For the heart - Chapter 62

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

Chapter 62

* * *

Upon hearing the news that Anny had died in the town square during the night, Nina rode her horse to the square without hesitation.

It was Casian who had brought her the news.

“It could become dangerous.”

“What do you mean?”

“If Your Highness steps forward to collect Anny’s body now, it will arouse the Emperor’s suspicion.”

“Anny came to the capital practically for my sake. I can’t turn away from her final moments. And Anny…”

She must have known that she didn’t have much time left.

When Nina had offered to arrange safe lodging and protection for her, Anny had said with a peaceful face that no one could harm her anymore.

Only now could Nina understand the meaning of those words.

No one would collect the Saint’s body.

Originally, when a Saint died, the Priestly Order would retrieve the body, but there was no Priestly Order in Arsed now.

Who could dare touch the body of a Saint, the only being blessed with God’s breath and capable of delivering divine oracles?

Until someone prepared to face divine punishment stepped forward, her body would rot in that very spot.

Nina couldn’t let Anny, who had helped her, meet such an end.

And above all, she was no longer afraid of the Emperor’s suspicion.

He was not her real father, he was the one who had torn out her heart, and he was the one who had fabricated false oracles to use her as a weapon of war.

He was also deeply involved in the whereabouts of the Former Emperor, who was declared dead, and the death of the Former Empress.

‘Once I find the Former Emperor and my heart, I’ll know. Just what he did to me.’

When Nina arrived at the town square, she saw countless people gathered there.

People were all clasping their hands together in prayer around where the Saint lay.

As Nina approached, people murmured and made way for her.

Anny’s appearance, with her hands folded and resting against one cheek, looked not dead but simply fallen into peaceful sleep.

Her face was serene and she even wore a gentle smile.

“Anny…”

When Nina lifted Anny’s body into her arms, people made way for her again.

People began following Nina as she walked slowly away. This was expected since they mistook Anny for a Saint.

At that moment, someone approached and stood beside Nina.

“The Saint came to prevent Your Highness’s wrongful suffering. She came to protect Your Highness.”

Nina quietly looked at the old man who had approached her.

To think there was someone who would come this close to her, when she had no heart and rumors spread that touching her meant death.

As she thought this surprising, even more people gathered around Nina.

“We would like to accompany Your Highness on the Saint’s final journey.”

“Thank you.”

People lined up behind Nina one by one, and then that flow grew like a snowball as a long procession followed her.

It was the longest funeral procession ever seen in Arsed.

And from the next day, strange rumors began to spread.

* * *

Count Puaco had not visited the Imperial Palace for over two weeks now.

“Count, His Majesty’s attendant came by again today.”

Rainer was sending an attendant every day asking Count Puaco to come to the palace. Always with expensive gifts in tow.

But he didn’t want to see the Emperor’s face.

The Emperor had granted a public trial to clear his daughter Michelle’s injustice.

The Emperor had even made the judge accept a witness in an unacceptable condition, yet suddenly he had cut down that witness.

The Count couldn’t understand what he was thinking when he did such a thing.

“Hand over your ledger to me.”

Could it be that he used such a shallow trick to obtain the ledger?

After all, the public trial had been held.

No matter how he thought about it, it seemed the Emperor had deceived him.

The Count, his face deeply furrowed, paced back and forth in his spacious study, organizing his tangled thoughts.

“Not a chance. Even if we go down together, I absolutely won’t hand it over this way.”

The murder charge that was expected to fall on Nina had been swept away by the Saint’s testimony.

Moreover, since the Emperor had killed the witness, it would be even harder to charge Nina with any crime in the future.

It would be natural to think again about how to take revenge on Nina, but Count Puaco had now taken a step back from his belief that Nina had killed his daughter.

This was because his reason, which had been madly raging since his daughter’s death, had returned.

Until now, he had not doubted for a moment that Nina had killed his daughter.

There was clearly a witness who said he saw Nina jumping from his daughter’s bedroom window.

Though the witness’s condition had suddenly become strange, when he first told him that story, he was certainly in his right mind.

Even when the blonde hair found on his daughter’s bed turned out not to be Nina’s, he believed such things could easily be fabricated.

But the Saint had appeared to testify to Nina Arsed’s innocence, and died the very next day.

And the rumor that reached him was something he never expected.

“It wasn’t Princess Nina who killed Michelle Puaco, but Princess Lillien.”

Princess Lillien killed his daughter, who had been a maid for nearly ten years?

He couldn’t easily understand it.

Yet strangely, those words kept circling in his head.

“Sob sob, Father!”

“Michelle! What happened to your hair!”

“Princess Nina, it was Princess Nina. Sob sob sob!”

His daughter, who had returned home crying that day, told him the whole story.

Though he thought his daughter’s behavior had crossed the line, he focused only on comforting his daughter who was crying with her hair hideously cut.

“If Her Highness really intended to kill your daughter, why would she warn her by cutting her hair?”

And the day after his daughter died.

It was Viscount Rodian Bronte, the Deputy Minister of Defense, who refuted the claims I had made while coughing up blood at the ministerial meeting.

He was someone who had observed Nina Arsed closer than anyone else. His words suddenly organized my thoughts.

“What kind of person was Nina Arsed…”

She was someone who, despite being of imperial blood, did not receive treatment befitting her status.

Now she had become the Knight Commander of Arsed with the nickname “Cold Sword,” but in her childhood, the princess had been treated worse than a servant.

That’s why I didn’t warn my daughter even when I saw her insolent behavior.

Since even the Emperor didn’t point it out, I thought she was just someone who could be treated that way.

Yet Nina Arsed had never once harmed those who looked down on her.

Despite having the ability to skillfully wield a great sword.

“If Nina Arsed really intended to kill Michelle, who couldn’t even properly hold a sword… would she have come all the way to the Count’s mansion, risking being caught?”

Moreover, how did the witness who claimed to have seen Nina recognize Nina Arsed’s appearance so instantly in that darkness?

She had never properly shown herself to the public.

Count Puaco finally felt foolish for being buried in the testimony of having seen Nina.

“Was it really not Nina Arsed… but Lillien Arsed who killed Michelle?”

And the more his thoughts organized, the more confused he became, yet anger boiled up at the thought that he had been chasing the wrong person as the culprit.

He should have noticed something strange from when evidence he didn’t even know about suddenly appeared.

“Princess Lillien is so angry with me because of Princess Nina. She even said she wanted to tear me to shreds. Sob sob, I’m so upset, Father.”

His daughter’s sobbing voice flashed through his mind.

Princess Lillien, who was selfish and had a subtly cruel side, had been angry with Michelle.

He bolted upright.

It was a fact known to everyone who frequented the Imperial Palace that Lillien Arsed was dying to devour Nina Arsed.

“Did she use my daughter as a sacrifice in a scheme to put Nina Arsed in trouble?”

Crack—the sound of bones grinding came from Count Puaco’s tightly clenched fist.

If it was Lillien Arsed who killed his daughter.

“Did the Emperor know this and put Nina Arsed forward to hide Princess Lillien?”

With Lillien as the culprit, another chain of suspicions followed.

Count Puaco immediately left the study and strode outside.

The attendant who had been waiting outside the door matched his pace and followed alongside him.

“I’m going to the Imperial Palace. There’s something I need to confirm.”

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