The Poisonous Princess Who Successfully Infiltrated the Enemy as an Employee - Chapter 9

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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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Episode 9.

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“Ah, what glorious air!”
Upon reaching the entrance to the Pedrica Mountain Range, I spread my arms wide and drew in a deep breath.
The air was cold and biting enough to sting my lungs, yet the scent of trees and earth mingled within it set my heart racing once more.
In and out, in and out—after breathing in the welcoming forest fragrance several times, I finally let my eyes settle upon the Pedrica Mountain Range’s massive snow-clad peaks.
“Ah….”
Magnificent.
A pristine expanse of white snow stretched endlessly across my vision.
Upon each ridge layered atop the others, brilliant snow clung in frozen masses, and whenever wind swept past, powder from the ridgeline scattered skyward in white clouds.
At the thought of climbing across frozen earth again after so long, my lips curled upward of their own accord.
‘Heh.’
Contrary to the concerns of the knights and the Archduke, I had reached the mountain’s entrance with ease.
My breathing remained steady, my legs and shoulders felt light rather than burdened.
‘This is it—a person must live with soil beneath her feet.’
With my heart soaring, I stepped forward into the range.
The two knights who had rushed ahead when the Archduke appeared were no longer in sight.
But there was no real reason to worry.
Before my feet lay a path cleared distinctly by the Archducal Household’s knights.
For all its reputation as a fierce and merciless northern mountain, this was a place where the Archducal Household’s knights trained daily, ascending and descending it without fail.
And so the trail they had traveled bore the unmistakable mark of human touch.
“What a shame.”
I clicked my tongue in disappointment.
‘Once footprints tread upon a place like this, medicinal herbs and rare poisonous plants simply won’t grow.’
What’s more, the two knights ahead had apparently cleared away snow that had accumulated overnight even as they received their punishment.
It wasn’t only the snow—they had uprooted sharp stones protruding from the frozen ground and stubborn weeds alike, scattering them to the sides of the path.
As though to say: take care as you follow.
‘For all my displeasure, knights remain knights.’
The faces of those who had shown concern for me before ascending flashed in my mind, and I let out a small laugh.
Rough and unpolished though they were, their quiet consideration as northerners came through completely.
I began climbing in earnest along the path the knights had so kindly prepared.
The solid earth beneath my feet felt wonderful. Even the cold creeping up through my soles pleased me despite the snow having been cleared away.
My body, which hadn’t touched a mountain for more than a week, now felt as though it had found its way home.
The southern winter mountains couldn’t compare to this harshness, yet the thought of poisonous plants growing even in this barrenness excited me all the more.
Huff, huff, huff—how much had I climbed.
I naturally could not sense the presence of the knights who had rushed ahead in full battle gear.
Unless I happened to meet them on their way down from the summit, there was no way I could catch up.
I stopped walking.
‘If this continues, there’s no real point in climbing the mountain.’
I hadn’t declared so boldly that I would accept punishment alongside them simply to follow a neatly maintained climbing path.
I stood in place and surveyed my surroundings carefully.
Everywhere except the path the knights had cleared, snow lay piled deep enough to sink past the knees.
Through that grave-like mound of snow, bare branches and blackened dead weeds thrust upward in eerie forms.
To most eyes it would be nothing but the bleak winter landscape of a dead mountain, but my eyes saw it differently.
My mouth began to water.
‘How many medicinal and poisonous plants might be hidden beneath that snow?’
I swallowed hard, reached into my cloak, and withdrew the gardener’s gloves and hoe I had hidden at my waist.
Days ago, on the day I was cleaning the outer wall’s windows.
I had seen Selin searching for four-leaf clovers beneath a ladder, and it was then I happened to discover the gloves and hoe.
A gardener must have forgotten them while tending the flowerbeds, and I had quietly taken them.
Small and worn though they were, they were sturdy enough to break through frozen earth.
Gripping the hoe’s handle firmly, I wheeled my body around without a shred of attachment to this safe mountain path.
Toward the place where no human footprint had ever touched.
Toward that perfect, uncharted territory where rare medicinal herbs and lethal poisonous plants seemed to lie thick upon the ground.
A wager with the Archduke had flickered through my mind for a moment.
‘Either way, I have nothing to lose if I lose the bet.’
In truth, from the very beginning, I never intended to win the wager.

