#09. Are You Hurt Somewhere?

“Did you see another vision?”

Prince Lukaris denied it, but his loyal subordinate, Jerman, quickly noticed his master’s issue.

Prince Lukaris didn’t answer, but he didn’t deny it either.

‘Why on earth?’

He was suffering from strange visions whenever a complete stranger he had never seen or known was mentioned.

“This is a recent phenomenon. These past few days……”

Jerman, thinking quietly, frowned. Strangely, this coincided with the time they received news about the Divine Beast’s egg.

Could all of this really be a coincidence?

Perhaps…

“Could it be black magic?”

“What?”

“Perhaps the lady of Dragonia has fallen for Your Highness and is trying to convey her feelings somehow……”

“Enough.”

Prince Lukaris cut him off as if telling him to stop talking nonsense.

“I have never even met her. How could someone with whom I have no relationship harbor such feelings? For the sake of the lady’s honor, don’t even mention such things.”

Despite the polite rebuke, Jerman persisted.

“But how many women claim to love Your Highness without even knowing you properly? Just in the capital alone, there’s so much commotion about people falling for Your Highness’s dignity and unparalleled beauty……”

“Jerman.”

“…Ahem, anyway, I’m just suggesting we consider all possibilities.”

Jerman cleared his throat and avoided his master’s glare.

“The three brothers of Dragonia are all known to be capable and handsome. So as a lady who grew up watching such brothers, wouldn’t she want a groom of Prince Lukaris’s caliber?”

The other subordinates of Lukaris nodded at this somewhat logical statement.

Yet they also sneered.

‘A daughter of Dragonia, how dare she?’

Lukaris Griffones-Fenrir was a legitimate son of the Griffones imperial family.

However, though called a prince, he was known not as the heir to the Griffones imperial family but as the successor to the Fenrir Grand Duchy.

This was due to Prince Lukaris’s birth.

He was not the son of Gordik, the current emperor of the Hakan Empire.

He was the posthumous son of ‘Gailis Griffones,’ the current emperor’s full brother.

Having been named crown prince early on and designated as the first in line to the throne, he was murdered by an unidentified assassin.

The crown princess, a lady of Fenrir who was with him at the same place, barely survived but never recovered her health.

She only managed to give birth to a posthumous son.

‘And so the Griffones imperial family was engulfed in a terrifying succession dispute.’

Even now, nearly twenty years after the current emperor, Gordik, had become the owner of the throne, it was difficult to say that the political situation was stable.

There were mainly two forces capable of such ruthless acts that would bring chaos to the empire:

‘Phoenix of the Southwest, and Dragonia of the Northwest.’

Both houses had both the ability and motive to commit such acts.

And now a daughter of such Dragonia wanted Prince Lukaris.

‘She knows neither shame nor her place!’

The subordinates of Prince Lukaris all felt unpleasant. Despite possibly being the daughter of an enemy, she dared!

Unlike his subordinates who felt such antipathy, Prince Lukaris cut them off with, “That’s enough.”

“Whatever the lady’s character may be, she is not someone you can discuss carelessly.”

“Y-Your Highness……”

After cutting them off like that, Prince Lukaris didn’t wait for his subordinates’ apologies and moved first in his thoughts.

The name of the lady of Dragonia was certainly…

* * *

“Lady Partanie!”

I found myself looking at the teapot, teacup, simple tea foods placed on the table, and the lower-ranking maids who had prepared them.

And I asked.

“Are you hurt somewhere?”

I had guessed there might be more people to treat, but the lower-ranking maid Eren, who had injured her ankle, answered brightly.

“Ah, I think it’s all better now! I can walk without the splint and it doesn’t hurt!”

“I see, that’s good.”

Then is there someone else who’s injured?

I tilted my head in confusion, but the maids just smiled shyly and said this was ‘a token of gratitude.’

“……”

It felt strange.

Well, receiving thanks and gifts from patients wasn’t unfamiliar to me as a recovery mage.

‘But Partanie of Dragonia……’

At least at this point in time, I wasn’t in a position to receive such goodwill.

But regardless of my complicated thoughts, the maids smiled cheerfully and guided me to a chair. Then they served me in a manner that seemed awkwardly learned from somewhere.

‘Why are they being so nice?’

Because I treated them personally?

Or is it out of pity?

By now, they should know about me. That the lady of Dragonia was actually just a half-wit with a grand name.

