A Famous Traitor and Treacherous Genius

39 – War on the Table (4)

A misunderstanding occurred unintentionally.

It is my specialty to deceive and humiliate people for a certain purpose, but-

‘That’s something they only do to people they don’t mind killing.’

Whisper false love and cause the downfall of the family.

You can destroy yourself by polluting your thoughts and narrowing your thinking.

Being intoxicated by the dream of the past and making one ignore reality.

All of those things were done against my ‘enemy’, not for my allies.

So, perhaps now is the time to clear up the twisted misunderstandings about me.

A misunderstanding with this woman who was my ally in the future and can now be said to be my ally.

“Queen. Wasn’t this the seat with her father?”

I was called.

On the rooftop of the orphanage.

“That’s right. Until I came here.”

Queen Carmen raised her glass alone, filling herself with the finest domestic wine (smuggled) that her father and she had left for the two of them to drink.

The time is night.

All afternoon schedules were cancelled.

After her conversation with her father, Queen Carmen went straight to her room and waited until nightfall.

-Follow me. Quietly.

Then, under the guidance of Viscount Hex, I headed to the rooftop of the orphanage.

My afternoon schedule was canceled and I wasn’t even informed, but the queen was already waiting for me on the rooftop.

It’s as if he’s going to release everything now.

It’s like he was planning for this moment.

“But after talking with your father, I felt like I needed to talk more deeply with you. So I called you.”

“This is….”

“It’s a quiet place. It could be quieter.”

Just right.

When Queen Carmen snapped her fingers, a barrier of mana was spread across her rooftop garden.

“It’s a silencing spell. Now, it’s just you and me here.”

“Are the two people over there okay?”

I pointed to Sir Mente and Sir Robert at the rooftop entrance.

“They say there are some knights who can hear conversations through barriers.”

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“It’s okay because it’s something you don’t mind hearing. If it’s just those two.”

Queen Carmen lightly takes a sip of wine.

Although the alcohol content is not that strong, the strong scent of grapes flows through the night air and tickles my nose.

“I was sorely mistaken. I thought you fell in love with Princess Naria at first sight.”

“It is true that I fell in love at first sight.”

Queen Carmen is a scary person.

“Are you not telling a single lie? Putting your honor on the line?”

“Yes. I fell in love.”

Especially since they are treating me like a ‘political enemy’ like they are now, I have to tell the truth as it is.

“Can I be really honest?”

“Tell me.”

“What would it be like for a woman as cold and cold as wood to fall in love, and what would it be like for her to find it in me? She’s ever wondered.”

Whether before the regression or now, the moment I first saw it was the same.

“But it didn’t work out.”

“Why?”

“Princess Naria is someone who doesn’t seem to work no matter how hard she tries.”

I took out a bottle of carbonated water from my pocket and poured it into my own glass.

“It’s right to give up on trees you can’t climb.”

Previously, it was too late to realize it.

“The princess didn’t seem to have any interest in her opposite s*x.”

“We only met once.”

“Once was enough to judge. Truly.”

Even if I exclude all past memories and judge only the princess I met in the garden, the answer is the same.

“The princess and queen really looked alike. Their eyes were calculating how to use me politically.”

“…….”

“The queen said I look like you, but the person she really resembles is Princess Naria. If I had to compare her.”

To be honest.

“Princess Naria is the one who took away the feeling of ‘love’ from Queen Carmen.”

“…….”

“The Queen does not understand. She believes that relationships can be established without the feeling of love between humans and humans, between men and women.”

“Well, isn’t it obvious?”

Queen Carmen breaks her glass once more and quenches her thirst.

“No matter how genius he is, he is still a human being and a living creature. It is inevitable that feelings of love will arise.”

“Yes, that’s right. If she had been born into a loving family from a young age, Princess Lia would have been a much more emotional person than she is now.”

“…What did you say?”

“You understand, right?”

Queen Carmen’s gaze deepens with anger, but I do not back down.

“There is no love between her king and her queen, and no one in her royal family treats her with her love.”

“…….”

“The princess is smart, just like the queen. You probably understood it long ago. I was not born because my parents loved me, but they were born through an arranged marriage.”

“…….”

Queen Carmen covers her face with one hand.

The green eyes that pass between her fingers appear to be filled with a slight annoyance, but one of her eyes is covered by her hand.

“The princess’s heart is something I cannot do anything about. Instead, I expressed my feelings to the princess with an ‘understanding’ that is more certain than her love.”

“Was that a declaration that he would make Princess Naria her king?”

“Yes.”

The princess understood.

Because she grew up without learning love and became who she is now.

