“Please declare the winner, Your Majesty. I don’t think anyone will object to my victory.”

I straightened up and smiled at him.

His face, which always wore a smile, was now distorted with irritation and anger.

On the day I requested an audience with Klaus, from the beginning, my aim was to clarify the vague rule of the game: ‘the last person standing’.

Even if I put the prisoners to sleep with a sedative, they were still living people. Klaus would surely refuse to acknowledge my victory, claiming it didn’t meet the conditions.

So I deliberately acted as if I was cornered with useless talk about the position of Empress. To prevent Klaus from noticing my true intentions.

And as I expected, he misunderstood the intent of my question and changed the rules of the game. So now he can’t deny it. Because it’s the rule he changed with his own words.

“Remove the barrier.”

At Klaus’s command, the mages busily moved to remove the barrier. Impatient as ever, he appeared in front of me through teleportation even before the curtain was fully lifted.

I know magic isn’t often used in crowded places, but seeing him rush over like this, he must be quite heated.

“You never fail to surprise people.”

“I’m truly glad to have contributed to Your Majesty’s entertainment.”

“Is this why you pretended to be cornered?”

“Well… I’m not sure what you’re talking about…”

When I feigned ignorance, his fierce eyes glared at me as if to pierce through.

“Surely you don’t think I’ll accept this kind of result?”

What will you do if you can’t accept it? It’s not like I violated any rules.

For Klaus, who seemed to have forgotten the rules, I kindly reminded him of the rules he had set.

“Didn’t you say that when everyone else falls, the last person standing would be acknowledged as the winner? You also said that those who fall would be executed regardless of whether they’re alive or dead. Oh, and all the weapons were approved items.”

I added an explanation while waving the baseball bat. He had allowed the use of various weapons for his entertainment, but he probably didn’t expect it to be used like this.

So, he should accept it. That all of this is ultimately the result of his own making.

“Then I’ll kill you right here and now, and hold the person who approved the item responsible as well.”

Saying that, Klaus drew his sword. Yes, that’s your style — cutting away anything that doesn’t go your way.

“But before that…”

Saying so, Klaus instantly grabbed me from behind and pointed his sword at my neck.

“Drop your sword, Duke. Unless you want to see your fiancée die.”

“…Klaus.”

Ilion was looking at Klaus with an expression that suggested he might pounce at any moment. I saw him on the third-floor terrace just a moment ago, when did he come down… I’m sure I told him to watch from above.

“Your Majesty, this is different from what you promised.”

I asked, glancing at the sword that looked ready to pierce my neck at any moment.

“What promise are you talking about? Do you mean about becoming the Empress?”

At those words, Ilion’s brow twitched slightly. You bastard, stop saying unnecessary things! I was asking about the promise to pardon my crimes if I became the winner! I already have a mountain of things to apologize to Ilion for.

Slightly irritated by Klaus’s actions of deliberately provoking Ilion, I retorted without backing down.

“My, just the Empress? After overcoming such hardships and adversities, you should at least offer me the Emperor’s position.”

“You say amusing things.”

Though he said it was amusing, Klaus’s stiff voice didn’t sound very pleased.

While they were in a standoff on both sides, the sharp sword pressed more and more against my neck, and red droplets of blood fell one by one on the slightly grazed skin.

Just when I was starting to worry, Ilion, as expected, couldn’t contain his anger, and like at the casino, black spots began to creep up on his skin.

“Is that the secret the Duke is hiding? I’ve heard the soldiers whispering about it, it’s a bit eerie.”

Klaus, saying this, was standing calmly despite the unknown power Ilion was emitting, unlike other soldiers.

“Didn’t you promise to pardon my crimes if I emerged victorious in the game?”

Ilion glared at Klaus, unable to move closer or drop his sword.

“Well, then let’s say the charge of plotting treason never happened. However, I can’t just let the Duke pointing his sword at me slide. So I’m thinking of charging you both with treason from now on.”

It was truly a plausible logic.

“Your Majesty, you’re not being honest. You simply want to kill the Duke, don’t you?”

“That’s not true.”

“Wasn’t it Your Majesty who planted the bomb in the mine and tampered with the machine at the academic festival?”

Though lacking evidence, the culprit of those two incidents could only be Klaus, no matter how I thought about it.

“Even so, what can you do? Are you going to find evidence?”

“Are you admitting that you did it, Your Majesty?”

