Chapter 10
4
“My Fist Is Faster Than Your Tattling!” (1)
“Your Highness, are you sure you don’t want me to carry you?”
“I’m fine.”
“You may feel okay now, but if you walk a little farther, your legs will start to hurt. Are you really sure?”
“Mmm-hmm!”
“Really, truly? Are you absolutely certain? Perhaps you should reconsider—”
Ugh.
I turned around sharply and glared at Margaret, who’d been repeating the same line like a looping chant from behind.
I let out an exaggerated pah! of a sigh on purpose. Margaret immediately put on a pitiful expression and blinked her innocent, deer-like eyes.
But I’d been watching her act cute for decades now. There was no way I’d fall for it.
“I said I’m fine. Why are you worrying so much? It’s not like I’m a baby.”
For a moment, I thought I heard a quiet cough from among the attendants standing behind Margaret.
“But still, Your Highness—”
“Tsk.”
Ignoring her, I clicked my tongue softly and continued walking, leaving behind a Margaret who clearly had more to say.
“Then how about at least letting me carry the ferrets?”
Still undeterred, Margaret offered another suggestion from behind.
I glanced down at the ferrets tucked under my arms.
Just before I left the palace, the two of them had abandoned their plate-licking mission and scampered after me. Now that they’d caught my eye, they squeaked kkiyu kkiyu at me.
Even though we weren’t going somewhere particularly exciting, they were shining their eyes and acting adorable.
In the past, I would’ve snorted at that.
But maybe dying once had softened me up, because I suddenly felt a little sorry for them.
Sigh. Fine. They’re still my kids, after all. I should take care of them.
“I’ll just bring them myself.”
I gently ruffled their heads, already planning to ask Margaret to give them the pudding they’d missed earlier once we returned to the palace.
I really am too kind.
That aside, considering that I was mentally a grown adult in my mid-twenties, I’d worried that my behavior and manner of speech had changed noticeably since yesterday, making Margaret feel uneasy around me.
But maybe because my birthday had just passed?
Just like in previous timelines, she seemed to misunderstand it as me earnestly trying to act more grown-up now that I was a year older.
For me, that worked out perfectly.
At the moment, I was leaving the palace under the pretense of a morning stroll—before Father returned.
Of course, my real objective had nothing to do with taking a walk.
I’m looking for the black mana stone.
The object that had damaged the guardian stone protecting the imperial palace barrier—and caused a fire in the Rosarium, the Garden of the Gods.
As I’d explained before, the villains of the future used a corrupt power derived from black miasma.
One of the most representative tools of that power was the black mana stone, created by injecting miasma into the core of a magical beast.
The mana stone itself—processed from a beast’s core—wasn’t inherently evil.
Mana stones purified in the Tower of the Void were considered artifacts. Depending on what kind of magic was infused into them, they could be used for offense, defense, and more.
They were also widely used in daily life—for cooling, heating, drying, purification, and other practical purposes.
However, black mana stones infused with miasma had only impure effects: they seduced the viewer, and eventually allowed the holder to be manipulated.
At this point in time, it wasn’t yet a perfected product.
It was merely a prototype—something the villains had created for testing and smuggled into the imperial palace once.
The weakness of the black mana stone was this:
Anyone manipulated by it had no memory of what they did while under its control.
This time, too, the guard who tampered with the barrier’s guardian stone and “accidentally” set fire to the Rosarium remembered absolutely nothing of his actions.
But I know he threw the black mana stone away in the herb garden before the control wore off.
In the novel, that same stone was later picked up by someone else inside the palace, causing even more trouble.
That was exactly what I intended to prevent by finding it first.
First, I’ll secure the mana stone. Then I’ll confirm that black trace I saw on Karus again last night.
There was still some time before the story entered its next major arc, so I didn’t have anything urgent to do.
Originally, the novel described Asphodel spending about two weeks recuperating inside the palace after her birthday banquet.
That was because she’d been injured while saving the First Prince from a magical beast.
