I’m Stuck on a Remote Island With the Male Leads - Chapter 177

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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 177
I glanced sideways at Father standing beside me before whispering to him.
“Given where we are, I won’t ask what this is about right now. But isn’t it dangerous? Every time you lose consciousness, Jenas takes over your body.”
“It’s more annoying than dangerous. Besides, if that bastard occupies my body for too long, his soul starts to deteriorate anyway. So why would he risk all that just to keep seeking you out?”
“Why indeed?”
That crazy person couldn’t possibly have come looking for me just because he missed me.
I asked out of genuine curiosity, but Kaiden’s brow furrowed. He clearly didn’t want to answer.
“That is…”
Just as Kaiden was about to respond, Father interjected.
“Margaret, why are you two whispering so amusingly while leaving your old man out?”
Father approached me with a curious expression, wanting to know what we were discussing. Though to be fair, he seemed quite delighted himself after meeting with acquaintances.
Thanks to his interruption, Kaiden closed his mouth again. Just then, the brass players in the orchestra section set up on one side of the ballroom rose in unison. A grand fanfare melody filled the air, announcing the arrival of the Imperial Family.
We all fell silent and turned to look.
The door leading inward to the Imperial Palace opened, and the Emperor, Empress, and Enoch Aster Klaus Langrid entered.
The nobles in the ballroom bowed their heads in unison. I followed suit, then looked back at Enoch Aster Klaus Langrid.
His golden eyes met mine immediately—he had been looking only at me from the start. As he continued to pierce me with his gaze, I noticed the people in the ballroom stealing glances in my direction.
How uncomfortable.
Fortunately, those stares all vanished the moment the Emperor opened his mouth.
* * *
Yuanna Lucy’s life goal had once been nothing more than making a fool of the Pope.
But after her visit to Alea Island, that humble goal had transformed into something far grander.
Margaret Rose Flone would be happy.
Happiness. Yes, that was a grand goal. At least for Yuanna Lucy.
“My goal is similar.”
Archbishop Luzef, who had been walking toward the prayer chamber behind Yuanna Lucy, spoke quietly. She glanced up at him walking beside her.
“I wish to help Lady Flone. No matter what she does going forward.”
Yuanna Lucy, observing Archbishop Luzef’s profile as he answered with a composed expression, nodded in understanding.
The two walked in silence through the quiet corridors of the Papal Court.
“In truth, I still cannot believe it. That she visited another dimension. I cannot fathom how she endured such an experience, how painful and agonizing it must have been, or how much she must be suffering even now.”
Breaking the silence, Archbishop Luzef spoke again. Yuanna Lucy sympathized with his words. In fact, disbelief extended beyond that alone. No matter whom they told about what they had experienced, few would easily believe it.
Archbishop Luzef suddenly stopped walking. Yuanna Lucy halted as well and turned to face him.
“She must be happy. Of course, you as well.”
Of course, without Margaret Rose Flone, they would not have survived even a month on the island, let alone escaped it.
But before Margaret Rose Flone’s accomplishments came Yuanna Lucy’s sacrifice. Had Yuanna Lucy not willingly offered herself and reversed time, there would be no Margaret Rose Flone as she is now.
Yuanna Lucy let out a soft laugh, her face filling with mischievous playfulness.
“Thank you for including me. I know the Archbishop only has eyes for Margaret Rose Flone.”
At Yuanna Lucy’s words, Archbishop Luzef’s face turned bright red.
“That is not—!”
“It’s fine. After all, Margaret Rose Flone is most important to me as well. Oh, and I’ve discovered something.”
Yuanna Lucy waved her hand dismissively with a laugh, then suddenly rummaged through her pocket while glancing around. She then pulled Archbishop Luzef around a corner of the corridor into a secluded spot.
She pulled out a tin case the size of her palm from her pocket and opened the lid. Inside the lid lay a crimson powder.
“Do you know what this is?”
“I’m afraid not.”
“It’s the Tentationem Flower that the Rohade Family developed.”
Archbishop Luzef hastily stumbled backward and covered his nose. Seeing his reaction, Yuanna Lucy closed the case’s lid and tucked it back into her pocket.
“The flower stamen has been removed and ground into powder, so it’s safe. The powder alone won’t produce the same reaction as on Alea Island.”
“Where did you obtain this?”
“You know there’s a basement under that old fogey’s room? I snuck in during the night, and fortunately, the door was unlocked.”
The old fogey Yuanna Lucy spoke of could only be the Pope. Archbishop Luzef stared at her with a deathly pale face.
“Such audacity in this world…!”
“Shh.”
Yuanna Lucy pressed her index finger to her lips and hurriedly glanced around.
“On Alea Island, we experienced hallucinations and agitation after catching the scent of this flower, didn’t we? It seems that when ground into powder, it produces a different effect.”
“Such as?”
“It was written in the Rohade Family’s ‘Experiment Log’ that was in that old fogey’s basement. When tested inland, people who ingested this flower’s powder lost consciousness, they said.”
“Then….”
“It seems this flower was used when they kidnapped us as well. If the powder is mixed into tea, medicine, or beverages, it takes effect, or so the notes said.”
Archbishop Luzef squeezed his eyes shut, his face contorted in anguish.
It was no simple matter to make someone absorb flower pollen into their body without their knowledge. Moreover, for people of such high status and position as they possessed, such an act would be exponentially more difficult.
That meant, just as Anata had said, there truly had been betrayal from those positioned closest to them.
“We already knew someone betrayed us anyway. There’s no need for that expression.”
Yuanna Lucy tapped the pocket containing the tin case with her fingers as she spoke.
