The way he chided her, not quite a scolding, about what she had chosen to prod him with felt very familiar.

“Then you should follow along nicely. Do you know how much trouble I went to for this guest?”

The man shed the pitch-black robe without a moment’s hesitation.

Beneath it, brown hair caught the moonlight and gleamed faintly, in a way that felt oddly familiar.

The sharp, cynical air about him was something no one could imitate, yet he resembled a man Asilri knew.

Only then did Asilri lower her head slowly and offer a belated greeting.

“It has been a while.”

She paused for a moment, then lifted her head with composure and looked him directly in the eye.

“Ludwig Ruin Ernst. Your Imperial Majesty.”

When Asilri recited the Emperor’s full name without flinching, he looked more amused than anything.

“As expected. Not even a hint of surprise.”

No fun at all, Ludwig muttered.

His voice carried genuine curiosity, but Asilri only looked back at him with a dry expression.

“Was that not what you wanted?”

“Hmm?”

“The invitation you sent was rather blatant.”

Asilri thought back to the attendant who had stood up to the Duke of Renatus with such brazen confidence.

That kind of boldness could never have come without a powerful patron behind it.

Ludwig caught her meaning at once and made no effort to deny it.

“Yes, that’s right. Meeting you without interference is no easy thing.”

“……Interference?”

She asked back in a surprised voice, though someone did come to mind immediately.

“Sit first. We don’t have much time.”

Ludwig read the complicated look on her face and laughed quietly, gesturing for her to take a seat.

Asilri sat down reluctantly across from him, and he opened his mouth as though he had been waiting for exactly that.

“Yes, that boldness of yours is unchanged. To be this composed in a situation like this.”

“I was surprised. You brought me here in quite a startling way.”

“Haha. But if I had let you step in back there, I didn’t think I’d be able to speak with you properly.”

Ah, right. He had said there was interference.

Asilri recalled his words belatedly.

“Tell me now. What interference?”

“You already know, don’t you.”

Rather than answering readily, Ludwig simply looked at her with a steady, unhurried gaze.

With a look like that, how could she not know.

“……Khalid?”

Exactly right.

Ludwig nodded as though he had been waiting for it.

“Yes. That husband of yours, who is said to cherish you so dearly.”

“……Khalid blocked you, Your Majesty?”

“Blocked would have been the better outcome. He had the audacity to warn me not to even look your way.”

“…….”

“I sent letters all the way to the estate and received no reply, so I sent someone in person.”

Ludwig looked at Asilri with eyes that held a clear, sharp light.

“And fortunately, I am told they managed to find you.”

The words themselves were unremarkable, but Asilri understood what lay beneath them.

‘……Letters?’

Asilri seemed to hesitate for just a moment, and Ludwig read her at once.

“I was curious how you were getting on, so I called for you. As you know, we made quite a good pair of partners, didn’t we?”

……Partners.

Asilri found herself thinking of a voice from some time ago before catching herself and turning her attention back to the Emperor before her.

“How could I presume to think of myself as a partner to His Imperial Majesty.”

“My. Was that a one-sided notion of mine, then.”

He laughed lightly, but his eyes were sharp as he read her reaction.

“I was simply curious whether you were well.”

“…….”

“From the moment the Duke of Renatus defied my orders and returned to the empire.”

Only then did Asilri understand why the situation around her had shifted in a different direction.

‘……It was because of Khalid.’

A single action of Khalid’s had set everything in motion up to this very moment.

When Asilri’s expression stiffened subtly, Ludwig smiled in a way she could not quite read.

“I always respect your wishes, but.”

Ludwig rose from his seat and walked toward her with long, unhurried strides.

He took a light hold of the shawl draped over her shoulder and looked down.

The small crest embroidered there was Renatus’s.

“Can this choice truly be called the right one?”

“…….”

It was not clearly a question that demanded an answer, yet it also felt faintly like he was waiting for one.

While Asilri considered, Ludwig spoke first.

“Then does Bliché now need to find a new master?”

At the sound of that familiar name, Asilri froze before she could even think to guard herself.

