“What are you waiting for? Aren’t you going to make the arrest? I’m starting to feel rather foolish holding her down by myself.”

Roned lifted his head with a composed expression, as though nothing had happened, and only then did the palace guards who had been stationed in the hall come rushing over to restrain Delmir.

Delmir wanted to scream at him to get his hands off her at once, but Roned’s eyes, fixed on her without any expression at all, frightened her too much to resist. She stopped struggling.

In that brief moment, she had calculated that the imperial palace’s prison was safer than the carriage ride home.

Watching Delmir go quietly, Roned gave a small, regretful twitch of his eyes, then immediately ran to Lucian.

“Handkerchiefs, clean cloth, as much as you can find!”

Heliones watched with dangerous eyes as Roned appeared out of nowhere, lifted Lucian upright, and pressed down on her chest below the wound.

“Your Majesty, please keep pressure on the wound. I’ll manage the pressure points on the blood vessels.”

Heliones had been about to strike him for daring to lay hands on her, but he remembered that among Roned’s many degrees was one in medicine, and forced his anger down.

There was no one present at that moment who could apply pressure to the blood vessels more precisely than a doctor.

Shortly after, within mere minutes of the incident, the imperial physician arrived.

“Prepare for surgery at once!!”

“Good heavens, what happ— yes, right away!”

Roned was only twenty-six, but true to his reputation as the empire’s greatest genius, he held degrees across multiple fields, the most renowned of which were in pharmacology and medicine.

His papers left even physicians with extensive clinical experience speechless, and anyone in the medical profession who encountered his work could not help but hold him in the highest regard.

Because of this, the imperial physician began preparing for surgery without a moment’s hesitation at Roned’s order.

There was nothing he could do. He could not even tell whether he was awake or wandering through a dream.

Heliones sat slumped against the wall outside the makeshift surgery room prepared within the imperial palace, trembling, looking like a man who had lost his mind.

Count Fonta could not bring himself to offer a single word of comfort to Heliones, who looked more like he himself was about to die than the injured Lucian. He simply stayed by his lord’s side, as a faithful retainer and close friend, watching him come apart in real time.

How much time had passed? Two hours in reality, but an eternity to Heliones. At last the door to the surgery room opened.

“Fortunately, it missed the artery. The surgery went well. We simply need to take care to prevent infection.”

The imperial physician bowed his head deeply to Heliones, who looked more exhausted than the physician who had performed the surgery himself, and delivered the result.

“She’s alive?”

“Yes.”

“She didn’t die?”

“Yes. If not for Lord Roned…”

Heliones ignored the physician’s words, shot to his feet, and moved toward the surgery room, but was stopped immediately.

“She needs to rest for now. Please visit once Lady Lucian has recovered.”

At Count Fonta’s words, Heliones managed to find a thread of reason and gave a weak nod. He crouched down in front of the surgery room door like an abandoned puppy.

Before long, Roned emerged from the surgery room, his face drained of all color, looking as though he had gone a week without sleep. Roned glanced briefly down at Heliones but said nothing to acknowledge him, and Heliones paid him no attention either.

Count Fonta was about to point out Roned’s discourteous behavior, but then saw him give a reluctant nod of acknowledgment and swallowed his words.

“Thank you for your help with the surgery.”

Roned gave little reaction to Count Fonta’s words.

“Everyone who was in the hall is currently being questioned. In my view it appears to be Lady Delmir’s act alone, but we cannot overlook the fact that someone brandished a weapon inside the imperial palace and in the emperor’s presence.”

Roned fixed Count Fonta with a cold stare, as though wondering what any of that had to do with him.

“Once the investigation concludes, a trial will begin. Since you assisted with the surgery, your testimony…”

“You don’t need to ask. I’ll do it as a matter of course. Of course I should testify.”

“Understood. You must be exhausted. Please go and rest.”

Some time after Roned left, Heliones was finally able to see Lucian, who had been moved to the recovery room. She lay sleeping in relative peace, bandages wrapped thickly around her neck, and at the sight of her, he at last broke free from the death-like waiting.

“Ah, thank goodness. Thank goodness.”

Heliones sank down beside the bed Lucian slept in, collapsing more than sitting. He clutched the white bedsheet and wept, like a child finally releasing a grief long held in. It was fortunate that Count Fonta had cleared the room immediately, or the doctors and nurses would have witnessed the emperor kneeling beside the bed and sobbing.