“I don’t blame the queen. Of course, her culprit is the King of Greater Nostrum, the source of all evil for us.”

“I thought you would say that I was the cause.”

“We were worse off than others even before we got married, right?”

“Yes. It’s the same now. I’m preparing to bring him down somehow, and he’s enjoying a more debauched life.”

Queen Carmen twitched the corners of her mouth.

“She said that for the remaining seven years, she would squander her treasury and enjoy her luxury until the day Naria came of age.”

“Without even a single thought about the legacy she would leave to her daughter. When you look at that….”

I lightly shrugged my shoulders.

“A home without love and without any intention to act outwardly would be a very painful and painful place for the child.”

“Are you blaming me now?”

“No, I’m just telling you the truth. If you feel that it’s a criticism, the queen is still a good person.”

“Am I good?”

“Yes. At least you have her guilt and regret toward Princess Lia and her love as her mother.”

I noticed this when we first met in the royal castle, so I decided to treat Queen Carmen as my ‘mother’ even though it was political.

“So I decided to help Princess Naria.”

“Because you feel pity?”

“Yes. In many ways.”

Externally, it can only be said to be cheap sympathy.

And the reason I wanted to help her ultimately came from her sympathy.

“Do you feel sorry for a child who grew up in love and became a doll because he did not receive love? That’s not funny.”

Queen Carmen tipped her glass in self-deprecation.

“So, if necessary, you can marry Princess Naria?”

“Yes.”

“No feelings of love, only sympathy?”

“Yes.”

“As a prerequisite, what if it is in the interest of Gibraltar and yourself?”

“Of course.”

“You’re a monster.”

Queen Carmen looked at me coldly and shook her head.

“I don’t think I’ll be able to understand you even if you die and wake up.”

“No. The queen understands me better than anyone else.”

“What?”

“If I have someone I love, I am a person who can do anything for that person.”

“…Ah, yes. Finally, I understand.”

Queen Carmen closed her eyes for a moment and her whole body trembled.

“Are you saying that to me, Saint Gio Nostrum is to you, Naria Gio Nostrum?”

“If you look only at human emotions, it might feel that way. Of course, the current king and the next queen are as different as a flea and a dragon.”

“……It’s an apologetic metaphor for a flea. He’s a human like a mosquito.”

Queen Carmen put down her glass.

“I’ll give you a drink.”

Before she knew it, her glass was empty, so I picked up the wine bottle and filled her glass.

“Then let me ask you something. After you marry Naria, what will you do if you meet the woman you truly love?”

“If it were Princess Ria, I think she would say, ‘It doesn’t matter as long as I have a son’ and let him go.”

“……And you?”

“Me? It’s probably one of the two.”

I am different from Queen Carmen.

“You either keep knocking on doors that won’t open and eventually give up.”

Queen Carmen still retains her love 13 years after I was born, but I eventually gave up.

“Or.”

Queen Carmen thoroughly rejected the touches of several married noblemen reaching out to her.

“Or you can embrace the arms of someone who can soothe and comfort your wounded heart, and open your eyes anew to reciprocated love.”

Like Queen Carmen, I couldn’t do that.

“Personally, I respect you so much. So much so that I want to have you as my mother.”

I also respect it.

This woman maintained her love for her father until the moment of his death.

“That’s why I’m preparing in advance. Just in case. This is really just a story of what if.”

Words that others, especially fathers, should not hear.

“What if my mother dies suddenly?”

“……!!”

“I don’t have a big problem, but wouldn’t you need someone to fill the role of my younger siblings’ mother?”

“You….”

“Oh, of course.”

I raised my glass.

“I am not the kind of traitor who would assassinate her mother for her stepmother.”

Horok.

“That’s not beneficial to Princess Naria, me, or anyone else.”

“…But, ‘if’.”

“If he dies without me doing anything, or if something suddenly falls from the sky and dies. As long as it’s not a sudden death like that, he’s probably still alive.”

“…You’re a scary son, really.”

Queen Carmen extended her glass to me.

“Okay, I’ll hang out with you somewhere. And then you’ll see. Who on earth will you fall in love with, other than my daughter?”

“You can look forward to it.”

Just because I loved her in the past, I doubt whether I will ever like her now again.

‘Even though we have the same roots, we are already different people.’

Because I don’t know whether I will fall in love or not.

“But that’s it.”

“Yes.”

“If you fall in love with an imperial woman, what will you do?”

“Are you talking about after you married Princess Naria?”

“No. At this moment.”

“Hmm….”

Ta-da.

“Of course.”

If you fall in love.

