Children of the Rune – Winterer - Chapter 480

—————
This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
—————

Episode 250.
Playing Oneself (26)
It was clear that someone had been living in this old house until recently. I asked the servants, but oddly enough, no one knew for certain. Nightingale Forest was vast. There were said to be more than a dozen log cabins and cottages scattered throughout. It had been a playground where the Young Duke played in his childhood, and a place where the household would venture for summer picnics to escape the heat. Of course, all of them stood empty now. This particular cottage was especially dilapidated, so even the servants couldn’t remember when they last looked inside.
Only the Forest Keeper would have known about such matters. I met with him that morning, but he only mumbled and evaded the question.
“Well, you see, sometimes guests of the Duke bring their families along, and it wouldn’t be my place to pry into such matters or make a fuss about it.”
Hispania remarked that if the person occupying this place weren’t someone the Duke tacitly approved of, the Forest Keeper wouldn’t have remained silent. Though the forest was vast, this was ultimately the Duke’s private property and required regular inspection. It was not a place where one could overlook a stranger’s intrusion for days on end.
However, there was no need to reprimand the Forest Keeper. Maximian had a rough idea of who might have been here. From what the servants said, a friend of Theostid da Moro had stayed at the manor for quite some time. Some said he was simply Moro’s childhood friend from his homeland. Others remarked that he seemed like a pleasant person, while yet another described him as irritable. One servant mentioned they’d never even seen his face because he lived in near-total seclusion. The decisive information came from a young maid who worked in the kitchen.
“That person was a Mage. I’m certain of it. The head cook strictly forbids anyone from entering the food storage without permission, but that person would come and go whenever he pleased, taking things. I know what he took were magical materials. My grandmother’s aunt learned about such things, so I know what Mages keep stored in their warehouses.”
It certainly didn’t seem like he’d taken materials to prepare midnight snacks. The old cottage left behind by the departed Mage was filled with garbage of unknown purpose. There were withered plants and flowers, unidentifiable clumps that might have been meat or leather, jars containing foul-smelling liquids, decomposing remains of animals and insects that reeked, bone fragments that might have been human, scraps of cloth and thread, various types of soil. Yet all the potted plants had dried up and shriveled, and everything made of precious glass lay shattered.
What experiments this Mage named Annie had conducted was of no importance. In any case, even if the Mage had explained directly, Maximian wouldn’t have understood. Maximian deduced that this person was the one who created the puppet, and therefore must possess the original body. The original body was the reason I’d come here, and since I hadn’t destroyed it, my objective remained unachieved. Even if Joshua had reclaimed his position, even if I’d obtained the puppet.
Even if Theo had disappeared.
Theo was discovered collapsed in his room late that afternoon when they arrived at the Castle. Before then, with everyone’s attention fixed on Joshua, no one had noticed that Theo was missing. Neither the servants nor the attendants—not even Maximian himself—had remembered that Theo needed to be captured before he escaped. Being at Joshua’s side as he hovered between life and death, no one could think of anything else.
Theo appeared to have stopped breathing as he tried to rise from his chair. The way he’d collapsed, embracing the table, suggested as much. Two glasses lay scattered on the floor. A bottle of alcohol was placed nearby. Judging by the remaining amount, only about two glasses had been poured. Since the alcohol that remained in the glasses had been absorbed by the carpet, it was impossible to determine whether it contained poison. The remaining alcohol in the bottle at least contained none.
The fact that there were two glasses suggested someone had been with him, but there was no way to know who. That day, everyone was too preoccupied to notice if a stranger had entered Theo’s room. Theo apparently had a personal secretary, but that person had also vanished.
People said it must have been suicide. That seemed plausible. Joshua had returned, so even if Theo hadn’t died this way, his conspiracy would have ended. Though it was unclear when he’d learned this fact, once the puppet’s existence was revealed, there would be no room for excuses.
But Maximian couldn’t think that way.
It was certain that someone had manipulated the puppet that day. Duke Arnim said that while conversing with the puppet, he noticed its behavior becoming slightly strange when Joshua appeared. He said Joshua materialized so suddenly and silently that he’d momentarily wondered if Joshua had been there all along. The next instant, the puppet drew a dagger and stabbed Joshua in the chest. It all happened in a flash—so quickly that even the seasoned warrior Duke couldn’t find an opportunity to intervene.
Could the puppet have originally intended to stab Joshua? That was impossible. There was no way the puppet could have anticipated meeting Joshua at that location. It was strange that a dagger had been prepared if they didn’t know. Maximian theorized that the person the puppet originally intended to stab was someone else—specifically, not the Duke, but someone else entirely. However, he didn’t voice this theory to the Duke.
If I trusted my deduction, then Theo had attempted to kill the Duke through the puppet manipulated by the Mage named Annie. That plan would have held considerable significance. On the surface, the incident would have appeared as though the Young Duke had killed his father, the Duke. If that had happened, the death of the Duke and the ruin of the Young Duke, branded as a parricide, would have been inevitable. Then who would have taken control of House Arnim? No one but Theo’s son, who carried Arnim blood.
