The Former Empress Roughly Hides Her Abilities - Chapter 146

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Team. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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【Chapter 146】

“I’ll give you a chance to make your final argument.”

Rianel stood quietly beside the chair.

She didn’t show anger or put fury in her voice, just stared intently.

“That’s…”

That alone was enough to intimidate Logan. It felt like returning to the days when he was a student and she was a professor.

The two were in the guest room of House Novantium.

This was also the space routinely used when Logan shared information he had gathered while acting as a spy in the Temple with the two of them.

In other words, it was a familiar place for Logan too, but today even the air in the room felt different. Especially Rianel’s gaze was like an awl.

He hunched his shoulders and hung his head low.

“What words could a sinner have? I have committed a mortal sin.”

While storming the Temple had been enjoyable, being in front of Rianel made his excitement cool down to the point where his blood ran dry.

Well, he had actually done something wrong.

Rianel had shared most information with Logan. This was partly to prevent confusion when he carried out his duties, but it also meant she recognized him as a collaborator rather than subordinate personnel.

But Logan had used that information to do exactly the one thing Rianel told him not to do—cause a disturbance at the Temple.

“I confirm that you have expressed remorse for your actions.”

Rianel wasn’t particularly interested in how much Logan was repenting.

What remained was only cleanup and resolution.

“Then just choose which you prefer among burning at the stake, beheading, hanging, quartering, or drowning, and I’ll carry it out—”

“Ah, seriously!”

Logan jumped up.

The man who had been pretending to repent with drooping eyebrows and hands on his knees, looking pitiful, was nowhere to be seen, replaced only by a man expressing the excessiveness and injustice of the punishment.

“Isn’t that too much? I didn’t do it on purpose!”

“I clearly gave you the correct answer to the problem, but if you wrote something different from the facts, that’s definitely intentional.”

“…”

He had nothing to say. Logan sat down, ruffling his hair.

Rianel had also explained why they shouldn’t cause riots in front of the Temple.

[The reason the current religious order maintains its present system is because there exists a focal point called the Pope.]

The Pope was the center of the old religion, a saint who proved the authority of the religious order, and a rallying point.

The Temple would know this too. The moment the Temple was deemed dangerous, they would try to evacuate the Pope somehow.

[Even when hunting rabbits, you must leave an exit and drive them to control the situation.]

Showing the Pope the snare called tax investigation was to make him walk out on his own feet without fleeing.

By giving the Pope hope that ‘he might be able to escape if he does well.’

Moreover, religious groups had the habit of interpreting external attacks as persecution. They would regard suffering as trials sent by God and unite even more tightly.

Therefore, pressure was necessary, but it shouldn’t go too far.

“What, am I some kind of demon? To drag all those people along just to test the Temple and make them suffer?”

“You probably looked like something similar to the priests. Why on earth did you bring an axe?”

Logan’s head turned. Asil was entering with two cups of steaming hot black tea. He handed one cup to Rianel and kept the remaining one for himself.

And that was it.

Logan wanted to ask if there wasn’t one for him, but thinking he might get scolded by Asil, he just swallowed dry saliva instead of speaking.

“That’s… I needed a key to open the closed doors. Since the Temple guys were defending…”

“Key, my foot. There were multiple testimonies that ‘Blue Hood’ only gave orders from a safe position while people damaged the doors with pickaxes and shovel handles.”

Logan raised his hands slightly as if surrendering.

“Alright. I’ll tell the truth. I wanted to destroy the Temple’s pillars.”

The result of his words was meeting four eyes staring at him blankly.

Sometimes gazes could contain more criticism than reproach. This was exactly one of those times. Logan felt choked up.

“Honestly, if you two had also lost something to the Temple like me, you would fully understand my feelings—”

Logan, who had been grumbling, suddenly stopped speaking.

In this place sat someone who had lost their life to the Temple and someone who had lost their teacher.

“That… no, that’s not right. I misspoke. Right? So don’t look at me like I’m a bug. It was really a slip of the tongue.”

Logan, who had been scratching the back of his neck, crouched down as much as possible.

“I’ve been a bit crazy lately.”

“…”

“It’s just… empty.”

Logan had devoted over ten years to revenge.

The time he had longed for so much, destroying the Temple, was accomplished in less than half a day.

It was currently night. Though the heat of day had long cooled, the sensation of revenge still lingered at Logan’s fingertips.

“But tell me. Wasn’t it honestly exhilarating?”

“Exhilaration only provides emotional satisfaction and contributes nothing to solving problems.”

“Tch.”

Logan became dejected again.

Rianel set down her finished teacup.

“However, it’s true that your actions instilled fear in the clergy, making the investigation smoother.”

That day. The clergy who remained at the site were escorted by Imperial Palace knights to the investigation room and responded to the investigator’s requests for statements without resistance.

Thus, the investigator was able to secure testimony from them about internal corruption within the Temple.

The experience of facing overwhelming public anger was not common.

The Imperial Family didn’t need to punish them specifically. Just saying they would throw them to the angry crowd if they weren’t cooperative with the investigation was pressure enough.

Logan had essentially turned them into docile sheep.

“Then one more time.”

“That proposal is difficult to accept.”

Asil presented a bill.

“It cost considerable bail money to release you from custody.”

This was because Logan had been classified as a riot ringleader.

He hadn’t killed anyone, and all he did was destroy some buildings and frighten the clergy, but there were definitely people who got injured from falling or being pushed in the process.

