Vanessa was sincerely grateful for the fact that she wasn’t directionally challenged and could remember and find her way well.

If she had taken after her mother and been bad with directions, she would have been wandering around here and there, unable to find her way here.

‘I’m glad I arrived safely, but…’

At the Evanwood ducal family’s townhouse in the central residential area of the Imperial City.

It was fortunate that she arrived quickly without wasting time… but the problem was whether she could succeed in delivering the letter.

‘Right now, I don’t have anything to prove my identity… What if I’m mistaken for a suspicious person?’

Not to mention, just loitering in front of the mansion was already suspicious enough. Sure enough, one of the knights standing guard at the main gate approached her and looked her up and down with suspicious eyes.

“What business do you have at the Evanwood ducal residence?”

Vanessa hesitated for a moment at the abruptly rude question, but she didn’t panic.

After all, she was born into royalty, and it wasn’t in her nature to be easily intimidated or angered by a single guard’s rudeness.

Vanessa lowered her hood, revealing her flaxen hair, and looked the guard straight in the eye. As the guard flinched for a moment, she smiled with a generous but dignified expression and spoke calmly.

“I am Vanessa Roengreen, the princess of Roengreen. I’m also the Queen of Terevron, but since Terevron has fallen, let’s set that aside. I’d like to meet Duke Evanwood. Is he currently in the Imperial City?”

At these words that flowed as smoothly as water, the guard blankly opened his mouth and blinked. Vanessa maintained the aura flowing from her natural dignity, straightening her shoulders proudly and raising her chin. The guard, after looking her over again, hesitated and then stammered out a question.

“Pr-Princess Vanessa? Is it really you…?”

“Do your eyes grow on your back? Can’t you tell by the color of my hair and eyes?”

While flaxen hair could be found anywhere, navy blue eyes were not so common. While there may be many people in the world with blue eyes, eyes as deep blue as Vanessa’s, reminiscent of the boundary between night and dawn, were rare.

Light flaxen hair, navy blue eyes, and beauty so extraordinary it made one doubt if she was human. The combination of these three characteristics was as good as proof of Vanessa Roengreen’s identity.

Sure enough, the guard stared at Vanessa with eyes clearly different from before and asked in a trembling voice.

“H-How are you in the Imperial City? There were widespread rumors that you had been captured and taken back by Duke Drake… I really thought…”

“It’s true that I was captured by Duke Drake, but I’m not dead. I don’t have time for idle chatter, so I’ll ask again. Is Duke Evanwood in the mansion?”

“Y-Yes, that’s right. No, I mean— He is in the Imperial City, but he’s not in the mansion right now. He went to the Imperial Palace…”

The guard still looked shocked, as if he had seen a ghost. Vanessa ignored his bothersome reaction and hurriedly conveyed her business.

“Make sure to deliver this letter to Duke Evanwood. Don’t tell anyone that you met me, except for Duke Evanwood. Understood?”

“Ah… Yes, I-I understand.”

Vanessa glanced at the guard, who kept bowing his head while blankly receiving the letter, with disapproving eyes. Just as she was about to turn her back, having nothing more to say…

“Um, b-but! Are you really Princess Vanessa?”

“……”

Vanessa, who had stopped, let out a long sigh and turned back to the guard. Then, with biting sarcasm that only she could deliver, she mocked,

“The ill-fated woman with the misfortune to stubbornly survive alone even after her husband’s country fell… There’s only one of me in the world, isn’t there?”

Come to think of it, even the attack of the goat herd seemed to be due to her misfortune. She felt somewhat sorry for the owner of those goats and the passersby who were caught up in it. It’s not like she wanted to carry around such misfortune…

‘…Now that I think about it, the largest Pantheon in Astra is in the Imperial City.’

The Pantheon is a temple dedicated to the seven gods believed in by the Lavinian religion, located in the capitals of each country, but of course, the one in the Imperial City is the largest.

However, the first Pantheon is in the Holy Kingdom of Lavinia. It’s a very old country founded by Saint Lavinia when she established the Lavinian religion.

If she went to the Pantheon and offered prayers to those seven gods of the Lavinian religion… Could she perhaps glean some clue about her misfortune?

Very rarely, it’s said that when a deeply faithful person prays earnestly, the gods respond.

‘…But I’m not deeply faithful.’

Thinking that she should hope for what she could hope for, she let out a deep sigh. Walking slowly while being cautious of unexpected situations that her misfortune might bring about, the way to the Drake ducal residence felt long.

She didn’t even think about looking for Renee and Garcia. That would only complicate things further.

If she returned to the mansion on her own, the two would hear the news and come back. She felt a pang of conscience thinking about the two who must be struggling to find her even at this moment, but…

‘It couldn’t be helped. Without shaking off those two, I couldn’t have delivered the letter to the Evanwood ducal family without Jurgen knowing.’

