Derek felt a strange discomfort.

What’s this? Their behavior makes me feel like they’re hiding secrets from me alone. It feels like I’m being excluded.

“Princess Asili.”

Ferdin, who had been lost in thought for a while, called the princess instead of answering Derek’s question.

She was playing with a child that Erin and Ferdin had brought back, sitting the child on her lap.

The princess initially tried to ignore Ferdin’s call, but soon realized others were present and put on a radiant smile befitting a saint.

However, her face cracked at Ferdin’s next words.

“Let’s break our contract.”

“Are you out of your mind?”

Hearing her own casual speech slip out reflexively, the princess quickly covered her mouth.

Derek stared at her with his mouth open in surprise. Having nearly exposed her true personality, the princess cleared her throat softly and avoided his gaze.

“You disliked it too. There’s no need to force yourself to do something you hate because of your feelings toward my father.”

“Bringing this up here… means you really want to end it.”

Princess Asili looked directly at Ferdin again as she spoke.

She quickly set down the child who had been sitting on her lap and moved swiftly toward Ferdin. Then she whispered in his ear.

“You… saw something in Lady Erin too?”

“…”

“What exactly did you see, Ferdin Lexia?”

Her eyes trembled as she spoke these words.

But Ferdin remained silent, not answering her question.

The princess fell into thought for a moment, then whispered to him again with a pale face.

It was a very small voice that others couldn’t hear.

“I… saw myself dying.”

“Princess Asili?”

“Running desperately through the forest, eventually caught and killed by monsters…”

“…”

“That was the fate originally given to me.”

* * *

Saint Princess Asili.

She was the first saint born after the Holy Kingdom became a vassal state of the Empire.

Whenever the Emperor saw Princess Asili, he would boast loudly, “See! Even God has abandoned the Holy Kingdom and chosen the Empire!”

At such times, Princess Asili wanted to cover the Emperor’s mouth.

How could he rejoice without knowing what he had done!

Saints beloved by God often received dreams about the future or premonitions. It was different from the innate abilities of the Lexia Empire’s royal family.

It literally meant receiving divine revelations and communicating with God.

Throughout history, saints had been very close to God, so this wasn’t unusual.

‘A half-baked saint.’

That’s how Princess Asili thought of herself.

People revered her as a saint, and her overflowing holy power constantly made her body ache, but she had never once heard God’s voice.

‘Can’t you let me hear your voice just once?’

Despite such pleas, God remained silent.

Princess Asili knew the reason. It was because God… hadn’t forgiven the Empire.

The current Emperor of the Lexia Empire, Sergia Lexia, had not only trampled the Holy Kingdom and made it a vassal state but also taken the previous saint as his concubine.

This happened before the princess was even born.

“Sergia Lexia will meet his downfall, consumed by his own greed.”

She recalled the last words the previous saint left for the Emperor.

The Emperor snorted and ignored those words, but as the saint predicted, God would not forgive him.

Since becoming a saint, she had seen and heard many things. The Emperor was someone who killed people for his own pleasure. He had pushed the people of the Holy Kingdom into the barren west and left them to die slowly.

That’s why many people didn’t know his true nature.

‘He buried his deeds under sensational rumors.’

Whenever the Emperor committed atrocities, major incidents always occurred.

‘Sometimes young Erin would kill her servant, or a horde of monsters would suddenly attack civilian homes.’

The princess found all these incidents suspicious. Though it might be a hasty assumption, she felt all of them were connected to the Emperor.

Even if they weren’t the Emperor’s schemes, he would eventually pay for what he had done.

No, he had to.

She would make sure of it, one way or another.

She firmly believed this was why holy power had manifested in her, a princess of the Lexia Empire.

She had taken Ferdin’s side, even pretending to be in love with him, to make the Emperor pay for his sins.

While her father, the Duke, tried to maintain strict neutrality, Princess Asili wanted to help Ferdin.

