistance, Theodore continued calmly.
“Which means the process of killing the Emperor and Empress and taking their place can hardly be called impulsive.”
“N-no…”
A long-planned crime. Struck squarely at the heart, the Empress was left speechless.
“That’s enough, Theodore.”
Melissa stepped forward, her rigid expression betraying how hard it was to steady her shattered composure.
“I’m sorry for misunderstanding you, but isn’t this going too far?”
She spoke with feigned calm, but her palms were slick with sweat from tension.
Raising her voice in an attempt to defuse Theodore’s attack, Melissa insisted,
“My father is your father’s younger brother! How could he possibly have done something so cruel?!”
“With all due respect, Your Highness did not misunderstand—you slandered the Crown Prince. And His Majesty did, in fact, commit that cruel act.”
Claire interjected politely, her tone gentle but firm. Melissa’s eyes sharpened instantly.
The way Claire precisely corrected what she was trying to gloss over was infuriating.
“And what would a mere lady know to speak with such certainty?”
“Here is the written confession of Brian, former Duke of Muton, who is currently exiled on Sarden Island.”
As if she’d been waiting for this moment, Claire presented yet another piece of evidence. Melissa’s lips trembled, realizing she had dug her own grave.
“After enduring constant threats to his life in exile, he confessed to me out of conscience—not only to his role in my aunt’s death, but also in the deaths of the former Emperor and Empress.”
At those words, the Emperor clenched his fists tightly.
He had sent assassins to Sarden Island multiple times to eliminate Brian.
Each attempt had failed, and recently he’d received reports that Brian was under the strange protection of the prison warden, making him difficult to approach.
Now he finally understood who had bribed the warden to protect Brian.
The Emperor shot Claire a sharp glare. Theodore stepped in front of her protectively and added,
“Count Brooks, who also joined the alliance, has confessed as well. He admitted that he accepted Marquis Bolton’s proposal and took part in the assassination of the former imperial couple.”
The Emperor’s eyes flew wide open.
Brooks… that bastard betrayed me?!
Forcing himself to suppress the urge to scream, his fists turned white.
The Empress staggered, her face on the verge of collapse. Roderick, who had been standing stiffly with parted lips, hurried to support his mother.
Two of the signatories on the pledge had betrayed them. With his uncle’s family driven to the edge of a cliff, Theodore drove the final nail.
“Additionally, we have confirmed that this pledge is not ordinary paper, but enchanted with magic, making it impossible to tamper with.”
Which meant that every name written on it had been written by the person themselves.
The shocked crowd covered their mouths, then began to speak one by one.
“To think His Majesty assassinated the former Emperor…”
“How can such a traitor be called Emperor?!”
“We’ve all been deceived! There was a reason the throne wasn’t handed over even after the Crown Prince came of age!”
The foreign envoys, who had been quietly tipped off by Claire, also stirred.
“So this was the crime committed by the fallen former Duke of Muton! No wonder he lost the power of his blessing.”
“Seeing how he was punished, it’s clear he helped assassinate the former imperial couple alongside those traitors.”
“Incredible. All this time, the truth remained hidden while the criminals enjoyed power.”
Overhearing their whispers, the faces of the Tricen nobles flushed red with shame at being judged by outsiders.
Seizing on the unrest, Marquis Feroz and Viscount Rost fanned public opinion.
“For the sake of the Empire’s dignity, we cannot allow a murderer to remain Emperor!”
“Hear, hear! Only when the nation stands on firm ground can Tricen’s glory and legacy endure!”
Just as even the imperial family began to sense the tide turning against them—
Boom!
The doors of the hall were thrown open violently, and a group of knights poured in.