By now, the sun was setting, and twilight was draping over the ground. In the distance, the Drake ducal residence came into view.

‘Just a little further…’

When her feet were starting to ache, the sight of her destination in view was welcome. Vanessa laughed wryly and was about to put more strength into her tired steps when…

“Vanessa…?”

Someone called her from a narrow, dark alley between buildings. Realizing that the voice was somehow familiar, Vanessa hesitated and peered intently into the darkness of the alley.

Eventually, a suspicious figure emerged from the deep shadows. As he removed the hood of the black cloak he had been wearing, a familiar face was fully revealed.

“Va-Vanessa, it’s me… Do you recognize me?”

“……”

Vanessa, who had flinched for a moment, opened her eyes wide and then narrowed them.

It was clear that she was utterly unlucky.

To come all the way to the Imperial City, only to run into this person of all people.

With a voice filled with cold contempt and disgust, Vanessa spat out,

“Arno, you didn’t die but survived.”

Arno Terevron. He was the brother of Leroy, Vanessa’s husband, and a prince of Terevron who had long ago been stripped of his right to succeed the throne due to being a born fool.

“Wh-When the castle was attacked, I managed to escape safely… I tried to take you with me then… I’m sorry, Vanessa. I tried to save you…”

“You? Save me?”

Vanessa snorted, mocking those words. The idea of Arno Terevron saving her was laughable. Arno was a damned bastard who pretended to be timid like that but would stab people in the back.

When she had just married Leroy, Vanessa was in great distress, despairing at having to live with a violent husband. It was Arno Terevron who first reached out to Vanessa in that state.

He badmouthed Leroy in front of her and tried to seduce her, saying he would protect her and that they should run away together. For Vanessa, who was suffering from Leroy’s violence, it was a tempting offer, but something felt off about it.

So when she refused, Arno tried to drag her to his room and r*pe her.

Fortunately, servants who witnessed the scene clung to him and pulled him off, otherwise Vanessa would have lost her chastity then, which even Leroy hadn’t taken.

Even after attempting to r*pe the king’s lawful wife, Arno wasn’t punished. The only one who could punish him, a prince, was King Leroy, but Leroy, far from scolding Arno, instead inflicted violence on Vanessa, saying it was her fault.

[It’s all because you go around seducing men! You witch!]

That incident made Vanessa’s hatred towards Leroy and the Terevron royal family even more intense.

Even after that one failed attempt, Arno persistently targeted Vanessa, and one day, she even witnessed Arno raping a maid in the palace corridor.

At that time, Vanessa saved that maid, but thinking about the numerous maids she couldn’t save who must have suffered at Arno’s hands made her furious and nauseous.

With Arno’s existence, the year Vanessa spent in Terevron was even more of a hell. How many times had she thought about gouging out those eyes that leered at her lecherously, cutting out that tongue that whispered disgusting words, and chopping off those hands that reached out to harass her?

Arno Terevron was a terrible nightmare she never wanted to experience again. She had been secretly rejoicing, thinking he must have died on the day Terevron fell, but…

‘I can’t believe he was alive…’

Towards Vanessa, who was glaring at him while grinding her teeth, Arno smiled with incomparable obsequiousness. His face looked both overjoyed and anxious.

Twitching his fingers as if he wanted to reach out to Vanessa right away, Arno said,

“Va-Vanessa… Let’s go together. I’ll protect you. Duke Drake is a scary man. Who knows what he might do to you… Let’s leave the Imperial City together and go to an island in the southern sea. And, and then we’ll get married… Just the two of us, no, we’ll have about five children… You’d be pretty even with a swollen belly…”

“What nonsense are you spouting?”

Vanessa retorted sharply, letting out a bitter laugh in disbelief. At her scornful voice, Arno’s dreamy eyes, which had been immersed in delusion, gradually turned cold.

“Get lost, Arno. I’d rather bite off my tongue and die than go with you. Just try to lay a hand on me. I’ll scream. Even if there’s no one on the street, this is such a respectable residential area, someone’s bound to hear!”

Vanessa, who had fiercely rebuked him, grasped the dagger that Renee had attached to her belt for self-defense.

Arno put on a truly sad face and slowly closed the distance. He pleaded as if lamenting,

“Why… Why don’t you understand my feelings…? I truly love you… I guess… I should have taken you somehow when we were in Terevron… If you had carried my child… Then you would have become completely mine…”

“It’s too disgusting to listen anymore.”

Vanessa muttered with a sneer, tensing her lower abdomen. Then she shouted with the loudest voice she could muster,

“Help! There’s a pervert!”

Vanessa’s scream echoed through the quiet residential area. At that moment, Arno’s mask of docility crumbled, revealing his vicious true nature like an evil spirit.

He lunged at Vanessa, reaching out to cover her mouth. Just as his hand was about to touch her face, Vanessa swung the dagger with all her might.