Ludwig, frustratingly, had committed to nothing.

But Asilri knew what he was saying.

‘The fact that the Emperor brought up Bliché means…….’

Asilri’s eyes sharpened in an instant.

In the past, being weighed between Bliché and Renatus would have made her furious.

But now, she felt instead that this moment was an opportunity.

“……That could never be.”

An opportunity to steady the heart that had been wavering.

Asilri held Ludwig’s gaze and answered without flinching.

But even after hearing her answer, Ludwig only offered a faint smile.

Asilri took that to mean he was giving her time.

It meant the answer he wanted had not yet come.

Asilri’s expression hardened with resolve.

“Nothing changes just because the circumstances have.”

“Hmm.”

“I have no intention of accepting anything other than Bliché. And that holds true for Renatus as well.”

Her unwavering voice carried the full weight of her conviction.

Though it was not without some exaggeration.

Having already lost Bliché, Asilri was, knowingly or not, being pulled toward Khalid.

She had even begun to wonder whether he might be hiding something he simply could not speak of.

Even so, the reason she had shown such a firm stance against Renatus in front of Ludwig was nothing more than instinct.

It felt like the right thing to do before the Emperor.

Whether Ludwig had seen through even that, she could not say, but Asilri did not let her steady gaze waver.

Ludwig’s eyes seemed to pass over her before drifting to somewhere behind her.

“I see. So that’s how it is.”

“…….”

“You will not accept Renatus either, you say.”

Ludwig curved the corners of his eyes with a playful smile.

Light flickered sharply through the gap in the door, but he dismissed it without a glance and turned away.

Asilri, unaware of that quiet presence, continued slowly.

“That is why I accepted Your Majesty’s invitation. There is something I wished to ask.”

“Go ahead.”

He settled back into the seat across from her and answered with an interested look.

There was something beyond mere interest in those eyes, but Asilri, already struggling to hold herself together, did not catch it.

“Do you happen to know anything about the carriage accident that took my parents?”

Asilri was careful, afraid the trembling hidden beneath her composed voice might show.

Drawing out each word cost her greatly, but she forced herself to speak.

She knew she could no longer afford to keep running from it.

“Hmm. I find myself reluctant to answer so easily today.”

But Ludwig’s manner was unusually contrary today.

His voice carried a lightness that made it seem like he was enjoying the situation.

“This may have been a matter for your husband, rather than me, at least in the past.”

“……He cannot help me.”

Whether for reasons he could not speak of, or otherwise.

The moment those words left her mouth, a dangerous force swept over Asilri.

But before she could even grasp what it meant.

“My. The Duke of Renatus would be hurt to hear that.”

Ludwig had put his poker face back on.

Sensing the strange shift in the air, Asilri looked around.

‘……Khalid?’

The force was so intense she could not believe she had missed it.

But Ludwig seemed to have already known he was there.

Nothing else could explain it.

“I cannot take your hand at this moment, regrettably.”

“…….”

“But I too hope you will see your wish through.”

There was no other reason to say something so precarious.

Ludwig, having delivered his words right up to the edge, finally let his gaze leave Asilri entirely.

The way he stared pointedly past her looked very much like a deliberate provocation.

Ludwig simply savored the feeling of the eyes on him growing slowly fiercer.

The conclusion of this little drama was not his to write, so he settled in to watch.

As expected, his intent was fulfilled shortly after.

Bang!

A heavy sound rang out, and Asilri flinched before she could stop herself.

But only for a moment. A firm hand came to rest on her slender shoulder.

“……What is the meaning of this?”

A cold presence wrapped itself around Asilri, and a razor-edged voice cut into her ear.

In that instant, Asilri felt, for the first time, the truth behind the dark rumors that had long circulated about him.

It was Ludwig who was facing Khalid, and yet the ferocity of it reached Asilri just as fully.

Not the mild aura of a man raised gently in a noble house, but something raw and untamed, sharp like a creature no hand had ever touched.

“Kha, lid.”

Asilri called his name without thinking.

There was no chance that voice would reach Khalid, not in the state he was in.