How to Replace Your Dad - Chapter 238

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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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How to Replace a Father
Chapter 238
* * *
Charlot, the King of Gilose, froze.
What came before his eyes was unmistakably a blade.
The soldiers stiffened, but Charlot merely pulled the corner of his mouth into a slant smile.
“You would harm me in my own palace? The Saint of the Empire?”
Absurd.
Yustea was a woman utterly impossible to predict. And yet she clearly calculated every move.
An attempt on the king’s life was no small matter—it led to war.
With the Restoration Council already a headache, the Imperial Family would never permit such a thing.
It was then that he laughed, at ease.
His throat stung.
“…!”
“…?!!”
Gilose’s soldiers went pale.
Blood was flowing from King Charlot’s throat.
Yustea had pressed her blade against his neck after all.
This time even Charlot could not help but lose his composure and stiffen.
“You….”
“Either way, you weren’t going to let me go quietly, were you?”
A grinding sound escaped from Charlot’s teeth.
Yustea spoke.
“Grianne, the Fragment of Grace.”
Grianne shattered the glass case and swiftly retrieved the Fragment of Grace.
At once, Yustea turned King Charlot around.
And she pressed her blade close to his throat, shouting.
“Fall back!”
The soldiers wavered in confusion.
But with the king in captivity, there was nothing they could do.
Eventually they retreated with bewildered faces.
In that moment, Abel slammed the door shut with a bang.
“Now, let’s move. The underground passage—there must be one known only to the king.”
Yustea patted King Charlot on the back as she spoke, like a farmer herding cattle.
King Charlot clenched his teeth.
“You will regret this.”
“I can regret it later, after I get out.”
“….”
“Let’s do this the easy way, yes?”
Yustea continued with a sorrowful expression.
“Turning you into rags and dragging you along would be a bother for us both.”
“How dare—!”
“The underground passage. Where is it?”
King Charlot’s eyes glittered with fury.
But he had no choice but to speak.
This mad woman had wounded his throat again.
“…Beneath the bed.”
She had coerced a king of a nation into revealing the location of the royal passage.
Grianne, clutching the Fragment of Grace, stood with his mouth hanging open.
‘What manner of person is she….’
What was even more absurd was that while he stood confused in this ridiculous situation, the Irregulars moved without hesitation.
The expressionless man lifted the bed effortlessly.
And the Language Mage with the gentle voice quickly found the passage button beneath the bed.
Her manner suggested Yustea’s recklessness was utterly familiar to her.
Yustea spoke.
“Won’t you come?”
“…I shall.”
Grianne answered respectfully.
* * *
Grianne and I and the Irregulars walked through the underground.
Of course, we carried a hostage with us.
Abel held a blade to the throat of the King of Gilose while walking in my stead.
Grianne spoke.
“What happened?”
“What do you mean?”
Grianne glanced at the King of Gilose, whose face had gone ashen with rage.
“Oh—the king surrendered so easily. He was careless. He trusted the palace barriers. He thought you couldn’t possibly lay hands on him given your position.”
Above all, he likely thought his soldiers would freeze us in place.
The soldiers numbered in the dozens. We were merely four.
If he valued his life, he would never have expected us to draw a blade.
‘And I think the fact that I’m a woman helped too.’
If it had been a man like Grianne, Abel, or Miliano approaching, he would have been on guard.
But when I came directly, he underestimated me. He never expected a delicate woman to threaten him with a sword.
When I smiled at that, Grianne looked at me with exasperation.
“No, I mean entering through this underground passage.”
“The underground passage?”
“There must be mechanisms we don’t know about. Defenses to eliminate intruders.”
“Ah.”
“This is not a wise choice. Of course, with soldiers stationed outside, escaping that way would have been impossible, but it would have been better to convince him and leave peacefully—”
That was when.
Whoosh—!
An arrow flew from the wall.
We dodged back quickly, but it grazed Abel’s cheek.
Abel’s cheek immediately turned a bruised blue.
The arrow had been poisoned.
“You see! Like this—!”
Just as Grianne cried out.
Golden light swirled….
The golden radiance rushed toward Abel.
The bruised cheek immediately returned to its proper color, and the wound vanished as if it had never been.
“Hm?”
When I tilted my head in confusion, Grianne let out an “Ah.”