It must not feel good to hear their benefactor spoken of like that. Are they showing kindness out of sympathy?

Well, either way, it wasn’t bad. I was actually a bit hungry.

‘The tea doesn’t taste bad either.’

Of course, the quality was cheap. It tasted like the best of cheap quality. As I slowly tilted my teacup…..

“It seems you’re quite fortunate?”

Bang, the door opened roughly and an unfamiliar voice invaded.

The figure that strode in without hesitation knocked away the teacup I was holding.

Crash!

“Kyaak!”

“L-Lady Johanna?”

I slowly turned my head amidst the voices of the startled maids.

A familiar hostile gaze.

‘Ah, I remember now.’

Johanna. Penelope’s direct maid. A servant who had taken the lead in tormenting me according to her mistress’s mood.

“You’ve always been so filthy and dirty like a maggot, unbecoming of a lady……”

She narrowed her eyes and looked me up and down.

With the cooperation of some lower-ranking maids recently, I had moved away from my previous messy and dirty appearance.

Johanna’s face twisted as if that displeased her.

“Now you’re even enjoying tea service and being treated like a princess?”

“……”

In the past, I was easily intimidated by such inexplicable malice.

As everyone said, I was of lowly birth, not knowing my mother. Thanks to my father, I became a daughter of Dragonia, but I wasn’t properly acknowledged by anyone.

‘So I was afraid, thinking I might be driven out someday.’

And no one understood my fear.

They just sneered, ‘As expected of those with humble origins,’ and watched me with eyes expecting me to make some mistake.

“This is really too much. After all the hardship Madam has suffered because of you…!”

“!”

Johanna’s madam, that is, Penelope, was suffering hardship?

‘So the rumors were true.’

Apart from the recent food waste incident, there hadn’t been any further harassment. I thought something was suspicious, but it turned out Penelope didn’t have time to focus on me.

‘They say screams, wails, and enormous treasures came out of Penelope’s vault.’

Of course, the culprit was Taran. Who else would dare to punish Penelope like that?

Perhaps that’s why Johanna, Penelope’s right hand, seems to have lost her mind.

‘To cause trouble for me without Penelope as a shield.’

No matter how much I was disregarded, that was only when Penelope was well. In a situation like this where she was absent, they couldn’t act up.

‘Well, it’s certainly enough to drive someone crazy. Taran continuing to team-kill.’

Taran, the second prince of Dragonia.

One of his power bases was the Barshava family, his maternal relatives, led by Penelope.

In other words, Taran attacking Penelope was like stepping on his own foot.

‘Why? Taran was crazy but not stupid.’

Could it be because of me?

Did the fact that I was beaten by Penelope anger Taran?

“Pfft.”

I burst into laughter without realizing it.

I found it absurd that I even thought Taran might be angry at Penelope because of me.

However.

“……Are you laughing at me right now?”

For some reason, Johanna looked insulted. As if she couldn’t believe someone like me would dare to laugh at her.

And right at that moment—

[Quest generated! <Punish and eliminate the wicked maid who dares defy her master.>

*Reward: Fragment of □□]

A silent request appeared before my eyes again.

* * *

Johanna’s sudden intrusion into the lady’s bedroom and her thuggish behavior wasn’t because she had suddenly lost her mind as Partanie had guessed.

It was for her mistress.

In fact, Penelope hadn’t always treated Partanie so poorly from the beginning. On the contrary, she was one of the first to approach her and treat her well.

‘Because back then, I thought she was a real lady.’

A daughter most beloved by the Grand Duke of Dragonia, even given the noble name ‘Par.’

……But that was a misunderstanding.

The Grand Duke of Dragonia had merely legally acknowledged his daughter, but was completely indifferent to what happened afterward.

Upon realizing this, Penelope felt deeply insulted. After all, she had needlessly bowed to someone who wasn’t even her equal!

Penelope was already feeling a great inferiority complex about coming from a merchant family since entering the Blue Brick Castle.

So she built up her self-esteem by taking out her frustrations on those of lower status than herself.

For such a Penelope, the Grand Duke’s lowly daughter who suddenly appeared was an appropriate target to vent her feelings of inferiority that had nowhere else to go.

But people always remember being hit, not hitting others.

Penelope, punished by Taran, was desperately seeking solutions and eventually thought of Partanie.

‘Johanna, honestly, how well did I treat that child?’

‘……Pardon?’

It was a statement that made even Johanna, who was no less shameless than her mistress, momentarily speechless.