“Who would believe it,

Even from the depths, light is born…”

Gabriella had become a pilgrim who embarked on a silent pilgrimage. She was now monk Noah, which signified that she was on a silent pilgrimage.

In fact, due to her lack of purity, she shouldn’t have been able to remain a servant of Vican in principle, but she could remain a monk because Michaela had buried that fact. However, the atrocities that High Priest Marcello had committed against Gabriella also had to be buried together.

But since Marcello’s sins were numerous even excluding what he did to Gabriella, sorting out the situation wasn’t difficult.

Since the greatest among Marcello’s remaining sins was the corruption and fraud he committed during the previous Holy King selection, it was natural that Gabriella, who had become Holy King through his support, should step down from the Holy King position.

She also lost her priesthood because she had committed murder, but she could still remain as a monk. Gabriella thought that was enough.

Walking across the beach, Gabriella thought about the contents of the letter she had left for Michaela. It was a letter she had left before departing on the silent pilgrimage path from the Holy City. She was too busy to see her face in the end, or rather, Michaela had become someone she couldn’t dare to see, but there were words she wanted to leave for her.

[You shouldn’t walk the path I walked, but I’m going to try walking the path you walked.]

She was finally standing on a path that perhaps should have been hers from the beginning.

In the distance, the minstrel raised his voice.

“A king wearing ill-fitting clothes

Stood blocking and obscuring the light

Standing at the crossroads of darkness

Wandering endlessly…”

Gabriella stopped walking and stood looking at the distant sea. She gazed quietly at the scenery that Michaela would have seen when she walked alone in her younger days.

The brilliantly blue sea was vast, and the sky covering it was endless. Here, nothing covered overhead, so there was nothing to cast darkness over her. Even her shadow barely hung small beneath her feet.

Waves rolled in and wet her shoes buried in the sand. The monk’s worn hem and old leather shoes. Things utterly shabby and worthless. But because they were light and weak, they didn’t bind or constrict her feet.

[I just had this thought. If back then, you had become Holy King. Would I have ever thought to walk this path myself…]

Gabriella raised her hand and removed the hat covering her head. And she recalled the last words she had left in the letter to Michaela.

[Even so, I can’t bring myself to shave my hair. You stubborn girl.]

Her reddish-brown hair, cut short below her ears, swayed. She couldn’t bring herself to shave it off like Michaela, but the hair she had cut seemed to shake off past times felt light. Perhaps because it was such a hot summer, it felt much cooler too.

Gabriella suddenly looked up at the shining sun. Solsita’s gaze piercing through summer. Though she frowned deeply because of the light too bright to face, she didn’t turn her head away or avoid it.

‘Ah…’

How long had it been since she had lifted her head to face that light herself?

During the several seasons when she had crouched without lifting her head, her light would have always been shining on her like that. In a position reachable just by lifting her gaze, in a place that would be shining immediately if she raised her head to look.

The minstrel’s singing grew fainter.

“Who would know

That wandering in darkness

Isn’t because there’s no light

But because we don’t look at the light…”

Gabriella spotted a monastery located high in the distance. There was still much road left to walk. The path to reach that monastery, and then depart again toward another monastery.

While walking and walking that path, sometimes night would fall and darkness would come. But light would always rise again to illuminate the path she had to walk.

Now knowing that she could lift her head and see that light anytime, Gabriella no longer bowed her head or stopped. Her steps were light. Nothing weighed heavily upon her.

Solsita’s blessing, the beach where summer sunlight blazed hot. Footprints continued to form anew on the sand where waves rolled in.

Noah, who was no longer Gabriella but had become a monk, walked toward the light.

* * *

The royal castle of Droisen, capital of Heinz. King Friedrich, who had returned from San Alino, was together in Queen Charlotte’s reception room.

On one side of Queen Charlotte’s room, gifts were piled up, and around them, maids busily came and went bringing new gifts to stack. Guests sitting across from Friedrich, who sat alongside Charlotte, offered congratulations to Charlotte.

“Truly congratulations.”

Charlotte smiled and answered her thanks. The guests also asked with smiling faces.

“What did the doctor say? That you’re healthy, right?”

“For now. We have to keep watching.”

“You’ll be able to give birth to a healthy royal heir. It’s wonderful that such good fortune has come. It feels like we finally have something to smile about.”

“That’s right.”

Because only bad things had happened to Heinz for a long time, this news sounded even more joyful. A guest looked at the royal couple and said.

“It’s fortunate that good news came so quickly. Summer really is a season when even Whicelius can’t be spiteful.”

Charlotte and Friedrich looked at each other and smiled.

Conceiving an heir was their duty, and both she and Friedrich knew that fact well. So they had originally fulfilled their duty at regularly scheduled times even during their crown prince and crown princess days. Once a month on designated nights.

And after Friedrich ascended to the throne and the situation stabilized, he came to Charlotte’s bedroom more often than before. In fact, unlike when they spent nights together out of duty, the frequency and number of times had increased incomparably to before, so it was true that they had expected good news to come quickly.

Friedrich spent nights with Charlotte seemingly like fulfilling his duty was the most important thing in the world, or like something that had been dammed up had burst.

Charlotte was somewhat bewildered by that sudden change, but she also knew well that she had to fulfill her duty, so she accepted it naturally. The more children royalty had, the better. She just thought that way.

Charlotte lowered her head and looked at her belly that wasn’t showing yet. She raised her hand and touched that belly. This child would be able to be born and grow up completely within blessings. Without anxiety about danger or precariousness. That was good for the child.

“I wonder if you’ll like the gift we brought.”

“Shall we see if they like it?”

Charlotte, speaking playfully, called over a maid who was organizing gifts. The maid brought a gift. Charlotte was about to reach for it, but Friedrich was faster. He got up and personally took the gift from the maid, unwrapped it, and showed it to Charlotte.

Charlotte gasped at the baby clothes and shoes contained in the box. They were so small. She showed Friedrich the baby shoes, lifting them up and smiling.

Since it was still summer, the weather was clear for once, and brilliant sunlight poured down over the castle walls. The queen’s reception room illuminated by that light was warm even with the windows open.

This summer was a season when warmth could linger even in lands where Whicelius had been spiteful.

* * *

Dana and Kaiden arrived at Rowen’s royal castle Larnas much later than scheduled. The reason was that they had traveled together in a carriage for this journey.

Throughout the journey to San Alino Temple for the agreement, Dana was so nervous that she couldn’t even remember how she got there. Kaiden sat beside the tense Dana and held her hand.

On the return journey after the agreement ended and everything was settled, her heart was very comfortable. For the stable Dana, Kaiden tried to make this carriage journey enjoyable and not boring for Dana, as he had told her before. 

He seemed to enjoy it the most, but anyway that was the goal. Thus for Dana, it became a return journey that was comfortable in heart but physically exhausting.

When the two arrived at the royal castle, it was already midnight. Dana and Kaiden, who had washed and returned to the bedroom, sat facing each other on the bed.

Dana called a maid and took out two rings from a box she had prepared in advance. They were their wedding rings that she had picked up at Castle Halcid and removed from her own hand. It had taken time to retrieve them, but they had returned to her anyway.

The rings in the box were polished to a shine and stored so well that it was hard to believe they had fallen in the dirt. Kaiden looked down at the two rings in the box with a gloomy face. Dana, with a shamefaced expression, spoke to her husband like making an excuse.

“I didn’t throw them away.”

The man who had actually thrown them away couldn’t say anything in the end and took the small ring from the box and fitted it snugly on Dana’s hand. The ring set with an aquamarine gem was placed on her finger again. The aquamarine bracelet on her wrist remained as well.