Despite acting like enemies in public, she had no intention of letting Ferdin die.

After all, Ferdin Lexia was the son of the Holy Kingdom’s saint whom Sergia Lexia had arbitrarily taken as his concubine.

Though the Emperor, who valued legitimacy, publicly declared him the Empress’s son to hide the fact that “impure blood” had mixed into the Lexia Empire, the truth was completely different.

The princess recalled the divine revelation she had received a few months ago while looking at Ferdin. Cold sweat ran down her back.

“Ferdin, have you… ever felt something strange when looking at Lady Erin?”

“What are you talking about?”

“Don’t stop her. That’s the divine revelation I received. A revelation I hadn’t received once in over a decade… I received it the moment I faced Lady Erin.”

Ferdin tried to ask the princess for more details.

What exactly did that mean? What did the revelation have to do with seeing Erin’s past?

But just as Ferdin was about to speak, they heard hurried footsteps approaching the meeting room.

“Lord Ferdin!”

Amon stood up at the shout from outside. He opened the door with a puzzled expression and tilted his head at the soldier visible outside.

The man standing at the door was a guard who protected the academy’s central hall.

“What’s the matter?”

The guard’s face turned pale at Amon’s words. He could instinctively tell what had happened by looking at the guard’s expression.

The guard protecting the academy’s central hall was Ferdin’s man. His shocked face meant something bad had happened to Ferdin.

“His Highness Ditrion… His Highness Ditrion has come to the academy!”

Amon’s face contorted. Ditrion Lexia. That bastard came here?

The bad relationship between him and Ferdin was well known.

‘Ferdin’s standing increased after this subjugation. Did the Emperor send Ditrion to check on him?’

Many people questioned what happened during the subjugation, but it was true that Ferdin had rescued the refugees without Count Leon’s help.

Amon understood why Ditrion had come to the academy. He probably wanted to determine the exact truth about the werewolf subjugation.

And if he found anything to nitpick during the process, he would clearly try to make the most of it.

He might pick fights over every little thing like before.

‘He’ll probably try to provoke people around Ferdin to find any flaws.’

Amon ran his hand through his hair in annoyance.

“And… His Highness Ditrion has ordered a duel between Sir Roham and Lady Erin!”

“Has he finally gone mad?”

Those words spontaneously escaped Amon’s mouth.

As soon as Amon finished speaking, Ferdin, who had been talking with the princess, rose from his seat.

Princess Asili’s eyes followed Ferdin.

He looked at Amon and said:

“Amon, follow me. We’re going to Erin.”

Amon followed Ferdin with a surprised face.

Ferdin’s expression was icily cold as he spoke to him.

* * *

Erin surveyed her surroundings. There were about a dozen of Ditrion’s knights hiding nearby.

She could also sense academy students watching them from a distance. More and more people were gathering.

“If you win a duel against Sir Roham, I’ll allow you to go to Ferdin.”

Ditrion said this with a smile. His intention to humiliate Erin in front of many people was obvious.

As soon as he finished speaking, murmurs rose from the students watching them.

The area was now filled with spectators observing Erin and Ditrion.

“Sir Roham? Isn’t he one of Prince Ditrion’s chief knights?”

“How could a department student defeat someone like that?”

“Erin Liserth fighting against Sir Roham? What if she gets seriously injured?”

While the Swordsmanship Department acknowledged Erin’s skills, those outside the department still doubted her abilities.

Seeing these reactions, Ditrion felt reassured.

That’s more like it. He had a sense of Erin Liserth’s skill level now.

In fact, he had been uneasy even before coming to Atenz Academy.

Ever since hearing that Raymon had left the subjugation team while enjoying tea time with Corelia, he had felt something unsettling.

And a few days later, another messenger arrived at the Marquis’s mansion. This time with news that Ferdin’s subjugation team had completed the mission assigned by the Emperor.

In other words, Ferdin had defeated the werewolves and rescued the refugees even without Sword Master Count Leon.