“I’m thinking of turning this against them.”
“Turning it against them?”
“I plan to kidnap them in the same way. Now that I know its purpose, I’ll need to gather Tentationem Flowers. Archbishop, you know? I’m quite confident in my thievery skills.”
When Yuanna Lucy winked with one eye closed, Archbishop Luzef covered his face with one hand. Indeed, Yuanna Lucy was entirely unsuited for the position of a cleric, yet that very unsuitability was so characteristically her that he had nothing to say.
“And what will you do after kidnapping them?”
“Hmm. I think it would be fitting to repay what we suffered. Shall we restore Alea Island?”
“Saint!”
When Archbishop Luzef cried out as if it were absurd, Yuanna Lucy burst into laughter, saying it was a joke. The problem was that it sounded nothing like a joke to Archbishop Luzef.
Archbishop Luzef looked at Yuanna Lucy as if he couldn’t stop her, then a sudden thought occurred to him and he posed a question.
“By the way, before you departed, didn’t you have a separate conversation with Diego Bastian Vilterheim at the Langrid Empire Military tent?”
“Ah…. Yes, I did.”
Yuanna Lucy narrowed the space between her eyebrows and answered.
“What was the conversation about? I heard raised voices were exchanged between you two.”
“Raised voices? Everyone exaggerates so much. It was just…. I got scolded. By Diego Bastian Vilterheim.”
“What? You were scolded? Are you saying he dared to scold the Saint?”
“Ah. Yes…. Well….”
Yuanna Lucy, embarrassed, scratched her cheek and avoided Archbishop Luzef’s gaze.
“I understand why Diego Bastian Vilterheim was angry, so it’s fine.”
“I’m curious what your reason is.”
“I said I’d sacrifice myself if needed, so it’s fine to use me as bait. After all, I was destined to die on that island anyway.”
“Good heavens. What kind of destiny requires someone to die?”
Archbishop Luzef raised his voice in exasperation, then pressed his temples repeatedly.
“Sir Diego had every right to be angry.”
“….”
“And now that we’ve escaped Alea Island, all we need to do is find the Blood Scripture and Magic Stones. What could possibly go wrong?”
At Archbishop Luzef’s words, Yuanna Lucy smiled with a meaningful expression.
“Do you really believe that? That there’s no danger at all?”
“What do you mean?”
“A dimensional rift appeared in this world, and the Peony Faction created something like an ‘experiment island’ because of it. But we only destroyed that experiment island.”
“That’s….”
“We haven’t sealed the dimensional rift yet. Do you understand what I’m saying? The fundamental problem hasn’t been solved. If we don’t resolve it, a second Peony Faction will emerge.”
“Is there a way?”
At Archbishop Luzef’s question, Yuanna Lucy shrugged her shoulders. She stepped back slightly from him.
“We’ll have to find that out starting now. Will you help me search? The Papal Court, which has been conducting experiments on dimensional rifts for a thousand years, must have investigated a great deal.”
“But we wouldn’t have access to view those records, and we don’t even know where the relevant information is kept. Most of the high-ranking clerics within the Papal Court seem to be part of the Peony Faction. If they discover we’re searching for that information, it will be dangerous.”
“Then we simply won’t let them find out.”
“Do you already have a method in mind?”
Yuanna Lucy laughed heartily and shook her head.
“We’ll figure that out as we go. This is what we need to do: once everything is finished, we’ll seal the dimensional rift and achieve complete peace. We’re going to bring this long story to an end ourselves.”
Yuanna Lucy’s words were quite grand, and Archbishop Luzef found himself swallowing hard with a tense expression.
“We should hurry—we need to give Margaret good news as a birthday gift.”
At Yuanna Lucy’s words, Archbishop Luzef nodded. He too hoped it would be possible.
* * *
The Imperial Palace’s banquet hall.
Kaiden wouldn’t have minded if Margaret Rose Flone hadn’t chosen him as her partner. It seemed she had also rejected Enoch Aster Klaus Langrid’s request.
So he had deliberately arrived at the party early to wait for Margaret Rose Flone.
[Our descendant, you don’t look well at all right now. Don’t get the wrong idea—I’m not worried about you.]
Jenas’s voice echoed in his mind.
Kaiden steadied himself against the wall as dizziness washed over him, then exhaled deeply. He just needed to rest for a moment—just a brief moment.
Since returning to the Empire, Kaiden hadn’t rested once. He’d been too busy overturning the Magic Tower, whose hierarchy had fallen into complete disorder during his absence.
Moreover, he had visited the Rohade Mansion, which he hadn’t set foot in for years while searching for the Blood Scripture.
But neither his father nor his mother was at the mansion, and despite searching it thoroughly, he couldn’t find anything resembling the Blood Scripture.
All that remained was to search the underground laboratory beneath the mansion, but since that required a more detailed plan and careful infiltration, he had no choice but to retreat for now.
However, it wasn’t entirely fruitless. He had discovered how the Peony Faction had kidnapped them to Alea Island.
[I clearly warned you. No matter how much you claim it’s for evidence gathering, directly handling Tentationem isn’t wise. And inhaling the pollen at that? Such a foolish act…. Tsk.]
“You’re being loud.”
Kaiden took a moment to breathe deeply and clutched his chest. Then he saw a carriage bearing the Flone Family crest entering.
The carriage door opened, and as expected, Margaret Rose Flone emerged alongside her father, Duke Flone.
And at the sight of Margaret Rose Flone’s resplendent and beautiful appearance—one he had never witnessed before—Kaiden found himself holding his breath.

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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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