Touch My Brother and You Die - Chapter 46

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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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I held out my hand to Lam, confirming that the cyan-white hue staining my skin hadn’t faded. The woman placed her fingers against mine and drew the color away with a sucking motion, as though using a dropper to extract it.
Fascinating… So she could control whether to stain or not according to her own will? Moreover, she could leave the color behind while withdrawing herself, or reclaim it later…
“….”
I entertained a rather troubling thought for a moment, but decided to verify it anyway. I asked Lam whether she could create complex forms like letters or drawings with that liquid. The woman said it was simple work, then proceeded to write out the national anthem of the Alein Kingdom across a pristine white blanket.
In that instant, I recalled something truly precious from my past life.
“…A multifunction copier.”
No! I can’t!
What was I just thinking?!
Glen had left the house, and I desperately needed useful office supplies, but I couldn’t covet someone else’s possession! No matter how much Lam functioned as a multifunction copier with copying capabilities and even printing functions, she belonged to the Prince!
Bad! Rosalite, bad!
Besides, she was designed for assassination, which meant she used poison! She had to be toxic! What good was a high-performance copier if the ink was poisonous?!
So let me verify this!
“Um… is it possible to adjust the toxicity to be as low as possible…?”
“If you mean as low as possible~ then eating it might cause severe stomach pain, but touching it could be made completely harmless~?”
Fine, that’s good enough. People die from eating printer cartridge ink anyway!
It was fate. There was no other way to explain meeting Lam in this distant Empire. I would take her with me. No matter what happened, I was bringing this copier back.
“Say, would you have any interest in a six-day work week, ten in the morning to four in the afternoon, no killing people, overtime pay separate, room and board provided at the Rocksburg Duchy in the Alein Kingdom, and only printing letters and drawings?”
“What, what kind of dream job is that?!”
Yes, I knew you’d love those terms. You’ll probably be working overtime almost every day, but since I promised overtime pay, that shouldn’t matter.
I grasped Lam’s hand firmly and spoke with unwavering resolve.
“Listen. Let’s do this together.”
I
was absolutely
taking this copier with me.

◇ ◆ ◇

After that day, I avoided all contact with Lam. I’d already told her what needed to be done, and I had no desire to invite unnecessary suspicion from the First Prince.
Of course, once everything was finished, I’d certainly harbor suspicions that I was the culprit—but what did it matter? Lam was a tool, after all. Besides, I intended to leave as little physical evidence as possible, and it was obvious the First Prince was using Lam in secret, so he wouldn’t bring this matter to light.
More importantly, if he lacked even that much magnanimity, he had no business playing Emperor and should have quit long ago! If he dared complain about my borrowing someone, I’d be the first to scold him for being petty. Such a petty First Prince—lacking even the presence of Marius.
In truth, Lam was the one most in danger from this scheme, yet she accepted my proposal far too easily. Judging by her words that she’d stake her life if it meant escaping the pig-faced man’s bedroom and the endless cycle of murder, she clearly despised her current work as an assassin.
When I relayed Lam’s desire to stop staining her hands with blood and return home to earn honest wages through clerical work, hoping her deceased parents would be proud—the elite soldiers from Noctram who were to assist in the plan heard this and some volunteered to remain in the Empire.
The captain of the elite unit loaned by Duchess Noctram was the one who wept profusely, declaring his willingness to help the admirable young lady return home. Later, he would take responsibility for retrieving Lam when she fell into a comatose state and was abandoned outside the Imperial Palace, escorting her back to the Alein Kingdom.
The plan itself was simple, but I couldn’t shake my unease about Lam dying once. If she were declared dead, the Imperial Palace might treat her corpse however they wished and desecrate it… Moreover, Lam had explained that the poison inducing the comatose state would cause severe brain damage while she remained unconscious.
If her mind deteriorated any further, it would be catastrophic.
Considering Lam’s future, this was something I should have abandoned immediately—but from my perspective, there was no need for a tool to be intelligent, so I found no will to object. Besides, there was no better alternative.
Yes… a tool doesn’t need to be intelligent… right…
So why did my chest ache so much?
“Miss, we’re ready.”
I heard Aster’s voice after she finished her warm-up exercises. I spread both arms wide so she could hold me comfortably and surrendered my weight to her.
With so little time left before returning to the Kingdom, I had no choice but to resort to drastic measures. If only the First Prince had pretended not to notice when I jumped out the window initially, I wouldn’t have had to smash all the windows of the First Prince’s Palace and flee.
I retrieved the ring from the 007 bag Papa had prepared for me, slipped it on beforehand, and surveyed my surroundings while fingering it.
I’d already identified the location of the Fourth Prince’s Palace. I’d instructed Noctram’s Elite to scatter and disrupt the guards the moment the windows shattered. Now it was time to execute the plan.
“Aster, are you confident you can run faster than a horse?”
“I’ll beat you for the first 500 meters.”
Right. You really aren’t human.
I praised the inhuman Aster for being so inhuman, then infused mana into the James Bond gadget and waited for the moment.
Soon came an unpleasant squealing sound, and as the glass reached its resonant frequency, windows shattered everywhere with deafening crashes.
The attendants screamed, Noctram’s Elite moved in unison, and I gave Aster her orders before the guards could assemble.
“Run, Aster.”
As I wrapped my arms around Aster’s neck and held tight, she sprinted at full speed. Even pedaling a bicycle at maximum effort couldn’t match this velocity. What was this sensation—like riding a roller coaster?
The sheer forward momentum made me curl up and burrow into Aster’s embrace. When she took a running start, jumped, and cleared the palace wall, my heart plummeted.
I was terrified.
So terrified I couldn’t even scream.
If we collided with someone at this speed, either they’d die or I would—one of us was certain to perish.
I’d hired a tutor because she seemed like she’d grow strong, but what kind of monster had we been raising? I’d stolen her snacks, held her hand in bed, and struck her back countless times.
Of course, stealing snacks was something I’d continue doing forever, but the only sensation this ride gave me was pure terror, and vertigo washed over me.
After enduring it for what felt like an eternity, Aster finally arrived at our destination—the Fourth Prince’s Palace. I barely managed to plant my feet on solid ground, clutching my head to suppress the nausea. As the maidservants came rushing out in alarm, I stated my business.
“I am Rosalite Rocksburg. Tell the Fourth Prince I’ve come to negotiate.”
If you don’t guide me quickly, I’ll destroy this entire place, I said, placing my hand on the ring while Aster rested her hand on her sword hilt. The maidservants shrieked for their head maidservant and rushed away.
It seemed I’d be able to meet the Fourth Prince before the First Prince could capture me.