Count Fonta watched Heliones cry without any restraint, all dignity abandoned, and let out a sigh so quiet no one could hear it.

He watched with a mix of pity and something bitter as his lord, who had always remained composed even on battlefields that made the mind go blank, on those fields of carnage where no one could tell whether they stood in the living world or in hell, now fell apart completely over a single woman.

By the time dawn broke, most of the nobles who had been questioned had gone home.

The incident had many witnesses to begin with, and it was nearly certain to be Delmir’s act alone. Even so, it was an attempted murder that had taken place before a member of the imperial family, and the questioning had been carried out as a matter of procedure. For those with no connection to the matter, the interrogation moved quickly.

After the nobles with no charges against them had departed, Duke Balthar paid a quiet visit to the imperial palace. He met Heliones in the emperor’s study, and despite his daughter sitting in a cell, he wore a rather composed expression.

“I too find Lady Lucian’s injury most regrettable. However, strictly speaking, she is a commoner, is she not? And this is a matter of bodily harm. A trial is unlikely to result in a severe sentence.”

Heliones’s manner was equally cold and composed, as though he had expected Duke Balthar to come in exactly this way.

“You sidestep the issue rather cleverly. Do you believe that brandishing a weapon inside the imperial palace, and in the presence of the emperor himself, is something that can simply be overlooked?”

“A weapon? That is quite an exaggeration. She simply acted on impulse with a brooch…”

“Lady Dylan of Horen county is also in custody at the moment.”

“?”

Duke Balthar furrowed his brow slightly, unable to understand why Heliones had cut him off and brought up Dylan out of nowhere.

“I hear the Countess of Horen has been visiting Rodencia frequently of late.”

The Countess of Horen was the great-niece of the previous king of Rodencia, Lucian’s father’s younger sister. She occasionally visited Rodencia to see cousins she had been close to.

Duke Balthar saw through Heliones’s intent and gave a scornful smile, but answered calmly, his blue eyes, so like his daughter’s, carrying ease and confidence.

“She still has family there, so that is only natural. Ah, but how is the ‘confirmation’ of the divorce proceeding? I heard the judge in charge has been standing by to process the paperwork.”

At Duke Balthar’s mention of the divorce, the eyebrow of Heliones, who had not shown so much as a flicker of reaction throughout, gave a slight twitch. It was a barely perceptible response, but Duke Balthar did not miss that instant.

‘As I thought. When it comes to that woman, his composure slips. Still green.’

“If Your Majesty is occupied, I can arrange to have the judge who finalized the divorce at the time summoned to the capital on your behalf.”

Heliones was silent for a moment. In that brief span, he recovered the cold composure of an iron-blooded sovereign at a frightening speed and answered.

“Do as you like. I was intending to wrap the matter up regardless.”

‘What? What is this young fool scheming?’

Heliones was so unnervingly calm that even a seasoned man like Duke Balthar could not help feeling thrown off.

“I didn’t realize you took such an interest in my personal affairs, but very well. Do as you please. Summon the judge or don’t.”

Duke Balthar, however, was not so shallow a man as to take everything at face value.

‘It’s a bluff, nothing more. I’ll grant him the performance, at least.’

“Your Majesty’s personal affairs affect the entire empire. This old servant simply concerns himself out of devotion to the empire.”

“I understand you have a great many pressing matters of your own to attend to at home, so the fact that you still find time to worry about me speaks to your loyalty. If a seasoned man such as yourself is willing to step forward on behalf of a beleaguered emperor, I will accept it with gratitude.”

How much of it was a bluff? Duke Balthar studied Heliones with cold eyes, trying to gauge what lay beneath, but he could detect no emotional movement from him whatsoever.

“Very well, then. I have already located the judge, so I will proceed accordingly.”

Heliones gave a wordless nod and turned his gaze away, letting the gesture serve as his dismissal. Duke Balthar offered a respectful farewell even as the emperor’s eyes no longer rested on him, and left the study.

‘Let us see, then, whether that bluff is real or not.’

Back at his residence, Duke Balthar gave his attendant two instructions.

“That judge I had looked into before, or is he a defense attorney now? No matter. Bring him to the capital at once. And find me the criminal defense attorney with the best win record in the empire.”

He had told his attendant to look into a criminal defense attorney for Delmir as well, but even then, a peculiar confidence lingered in him. He was certain that an emperor who clung to Lucian would ultimately back down when faced with the drastic measure of a finalized divorce.