Cardinal de Mare spoke in a calm tone.
“I’m sorry for asking such a difficult question.”
“...”
“Of course, even if I were excommunicated and my name was erased from all documents, and my living body were to wander the streets and die, and everyone would throw stones at de Mare’s blood relatives, I know that it would not be difficult at all for the Prince to take my daughter in and keep her safe.”
Cardinal de Mare's voice was soft, but he looked at Prince Alfonso with intense eyes.
“But my daughter is not the type of child who would be satisfied with that. Do you understand what I mean?”
Ariadne was not a woman who wanted a position in government.
If that were her goal, she would have achieved it long ago. And in fact, what she wanted was not even status itself anymore.
If she had only wanted to be Queen, she would have become Leo III's second wife and already had the Queen's tiara on her head.
She wanted a full, upright man's side.
In Alfonso's opinion, she was the perfect woman to occupy such a position: large, neat, and elegant.
“I understand very well what you are saying.”
Prince Alfonso spoke with confidence.
“I will protect Ari well.”
Is it just to protect her? Isn't this journey to Trevero itself a journey to place a crown on her head that is worthy of her dignity?
“And her seat is right next to mine, in the Princess’s chair. Your Eminence, you don’t have to worry about that.”
A smile of relief crossed Cardinal de Mare's face, perhaps because he knew his daughter was in safe hands.
What he didn't think about was that, on the contrary, his own daughter could become wings for someone.
Cardinal de Mare believed that only he could play that role in the family.
“If only this old man had one more request.”
“Please speak.”
“If you have a second child, I would like you to give the child the title of de Mare and make him independent.”
Prince Alfonso opened his eyes wide and looked at Cardinal de Mare.
If Ariadne marries Alfonso and has children, the children will belong to the House of Charles, not to de Mare.
Prince Alfonso, who readily agreed to the very difficult request of taking the daughter of an excommunicated person as his Princess, was speechless at this request.
It wasn't because the talk of giving up the second child was a stain on de Carlo's reputation or anything of that kind.
'Two...?'
First of all, he had doubts about whether the two children could do as they pleased.
'Will Ari give birth to two? Should she say she will?'
The future son-in-law's eyes wavered.
Cardinal de Mare misinterpreted this as an excessive demand on his part. The old fox quickly took a step back.
“Oh, by independence, I don’t mean changing the surname to de Mare or depriving the de Carlo family of their inheritance rights. I just want the Count of de Mare to be maintained as an independent family, not as one of the titles attached to the royal family and passed down from generation to generation. Please don’t misunderstand.”
Of course, that's not what he meant when he first said it.
They wanted to give him an independent title and give me de Mare instead of Saint Carlo, but he can tolerate that much.
The Cardinal grinned and pressed the Prince. Alfonso barely managed to answer. He had nothing else to say.
“Ari... let’s discuss it.”
Sir Manfredi, who had been bragging to Cardinal de Mare to trust only him, was flustered and at a loss when he had to talk to his butler, Niccolo, about how to reload and distribute the luggage to create the most efficient route.
When he was in Yesak, his adjutant was Elko, and now the person in charge of these miscellaneous household matters is Sir Bernardino. Sir Manfredi had no talent for administrative work.
It suited his nature to just run around with his sword in hand and do as he was told.
The struggling Sir Manfredi was the butler Nicolo's meal.
The story ends with the butler Nicolo skillfully coaxing and appeasing Sir Manfredi, and all the annoying tasks fall to Sir Manfredi.
But anyway, he finished everything the Prince asked him to do.
Sir Manfredi, who had barely caught his breath, lamented to Ariadne, who was waiting for him behind him.
“Oh my! This is really dizzying. If packing for a trip is this hard, how do you supply supplies on the battlefield?”
“Didn’t you do well in Yesak, though?”
“Well done! It was a mess. But it wasn’t just me, everyone else was a mess too, so it was just a bit disappointing.”
Sir Manfredi became excited and began to tell tales of his exploits on the battlefield.
Sir Manfredi, who was already very excited when meeting someone of high status, was thrilled to have the beautiful and high-ranking Countess Ariadne de Mare listen to his story.
