Chapter 132

Unlike my startled self, Duchess Rachel relaxed her rigid expression with a look of delight.

“Sera is a child I’ve known for a very long time, and she’s trustworthy…”

Wait, with someone right outside the door, what were we going to do if she heard?

I hurriedly signaled her to be quiet.

Even so, the Duchess didn’t give up, whispering just loudly enough for only me to hear.

“She’s a child with deep loyalty. You can trust her. If we explain our situation well, she’ll help us.”

‘There’s trusting people, and then there’s her?’

There wasn’t even time to argue.

With a firm expression and no response, I pointed toward a wardrobe barely large enough to fit a single person.

The Duchess raised her index finger toward herself, and I nodded in confirmation.
Though she looked hesitant, the Duchess obediently stepped inside the wardrobe.
Confirming that the door clicked shut, I took a deep breath and opened my door.

Slam!

“Why’d it take you so long to open up?”

“Why all of a sudden? Did you find the Duchess?”

“…Is that the first thing you say the moment we meet?”

Twisting the corners of her mouth as if annoyed, Sera calmed herself down with a dry cough.

“Ahem, never mind that. I have a favor to ask you regarding that matter.”

She was awfully brazen for someone asking a favor. Wasn’t an unwritten rule that you had to lower your head first?

Though I didn’t look kindly on it, I was willing to hear her out for now.

“Help me look for the Duchess. With your intuition, you should be able to find her in no time, right?”

“…….”

When I remained silent, Sera pressed me, seemingly growing impatient.

“Comrades working together on a grand endeavor shouldn’t refuse to do even this much, right? Help out, if only for her sake!”

“…….”

“And you’re keeping your mouth shut again? If you don’t want to, just say so!”

I replied just before Sera’s temper reached a boiling point.

“It’s not that. It’s just that right now isn’t the time for that.”

“What?”

She wore a face that asked what on earth I meant. It seemed the news hadn’t reached her side yet.

I kindly guided her regarding the danger we were facing.

“What? The wall breached? Are you insane…?”

“You’d better pack your bags quickly. An evacuation order is going to be issued soon.”

Turning pale, Sera muttered a brief acknowledgment and turned around with hurried steps.

After confirming that Sera had gone far away and closing the door, the Duchess emerged from the wardrobe.

She wore a thoroughly dejected expression. Since she remained silent for a while, I just let her be.

It was understandable, though; the fact that Sera—whom she had so confidently declared trustworthy—had given up on searching for her faster than anyone else must have been hard to swallow.

“But you know.”

“Yes.”

“Sera seemed to place a lot of trust in your intuition.”

Ah, right. I hurriedly brushed it off.

“Haha, it’s nothing much, it’s just that I have sort of a spiritual knack. I have this mysterious ability where I can guess anything right. The situation was so frustrating, so Sera must have vaguely tried to rely on that, I suppose.”

The Duchess stared at me quietly for a moment, then nodded as if convinced.

“Mmm, I see. I suppose I can understand. Perhaps it was thanks to that intuition of yours that I survived in the first place.”

…Think whatever you like, really.

Meanwhile, Robert headed toward the meeting hall with hurried strides.

“Ah, Your Grace. Why the sudden summons…?”

“There’s no time. Everyone, please take your seats for now.”

Normally, this would be a time for enjoying a vacation.

At the sudden summons, the vassals’ expressions were thoroughly displeased.

However, that unenthusiastic attitude didn’t last long. Because the shocking news Robert delivered next left everyone utterly dumbfounded.

Amidst the panic-stricken people, loud voices erupted from here and there.

“The primary defense line hasn’t been breached once in a few hundred years! How on earth did something like this happen!”

“Just how long has it been since the succession, and a catastrophe like this!”

Faced with the expected turbulence, Robert let out a suppressed groan and squeezed his eyes shut.

A young man watching the scene closely spoke up quietly amidst the chaotic meeting hall.

“I heard that Your Grace reorganized the guard personnel for the defensive wall… and now an accident has happened.”

The meeting hall fell silent in an instant.

Even though Robert’s menacing glare from across the table was directed right at him, the young man continued.

“How could that be a mere coincidence? It goes without saying that there must have been shortcomings in the newly brought-in personnel. Otherwise, there’s no explaining how the wall collapsed so suddenly.”

“Watch your tongue, Baron Karl!”

Unable to hold back, Robert tried to cut Baron Karl off.

He looked around, hoping others would chime in and agree with him, but the other vassals were busy avoiding his gaze.

