Rewriting the Trash Ending - Chapter 5

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

5.

***

Before the Imperial Palace, as lofty as the empire’s distant prestige.
‘Late,’ Axid thought.
Axid kept his eyes half-lidded, fixed on the Palace Gate.
Even though the sun had already reached its zenith, the gates showed no sign of opening.
When delegations from other nations typically visited, it was customary for an honor guard composed of the Imperial Guard to assemble before the gates for a formal review, or for imperial riders to come out to greet them.
To leave them standing outside was something done only to the envoys of enemy states.
“Your Highness, wouldn’t it be better to simply break down the gate and enter now?”
Kaiden spoke with his hand gripping his sword hilt, and Axid answered curtly.
“We wait until the gates open.”
“But——”
As Kaiden began to protest, Axid cut him off with decisive finality.
“Of course, I’ll make sure they open of their own accord.”
Originally, Winterheim and the Wijzer Empire were allied nations bound by the friendship of their founders.
Even if the goodwill between the two kingdoms had faded over the long centuries, maintaining a basic courtesy was only proper.
Besides, Winterheim was no vassal state of the empire—it was a sovereign independent nation.
They seemed intent on dragging out the time to diminish their spirits, but having waited this long, Axid had already fulfilled his duty as an allied nation.
“Your word is our command, Your Highness.”
Kaiden bowed with eager eyes, and Axid, who had been gazing steadily at the gates, spoke his command in a voice gone cold as steel.
“Tell them: if they do not open these doors, I will retrieve the Imperial Princess myself.”
He had accepted this marriage proposal not out of fear of the empire.
The Grand Duchy of Winterheim, which had stood as humanity’s breakwater, was in no way inferior to the empire in strength.
He had agreed simply because he deemed the Imperial Princess an adequate bargaining piece for this transaction.
He would tolerate no further discourtesy beyond this.
Receiving his command, Kaiden approached the gate guards.
“I think we’ve extended courtesy enough at this point. Are you really not going to open?”
“We have not yet received orders from above.”
The guard responded with an imperious bearing.
As a gatekeeper of the Imperial Palace, he seemed to believe his authority was considerable—as if he dared to swagger before whom.
Kaiden fingered his sword hilt and smiled wickedly.
“That’s unfortunate. Our lord has decided that if you don’t open this gate at once, he’ll go straight to the Princess’s chambers.”
The guard swallowed hard.
Beneath the playful smile, a chilling aura of killing intent emanated from Kaiden’s grip on his sword.
“Surely you don’t mean to set foot in the Imperial Palace without the Emperor’s permission?”
“Is that a problem?”
Once the Grand Duke had made such a decision, these men had only two choices.
Either they could yield the way freely.
Or they could watch the gates be torn open.
“Can you… truly bear the consequences that follow?”
“Feel free to test it, if you’re curious.”
The fact that Axid had come with only a handful of knights despite the alliance being mere words, scarcely more than a stranger’s bond, spoke volumes.
The empire posed no threat to them whatsoever.
Steel whispered.
As Kaiden drew his blade slightly, the knights who had been standing loose suddenly straightened as one, moving with practiced readiness.
……
Their gazes gleamed like beasts measuring prey.
An atmosphere so ominous it felt they might tear out a man’s throat without hesitation.
The guard’s face went pale, and he faltered before his eyes involuntarily drifted toward Axid.
A chill ran through him.
Black eyes, utterly emotionless and serene.
A gaze as blank as one directed at an inanimate object—it pressed down on his throat with suffocating weight.
The Grand Duke’s stillness until now was not because he had been cowed by imperial authority.
The certainty struck him like a blade: Axid had merely been watching.
Without thinking, the guard retreated a step, then raised a trembling hand to signal across the wall.
How long did that suffocating standoff stretch on?
Screeeech.
The heavy Palace Gate, sealed shut for so long, groaned open with a cry of protest.
“Tsk.”
Kaiden, robbed of his chance to rampage, clicked his tongue in disappointment.
“…Please enter the palace.”
Only when the guard, his face drained of color, lowered his spear did the way open at last.
Axid, who had maintained his silence from the rear all this while, crossed the Palace Gate with deliberate slowness, and a dozen-odd knights followed in his shadow like dark omens.