◇ ◆ ◇

“…So you’ve finally come.”
Upon being led to what was called the Fourth Prince’s Office, I found a child with pink hair sitting at the central desk.
He was perhaps slightly shorter than our Princess. Whether they’d been tailored as a matching set, the boy wearing round, thick-lensed glasses frowned at the sight of me and began puffing on a pipe with tobacco. I wanted to scold him for smoking at such a young age and snatch it away, but then I realized that this vivid cherry-blossom pink hair existed nowhere else in the Imperial Palace except on two people—and my own expression hardened.
“I don’t believe portrait fraud is an acceptable practice.”
“Clever of you to see through it.”
Indeed. The Fourth Prince’s face I’d memorized from studying the Imperial Court’s family tree was unmistakably that of a red-haired, robust handsome man.
My teacher had mentioned that the actual Fourth Prince possessed lighter-colored hair and a somewhat more youthful appearance than his portrait, but this wasn’t merely “somewhat” youthful—was he truly an adult? How could someone fail to grow to this degree? With a face so childlike, wasn’t he cursed?
“That expression suggests you suspect a curse.”
“You seem well acquainted with such remarks, Your Highness.”
“What is your business?”
“I’ve come to return the Third Prince.”
The man exhaled deeply and tapped the tobacco from his pipe.
“I should have killed him before he set foot in the Capital.”
The mage I’d encountered the moment I disembarked was one of the Fourth Prince’s people? I’d assumed he belonged to the Temple faction since he hadn’t welcomed my entry into the Imperial Palace, but to think he was actually the Fourth Prince’s own subordinate.
If he was willing to intervene in such matters, it seemed the Temple and the Fourth Prince were far more deeply connected than I’d imagined.
“Had I known he served Your Highness, I would have spared his life.”
“It’s fine. There’s no shortage of replacements. A man like that isn’t even worth being a pawn.”
Truly, the Imperial people operate on a different scale.
The more I learned how brutal their conflicts were, the more I longed to return to the Kingdom and find solace in watching the harmonious sibling relationship between the Princess and Crown Prince. Yes, those two get along splendidly. They don’t even draw blades when they meet—how adorable they are.
According to the First Prince’s Palace maidservants, there was an incident at an Imperial banquet three years ago where the First Prince and Fourth Prince locked eyes and a fight broke out, resulting in thirty guards being killed. Both had apparently bickered over who was glaring at whom first, and it became a notorious tale in the Imperial Palace—a prime example of subordinates suffering for their masters’ pettiness.
“Groups are already forming, seizing upon apocalyptic doctrine to rise up. If you refuse my request, a great fire will consume the eastern region of the Capital where the Zoraab Holy Land stands.”
“How well a Kingdom subject knows the scriptures of the Heretical Sect.”
“There was one in the Third Prince’s belongings.”
“…Foolish bastard.”
The man, his expression darkening with exasperation, told me to withdraw as he would consider the matter.
Wait—did he think I’d come all this way, breaking through windows, just to be “considered”? Unwilling to be dismissed like this, I strode to his desk and slammed my palm down. The man’s face twisted in displeasure as he looked up, seeming ready to call me irreverent and order me out. Yet strangely, his eyes widened abruptly, his mouth fell open, and he made a sound no human should produce.
“Th-th-th-wh-no.”
What? What’s happening?
The man trembled as if electricity coursed through his entire body, then took a deep breath, shot up from his chair, and spun around in place. Then he leaned close to me and whispered.
“Tell me—who is that beautiful woman over there?”
A beautiful woman? There’s no one like that here besides me.
Upon hearing the Fourth Prince’s words, I glanced around the room, but there was only the Prince, myself, and Aster. Since he’d used the word “beautiful,” I ventured, “Could you mean me?” The Prince looked at me with contempt, as if I were rotting garbage, and added:
“I mean the tall, pitiable-looking one. Is he your aide?”
“…Aster?”
“Ah, so his name is Aster. No wonder I thought him as beautiful as a flower. His name must derive from flowers. It suits him perfectly.”
Hmm…
Yes, our Aster is…
Well…
I mean, yes, he is handsome, but…

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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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