The Arrow of Destiny Cuts Through the Night

#48

Jersian walked across the large ballroom. Kain followed Jersian with long strides.

“Mr. Jersian Gerold, hello. I came up to the capital this time-“

“Let’s talk next time. I have a personal matter to attend to, so excuse me.”

Even while moving, several people tried to greet Jersian and speak with him. However, Jersian politely declined their greetings and continued walking.

The people trying to talk to Jersian were all wearing expensive-looking clothes and jewelry.

“Ah, if you have important business, it can’t be helped! Let’s be sure to talk later!”

“…”

They were people desperate to catch Jersian’s eye and establish connections with the marquis’s family. To Kain’s eyes, Jersian looked like an endlessly small and delicate boy, but others only thought about how to gain things from him or use him.

Hm? Where did he go just now? While Kain was looking around, having lost sight of Jersian while lost in thought, it happened.

“What are you doing? I’m over here.”

Jersian had slightly parted the thick ballroom curtain and was peeking out his face. Ah, Kain immediately opened the curtain and walked out of the hall.

Whoosh- Unlike the bright and hot ballroom, the dark outside had a cool breeze blowing. Jersian walked to the balcony railing and leaned his elbows on it, staring at the black sky.

“…Weren’t we going to meet Hernin?”

“What?”

He frowned as if he had heard something strange.

“Why are you suddenly talking about Hernin?”

“You told the baron earlier, ‘Hernin is calling from over there.’ So I thought we were going to where he was.”

“Ah, that.”

Jersian looked at Kain curiously, smirking.

“I was going to, but I changed my mind halfway.”

“Is that okay?”

“Of course. Anyway, Hernin has plenty of people to congratulate him right now, even without me.”

“That’s true.”

Kain replied and walked to the railing where Jersian was leaning his elbows, and looked up at the pitch-black night sky in the same position. In truth, he too had no interest in Hernin Gerold, the protagonist of this banquet.

“…”

“…”

For a while, neither of them said anything.

Jersian was the first to break the silence.

“Shall I tell you what I discovered at the baron’s house today?”

“…”

Kain had no idea what he was going to talk about. His eyes glanced towards Jersian. Even after speaking first, Jersian was still gazing at the night sky.

“It was a letter. A single page.”

As he spoke with his head raised, Jersian’s voice seemed to scatter into the pitch-black darkness.

“What kind of letter was it?”

Kain responded to Jersian’s words, thinking his voice sounded strange. Was it because of that letter that he had been in a bad mood since waiting in the carriage?

Kain’s bright lime-green eyes briefly touched Jersian’s face. He seemed to be in a slightly better mood than before, but Jersian’s eyes were still full of emptiness.

“It was a letter my mother had written. Quite heartfelt.”

In Jersian’s red eyes, which were calmly continuing to speak, a few stars from the night sky were reflected. Kain stared intently at those white lights before answering.

“What was written in it?”

It felt like he had to ask this question. Pleased with Kain’s response, Jersian turned his head, pulling one corner of his mouth into a smirk.

“It wasn’t anything particularly helpful to me. So I burned it right away.”

“…You burned it.”

Kain said, raising one eyebrow. He couldn’t understand Jersian’s feelings about immediately burning a keepsake from his deceased mother upon discovering it. No matter how unhelpful it might be to oneself, choosing to burn it immediately upon discovery would not be an easy decision.

Even Jersian himself, who was saying this, didn’t look particularly relieved.

“It was a letter sent to the crown prince at the time. I don’t know why it was in Baron Basiz’s possession, though.”

“…”

“My mother and the current emperor were unofficial lovers. They were just a few steps away from getting married. With a little more time, she would have naturally become the queen. Yes, everyone thought so.”

It’s a typical and cliché story. Jersian looked at Kain, who was quietly listening to what he would say next, and continued.

“…Until my mother became pregnant with me.”

Jersian looked at Kain, who was nodding calmly without showing any surprise, and spoke again.

“Anyway, there was an uproar in the imperial family. Having a child before marriage when they weren’t even married yet was something that lowered the prestige of the imperial family.”

“I see.”

While he didn’t fully understand why a mere pregnancy would lower their prestige, if Jersian said so, then it must have been the case.

“But still, it’s hard to guess the contents of the letter.”

“Yes, because this story isn’t over yet.”

Jersian looked straight at Kain with his elbows still resting on the railing. His red eyes, which had been full of emptiness, were now filled with anger. It was like a bright red, blazing flame.

“The wedding kept getting postponed. At first, the excuse was that it would be difficult to hold the imperial family’s traditional wedding ceremony with a swollen belly, but after I was born, it changed to needing to wait until I was old enough to walk. And that excuse changed several times again. …Then one day, my mother finally realized. That the crown prince’s desire to marry her had disappeared.”

“…”

Kain stared at Jersian, who was speaking in a low voice. Right now, Jersian was talking about why he was living as ‘Jersian Gerold’ instead of ‘Jersian Del Claude’.

“But even then, my mother still loved the crown prince. After waiting for years, she probably couldn’t give up the position of queen. My mother believed without doubt that she would become queen until the moment she died. It was quite a miserable life.”

A cold sneer spread across Jersian’s entire face.

“But that expectation was shattered soon after. Rumors started circulating that my mother had given birth to a child of a man other than the emperor.”

Whoosh- Jersian blew a breath to make his bangs, which had slightly fallen in the evening breeze, flutter. Then he checked what expression Kain, right beside him, was making.

“…”

Usually at this point, most other people would make a fuss and try to offer shallow consolation, or show unnecessary sympathy. Both of those were things Jersian hated most in this world. Fortunately, Kain Starchis had his usual calm, composed face.

Kain, who had been standing quietly and thinking, asked Jersian.

“So what was the truth in the end?”

“What?”

“I meant, was it true that you were really a child of a man other than the emperor, as the rumors said.”

“…”

This kind of reaction is somewhat new. It was even asked so bluntly that there wasn’t time to feel offended. As Jersian stared intently at Kain, an “Ah” reaction flowed from him.

…Is he going to apologize for asking such a rude question?

Jersian remained silent, ready to listen to what Kain was about to say.

“That was written in the letter you discovered today, wasn’t it? The truth about that rumor, I mean.”

“…That’s right.”

Contrary to expectations, it wasn’t an apology. Jersian nodded with a slightly bitter expression. Kain Starchis, now understanding that his guess was correct, said:

“Judging by the fact that it wasn’t the content young master Jersian wanted… it must have been evidence that the rumor was true.”

“Yes, that’s right too.”

Jersian nodded and said.

“It was my mother admitting to the affair. But even if it wasn’t for that letter, we would have been driven out eventually. The imperial family had completely confirmed that rumor as truth. In fact, from their perspective, my mother was nothing but a thorn in their side, so that rumor was a much stronger blow than other excuses.”

Jersian let out a short sigh before continuing.

“In the end, my mother had no choice but to leave the palace and return to the Gerold mansion. But she always told me it was unfair. ‘You are of the Claude imperial bloodline,’ ‘You were born with royal blood,’ and ‘No one else knows.’ I grew up hearing these words from the moment I was born. I believed my mother. I was convinced that someday I would be able to reveal the truth. …Until I saw that letter written in my mother’s handwriting today.”

A strange light swirled in Jersian’s red eyes.

“It turns out all of this was just fake. The thing I thought was a lie my whole life… the truth is that I am the child of another man.”

Ironically.

Jersian wore the same sneer he had when he called his own mother’s life ‘miserable’.