“It wasn’t like we were the only ones who were bad. Those Porto Republic guys who were so showy were also a mess.”
“Why? Did you give me some rotten bread?”
“Stale bread is basically eaten.”
Sir Manfredi, who had tried to act tough, told the story of how Ariadne had mistakenly received a letter from the Republic of Porto, not even dreaming that if Ariadne had to distribute stale bread, she might feed it to Sir Manfredi first.
“They were talking about controlling the supply lines without any errors! And then... didn’t we get broken off because I didn’t send the letter?”
“Ah. I’m so sorry about what happened with Miss Bedelia.”
“Oh my... That too. There’s so much to talk about.”
Sir Manfredi trembled as if he had been wronged by what he had said.
“You said I didn’t send it, but that’s not true. I did send a letter, but the Republic of Porto was in charge of sending and receiving the letter?”
“You were in charge of all the distribution and communication.”
“I had collected all the letters to be sent to the Central Continent and taken them with me. The letter I sent to Miss Bedelia was also there.”
Sir Manfredi boasted about how carefully he wrote the letter, kept it safe, and sent it to Miss Bedelia on the regular ship that came once a month.
“But then, the following month, a ship came back from the Central Continent and each person was given their own letter to take back, but didn’t my letter come back intact?”
“Did Miss Bedelia return it, or did it come back without being delivered at all?”
“I believe it was returned by Miss Bedelia. It was clearly a sealed letter, but it was torn open when it came back. It was with a letter-cutting knife or something.”
Ariadne's eyes narrowed.
“And there was no reply or anything?”
“Yes, nothing... I think there were traces of it being taken out and read, but the paper was a bit haphazardly crumpled.”
“But why didn’t Miss Bedelia receive the letter?”
“I don’t know about that! Isn’t it that she wanted to break off the engagement with me?”
Ariadne had always wondered whether the dead Elko had been the sole perpetrator of the complete impossibility of correspondence between her and Alfonso, or whether there had been some other, more serious accomplice.
“Did you ask Miss Bedelia?”
Sir Manfredi trailed off.
“Uh, not necessarily like that... No.”
It would not have been surprising if Elko had insisted on stealing the correspondence between Ariadne and Alfonso, while the correspondence of the other knights had been naturally lost.
Originally, it was difficult to expect letters or items crossing the sea to arrive safely, and letters from common knights would have been treated more harshly than those from direct royal families.
But there were also traces of tampering with Sir Manfredi's letter? Moreover, the fact that it was found not in Prince Alfonso's camp but in the territory of the Republic of Porto meant that it was not Elko who tampered with it, but a third person.
Ariadne looked at the sky. It had been quite some time since the morning rooster crowed, but there was still time until the church bells rang at noon.
“Please go to Rinaldi’s house.”
"Yes?"
“This is a slow-moving carriage. If Sir Manfredi goes to the Rinaldi household right now and meets with Lady Bedelia, and then follows by horseback, we should be able to meet up a little after lunchtime.”
Sir Manfredi began to stutter.
“No, I, I, I’m an adjutant. I have to look after carriages and things like that.”
His face turned pale and then bright red. It felt like his cheek, where Bedelia had been hit last time, was starting to sting again.
“I, I, I have to take charge of that too.”
He finally asked with a tearful face.
“What on earth am I going to say to Miss Bedelia now?”
Ariadne specified simply.
“What can you say? Ask Miss Bedelia whether she really never received the letter, and tell her the date it was sent and that it was opened.”
She gave a sharp rebuke to Sir Manfredi, whose face was still flushed.
“Who wants to go back and date again? This is work, work.”
Nevertheless, while Sir Manfredi was mumbling with a sad face, Alfonso, who had finished his walk with Cardinal de Mare, appeared.
He followed Ariadne's side as if it were a dog returning home after a walk.
"Ari!"
Alfonso pulled Ariadne around the waist and hugged her, gently kissing her forehead. He must have even gotten permission from his father-in-law to do so, so there was nothing he could do.