The King of Gilose, who had been smirking at the sight of Abel grazed by a poison arrow, twisted his face.
Grianne said.
“Is this the famous Nullification Field?”
“Yes.”
I nodded, and Grianne muttered with a tired expression.
“If any mechanism’s damage is healed the instant it’s inflicted, it becomes rather pointless….”
He understood now why I had entered the underground passage with such boldness.
While Grianne shook his head, I patted the King of Gilose.
“Is there a passage that connects within the palace without leading outside?”
I needed to bring Cesar and Yuise.
I asked casually, and once again a grinding sound of teeth escaped the King of Gilose’s lips.
Thud!
I twisted his head.
Both the King of Gilose and Grianne looked at me in shock again.
“Hurry.”
“What are you doing?”
The King of Gilose’s eyes shone with fury and contempt.
He spoke as if he might tear me apart.
“You’re not dragging me along just for the passage. You never intended to kill me from the start. You want to avoid war at any cost.”
“….”
“You will repay me in full for every humiliation you have caused.”
“….”
I sighed.
I grabbed him by the waist and yanked his collar roughly.
“What, are you planning to inform the Empire?”
“Could you stop me?”
“Go ahead, then.”
The King of Gilose’s brow twitched at my unexpected response.
I spoke with folded arms and a calm tone.
“Then I’ll just tell them the Fragment of Grace is in our hands. If it’s been destroyed, I’ll say it’s been destroyed.”
“…What?”
“Why do you think you still have your head despite ruling with such tyranny?”
“You….”
“It’s not because Gilose’s nobles and people are stupid. It’s because of the Fragment of Grace. With the Fragment of Grace, this nation will prosper forever.”
“….”
“But the Fragment of Grace is destroyed? What reason would your people have to endure your tyranny?”
“….”
“In three years, you’ll be dragged down by your nobles and people and met with a miserable death.”
“….”
If he were not a tyrant, he could never have chosen such an extreme method.
But he is a tyrant.
And.
“There is only one way for a tyrant to survive. You must be a figure of dread to your people.”
So they wouldn’t dare approach you.
Yet if he were to announce from his own mouth that the Fragment of Grace is gone and that he’s been taken hostage by a Saint?
I yanked his collar and spoke savagely.
“You can’t. You have no choice but to cover up everything we’ve done.”
The King of Gilose’s fists trembled.
Grianne asked Miliano with a shocked expression.
“Is she always this terrifying?”
“With enemies, there is no mercy. Our lady is merciless.”
“…That was not meant as praise.”
Grianne shook his head side to side.
Yet he seemed to find the situation amusing and chuckled softly.
In the end, the King of Gilose had no choice but to reveal all the secret passages of the royal palace.
While Grianne and I held the king in the passage, Miliano and Abel moved.
They went to retrieve Yuise and Cesar.
Grianne kept watch over the King of Gilose.
I pulled out a small bag I had brought from the room where the King of Gilose had confined me.
As I rifled through the bag, Grianne and the King of Gilose watched me.
I extended my hand to both of them.
I offered bread.
“…What is this?”
“Eat. You haven’t eaten.”
We had been unable to eat because the Irregulars breached the barrier.
The King of Gilose looked at me with suspicion.
But Grianne accepted the bread without hesitation.
“Mm. Delicious. I’ve thought so since the candidate’s quarters, but bread made by the Saint is truly exquisite.”
As Grianne bit into the bread, the King of Gilose eventually accepted it as well.
This bread turned out quite well, even by my judgment.
As I was eating contentedly, the King of Gilose’s eyes widened.
And he stared at the bread I had bitten into.
“…What is this?”
“Red Bean Cream Bread.”
“What?”
“In Gilose, you only use beans in rituals to chase away evil spirits, then discard them. Thanks to that, I collected plenty and made this.”
“…Red bean.”
I watched him eat the bread again before speaking.
“Eat slowly. There’s not much water in the waterskin, so I won’t give you any.”
The King of Gilose flinched.
As we shared bread like that, the Irregulars returned before long.
Yuise and Cesar had stunned expressions when they saw the King of Gilose.
“You really did take the king as a hostage….”
“This is getting worse.”
As both of them exhaled deeply, Abel spoke.
“Mine.”
“Ah. You gave it to the King of Gilose….”
