My Beloved Princess ~The Boy Called Incompetent Rises with Only a Sword and the Princess's Devotion~ - Chapter 116: The Beginning of the Nightmare

Chapter 116: The Beginning of the Nightmare

She woke from a nightmare.

In the darkness, while her consciousness was still climbing toward wakefulness, Seiran sat up in bed, breathing hard, feeling strangely detached from herself. She could no longer remember what the nightmare had been about, but the hammering of her heart and the clammy dampness on her chest still carried its lingering aftertaste.

She took the candlestick from the small table and lit it.

The faint orange light gently pushed back the darkness.

Bathed in that warmth, Seiran let out a small sigh of relief.

Perhaps the tense state of affairs had only deepened her unease.

What in the world had happened in Algant?

The joint army sent out by the General Consort and the Loyal Consort had marched with five thousand handpicked elites. It had been a perfect surprise attack, launched without even the formality of a declaration of war. There should have been no time for siege weapons to answer them, nor for reinforcements from nearby cities to arrive. If all they were facing were the troops stationed in Algant, they should have been able to wipe them out within a day.

“Then why…?”

The General Consort and the Loyal Consort had both died in battle. Since that report had come by black pigeon, there had been no further word. Not a single survivor had returned, and because of that, no information at all had come back.

Her frustration at the lack of intelligence kept mounting, but even putting that aside, the very fact that five thousand elite troops had failed to send back even one returnee was far too abnormal.

The General Consort and the others were not so blind that they could not judge the difference in strength between themselves and the enemy.

Nor were they so incompetent that their pride would stop them from issuing a retreat order.

If that was the case, then only two possibilities remained: they had given the order to withdraw and still failed to escape, or they had been annihilated before such an order could be given at all. Either way, the situation was abnormal.

What came to mind was the tragedy of Casteria two hundred years ago. Just as then, one had to suspect they had been wiped out by the flames of a [core]. But…

“According to the scouts’ reports, Algant is still standing. It wasn’t a [core].”

Or was she meant to believe that some superweapon on par with a [core] had been deployed instead?

Did such a superweapon even exist, something that could be fired without any preparation time?

The questions were endless, but rather than dwell on them now, she had to turn her attention to a more urgent and more serious problem.

Dragon King Tengen.

Anraku’s camp had suffered a crushing defeat in the invasion of Algant, taking a severe blow to its military strength. Tengen had sniffed that out at once and, seizing the opportunity, bared his fangs at Anraku.

Anraku’s territory had been ravaged, and many strongholds had already gone up in flames. Even now, his army had advanced to just before the capital, with only a single mountain between them, and perhaps that very anxiety was why she had woken in the middle of the night like this.

“I should speak with Head Consort-sama after all.”

When she laid a hand over her swelling belly, it felt as though the child inside, who should not yet have been able to move, had stirred. Biting her lip hard, Seiran left the room.

She moved through the corridor slumbering in darkness, relying on nothing but the light of her candlestick.

It was quiet.

The sound of her footsteps rang sharply along the floorboards.

It had already been more than a hundred years since this place had become their home castle. It should have been a familiar place to live, so why did it feel so strangely alien?

She had heard that carrying a child made one conservative. If this cowardice had come from wanting to protect the child in her womb, then the pregnancies of the Six Consorts truly were not something to celebrate without reservation. If the highest-ranking officers became conservative, the effects would spread through the entire pack.

“Maybe trying to appeal directly to Head Consort-sama like this isn’t a good idea after all.”

And yet, despite her words, Seiran’s pace quickened.

If she stopped walking now, it felt as if something closing in from behind would catch up to her. That baseless delusion sent gooseflesh racing down her spine and drove her onward.

Something was truly wrong with her. Under normal circumstances, if anyone voiced thoughts so maidenly, she would have snorted and laughed them off.

Anraku’s city lay in a basin surrounded on all sides by mountains.

In the home castle built atop a sheer cliff lived Anraku and his consorts. Head Consort-sama’s quarters were on the top floor, and Seiran’s feet naturally carried her upward.

She hurried up the stairs. One hand on the lavish banister gleaming in her candlelight, she was just about to cross the landing when her foot caught on something, and she nearly pitched forward. Reflexively, she threw strength into her arm, seized the railing, and caught herself. She barely avoided disaster.

First she checked by feel that there was nothing wrong with her belly, then let out a breath of relief. After that came anger toward the maid who had left such an obstacle there, and in half-desperate irritation she turned the candlelight toward the landing.

“……..!?”

