Fear struck her that she might really lose the child. As this terrible thought crossed her mind, Ines struggled to raise herself.

“I, I need to see the Marquis myself.”

This was no time to lie around idly. She needed to grab hold of the Marquis’s trouser leg and plead with him. She had to get on her knees and tell him she couldn’t do this anymore. That was the only way to protect her child.

Just as Ines barely managed to get up, Descartes entered the bedroom and approached her.

“It seems I’ve come at an appropriate time. I was about to relay information about tomorrow’s guest anyway.”

“Marquis Descartes…”

He looked at Ines with arrogant eyes, as if saying she could speak if she had something to say. His demeanor was no different from that of a king bestowing grace.

Ines immediately approached Descartes and grabbed him. The fear of losing her child made her unable to maintain her dignity as queen.

“Any more than this… is really too much. My body has already reached its limit. If I use my ability on someone other than your son at this point, my body won’t be able to handle it. Then…”

She clutched her belly as she murmured.

“I might lose the baby.”

She looked at Descartes with desperate eyes. She hoped desperately to hear the words she wanted from his mouth. But Descartes just stared at Ines intently, his thoughts unreadable.

Growing anxious, Ines finally fell to her knees. She grabbed Descartes’ legs and begged. Her left arm, which had only recently had its splint removed, moved awkwardly.

“Couldn’t you at least wait until after the birth? Once I safely deliver the child, I’ll use my ability as much as you want. I promise I’ll keep this promise.”

Only then did Descartes, who had been silent, open his mouth.

“Wouldn’t losing that child be better for Your Majesty?”

At these thunderous words, Ines suddenly raised her head.

“What do you…”

“From what I’ve learned, the former king sent an anonymous letter to the temple. It said that Your Majesty had committed adultery by sleeping with him before marrying His Majesty. If that’s true, the child in your womb could be the former king’s.”

“No, that’s not true! The contents of that letter are false!”

She strongly denied Descartes’ words. Though she didn’t know how this information had spread, nothing good could come from such baseless rumors spreading further. But Descartes shook his head, dismissing Ines’s protest.

“It doesn’t matter if Your Majesty claims innocence. People will believe the contents of the letter more than your words. So I think it would be better to cleanly miscarry now and bear His Majesty’s child later. After all, you can always make another child.”

At Descartes’ final words, Ines’s hands, which had been gripping his trouser legs, lost their strength.

Passing by the dumbfounded Ines, Descartes issued an order.

“Escort Her Majesty safely back to the palace.”

“Yes, Your Excellency.”

With those words, Descartes walked out as if he had no more business with her. Watching the man walk away, Ines realized.

‘From the start, he intended to get rid of my child.’

It had been too naive to think they wouldn’t push her further because the child carried royal blood. From the beginning, he had planned to make her miscarry.

Ines, her hands pressed against the floor, clenched her fists. This caused the temporarily treated wound on her palm to burst open.

‘This can’t go on.’

If she continued to be pushed around by them like this, her child would die.

Red blood seeped from her clenched fist.

A determined light appeared in Ines’s eyes, as if she had made some decision.

* * *

In a village near Alfarano in the national territory of Brillant.

In the most outlying inn, Carlos, disguised as a traveler, was holding a meeting with his subordinates.

“Have the scouts sent to Alfarano returned?”

“Yes, we’ve identified approximately fifty knights currently guarding the mansion. Thirty of them are knights sent by the King of Brillant for security purposes. The remaining twenty are knights who have been responsible for the former king’s escort since Tezever.”

“Fifty men…”

Carlos stroked his chin at Herman’s report.

Currently, Carlos had brought only twenty men with him to Brillant.

Though he had originally left the palace with over 100 men, most of the actual force remained in Tezever, pretending to be on inspection tours with him for the sake of deception.

“Taking on fifty men with twenty isn’t too unreasonable a battle.”

Though only twenty, the knights who came with Carlos were highly skilled. They prided themselves on being able to match ten ordinary soldiers each, and had much experience winning battles while outnumbered.

“But the problem is we don’t know the skill level of their knights.”

The ten from Brillant could be an elite unit, or the knights who fled with Joseph could have been the elite ones. As if understanding what Carlos was worried about, Herman added his input.

“You don’t need to worry about that part. Though we don’t know the skill level of the Brillant knights, we do know how skilled the knights who’ve been with Joseph since Tezever are.”

“You know their skill level?”

At Carlos’s question, one of the knights behind Herman stepped forward. He was one of the scouts who had returned.

“Yes. I definitely recognized their faces. Most of them are children of high nobles who bought their knighthoods with money. They probably followed the former king in the sudden rebellion out of confusion. With their families destroyed, they had nowhere else to go.”

This was welcome news among what he’d been hearing.

During Joseph’s reign, it had been common to buy knighthoods with money. As a result, even those without proper skills often rose to become royal guard knights. In the end, their corruption had come back to bite Joseph.

As the situation turned in his favor, Carlos pulled up the corners of his mouth.

He shifted his gaze to the mansion’s blueprint he had obtained in advance.

“Are there only these two exits?”

The entrances Carlos pointed to were just the main gate and back gate. However, the surface blueprint couldn’t show hidden entrances.

Usually, mansions where nobles or royalty lived had secret passages known only to immediate family members. Carlos double-checked this to avoid repeating the mistake made during the coup.

Herman answered with a confident voice.

“Yes. There are definitely just two. First, it’s so small it’s embarrassing to even call it a castle, and its former lord was just a commoner who received a baronetcy. He never needed to fear for his life because of his title, and since Vernar is a religious state, there was no need to prepare for war, so there was no reason to build secret passages in the first place.”

Herman added additional facts he had investigated.

“Moreover, we found an elderly butler who used to work at the castle and got confirmation that there are no secret passages. He said he’s worked there since the castle was built.”

Carlos nodded with satisfaction at Herman’s report. Then he began to devise a strategy to cut off Joseph’s escape.

After some time had passed. Having finished his deliberation, Carlos finally spoke.

“Good. First, they have fifty men and we have twenty. It could be disadvantageous if we all charge in at once. So we’ll divide their forces.”

He pointed to the main gate and asked.

“How many soldiers guard the main gate?”

“It seemed like ten men take turns standing guard in three shifts.”

“Then we’ll attack when the guards are changing shifts. Since the walls aren’t high, we’ll first infiltrate by climbing ropes and then open the gates.”

“Yes.”

“They’ll probably realize we’ve infiltrated soon after the gates open. Then some forces will try to escape with Joseph. They’ll definitely head for the capital, so we’ll ambush Joseph as they pass by while hiding here.”

Carlos’s finger pointed to a small mountain range. It was a mountain that had to be crossed to reach the capital from Alfarano. There was another route through a small river, but the slow current would risk exposure to enemies, so they would surely cross over the mountain range.

Having organized his thoughts this way, Carlos muttered quietly.

“This time, I’ll definitely cut off his lifeline.”

Carlos’s eyes flashed fiercely as he gritted his teeth.