Fortunately, the Imperial Family handled this situation lightly. Since destroying the Temple was beneficial to them, Logan received a minor punishment.

Of course, the Temple could demand compensation for property damage, but that was a civil matter not to be discussed here.

Logan quietly accepted the bill. The paper rustled as he gripped it firmly.

The amount on the bill was substantial, but it was a better outcome than rotting in prison for several years.

‘I have no family or anyone to save me.’

He could form solidarity with the other victims who were dragged to the Temple with him, but that was as far as it went.

‘The more I face them, the more memories of being trapped in the Temple come back.’

It would be the same for them too.

Logan couldn’t become friends with them.

‘These people who stay by my side until the end, I suppose.’

Still, at least the end wouldn’t be alone, so maybe that was fortunate.

Logan put the bill in his pocket and forced a smile.

“Of course. I know well that there’s no such thing as free in this world.”

If it was money incurred because of him, naturally he should pay it back.

“By the way, if payment is delayed, we’ll add legal interest.”

However, at Asil’s following words, Logan’s smile immediately crumpled.

“Come on, charging interest too is a bit much, isn’t it?”

“It’s stipulated by law.”

‘That cold-blooded bastard.’

Logan couldn’t bring himself to argue back and just trembled for a while.

* * *

“The sun is already at its zenith, and she still hasn’t risen?”

At the Empress Dowager’s question, the maids hung their heads as if they had committed a crime.

A week since the commotion at the Temple.

Yuna had been holed up in her room and wouldn’t come out.

‘But my son, suddenly seized by some whim, is making a fuss about marrying the Saint.’

Even when the article appeared in the newspaper, the Empress Dowager thought her son bringing Yuna into the Imperial Palace was just a momentary whim.

However, as preparations for the imperial wedding began in earnest, she could no longer stand by and watch, so she came to check on Yuna’s condition.

An Empress was more than just the Emperor’s spouse—she was a political partner who would share in governing the nation.

And such a person was curled up in her shell like a snail whenever things became unfavorable for her.

“How pathetic.”

Clicking her tongue, the Empress Dowager commanded the maids guarding the door.

“Open it. I need to see her condition with my own eyes.”

The maids exchanged glances and hesitated. But they couldn’t ignore the Empress Dowager’s authority.

Inside the wide-open room.

The Empress Dowager caught the stale air characteristic of a sealed room and covered her nose with her sleeve. She unconsciously stepped back and discovered what looked like a cocoon made of blankets on the bed.

Looking closely, the blanket was trembling slightly, accompanied by the sounds of sniffling and sobbing.

“G-go away.”

Sensing someone’s presence, Yuna shouted without even knowing who it was.

“….”

Though Yuna had been living in seclusion recently, her current state had solidified due to an incident a few days ago.

Yuna had declared the founding of the National Church and exposed that suspicious experiments were being conducted inside the Temple. However, even then, people were skeptical.

There was insufficient evidence to confirm the rumors, and they couldn’t trust Yuna’s words.

Moreover, most of the flyers scattered on the streets that day had been collected by Yuna herself.

People paid attention to the sensational rumor that Yuna was the Emperor’s mistress rather than the truth.

But when Logan brought down the Temple and direct testimony from victims was backed up with evidence, those who had missing family members began to harbor one suspicion.

‘The reason my missing sibling hasn’t returned all this time isn’t because they hate me, but because they were taken to the Temple and died, isn’t it?’

Mary was among them.

Working in another palace, she mustered up courage to ask Yuna, hoping to at least confirm whether her brother who had disappeared years ago was alive or dead.

It came from her desperate desire to find even his corpse if he had died.

[I’m asking just in case… did the Saint perhaps see my brother?]

It sounded different to Yuna’s ears.

-You knew about the illegal experiments inside the Temple but turned a blind eye to them, is that true?

“I don’t know! I don’t know anything!”

No, Yuna did know.

She knew and yet turned away, feeling no guilt.

‘It’s not like I was personally torturing people, so what does that have to do with me.’

Since closing her eyes wouldn’t cause her any loss, she chose silence.

The price of making the easiest choice was coming back in a different form to torment Yuna.

“Why is that my fault.”

“….”

“I didn’t do anything. I don’t know anything…”

Watching her refuse to come out while covered in blankets, the Empress Dowager simply turned and left. She didn’t even want to speak with her.

The Empress Dowager walked down the corridor, descended the stairs, and headed to where her son was.

“Do you truly intend to marry that child?”

The Emperor was sitting in his office. His posture was upright and his appearance neat, but the dark circles under his eyes revealed that he had been spending nights in the office for several days.

Though she should have praised the fact that someone who used to dump his work on his mother was now looking at documents in his office, knowing they were documents related to imperial wedding preparations annoyed the Empress Dowager.

“Is this truly a decision made with a sound mind?”

She wanted to grab him by the collar and find out what he was thinking. Instead of acting on this desire, the Empress Dowager just repeatedly clenched and unclenched her fists.

“It’s a matter of filling a vacant position. Since we’re welcoming someone precious, shouldn’t we naturally put our hearts into it?”

“You foolish—”

Just as the Empress Dowager was about to burst out.

“You need not worry, Mother.”

Her son added.

“Everything will return to where it originally belongs.”

Her son’s smile was the same as usual, but there was something about it that sent chills down her spine.

The Empress Dowager couldn’t ask any more questions and closed her mouth.

She failed to notice that among the pile of documents spread across the Emperor’s desk, documents containing personal information about the Vincenheim family disappeared, covered by other papers.

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