Her breath nearly stopped.

What the darkness revealed was not an obstacle at all, but a person lying there limply.

And more than that, she knew at a glance.

Dead.

Eyes wide with shock. Foamy blood dribbling from the mouth.

There was a large cave-in in the chest, and it was obvious that single blow had been the cause of death.

Had it been a crushing strike? The body was horribly twisted, the upper and lower halves torqued a full one hundred and eighty degrees apart. The eyes, dulled like glass beads, stared up at the ceiling, while the tips of the feet were buried deep in the long-piled carpet. The corpse had met its end in a grotesque state, as though it had been violently torn apart.

And that was not the end of the shock.

Seiran knew that face well.

“Jinhi… why are you…?”

This was nothing like seeing corpses on a battlefield. In a home castle that should have been safe, in the living space where the Six Consorts resided, one of the highest-ranking officers had lost her life. That was something that absolutely must never happen. And precisely because of that, the shock Seiran suffered was immense. In the instability of pregnancy, without even being given time to brace herself, she had been forced to witness the death of someone close to her. It was vivid, gruesome, cruel, a betrayal so savage it bordered on madness.

Daily life was swallowed in an instant, and the stench of blood and death robbed Seiran of all normal thought.

“G-guards. Where are the guards…?”

She looked blankly around her.

She could see nothing in the darkness.

She strained her ears.

She heard nothing.

There was not even the presence of another person.

And then she realised it. That sense of wrongness.

She had not passed a single patrolling guard on her way here.

Cold sweat ran down her spine. Fear screamed at Seiran to abandon thought altogether.

For the sake of the child in her womb, she had to get to a safe place as quickly as possible. When, who, for what purpose, by what means… those questions could come later. To remain in a place where death still lingered so thickly was madness.

She somehow managed to hold back the urge to scream. Her knees shook so badly she could barely walk, and she had to crawl the rest of the way up the stairs. At last she reached the top floor.

There was a broad corridor stretching straight ahead.

There was no sign of the personal guard unit that protected Head Consort-sama.

“Why is no one here?”

An ominous premonition prickled at the nape of her neck.

Drifting through the air was an uncanny scent of death.

Please, she prayed over and over in her heart.

The closer she came to Head Consort-sama’s quarters, the greater her anxiety grew.

Please, please let her be safe.

Was that prayer for Head Consort-sama’s sake, or for her own? Seiran’s lips trembled with fear, and she could no longer even tell the difference.

Could this be a continuation of the nightmare?

That thought suddenly came to Seiran.

She was still lying in bed in her own room, not yet awake from the nightmare. She was the only one in it. Wasn’t that just the sort of thing dreams often did? This was only a hallucination shown to her by the weak part of herself, made conservative by pregnancy. Otherwise, there was no explaining how Jinhi could have been murdered inside the home castle, where security should have been tighter than anywhere else.

This had to be a dream. A bizarre situation without context was proof enough.

Yes. This had to be a dream. Otherwise, her heart would…

With a prayer on her lips, Seiran knocked on Head Consort-sama’s door.

◇◇◇◇◇

Head Consort-sama was dead, slumped against the bed.

There was a single deep cave-in in her chest. The cause of death was the same as Jinhi’s.

Her head hung limply downward, and her vacant gaze had fallen toward her feet.

There was a longsword gripped in her right hand, but it showed no sign of ever having left its scabbard.

Blood trailing from the corner of her mouth was still dripping onto the sword hilt in her hand.

She was still warm. It had not been long since her life had been taken.

“Ah…”

A hoarse sound slipped from her throat.

The image of Head Consort-sama wearing the gentle smile she had borne in life flashed through her mind, and the awful gulf between that memory and what lay before her left Seiran aghast. She crumpled to the floor on the spot.

“Why…? What happened here…?”

Not only Jinhi, but Head Consort-sama as well had been killed.

Inside a castle that should have been safe.

Those two, both masters of their craft.

Killed without being able to offer any resistance at all.

Even if, for argument’s sake, it had been the work of an assassin…

Could such a peerless assassin really exist? Without making so much as a sound. Without allowing even a breath or a spell to be used. To say nothing of not even letting them draw their blades before taking their lives.

She could not believe it.

For four hundred years, Head Consort-sama had supported Dragon King Anraku. Needless to say, she was a veteran warrior tempered by countless battles. The strongest after the Dragon King himself. A woman whose power was worthy of the name Head Consort, slain without being able to put up so much as meaningful resistance… if this was not a nightmare, then what was?

