1

Naranda’s laboratory was a path for the wind.

The scent of many kinds of medicinal herbs mingled together rode the refreshing breeze from the large window and tickled Noel’s nostrils.

The sound of the green leaves rustling in the large trees beyond the window was gentle on the ears.

“I see. Congratulations. Noel-sama was so utterly spineless that, if Noel-sama had not taken her in, I was thinking of taking Beth in myself. What a shame.”

Noel had come to this laboratory to tell him of his engagement to Beth.

It was rare for this beautiful man to say such a thing, even as a joke.

There were rumors, whispered as though they were true, that with his appraisal magic, the finest in the kingdom, he could appraise people’s souls.

It was also said that despite having such beauty and status, the reason he still remained unmarried was that he was searching for the owner of a beautiful soul.

Naranda’s remark was probably not entirely a joke. Noel said with displeasure.

“What a shame for you. Look somewhere other than Beth.”

Then he picked up the plant fossil Naranda was studying, which had been lying on Naranda’s large desk.

“More importantly, do you not intend to take part in the new government?”

For Naranda, one of the contributors to the coup, Eugenia had prepared the seat of prime minister.

Naranda was at the lowest rank, but he was still a nobleman registered with the royal family.

Despite being in a position and at a time when he ought to place himself at the center of the government, Naranda was still continuing his research in a corner of the Magic Institute like this.

“I wish to remain a mere magician. I can only take interest in the world as seen through beautiful magic. Besides, you, Beth, and the greenhouse are here.”

Naranda smiled.

“Ah, it seems becoming a miller and living leisurely in the countryside with Beth is still quite far off for me as well.”

Noel smiled wryly and looked at Noel’s greenhouse, visible through the window.

“What? You are joking, right? The magician-sama in that book was modeled after Ezra-sama?”

Beth, who had been having tea in the greenhouse with Ezra and Rodney, was so shocked that she knocked over her tea.

“Ah, it was greatly exaggerated and dramatized, though. But it was indeed something like that. My wife was a princess of another country who had been locked in a tower, and my rescuing her from the tower with magic was how we met.”

“Huh, Beth did not know?”

Rodney turned a surprised face toward Beth.

Apparently, it was a very famous piece of common knowledge.

“Look, the name does not come up much in the story, but the magician-sama’s name is Razuel-sama, right? That name is Ezra-sama read backward.”

“The princess’s name was also exactly the same as Ezra-sama’s wife. The princess was Beatrice-sama, and Ezra-sama calls his wife Bebe-sama, right?”

Beth learned that the model for the magician-sama she admired in the book she had read until it was worn out was, unbelievably, the stubborn old man before her eyes, and her face became truly unpleasant.

Beth also knew Ezra’s wife well, and while she was a very plump and adorable woman, she was quite far removed from the princess in the story, who was nobler and more beautiful than anyone.

“I-I see…”

(No wonder Noel-sama knew so much about both the magic and the magician-sama who appeared in the story.)

She remembered Noel’s face, which had looked somewhat displeased for some reason when Beth spoke about the magician-sama she admired.

Beth was probably making the same face now as Noel had at that time.

“To think Beth liked that story so much. Next time, I shall sign the book for you.”

“Um… no, thank you…”

Glancing sideways at the cheerful Ezra, Beth felt as if she had burned out into pure white ash.

To celebrate the birth of the new queen, the entire Royal Capital was filled with yellow and orange marigold flowers.

With the birth of the first royal authority of the Goddess Temple faction since the kingdom began, and the birth of a queen, the Royal Capital showed tremendous excitement.

Beside Queen Eugenia, who smiled from the throne, stood the second son of a duke from the largest Goddess Temple faction in a neighboring country.

Their wedding had been decided for next year.

By welcoming a beautiful and capable royal consort into the kingdom, Eugenia’s royal authority would likely become even more unshakable.

After the coup Eugenia had caused, the Royal Capital completely changed.

In accordance with the law and with fairness, Eugenia sentenced her father, the king, the First Queen, and the First Prince, as the culprits in the attempted murders of Noel and Eugenia, to imprisonment in a prison where ordinary criminals involved with magic were also incarcerated.

The new queen widely demonstrated that before the law, there was neither status nor magical power, and all were equal, by using the punishment of the former king, who was her own father.

Then, she advocated meritocracy and declared that those with ability would be appointed regardless of gender, the presence or absence of magical power, or origin.

“I was attacked by a magical beast because I was a female royal with a mother of weak backing, after all.”

Eloise became a close aide to this young and beautiful new queen.

“I, too, decided that, like Queen Eugenia, I would not be a daughter who merely obeyed what Father said, but would seize what I wanted by force.”

There was no physical strength in the slender, white, graceful arms of the young lady.

But this girl was the headache of a ducal house, loving magic more than three meals a day.

It was not the method her parents had desperately desired, in which she would behave in a way beneficial to the house in the place called high society and enter a political marriage with a noble who would benefit the house even slightly.

But as the female magician who was a close aide of the queen and the foremost user of offensive magic in the country, Eloise, the problem child of the ducal house, brought great honor to the ducal house.

The close aide of the new queen, who had once been a duke’s daughter as beautiful as a doll, was called “the Queen’s Thunder” for the power and precision of her unrivaled offensive magic. Eloise looked far happier than when she had been called the “Doll Princess.”