Prologue 2

“Lord Darius, did you personally do anything?”

“No.”

“Your surroundings moved on their own, separate from your instructions or intentions, didn’t they? If so, then no matter what you did, wouldn’t you have ended up at that outcome sooner or later?”

“…Would I?”

Darius understood what the woman in front of him was trying to say. But that was only part of her argument; he neither fully grasped every word nor had he reached the point of accepting it.

“If your own will wasn’t clinging to it, then it was action born from the will of those around you. Will becomes intent. A person’s intent cannot be suppressed no matter how forcefully one tries. And on top of that, kindhearted as you are, Lord Darius—did you try to crush their thinking by force?”

“…”

Her words lit a lamp, and the hazy thoughts Darius still couldn’t recognize or put into words gradually cleared.

“Along with your nobility, you possess kindness, Lord Darius. You wouldn’t do such a thing. If that’s the case, then there’s nothing to it. You were simply caught up in an accident.”

Just the other day, Darius had faced his father Zoin like this, one-on-one in a room.

Back then, he had been stared at with eyes as cold as the reaper’s, and though the tone had been calm, it had been a vile situation that froze the spine.

The furnishings in Zoin’s study weren’t vulgar like the gaudy items here, but every single one of them rejected Darius.

It was the complete opposite here.

The woman had spoken matter-of-factly at first, but before he knew it, her words had gained inflection and were filled with tenderness.

She—the expensive, easy-to-read furnishings—the entire room—gently enveloped Darius.

“You did not suppress the will of those around you, Lord Darius, nor did you suffer their backlash.”

“…There was nothing I could do.”

That environment reshaped Darius’s thinking in a direction convenient for him.

What happened around the time Talidge challenged Ains to a duel—and how it ended.

What happened around the time Talidge went to the slums saying he would obtain a holy relic to redeem himself—and how it ended.

The outcome where Talidge ended up as Ains’s attendant. And at the same time, the humiliation of a House Sobi attendant becoming a House Brandy attendant.

The outcome where House Brandy, without realizing it, formed ties with Ains—and as a result, without realizing it, gained enough power to stand toe-to-toe with the royal family.

And as those outcomes guided everything forward, they lowered Father Zoin’s evaluation of Darius.

But—yes, it was being reshaped.

“…Just one thing. If there’s any fault on Lord Darius’s side…”

The woman lowered her eyes dramatically and spoke to Darius in small, apologetic murmurs.

“Fault?”

Darius asked back, suspicious.

“No, to be precise, it doesn’t rise to the level of fault… However, the reason you’re in such an irritating situation now, Lord Darius—could it be because you didn’t strike first?”

Her words guided Darius into thinking in a way that benefited him.

For someone with Darius’s personality, simply handing him an answer wasn’t best. With his high pride, he would reject another person’s opinion. That was why you made him think for himself—and arrive at the conclusion himself. That way, he could swallow the idea without resistance.

If you guided him properly toward what conclusion he would reach, there was no one easier to handle than a person with pride as swollen as his.

“…True. I trusted my surroundings and left it to them. If I had moved myself, I wouldn’t have been dragged down by those trash around me.”

“Exactly. It isn’t that you’re at fault, Lord Darius, but if the wise you had moved first, the situation would have changed, and—”

The woman paused for a beat.

And she knew it. In that beat, Darius would speak the rest.

“—Even now, I can recover.”

The woman merely nodded quietly.

There was no need to keep steering the manageable brat in front of her. He would think on his own, reach conclusions on his own, and move forward on his own.

In the direction that benefited her.

“I see. The reason you called me here is that you’ll cooperate with that?”

Darius wore a fearless smile toward the woman.

“But you wouldn’t treat me this politely for only that. …If you help me, you gain something too, don’t you? That’s it, right?”

Pleased with himself, Darius asked.

“…To think you would see through me that far. I had no intention of deceiving you. It’s just that I, too—”

The woman showed a flicker of agitation at Darius’s words and lowered her tone as if resigned.

“It doesn’t matter. Whatever benefit you gain while cooperating with my goals has nothing to do with me. Do as you like!”

“Then!”

The woman’s eyes suddenly shone as she looked at Darius—at his self-satisfied face.

“Fine. In return, work properly for me. …Oh, right. Come to think of it, I still haven’t heard your name.”

The woman sat up straight, placed a hand to her chest, and bowed reverently.

“My apologies for the late introduction. I am one of the Next-Era Luminaries—Rubelmel, the Sorcerer of Antagonism.”

Hair cut neatly around her shoulders fell, hiding her expression from Darius’s view.

Not an answer handed to him, but an answer he believed he had found himself—this gave Darius an inexplicable trust in the strange woman in front of him, without realizing that conclusion had been guided by someone else.

“From this point on, I look forward to your acquaintance.”