"It seems like the criminal is quite a smart person."
Hugh sighed at my words and covered his face.
"At best, did you end up harming someone because of an embezzler? A guy like you is really..."
"At best, an embezzler? Can't you see the knights moving around the entire territory in such a hurry? It's not just simple embezzlement."
Hugh, who was quietly listening to me, asked with his arms crossed.
"So what do you want to do?"
"Are you saying there's a criminal hiding here?"
Before I knew it, the life that had been flashing in my eyes had calmed down. Rather, it had a mysterious glow.
He straightened his body, which had been leaning against the door, and opened his mouth with a sigh.
"Listen carefully. I am a knight of the principality. If you interfere needlessly and try to catch the culprit, there is a high chance that you will offend the Marquis."
The Marquis's planting.
I blinked at the unexpected comment.
"Isn't it that a knight from another country did what his own knight couldn't do? Is there anything that would hurt the pride of a nobleman more than that, especially one who values honor as much as a marquis?"
Only then did I realize that I had been too absorbed in the suspicious aspects of the inn and the 'facts' inferred through the knight's conversations, and had failed to look at the situation from a more diverse perspective.
It's not like I didn't know that nobles were like that...
"Their purpose in the first place was to escort us to the mansion. Finding embezzlers is the job of the security forces. Even if they can't find it, there's no problem for us."
"..."
"Even if you made its existence known, do you think she would be happy? Do you think they would look at you with respect, saying that a young noble lady knew about the existence of a criminal that they had no idea about?"
No way. Rather, they will reject it.
Certainly, cooperating in finding and apprehending a hidden embezzler would not only be an example of a noble lady, but it would also likely only hurt the knights' pride.
"Yes."
"It may be unpleasant, but there is no need to expose the Marquis's incompetence and be hated. It would be best to just move on."
After hearing what he said, I stayed still and nodded.
"So that means we have to make sure they don't know that we discovered it first."
"...Did you hear what I said?"
"From what I heard, you're saying you're going to leave the clear road and go back."
Hugh grabbed my arm and looked at me as if he couldn't understand.
"It's okay. I have no intention of delaying the schedule."
Slowly, he released his hand, opened the door, and headed outside. As I walked to the table where the Viscountess was waiting, I recalled my memory.
Embezzlement occurs more frequently than you might think. Nobles don't think about the circumstances of their subordinates as long as they eat and use their money.
A long time ago, in the territory where I lived, a large administrator embezzled a large amount of money and went into exile in another country.
The skill was so impressive that the lord, who did not even know about the crime until he disappeared far away, became angry when he saw the empty warehouse.
And that year, taxes rose tremendously.
The lords, who had to maintain their own spending regardless of the financial status of the territory, did not care about the circumstances of others.
A death registration fee was paid to the deceased, and a birth registration fee was paid to the newly born child.
In a chaos where even giving birth was a sin, the cries of parents were overflowing with the cries of parents sending their unborn children away to survive.
At that time, the lord took responsibility for his incompetence with their tears.
'What choice will Marquis Xavier choose?"
The greatest knight in the empire who took an imperial woman as his wife.
As it was a sudden decision to travel to the ecliptic, no information was available about it.
'Maybe this will be an opportunity to understand his personality.'
As Eric told me, we will also be able to see the 'not so easy' side of the central nobles.
A look of confusion appeared on the Viscountess's face when she saw me returning to the table.
“Ma’am.”
"I heard you were changing clothes?"
"I changed my mind. Since it was just on my sleeve, I thought I could just wipe it off. It's a dress I've been liking for a long time, and it's a dress I've been saving for today."
"That too."
She answered softly, called a waiter waiting in the distance, and asked for water to remove the stain.
It was at that moment that the waiter, who had been looking at my sleeve, quickly moved to bring me a bowl of water.
I used Windy to trip on his feet, and the waiter's body fell hard and hit the counter with a loud bang, hitting the piled bags.