“I plan to give everything for her future.”

“Everything?”

“Yes. Literally everything. If she wants to ‘rule the kingdom of the empire.'”

I looked up for a moment at the night sky full of darkness.

“Mother will become the governor of the colony of Nostrum, and I will sell her kingdom for her. She will become a traitor.”

“…….”

“Morgania’s power becomes more and more solid. It’s just that the country they live in becomes an empire, not a kingdom.”

“…….”

She even made a toast, but Queen Carmen remained frozen and said nothing.

“Ah.”

I forgot to tell you this story.

“I will give you my father instead.”

“…….”

“The crazy son who was blinded by love and opened the gate to the canyon. I couldn’t bear to kill such a son, so he took everyone with him and together with Morgania, the hero and queen of the country saved the kingdom’s people. Although narrow-minded, he couldn’t do anything at all. “It’s not a picture to draw.”

Queen Carmen answered her question very quietly, swallowing her wine.

“…Just go. I have one more guest for the night, so I will have a long talk with your father for the rest.”

“Yes.”

I took my glass and stood up.

“This is a long-awaited date night. I believe you won’t just talk about hard things.”

“…That’s it, let’s go.”

Queen Carmen waved her hand as if telling me to go quickly, and I bowed my head to her and left her rooftop.

In a moment.

The moment I arrived at the mansion, I saw a red shadow running out of the terrace.

I don’t know what the two talked about last night, but-

“Gray, Count…Perhaps with Queen Carmen…”

“Just sleep, mother.”

“Ugh….”

“Even if you say the two of you are having an affair, there is no particular problem, right? It’s common for nobles to have mistresses. The second wife is a bit of a different story.”

“…….”

I sat down on a chair in the couple’s bedroom and continued to be his mother’s companion until his father returned.

“I’m the youngest, so I won’t say anything.”

“…What would you have said if the youngest wasn’t there?”

“She was trying to say that it’s okay if you don’t have children.”

“…The queen and the margrave?”

“99 Out of 100 people of Nostrum will welcome you with open arms.”

The Count has finally come to his senses.

He was possessed by the chest witch and finally made the decision to save the country.

Everyone will shout that.

“For generations, children born to Gibraltar and Morgania have always grown up to be masters and heroes of the country’s salvation.”

“…….”

“There is no one on my mother’s side. Other than me here.”

I stayed by her mother’s side until dawn, reading the books she brought from the study.

* * *

The next day, morning.

“I expected it, but still.”

“…….”

“If a father breaks his heart just because his son talks about various things next to him, it is not pure love.”

Queen Carmen was exhausted from living in low pressure, and I tagged along next to her to carry out yesterday’s canceled schedule.

“Still, I support you, but did you still fail?”

“……Ha.”

“Next time, should I put some medicine in the alcohol? A medicine that even the Sword Master can get over.”

“What a crazy thing to say….”

Carmen pounded her chest with her fist in frustration and lamented deeply.

“It seems necessary. I need to make an option.”

“Why don’t you attack me instead? If you’re going to regret it that much.”

“Are you thinking I haven’t tried that before?”

Queen Carmen rolled up her coat and pointed to the red bruises on her sleeves.

“Damn….”

“It’s profane, queen.”

“How can you keep talking until dawn? Huh?”

Last night.

“Did I have to talk with your father until dawn about the true nature of the man called Gray Gibraltar? Huh?”

Nothing happened.

“Still.”

There was none.

“One, there has been progress.”

“What is it?”

“If something happens to you or you leave early, please help Gray.”

“……Congratulations on being recognized as a godmother?”

Correction.

“Yes, that’s right.”

I crossed the first fence.

“First of all, I am satisfied because I feel like I have taken my mother’s place. From now on, please call me mother whenever we are together.”

“I think my father only allowed me to be called godmother.”

“Don’t just call me godmother, call me mother. Aren’t you going to become my mother-in-law anyway?”

“…Do whatever you want.”

It’s something to see and live for a long time.

“Mother.”

I have two mothers.

“Ah.”

Come to think of it.

“Or should I call you mom?”

Let’s whisper into Queen Carmen’s ear.

“… She has never been called mother, not even by me or Lia.”

Queen Carmen blushed and pursed her lips.

“…….”

“If you don’t like it-“

“… Your mom is kind of creepy, so just say she’s your mother.”

Carmen’s ears turned red.

“That’s it. Let’s go greet the guests.”

Queen Carmen adjusted her expression and turned her gaze to the west.

“Whether you protect Nostrum or sell the country, something big comes from the empire.”

Toward the canyon.

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