For the Young Villain’s Happy Ending - Chapter 24

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Chapter 24

Let me rewind time to when Raina Hart was presenting a bracelet to Count William.
Three members of the Imperial Third Knights Order were receiving unbelievable news.

“Pardon?”
“Dismissed?”
“…Terminated?”

Not only the rank-and-file members Shukal and Fontepon, but even Person, the vice-captain, had been expelled from the Imperial Third Knights Order.
The personnel department official nodded at the three stunned men.

“You’ve been absent from your posts for far too long.”

What kind of reason was that?
They had spent four years stationed in Hibei as ordered, and only recently made excuses to return because they hadn’t been summoned in so long.
And now they were being dismissed? Dismissed for being absent too long?
It was profoundly unfair.

“I cannot accept this. I will ask the Captain directly.”

Unusually, Person spoke with conviction.
With the former vice-captain leading the way, Shukal and Fontepon sought out the Captain of Imperial Third Knights, a man whose face they had never seen before.
The gruff-looking captain, dressed in a navy uniform, spoke curtly to the three men.

“Reinstatement? The orders for your deployment and dismissal didn’t come from me—they came from above. Take it up with them.”
“Surely you have personnel authority, Captain. If you would just speak on our behalf—”
“Speak, you say? Fine. You’re strangers to me, but since you were once my subordinates, I can put in a word. But first, tell me—what were you three doing in Hibei for four years?”

The new Captain of Imperial Third Knights was renowned as a sword fanatic.
It was his habit to say that magic without physical training was not the true path.
He regarded the three men, who had spent four years in the territory of a great mage, with the suspicious gaze one reserves for spies.

“Well, you see…”

But there was nothing I could say.
Hadn’t I sworn to Raina Hart not to follow them to Jenia?
To keep silent about what happened in Hibei.
The Captain drove them away with harsh words.

And now.

“….”

After hearing the circumstances, Raina Hart had become an unwilling spectacle.

“Lady Raina Hart, we respect you.”
“Please give us the chance to serve you.”

Shukal and Fontepon clasped their hands together, appealing to Raina Hart.
A desperate plea to be accepted as knights of the Hart Marquis Household.
They looked ready to weep if refused, kneeling and prostrating themselves so low their foreheads nearly touched the ground. Passersby at the checkpoint whispered and stared.
Look there. The Archmage has two men in tears.

‘Should I just abandon them and leave?’

Under the weight of all those stares, I considered it briefly. Perhaps I could teleport away with only Keri to Hibei.
But then.
The Village Chief had entrusted me with over ten disciples, and they followed these three members of the Imperial Third Knights Order quite well.
If those three disappeared.

– Master, where is Uncle Fontepon?
– Where is Uncle Shukal?
– Master! Where is Mr. Person?
– Master! Master!

The children would ask me about those three people endlessly.
In the worst case, they might choose me as their substitute playmate and follow me all the way to the castle.
A bustling castle. Raina Hart surrounded by children.
A horrifying prospect.

“…Do as you wish.”

Raina Hart’s permission had been granted.
Shukal and Fontepon, ears perked up in attention, shot to their feet.

“Is… is that truly the case?!”
“I love you! Raina Hart!”

The joy was overwhelming. So overwhelming that even Fontepon, who usually feared Raina Hart, found himself crying out his habitual declaration of love.

“….”

Fontepon, grinning from ear to ear, suddenly locked eyes with Kevenriak Heteroven.
The Fourth Prince regarded him quietly with a measured gaze.

“Hmm? Kevenriak Heteroven. Do you have something to say?”
“No.”

Kevenriak Heteroven turned his head away.

“Raina Hart, are you certain about this?”

Person asked her directly.
Unlike the other two, there was a reason he hadn’t shown the same eager enthusiasm in seeking her employment.

“The finances….”

The Butler had mentioned to him previously that Raina Hart had no money.

“There’s no problem. I’ve come into funds.”

But that was ancient history now.
The deed to the Lindraham Mine, where diamonds slumbered, rested within Raina Hart’s possession.
In eight years, I would need to return it naturally to Tiernan Fargan, the male lead, so I couldn’t spend too freely.
But the amount was more than sufficient to pay salaries for the newly hired knights.

“Ah, then—.”

Person’s face brightened at those words.
Raina Hart observed him in turn.

“You’ll stay behind.”
“Pardon?”

From the beginning, I had intended to leave Person behind.
Shukal and Fontepon were extras, so taking them along was one thing.

‘Person is a character with significant narrative weight. It’s better to maintain his established trajectory. I need to let him grow as he does in the original story.’

In the future, he would become nothing less than the Captain of the Imperial First Knights.
The man who would fill Dresherd’s position while he searched for a way to return from the Opposite Continent.
I placed my hand on Person’s shoulder and whispered to him in confidence.

“Person, you will become the Captain of the First Knights.”
“Pardon?”
“You already know that I possess a foresight ability that manifests from time to time.”
“…!”