Ariadne took Alfonso's arm and pointed to Sir Manfredi.
“I’d like to ask him to do something in the morning. Is that okay? He’s stopping by one of the noble houses in San Carlo, so he can join our group in the afternoon.”
Sir Manfredi opened his mouth and looked at Ariadne. Prince Alfonso gestured without looking back at Manfredi.
“Have a nice trip.”
Manfredi jumped.
“Your Highness! You didn’t even ask what’s going on! I only listen to your orders, and the Knights’ chain of command is...”
As Manfredi began his first sentence, Alfonso slowly turned to the side.
The tower-like upper body faced Sir Manfredi head-on. Sir Manfredi gulped.
Prince Alfonso's expression was terrifying.
'This is the face I made when I was made to roll around the parade ground 30 times...'
Fortunately, Alfonso said only one word without mentioning the parade ground.
“Have a nice trip.”
Sir Manfredi immediately saluted loudly.
"Yep!"
And it was not in the afternoon of that day that Sir Manfredi, who had set out on the Rinaldi route, caught up with the party that had set out north first, but at the agreed-upon first night's lodging place.
Previous Next
“I’m sorry for asking such a difficult question.”
“...”
“Of course, even if I were excommunicated and my name was erased from all documents, and my living body were to wander the streets and die, and everyone would throw stones at de Mare’s blood relatives, I know that it would not be difficult at all for the Prince to take my daughter in and keep her safe.”
Cardinal de Mare's voice was soft, but he looked at Prince Alfonso with intense eyes.
“But my daughter is not the type of child who would be satisfied with that. Do you understand what I mean?”
Ariadne was not a woman who wanted a position in government.
If that were her goal, she would have achieved it long ago. And in fact, what she wanted was not even status itself anymore.
If she had only wanted to be Queen, she would have become Leo III's second wife and already had the Queen's tiara on her head.
She wanted a full, upright man's side.
In Alfonso's opinion, she was the perfect woman to occupy such a position: large, neat, and elegant.
“I understand very well what you are saying.”
Prince Alfonso spoke with confidence.
“I will protect Ari well.”
Is it just to protect her? Isn't this journey to Trevero itself a journey to place a crown on her head that is worthy of her dignity?
“And her seat is right next to mine, in the Princess’s chair. Your Eminence, you don’t have to worry about that.”
A smile of relief crossed Cardinal de Mare's face, perhaps because he knew his daughter was in safe hands.
What he didn't think about was that, on the contrary, his own daughter could become wings for someone.
Cardinal de Mare believed that only he could play that role in the family.
“If only this old man had one more request.”
“Please speak.”
“If you have a second child, I would like you to give the child the title of de Mare and make him independent.”
Prince Alfonso opened his eyes wide and looked at Cardinal de Mare.
If Ariadne marries Alfonso and has children, the children will belong to the House of Charles, not to de Mare.
Prince Alfonso, who readily agreed to the very difficult request of taking the daughter of an excommunicated person as his Princess, was speechless at this request.
It wasn't because the talk of giving up the second child was a stain on de Carlo's reputation or anything of that kind.
'Two...?'
First of all, he had doubts about whether the two children could do as they pleased.
'Will Ari give birth to two? Should she say she will?'
The future son-in-law's eyes wavered.
Cardinal de Mare misinterpreted this as an excessive demand on his part. The old fox quickly took a step back.
“Oh, by independence, I don’t mean changing the surname to de Mare or depriving the de Carlo family of their inheritance rights. I just want the Count of de Mare to be maintained as an independent family, not as one of the titles attached to the royal family and passed down from generation to generation. Please don’t misunderstand.”
Of course, that's not what he meant when he first said it.
They wanted to give him an independent title and give me de Mare instead of Saint Carlo, but he can tolerate that much.
The Cardinal grinned and pressed the Prince. Alfonso barely managed to answer. He had nothing else to say.
“Ari... let’s discuss it.”
***
Sir Manfredi, who had been bragging to Cardinal de Mare to trust only him, was flustered and at a loss when he had to talk to his butler, Niccolo, about how to reload and distribute the luggage to create the most efficient route.