To my question, Klaus sneered as if it was a trivial matter and answered.

“There’s nothing to deny. You’ll all die here anyway.”

“That’s what I wanted to hear.”

“What?”

It wasn’t a pleasant thing, but when it came to Klaus, I could pride myself on knowing him better than anyone else here. I remembered every aspect of his personality, lines, and actions.

That’s why I thought if things didn’t go his way, he would definitely take action himself. You’re the type of person who needs to do that to feel satisfied.

Pop!

Yellow powder burst out from between my fingertips. It was a ball I had prepared separately for Klaus. One side was shaved down so it could be easily burst with just a sharpened fingernail.

Seeing the powder burst, Klaus hurriedly distanced himself from me, but he had already inhaled the sleeping agent.

“How dare you…”

“That’s why I told you. You should wear the mask properly.”

I smiled with my eyes as I slightly pulled up my mask.

The blue eyes that had been glaring at me as if they would kill me at any moment gradually lost their light. Soon his eyelids closed, and he dropped his sword and collapsed.

“Ravenne!”

As I was dusting off the powder on my hands while looking at the fallen Klaus, Ilion rushed over urgently.

“Don’t come closer. There’s powder on my hands…”

I pointed to the powder still on my palm, but Ilion didn’t stop and came running to embrace me. So tightly that it was a bit hard to breathe.

My hands, raised to avoid getting flower petal powder on his clothes, awkwardly stopped in mid-air.

“I told you to wait up there.”

“I did wait.”

“But you came down in the end. I didn’t think you’d trust me so little.”

“I trusted you. I just didn’t trust Klaus.”

The heartbeat heard through his clothes was beating at an incredibly fast pace. In many ways, I felt sorry for causing him so much worry.

“The reward I promised is canceled.”

“What reward were you going to give?”

“Well… Actually, I hadn’t thought that far. I just thought you wouldn’t be able to resist coming down.”

A low laugh returned at my answer. Despite having met just a few hours ago, it felt like we were reuniting after a very long time.

With regret that it would have been nice if there wasn’t powder on my hands, I pulled away from his embrace.

“By the way, what should we do now?”

For now, since he admitted with his own mouth that he tried to kill Ilion, I was thinking of using that as leverage to counterattack.

“Don’t worry about that.”

“Do you have some kind of plan…”

“Ravenne!”

When I was about to ask Ilion, who seemed to have something in mind already, a clear voice with an unmistakable presence was heard from afar.

“Miss Spinel?”

“Ilion, you damn bastard. How dare you dump all these guys on me and go off alone?!”

While saying this, Spinel was charging towards us with knights dangling from her hands and feet.

“Damn it, get off!”

With a rough kick, several soldiers who were trying to stop her with their bodies were thrown off. Sometimes, I think, she really has superhuman physical abilities that make it hard to believe she’s human. Watching that scene from a distance, I asked Ilion.

“Was Miss Spinel here too?”

“…Yes.”

The answer that came after a moment of silence was brief, but somehow I could feel complex emotions that couldn’t be fully expressed in words. Yes, you must have had a hard time behind the scenes too.

After squabbling with the soldiers for a while, Spinel finally shook them all off and rushed towards me.

“W-wait. Stop…”

Before I could finish saying stop, she threw herself at me, and I lost my balance and fell flat on the ground.

“What were you thinking, when you can’t even use magic or handle a sword! Don’t ever do something like this again.”

“Miss Spinel…”

“To begin with, what’s so pretty about a guy like that for you to go through all this trouble?”

“……”

The mood of that guy you’re talking about, who’s listening, seems quite uncomfortable, Miss Spinel.

After badmouthing Ilion like that and scolding me again for my carelessness, Spinel suddenly got up as if she had remembered something.

“I should just kill that bastard after all.”

“W-wait a moment, you can’t do that.”

I pulled on Spinel’s clothes as she was about to rush at Klaus, seeming as though she wanted to kill him right away.

“Why? Are you stopping me saying we should put him in prison again?”

Spinel frowned, thinking I was trying to stop her like during the last incident.

“It’s not that. There are too many eyes watching around us. Later, when no one’s around…”

As I whispered quietly into Spinel’s ear, somehow the back of my head felt a bit stinging.

“Ahem. That’s not it, let’s try using a more peaceful method.”

“How?”

Hmm, maybe poison or something.