She turned around.

She pointed the candlestick into the darkness spreading behind her.

Nothing.

No one.

And yet she felt as though someone were watching her.

“Ah… ahh…”

What if the killer was still hiding somewhere in the room?

The moment that suspicion surfaced, the fear she had almost forgotten seized her whole body once more.

“AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!”

Her throat trembling with all its strength, she screamed with everything she had.

It was a foolish act, one that announced her location to the murderer lurking in the darkness.

But Seiran no longer had the composure to make a calm decision. All she had left was overwhelming fear. Only fear of a supernatural existence beyond human understanding drove her onward.

She fled the room.

She did not remember where she had gone or how.

She was not even certain where she had been trying to run.

On the way, she felt as if she saw fallen figures sprawled across the floor over and over again, but none of it stayed in her memory.

Before she knew it, she had arrived at the throne room.

“Anraku-sama, please save me.”

She shoved open the great doors leading to the throne room and stumbled inside, begging her beloved husband for help.

And yet, at this late hour of night, if she wanted Anraku’s help, she should have gone not to the throne room but to his bedchamber.

If Seiran had been even a little calmer, she never would have gone to the throne room.

And yet, perhaps it was a trick of fate.

Anraku was there.

The encounter that should never have been possible had come to pass.

“Don’t come any closer! Run, now!!”

That enormous, thoroughly trained physique. That giant body, well over two metres tall, could only have belonged to her husband, Anraku. The instant she saw him, relief washed over Seiran, but only for a moment. Then his sharp glare and furious shout struck her, and her body froze.

Unable to understand the meaning of his shout, Seiran stood there in confusion.

She had fled here. All the way here. Relying on Anraku, her husband. And yet…

“Where am I supposed to run to?”

Head Consort-sama was dead. Jinhi was dead too.

The guards were nowhere to be seen. The personal guard unit was nowhere to be seen either.

And likely the other consorts as well… and yet where was her husband telling her to run?

“Anywhere, just far away. Leave this capital and run to somewhere safe, somewhere no pursuers can reach you.”

“Far away where!? Head Consort-sama and Jinhi, even the guards… and yet where is there left to run to?”

“Anywhere is fine! I’ll stake my life to stop that monster. So hurry…”

Her husband, breathing hard with the look of a man prepared to die, seized her shoulders.

At the news of Head Consort-sama’s death, he showed no sign of being shaken. Even though the two of them had been such a close couple, how could he remain so calm? The sheer absurdity of it pinned Seiran’s thoughts in place and would not let them move.

Precious time was slipping away.

Perhaps frustrated that Seiran still would not move, Anraku shook her hard by the shoulders.

But Seiran still could not move.

As though to shatter that paralysis, a cold voice rang through the throne room.

“I won’t let you escape. I will dispose of every last one of you.”

It was a presence that could only be called a grim reaper.

Wrapped in pitch-black dragon robes stripped of all ornament, she walked across the tiled floor without making a sound. The pale face floating in the darkness wore the furious visage of a wrathful demon.

Eyes blazing with killing intent pierced through her husband’s back and skewered Seiran.

No explanation was needed.

It was her.

This woman was the culprit who had killed Head Consort-sama and Jinhi.

With her husband beside her, perhaps that sense of safety managed to overcome her fear. Anger began to boil up inside Seiran.

“How dare you… how dare you kill Head Consort-sama…!”

“No, Seiran. Don’t lay a hand on her.”

“Freeze solid and shatter! [Cold Halt]!”

Ignoring her husband’s attempt to stop her, Seiran loosed a frigid breath that seemed ready to blow the woman’s head away. Or so it seemed. But…

“……..!?”

How should it be described? It was as though space itself twisted and warped.

The path of the freezing breath bent out of shape, tracing an unnatural arc before slamming into the ceiling. The lavish ceiling, exquisitely carved with intricate patterns, froze solid in an instant, and white frost spread across it.

The frost pattered down, and the cold passed from above their heads all the way to their feet.

In a bitter voice, Anraku said,

“Projectile attacks don’t work on that woman.”

“That’s impossible!?”

There had been no sign that the woman had used sorcery.

Then how had she blocked it?

To Seiran’s eyes, the woman had done nothing but stand there.

She had done nothing special at all.

And yet the breath had been stopped.

Seiran had not managed to freeze even a single strand of the woman’s hair.

The woman gave the shaken Seiran a sidelong glance, then spoke with sharpened killing intent.

“I am not mild-tempered enough to keep smiling after my family has been hurt.”