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Varcan followed at a distance behind the Princess, keeping his eyes on her movements.
At the same time, her peculiar behavior made no sense to him whatsoever.
Of course, trying to understand someone whose mind was not entirely sound was itself unreasonable—but mental unsoundness and the physical stamina that defied all common sense were matters of an entirely different order.
A Princess of Delmar raised like a hothouse flower ought to have been gasping for breath merely reaching the mountain’s entrance against this biting northern wind.
Yes, judging by her temperament, one might suppose she’d grimaced and persisted through sheer obstinacy to get that far.
Yet once the Princess began climbing the mountain, she’d been in high spirits the entire time.
Literally—she moved with the exuberance of a puppy treading snow for the first time, nimble as a fox darting through the snowy peaks as if they were her own home.
Her footsteps were light, her breathing impossibly steady.
Was such a thing even possible.
Varcan, watching the Princess who was clearly not in her right mind, found himself wondering precisely why she wasn’t.
So he followed silently in her wake for some time.
They’d already climbed halfway up the mountain.
Varcan’s eyes narrowed slightly.
‘This is no ordinary level of stamina.’
Hendrick’s report came back to him then—how the Princess performed her maid’s duties without tiring, managing them with ease. At the time, he’d only heard it as impressive for someone so delicate.
But now he saw differently. This was stamina no body as frail as hers should possess.
Varcan glanced once toward the mountain’s peak.
‘Those who went ahead must be coming back down by now.’
Tracking the mountain’s flow with his gaze, Varcan moved his steps again, continuing after the Princess.
Then.
The Princess, who had been advancing unhesitatingly along the path, suddenly stopped.
She reached into her cloak and began fumbling for something inside.
Varcan’s brow furrowed slightly.
‘……A hoe?’
An object wholly at odds with her small, pale hands.
‘Where in the world did she get that…….’
He pressed his aching temples and exhaled sharply.
Before that breath had even finished, the Princess glanced about, then abruptly abandoned the path the knights had cleared and changed direction entirely.
Following her, Varcan thought to himself.
‘So it begins at last.’
Yes, climbing so quietly had been strange from the start.
He followed silently, resolving that if any dangerous situation arose, he would seize upon it as grounds to escort her back down the mountain.
He wanted nothing more than to snatch the hoe from her hands and drag her back to the Archducal Household.
That was when.
Thwack! Thwack-thwack! Thwack-thwack-thwack!
“…….”
Beneath a frozen dead tree, the Princess began rapidly clearing away the accumulated snow.
‘What on earth is…….’
Then—strike, strike, strike!—she brought the hoe down against the frozen earth.
Varcan found himself at a loss for words.
Here was a woman who looked every inch the proper and beautiful noble, wielding that hoe like a weapon, tearing at the frozen ground like some wild creature.
Had any of the other knights or servants witnessed this, their blood would have run cold.
But Varcan’s confusion arose from an entirely different source.
‘……She’s skilled.’
The earth beneath had frozen and thawed hundreds, perhaps thousands of times over.
Breaking it open with nothing but a small hoe, using only the strength of those thin, delicate hands—it should not have been easy in the slightest.
Yet the Princess varied her angles and approach, chipping away at the soil methodically.
Her hand movements were far too practiced.
After excavating for some time, she began stuffing something into a pouch she’d prepared beforehand, then moved to a new spot.
Again she dug, again she gathered, and then, beaming as though she possessed the world entire, she carefully collected them all into her pouch.
Watching her, a memory suddenly surfaced.
His own mother, abandoned by his father and lost to her own mind.
Not everyone, perhaps, but those who had lost their senses to devastating trauma typically developed a morbid fixation on some single thing.
His own mother had been no exception. When daylight came, she would venture to the winter shore in thin clothing, gathering worthless pebbles.
Unmindful of her fingertips blackening from frostbite, she’d clutch those ugly stones as though they were jewels, hoarding them in boxes and pouches.
Perhaps this Princess, too, had suffered some devastating loss and was now fixated on gathering these meaningless rocks and weeds.
Blowing softly on the tips of his dirt-covered hands, Varcan watched the Princess’s retreating figure grow distant—and something in that silhouette stirred an echo of his mother’s final moments.
The corners of Varcan’s eyes narrowed slightly.
A hollow ache bloomed in his chest, and he continued to follow her antics in silence for a long time more.
Then the Princess began to climb a steep slope.
Varcan’s brow creased faintly.
‘This is dangerous.’
The direction the Princess bounded toward was a treacherously steep stretch notorious throughout the Pedrica Mountain Range for unstable ground.
Snow might blanket it into the illusion of flat earth, but beyond lay a dizzying precipice that plunged a thousand feet.
‘I should take her down now. She’s had enough.’
Varcan decided he had granted her sufficient time. With that resolve, he took a step toward her—and in that very instant.
“Whoa!”
A sharp cry of wonder burst from her lips, and then—whoosh—the Princess vanished from sight as though swallowed by the empty air below.
“……!”
Varcan’s body moved on instinct, sprinting forward.
He crossed the snow-field in great strides, reaching the very edge of the ridge where the Princess had been standing moments before.
“Princess!”
Varcan’s voice cut through the snow-laden mountain range like a blade.

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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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