Instead, they actually sided with Baron Karl rather than Robert.

“Baron Karl isn’t saying anything wrong, you know.”

“I don’t know how many magic beasts have invaded, but we need to evacuate quickly, too…”

“We also need to decide how someone is supposed to clean this mess up…”

“To think Sir Hereis isn’t here at a time like this. This is bad…”

“Even Lord Jeffrey would have…”

Pressured by the vassals’ stares and the overwhelming tension pouring out like a broken dam, Robert shrank back for a moment.

Still, he couldn’t just sit there idly.

Taking a heavy, deep breath, Robert opened his mouth.

“Everyone, calm down for now. Cleanup is our top priority right now.”

“…Ahem.”

“That is true. If the ducal domain is breached, estimating the damage to other regions is practically impossible. We must immediately request aid from the imperial palace and mobilize the entire knighthood.”

“Our family will prepare in a hurry as well.”

“Ours too…!”

“However.”

It was Baron Karl who plunged the meeting hall into silence once again.

“Naturally, Your Grace will be commanding the entire army yourself, won’t you?”

Robert’s brow twitched.

With him tackling him at every single turn, it was honestly a wonder Robert wasn’t openly showing his displeasure.

“Since this is an accident that occurred in the ducal domain, it’s only right that the head of the house takes charge of it.”

Spurred by that middle-aged woman sitting next to Baron Karl, other vassals chimed in with agreement.

“Surely Your Grace wouldn’t run away! You’re not a coward, after all!”

“Your Grace. This is the time to show us your capability.”

Bam!

“I get it! Stop right there!”

It wasn’t an issue that could be put off indefinitely anyway.

In the end, slamming his fist down on the table, Robert shouted.

“I will personally lead and direct the army. Since I am heading to the wall, the rest of you focus on territorial defense and the subjugation of the invading magic beasts.”

“Understood!”

“We have your back, everyone wish us luck!”

“Come now, let’s return quickly.”

“Baron Karl, hurry on out as well.”

Feeling his temper flare up once again at Karl walking past him and out the door, Robert swallowed down his anger inwardly.

“That’s how it is.”

“Pardon?”

“It’s said there won’t even be time to stop by the mansion.”

“Pardon?”

“Pack well, we’re leaving tomorrow.”

“Pardon?”

There were three people endlessly repeating “Pardon” like parrots without a single break.
Sera, Noah, and me.

“Noah and Belita aside, why are you dragging me to that death trap! I’m the Duchess’s personal maid!”

Villero said with a straight face.

“Tsk. You’re as capable a maid as the one who served the Duchess, that’s why. Besides, you seem close with Belita, so I specially handpicked you two to work well together.”

“Wait, hold on a minute! We haven’t even found the Duchess yet…”

“I’m busy, we’re leaving.”

Watching Villero leave with a dazed look on her face, Sera whipped around and glared fiercely at me… She seemed to think it was all my fault, which felt utterly unfair.

‘I don’t want to go either…’

Unfortunately, it seemed we had been invited to the magic beast subjugation operation alongside Robert.

And forcibly, at that.

“Crazy, I’m not going. How are we supposed to go to a dangerous place like that?”

At Sera’s outburst, Noah chuckled, telling her she didn’t need to be overly terrified.

“Do you really think the Duke is going to head straight to the front lines?”

“You idiot. You never know what’ll happen in this world. Run away if you don’t want to die, too.”

“Run away? You’re going to run away?”

When Noah asked with a bewildered expression, Sera panicked, pressed her index finger to her lips, and made a shushing sound.

“Are you insane? What if someone hears us!”

Then, dragging me into the hallway opposite to Noah, she added in a voice small enough for only me to hear.

“I’m going to run away. Belita, you might be fine, but I’m fragile. What are you going to do? You’re not actually planning to follow along, are you? Do you want to run away with me? I’ll let you tag along. Ah, it’s better to leave that Duke-worshipping fool behind. Bringing along a guy whose head is full of flowers would only get in our way.”

Her ulterior motives were painfully obvious.

‘No doubt she’s uneasy on her own, so she wants to drag a reliable person like Belita along.’

Trying to secure a free bodyguard—people really did want to live life as comfortably as possible.

Of course, I wasn’t all that thrilled about heading to the front lines, either. Who in their right mind would want to go to a blood-soaked battlefield?

Even with holy artifacts around, terrifying was still terrifying.

In the previous run, it was a situation I had to do, so I gritted my teeth and pushed through, but this was a matter of choice.