At that moment, the sack piled on top collapsed.
"Oh, no."
The chef ran quickly and barely caught the sack.
The loud sound immediately caught the attention of the knights.
"Hey, be careful!"
The chef bowed low at someone's shout.
"But what's in there? It sounded strangely dull."
"Well?"
At that moment, I felt the chef's body flinch.
The knight commander at the door narrowed his eyes as he noticed his gesture.
The chef hurriedly put down the sack and handed me a bowl of water and some white powder.
"Oh, it's cornstarch. With this, stains on the inside of the sleeve can be easily removed."
I looked at his fingertips being wet and slippery with sweat, and silently took the bowl of water and the powder.
The woman who sat down next to me wet my sleeve and started rubbing it.
"Ma'am, I will do it."
"If I had known this would happen, I should have brought at least one of my maids with me. I'm sorry t hat Alfred had to suddenly clean up the imperial capital's large mansion by himself, so the problem is that I sent all the workers away."
I looked down at the sleeves where the red stain was disappearing and looked at the knights who were still 'watching' the suspicious-looking person.
No matter how good your senses are, it would be difficult to make a connection between the inn you happened to visit and the magistrate who was wanted.
I started to cough slightly in discomfort.
"Isabella, why are you doing this?"
Some people are overly sensitive to spices.
I don't know if I ate the right amount, but the soup that was served earlier was full of excessively strong spices.
"Ugh."
As I lowered my head and retched as if in pain, the Viscountess's hand stopped.
She handed me a handkerchief and asked the staff for a favor.
"Bring me some honey water. Warmed to lukewarm."
"Is something wrong?"
Perhaps because my appearance was unusual, the Viscountess opened her mouth as if she had no choice when the knight leader approached me.
"The food seems a little unpalatable."
"You seem to be in too much pain for something like that."
"The spices in the food were so strong that it was actually a bit difficult for me to eat. Especially since Isabella has been convalescing at the mansion, she has always consumed only bland foods..."
Maxwell's eyebrows moved slightly at those words.
This is an inn that serves food that is hard for both the Viscountess and me to eat. Isn't this even a 'rest area' that he took care of?
"Is that possible, Ma'am?"
He quickly looked at the remaining plate of food, reached out his hand, and carefully tasted it. Maxwell looked up and his expression was stiff.
"Chef!"
The man, who had turned pale from the thunderous shout, began to run out the back door.
Other knights seemed to sense something strange and started chasing him.
Suddenly, the waiter began to hurriedly climb up behind the people running out the back door.
'He follows what that man is doing.'
To begin with. It wasn't just one chef who won the award.
Everyone who waited to welcome us to this inn might have been accomplices.
It was that moment.
Something rolled out of the sack that the chef had half-laid down while running away.
It was different from what I expected to be a gold coin.
It had a yellow glow, but unlike the gold coin, it was just a jagged, irregularly sized shiny stone.
"Hmm."
At that moment, the face of the Viscountess who was sensitive to smells distorted.
Perhaps because the string that held it tightly together had come loose, a faint smell of rotten eggs was coming out.
Terrible smell. A yellowish stone.
Something lingered in my complicated mind as if something would come to mind or not.
Windy, who had chased after the waiter who had hurried upstairs just in time, spoke to me.
[Something was tied to the bird's ankle and sent. It looks like a letter. Should I bring it?]
'Okay. What is he doing now?"
[He grabs a piece of wood and makes a small torch. He is trying to come down.]
Fire, fire!
Only then did I come to my senses. and pulled the Viscountess towards me.
"Isabella?"
"Get out of here."
She looked up at me as if she was dumbfounded by my words.
Without any time to explain, I quickly grabbed her arm and started dragging her outside. That was the moment when the remaining knight followed us out of the inn.
At that moment, I made eye contact with the waiter who was coming down holding a torch in his hand. I noticed a man with very determined eyes slowly throwing a torch between the sacks.
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