Naturally, since it involved a royal injury, priests from the Grand Temple were dispatched immediately and healed her with holy power.
But wasn’t my father famously devoted to his daughter?
Under his attentive care, Asphodel stayed inside the palace for a while, focusing on mental and physical recovery.
Then the First Prince would come to visit her, fall head over heels for her angelic heart and cuteness, and start down the path of devotion—
Hmph. None of that has anything to do with me.
In any case, that meant I had plenty of breathing room to calmly plan my next steps.
“Ah!”
Just then, I spotted Karus in the distance.
Perfect timing. Where’s he headed?
Karus’s palace wasn’t far from my father Roxan’s, so I remembered running into him occasionally while passing through the area in the past.
Just like last night, he was moving without a single attendant.
Even though I’d reduced it somewhat when I touched him yesterday, black haze still clung to his body.
And then—after glancing around as if wary of being seen—Karus quietly stepped into a place that made my eyes narrow.
The very herb garden I was headed for.
What? Why is Karus going in there?
And what was with that suspicious behavior?
“Margaret, let’s go over there!”
“Oh my, the herb garden? You usually don’t like it because of the scent—what’s gotten into you today?”
I urged Margaret along and followed Karus.
She didn’t seem to have noticed him slipping in ahead of us.
Once inside the garden, Karus was nowhere to be seen.
He must’ve gone deeper inside.
“Margaret, let’s play hide-and-seek! I’ll hide, and you be ‘it.’ Count to one hundred and then come find me!”
“Yes, then I’ll start counting now!”
Using the game as an excuse, I separated from Margaret and went looking for Karus.
Miasma’s smeared on the leaves.
Had his hand brushed against them as he passed?
On the leaves of the green bushes leading deeper into the garden, faint black traces lingered.
Like Hansel and Gretel’s breadcrumbs, they guided my way.
Following the black trail, it didn’t take long to find Karus.
“Kk?”
“Kkiiiu.”
“Shh. Be quiet.”
The ferrets had also noticed the people inside the garden and started whispering. I silenced them gently.
Then I strained my ears.
“Karus, no one saw you coming here, did they?”
“Yes. I came alone, secretly. No one noticed.”
I mean, come on—he sounded suspicious even in his lines.
Didn’t he practically scream ‘I’m definitely hiding something!’?
“Then take this. It’s the item I mentioned last night. You must let it mature in the shade for at least one or two days without exposing it to sunlight before using it.”
Karus received an object from someone he’d met in secret.
I couldn’t see exactly what it was, but I saw him swallow hard and cradle it carefully against his chest.
And then—I recognized who the other person was.
“Lord Kuncha, to go so far as to prepare something like this for me… I’ll never forget this kindness.”
“I didn’t do it just for you. It simply didn’t feel like someone else’s problem.”
A young man with long pale pink hair and light lavender eyes—identical to his son’s.
The Third Consort, Kuncha, pushed up his monocle arrogantly as he spoke.
“Hmph. I remember struggling quite a bit myself when my Rubel was in the Rosarium and his growth was… just a little—really, just a little—slow.”
Huh? Rubel?
I tilted my head at the sudden name.
Why was the Second Prince, Rubellio, coming up now?
“This is a rare medicinal ingredient that was difficult to obtain. Don’t waste a single drop.”
“Of course! With every drop I give to the fruit, I’ll remember Lord Kuncha’s kindness!”
At that moment, all my tension drained away.
I’d thought they were secretly plotting something shady—
But it turned out to be a late-night parenting exchange between two fathers worried about their children’s stunted growth.
Kuncha snorted proudly and crossed his arms, clearly pleased with himself.
“Though many in the palace would surely be deeply moved by my considerate nature if they knew of this, you must restrain yourself. You must not tell anyone that I obtained this for you.”
I stared, dumbfounded, at his shameless boasting.
“If others were to mistakenly believe that I—a refined noble of Diomene origin—had close ties with someone of mere Oclante descent like yourself, it would be troublesome. Do you understand?”
The Rogue Princess’s Anything-Goes Life Plan