There were plenty of ways to raise Robert’s affection outside of a battlefield, after all.
With the Duchess out of the picture now, the difficulty level would drop, too.

‘But if I don’t go, I’ll be uneasy in a different way.’

What happens if Robert fails the operation? I doubt he’d actually die, but as Sera said, you never know what will happen in human affairs.

I felt like I should go along and keep an eye on him, just in case. Though I had no idea if I’d actually be able to protect him.

‘So I guess I have to go after all…’

My vision went pitch black.

‘Ah, wait a second.’

Come to think of it—the Duchess!

If Noah and I head off to the defensive wall, we won’t be able to call a carriage for her!

‘I was planning to go out and call the carriage for her myself, after all.’

Which was only natural.

How on earth could you book a carriage from an isolated villa while dodging everyone’s eyes?

‘What do I do now?’

“Well, if you’re not coming with me, fine.”

Sera muttered in a grumbling tone, as if she hadn’t expected much anyway.

“Ah, damn it. If I run away, I’m definitely getting fired. Then what am I supposed to say to him? This is driving me nuts.”

If a spy gets chased out of their mission zone, Jeffrey blowing his top was a given.

If she hated that, she could just follow Robert.

Though Sera genuinely looked like she had zero intention of doing that.

“Hey, can you cover for me nicely? Just say I really wanted to go, but circumstances came up and I couldn’t follow along.”

Good grief, she cherished her own life to an absolute fault.

‘No, actually, this works out great.’

Couldn’t she just call a carriage for me while she was running away, solving all my problems in one go?

“Fine. I’ll take responsibility and make sure you can return to the ducal house, so in exchange, send a carriage over to the Edin villa tomorrow.”

“What? What for?”

“Don’t ask.”

“Are you kidding me? There’s no way the coachmen are going to agree to come out here with the current situation.”

The news probably hadn’t spread on a massive scale yet.

According to Villero’s words, the evacuation order was supposed to be issued around tomorrow, after all.

I figured things would be fine until tomorrow, but just in case, should I secure one extra safety measure?

“Will fifty gold cover the payment?”

“Obviously it will, with that much. There’d be a thousand people willing to come even if magic beasts were already setting up camp at the villa.”

…As expected, the ideology that money can make even the impossible possible applied in any country, across any dimension.

“I’m counting on you. Just keep in mind that if the carriage doesn’t show up, you won’t have a place left in the ducal house.”

“Is that a threat? Hey, do you take me for someone who can’t even keep a promise like that? Just fork over the payment.”

“I’ll give it to you before we leave tomorrow.”

“…You’re actually giving it to me, right?”

“No need to worry about useless things.”

“Hey, I’m really trusting you, okay?”

Anyone watching would think I was the one who owed a debt.

“That’s my line.”

“Good grief. Fine. Though I have no idea where you managed to scrape up that kind of money.”

“I made some pretty good investments.”

“What?”

“You shouldn’t just hoard whatever salary comes in either; you should invest, even if it’s just a little bit at a time.”

I said that while thinking of my actual stock account back in reality.

By the way, the fact that real-world time kept ticking even while I was stuck here was a proven truth thanks to Mo Je-won.

Yet my stocks were forcibly frozen in place…

They couldn’t possibly have crashed in the meantime, right?

If it’s a bull market, I need to time my exits properly while it’s bullish.

‘This is driving me nuts.’

Yet another reason to hurry back had just been added…

“Star…”

After Sera left—looking at me as if I were a certified lunatic—Noah approached me.

“What’d she say?”

“She’s running away. Ah, and about the Duchess’s carriage—she agreed to call one for us.”

“You didn’t mention the Duchess, did you?”

“Of course not.”

Noah let out a heavy sigh of relief.

“That takes care of one big worry.”

The Duchess’s situation aside, we were the real problem.

Heading off to that brutal front line, wondering what on earth was going to happen.

Everything was an unknown variable.

Feeling unnecessarily anxious, I checked my status window to see if the holy artifact’s functions were still active.

The next day at dawn.

Before setting off for the wall, I ran into three familiar faces in the dining hall where we went to pick up our final rations.

“Look who it is. Isn’t it Belita, who has to head straight to the front lines the moment we evacuate?”

The trio who chose to sit right across from me and pick a fight were…

“You’re definitely going to get a good look at magic beasts, girl!”

“If you survive, it’ll definitely make a great drinking story!”

Sure enough, it was Bridget’s clique.

Unable to break their old habits, they were picking fights again.

This time, though, the blow to my patience was quite heavy…