At those words, Person’s eyes transformed in an instant.

“I will give it my all.”

His gaze brimmed with trust toward the one who had spoken to him.
I answered that gaze by nodding slowly.
Of course, I had never seen in the original story that he would be dismissed as he is now.

“You will be capable of it.”

I encouraged Person.

About an hour later.
The Captain of the Imperial First Knights and several others attempted an illegal teleportation to Jenia, only to be repelled by the barrier surrounding the castle walls.
Their arrogance had birthed pristine white uniforms.
Though “pristine white” was a generous description—they were already filthy from rolling in the dirt somewhere. Those uniforms had been dragged through the earth.

“….”
“My, there are quite a few criminals about.”

A Knight at the Checkpoint smiled broadly as he fastened shackles around the wrists of the fallen Knights.
The metallic clink of restraints echoed from the Emperor’s direct subordinates’ wrists.
The people lined up in front of the Checkpoint witnessed the sight.
In the subsequent investigation, only one consistent answer emerged: “I don’t remember the past few days.”

***

That afternoon, upon returning to Hibei.
Raina Hart, who had teleported away claiming she had a brief errand, returned with a distinctly satisfied expression.

“Welcome back.”

A short outing that took roughly thirty minutes.
Kevenriak, who had been waiting at the entrance, greeted Raina Hart warmly.

“I’m back. Keri, have you been waiting here the whole time?”
“I just came out a moment ago.”
“Is that so?”

Raina Hart gently brought her nose close to Kevenriak’s hair.

“For someone who just came out, there’s quite a bit of wind scent clinging to your hair, Keri.”

Raina Hart laughed playfully.
Since he was always caught this way, Kevenriak simply acknowledged it with a smile rather than making excuses.
He really had grown. Until the year before last, he would blush and say, “That’s not true…”

‘My little one has already—.’

Fourth Circle, no less.
I wanted to hear what had happened at the Empress’s Palace.
But the Empress, the Imperial Family members, and even Kevenriak.
They all seemed reluctant to speak, watching my expression carefully.
I could have found out by using magic, but I chose not to.

‘Rummaging through someone’s mind comes with aftereffects, and I can roughly guess what happened anyway.’

Plates on the floor bearing traces of food. Imperial Family members sitting rigidly at a well-prepared table, unable to move.
For a moment, my blood ran cold.

[Do not forgive.]

A voice—whether from the author or someone unknown—whispered in Raina Hart’s mind, just as it had four years ago.
But the circumstances were vastly different from that night when the servants and maids had been consumed by magic.
Now, Kevenriak’s future mattered more than unleashing her rage in the moment.

‘Becoming openly hostile to the Imperial Household would do nothing for Keri’s future.’

That was why Raina Hart had refrained from using magic against them then.
Of course, that didn’t mean she had simply walked away.

‘The Empress, the Empress Consort, two Imperial Princesses, and one Imperial Prince.’

Beyond them, she had memorized the faces of servants, maids, and knights alike.
She had left a doll imbued with those memories in the Imperial Palace—each night, it would randomly seek out one of them and inflict nightmares upon them.
Not quite dark magic, but a doll saturated with the Alchemist’s curse.

‘A masterwork of redemption that the Alchemist who attacked Raina Hart six years ago had instead lost to her.’

Whether it was truly a masterwork, she couldn’t say—she was merely quoting the Alchemist’s anguished cry from Raina Hart’s memories: “My masterwork!”

‘Even strength must have been tedious for them.’

Raina Hart’s memories were filled with such incidents.
People who had rushed at her seeking revenge, only to flee without landing a single scratch.
As a result, the Grand Mage’s interdimensional pouch was brimming with such spoils of war.

‘Since I possessed her, nothing like that has happened. It’s surely because Raina Hart obliterated Tunchar, an island in the Tunterra Archipelago, in a single night.’

A Grand Mage who could erase an entire great city in one night.
Revenge or otherwise—they were all too terrified to approach.

‘Overpowered to the extreme.’

Raina Hart was satisfied.
How tedious it would have been to deal with each of them individually.

“Master?”

Kevenriak, who was about to open the front door, tilted his head upon seeing his master’s meaningful smile.

“No, wait. Ah, Keri.”

Raina Hart called out to Kevenriak.
She hadn’t yet discussed with her disciple what had transpired at the Imperial Palace.
Setting aside the matter of the Empress’s Palace, she wondered if his body—now transformed to the Fourth Circle—was straining under the burden. Whether it was truly acceptable for him not to return to the Imperial Palace.

“What should we do about not being able to return to the Imperial Palace now? It’s practically permanent banishment.”
“…Master, being banished would be better.”

A cutting remark that fell from such an innocent face.
His master being banished would be better, he said.

“…What?”

Kevenriak caught Raina Hart as her legs gave way beneath her.
Though concerned words spilled from his lips, they could never properly reach the ears of his bewildered master.

‘My… my child…’

Perhaps it wasn’t adolescence—it was rebellion.

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