***

On this day in her previous life.
Lumiere had to sink down as though mired in a quagmire from which there was no escape.
It was not enough that her first love had ended in spectacular ruin—death awaited her in the marriage that lay ahead.
“…….”
She stood before the doors of the Great Hall, their elaborate patterns embossed in relief, and summoned the memory of that day.
The day she had been cast down to the floor with such degradation, like a beast dragged to the slaughterhouse.
What cut deepest into her very bones was that the man she loved had seen only her ugliest, most pitiful self until the very end.
The wretchedness of that moment had been dulled by time.
Screeeech….
As the doors parted slowly, the phantom of that day seemed to flicker before her eyes.
Her own image crawling across the Great Hall floor like an insect, her body limp, fainting at the sight of the Grand Duke who appeared like a harbinger of death.
She released the phantom with a short breath, then stepped forward with eyes now bright and clear.
“Your Imperial Majesty, the Sun of the Empire—I have come in answer to your summons as commanded. Might I venture to ask the reason you have called for me?”
As she offered a graceful curtsey with an ease that seemed almost carefree, the chamber fell silent as though ice-cold water had been poured over it.
A month ago she had been little more than a living corpse, but perhaps due to having regained some weight since then.
Despite the pallor that had not yet fully faded, she seemed to glow with a strange vitality that no one could tear their eyes away from.
Not even Logan, who had found her abhorrent.
‘Can you blame them?’
She who had always been mocked in those shapeless, sack-like dresses now presented herself in an entirely different light.
How long did that eerie silence stretch?
The Emperor, observing Trobytan, who stood transfixed as though under a spell, clicked his tongue and opened his mouth.
“An Imperial Family Member attempting suicide? If death were truly your desire, why not wait a moment longer? If you possessed even a shred of shame, you should not have forced the palace to dispose of a corpse within these walls.”
A faint scorn flickered across his violet eyes, cast downward.
As if he had any right to speak of shame.
He, who by fortune alone bore the blood of the Imperial line, yet gnawed at the realm with his incompetence and tyranny.
“I am deeply sorry for the distress caused by my foolish actions, Your Majesty. My moment of weakness brought dishonor to the Imperial Family, but I assure you such a thing will not happen again. Please set your mind at ease.”
“Yes, if you understand your fault, then bring no further shame upon the Imperial House and depart. Your betrothed has arrived in time.”
At the Emperor’s words, Lumiere turned slowly.
Axid of Winterheim.
Black hair fell naturally across his brow; his eyes were fierce and penetrating, his nose sharp and high, his lips set firm and stubborn.
Unlike the pale-skinned people of the Empire, a massive man with bronzed skin was walking in alongside his knights.
“…….”
Lumiere’s violet eyes rippled like still water disturbed by wind.
Though they had never exchanged a single word in her previous life, she had watched him for so long.
His bearing was severe, like that of one arriving to apprehend a criminal, yet a joy and an inexplicable surge of emotion washed over her as though she were meeting an old acquaintance.
“…Axid of Winterheim, ruler of the northern Grand Duchy of Winterheim and the man who is to become your husband.”
Soon the man reached her side and extended a rough, calloused hand.
Unlike his usual preference for practical military dress, he wore formal attire now.
‘…So that was how it was.’
He had taken care even at their first meeting.
Warmth bloomed in her chest at the memory she had forgotten, and her eyes softened with emotion.
“Lumiere of Wijzer. Your Grace, I am honored to meet you.”
How long she had waited for this moment.
And how deeply she was rejoicing in it now.
Her smile was bright and pure enough for anyone to see.
For just a moment, Axid’s eyes wavered at the sight.
“Barbarous and ignorant as befits a barbarian, it seems. Even if a bride is pleased, does it not occur to you that you should first show proper courtesy to His Majesty the Emperor?”
At the voice that cut in unexpectedly, the chamber froze.

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