A perfect stage had been set. Just as the manipulated puppet was about to stab the Duke, Joshua rushed in to stop it. Seeing a face identical to his own, the puppet panicked and stabbed Joshua instead. This was Maximian’s understanding of what had transpired. As a result, because Joshua had entered that dawn, he’d inadvertently saved his father. But since I couldn’t save him, I couldn’t offer praise. It would absolutely never happen. I’d told him so clearly not to throw his life away so recklessly.
The Duke’s account of Joshua appearing in an instant was likely because Joshua had used a brief Summon to protect the Duke. Joshua had recently become capable of such things. When the Salaryman appeared at the Sea Battle, he’d saved Grandfather the same way. Joshua said it required a moment of concentration, so he couldn’t use it freely and could only maintain it briefly. According to Joshua, he’d learned it from a certain girl in Periwinkle.
Why had Theo, who’d devised such a plan, committed suicide? Because he’d learned that the real Joshua had appeared? Because he’d realized the assassination of the Duke had failed? That couldn’t be it. Throughout the morning while everyone was in chaos, he’d had plenty of time to escape. No one was even trying to find him or capture him. As proof, hadn’t the Mage named Annie disappeared? And the secretary had fled as well. So why had only Theo failed to escape and instead died?
Here, my reasoning hit a wall. There was insufficient information. After learning that Theo was the one who’d created the puppet, the Duke and others seemed to think that with Theo dead, everything had worked out for the best. But Maximian couldn’t accept that. Whether or not Theo’s death was connected, the Mage had escaped and the original body had vanished as well. And there was one more thing—the fragment of the artifact that Anarose had requested remained unfound.
With Theo dead, the only person who could hold the key to everything was the Mage Annie. Hispania and Duke Arnim had each ordered their trusted subordinates to search. But the Mage, who should have been at Jade Ring Castle until the moment of manipulating the puppet that morning, had vanished like smoke without a trace. Had another colleague hidden her? How else could someone disappear so completely without leaving any trace?
“The coffin that would have been lying in this dust must have been the original body. But this Mage took only the original and abandoned the puppet.”
“As a result, the puppet cannot awaken, can it?”
The puppet still lay sleeping in another bedroom. With no one to tend to it except the Duchess.
“I’ve heard that when the original and puppet are separated, their connection weakens. Even if the original had been left behind, we wouldn’t have kept it safely, but separating it from the puppet might amount to the same thing in the end. Even if the Mage couldn’t take the puppet, to take the original body anyway… Did the Mage have no attachment to the puppet she created?”
“Do you think the puppet will never awaken as things stand?”
“I don’t know much about magic, but I’d imagine not, unless the original returns.”
Hispania nodded in agreement. Maximian sighed and rubbed away the chalk mark with his toe, then looked up at the ceiling. The dilapidated rafters looked as though they might collapse at any moment.
“What on earth did Joshua do when he first entered the manor?”
Hispania absently rummaged through the pile of miscellaneous items he’d already investigated, then turned and left the door open. Maximian stared blankly out through the doorway. The sunlight was pleasant, and the forest was perfect for a walk. It truly was a beautiful castle. A damned beautiful day.
“He said he’d go tell his mother everything, that it would be better for him to go alone rather than have Riche and me suddenly appear, that since it was his own home it would be natural, but what in the world was he doing to end up in such a state…”
Hispania didn’t answer.
It was a tediously long August 24th.
August 25th was the day the Doctor Louise Strom, famous for the rumor that one had to book an appointment half a year in advance to see her, was summoned.
A fine drizzle fell from morning. Inside the carriage sent by the Duke, Strom gazed out the window without saying a word. The Duke’s secretary Hessel, who sat beside her and found the silence uncomfortable, ventured a few remarks about the weather, but she barely responded with a nod.
The carriage came to a stop before the Castle. At the entrance, an elderly man stood among the attendants. Strom, who had been coldly distant throughout, embraced the old man the moment she descended from the carriage and exchanged three formal greetings.
“Louise. You’ve come despite the difficulty.”
“I wouldn’t have come if it weren’t for Hispania.”
“I know. Thank you for coming.”
Louise Strom was a petite woman in her forties. Dressed in an unadorned black tunic with her hair cut short, her appearance revealed nothing remarkable at first glance. She was the healer who could cure any patient by wielding both magic and medicine simultaneously, yet her reputation for arrogance had only grown notorious over the past three or four years. Most people cursed her for inflating her own worth, but those close to Hispania understood the true reason.
Strom was soon guided to Joshua’s bedroom. Before the chamber door, she encountered the Duke, offering only the minimum courtesy befitting the occasion. The Duke, having already heard the circumstances, paid it no mind and opened the door for her.
Joshua lay upon the bed.
Over the past four days, dozens of physicians had come and gone from the Royal Palace, including the court’s own doctors. All of them had left uttering the same words, each having struggled upon arrival to show some sign of improvement. Their words meant nothing. Once they had all departed, only the Young Duke remained, eyes closed as though sleeping. His pale face bore a bluish tinge, his lips still tinged with violet.
“Let me examine the wound.”
An attendant carefully drew back the blanket. Joshua’s upper body was bare. Across his chest, from the center downward to the left, lay a wound the size of two finger joints. It was the mark of a broad-bladed dagger’s thrust.
Children of Rune – Winterer
Author: Jeon Min-hee
Publisher: 14 Months Publishing
The copyright of this book belongs to the author and 14 Months Publishing.
To reuse all or part of the contents of this book, written consent from both parties is required.

—————
This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
—————