Abel’s eyes gleamed.
As he gripped his sword hilt, Yuise and Cesar held on urgently.
“You can’t kill him!”
“He’s a king!”
But it was quite difficult to placate a deeply rooted dessert enthusiast.
Only after promising to make plenty of Red Bean Cream Bread when we returned did Abel settle down.
After that, we escaped the royal palace.
I healed the King of Gilose’s throat and spoke.
“Now you understand how dangerous it is to live as a tyrant, yes? Try to be kinder. It’s not that other kings don’t rule tyrannically because they’re fools.”
I smiled brightly and waved to him.
The Gilose affair had ended.
* * *
Dawn arrived.
As darkness lifted and the world grew dim, Gilose’s soldiers found King Charlot.
“Your Majesty!”
“And them?”
“The Saint’s party is nowhere to be found. We shall send a search party at once.”
“Never mind.”
“…Pardon?”
As the knight’s eyes widened, Charlot got to his feet.
“First, suppress any rumors within the palace.”
“Aside from the soldiers who went to the bedchamber, all is quiet. Strangely, everyone who encountered them has lost their memories.”
It was Miliano’s doing with Language Magic.
The King of Gilose let out a small laugh.
“How thorough.”
“What shall we do?”
“Silence the soldiers. This matter must never reach the outside.”
He had learned well on this occasion just how precarious life as a tyrant truly was.
The King of Gilose, chuckling to himself, moved forward.
Pausing briefly, he spoke.
“Red beans. Even as a dessert, they are good.”
“…?”
The knight froze.
After the king rode off, the knight exchanged glances with his comrades.
The knight swallowed dryly and spoke.
“A cipher?”
“…I shall summon the cipher master.”
The soldiers nodded with grave expressions.
No rumor ever spread that the Saint had entered Gilose’s concubine selection, taken the king hostage, and escaped with the Fragment of Grace.
But one rumor did circulate.
That the King of Gilose’s taste in desserts had changed.
* * *
The Imperial Palace.
I stood with a dejected expression, my head bowed.
I started to raise my head slightly, then quickly cast my gaze down again.
Because Luciano’s expression was too frightening….
“You seem to have had quite the entertaining time.”
“B-but we got the Fragment of Grace!”
“And?”
“…I have erred.”
Luciano held up a letter bearing Gilose’s seal.
He wore a smile.
“It says the Saint is officially invited.”
“…Why?”
“Who knows? Why indeed?”
Luciano’s smile deepened, and I gulped dryly.
Smiling Luciano was far more frightening.
He set the letter down with a bang and sat across from me.
“Isis was selected in Gilose’s concubine selection.”
“Not Michiya?”
“The queen is dead. Her cousin Michiya believed the king was surely the killer and didn’t wish to live that way, so she fled the family.”
“Michiya had quite the decisive side to her….”
“A woman named Yura from Ilfarm swapped out her daughter, claiming hers was taken, and her father is tearing his hair out searching for the woman of Ilfarm.”
I laughed awkwardly.
Luciano’s eyes narrowed.
“I didn’t ask you to laugh.”
I quickly clung to his neck.
“But no one was hurt.”
“….”
“I missed you, Luciano.”
When I leaned my face against his neck, he sighed deeply.
Grasping my jaw, he spoke.
“You’re taking advantage of the fact that I’m easy on you.”
“That’s just how I love you.”
“….”
Luciano fell silent, but slowly wrapped his arms around my back.
“I have to go. While you were away, Yohaël completed one of Calipso’s tasks. He obtained some special trait.”
I glanced outside.
Nobles were densely positioned around Calipso.
When I left, the nobles were tittering among themselves.
“What Divine Task did you accomplish?”
A red-haired man beside Calipso puffed out his chest proudly.
“It was a Channel Three task. Though it was difficult, I, Constance, risked my life to complete the task!”
He was the heir of a family with some standing among the newly risen nobles.
He glanced at me with a sneer.
“It was only because the young lady Calipso received a task from a channel that the young lady Esgaroth cannot enter.”
His gaze carried mockery.
He spread both arms wide and spoke.
“An angel bearing a torch! I have completed the Divine Task granted by the god who bestowed the Fragment of Grace upon Gilose!”
What?
‘But we were the ones who completed that task?’

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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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