When he was in Yesak, his adjutant was Elko, and now the person in charge of these miscellaneous household matters is Sir Bernardino. Sir Manfredi had no talent for administrative work.
It suited his nature to just run around with his sword in hand and do as he was told.
The struggling Sir Manfredi was the butler Nicolo's meal.
The story ends with the butler Nicolo skillfully coaxing and appeasing Sir Manfredi, and all the annoying tasks fall to Sir Manfredi.
But anyway, he finished everything the Prince asked him to do.
Sir Manfredi, who had barely caught his breath, lamented to Ariadne, who was waiting for him behind him.
“Oh my! This is really dizzying. If packing for a trip is this hard, how do you supply supplies on the battlefield?”
“Didn’t you do well in Yesak, though?”
“Well done! It was a mess. But it wasn’t just me, everyone else was a mess too, so it was just a bit disappointing.”
Sir Manfredi became excited and began to tell tales of his exploits on the battlefield.
Sir Manfredi, who was already very excited when meeting someone of high status, was thrilled to have the beautiful and high-ranking Countess Ariadne de Mare listen to his story.
“It wasn’t like we were the only ones who were bad. Those Porto Republic guys who were so showy were also a mess.”
“Why? Did you give me some rotten bread?”
“Stale bread is basically eaten.”
Sir Manfredi, who had tried to act tough, told the story of how Ariadne had mistakenly received a letter from the Republic of Porto, not even dreaming that if Ariadne had to distribute stale bread, she might feed it to Sir Manfredi first.
“They were talking about controlling the supply lines without any errors! And then... didn’t we get broken off because I didn’t send the letter?”
“Ah. I’m so sorry about what happened with Miss Bedelia.”
“Oh my... That too. There’s so much to talk about.”
Sir Manfredi trembled as if he had been wronged by what he had said.
“You said I didn’t send it, but that’s not true. I did send a letter, but the Republic of Porto was in charge of sending and receiving the letter?”
“You were in charge of all the distribution and communication.”
“I had collected all the letters to be sent to the Central Continent and taken them with me. The letter I sent to Miss Bedelia was also there.”
Sir Manfredi boasted about how carefully he wrote the letter, kept it safe, and sent it to Miss Bedelia on the regular ship that came once a month.
“But then, the following month, a ship came back from the Central Continent and each person was given their own letter to take back, but didn’t my letter come back intact?”
“Did Miss Bedelia return it, or did it come back without being delivered at all?”
“I believe it was returned by Miss Bedelia. It was clearly a sealed letter, but it was torn open when it came back. It was with a letter-cutting knife or something.”
Ariadne's eyes narrowed.
“And there was no reply or anything?”
“Yes, nothing... I think there were traces of it being taken out and read, but the paper was a bit haphazardly crumpled.”
“But why didn’t Miss Bedelia receive the letter?”
“I don’t know about that! Isn’t it that she wanted to break off the engagement with me?”
Ariadne had always wondered whether the dead Elko had been the sole perpetrator of the complete impossibility of correspondence between her and Alfonso, or whether there had been some other, more serious accomplice.
“Did you ask Miss Bedelia?”
Sir Manfredi trailed off.
“Uh, not necessarily like that... No.”
It would not have been surprising if Elko had insisted on stealing the correspondence between Ariadne and Alfonso, while the correspondence of the other knights had been naturally lost.
Originally, it was difficult to expect letters or items crossing the sea to arrive safely, and letters from common knights would have been treated more harshly than those from direct royal families.
But there were also traces of tampering with Sir Manfredi's letter? Moreover, the fact that it was found not in Prince Alfonso's camp but in the territory of the Republic of Porto meant that it was not Elko who tampered with it, but a third person.
Ariadne looked at the sky. It had been quite some time since the morning rooster crowed, but there was still time until the church bells rang at noon.
“Please go to Rinaldi’s house.”
"Yes?"
“This is a slow-moving carriage. If Sir Manfredi goes to the Rinaldi household right now and meets with Lady Bedelia, and then follows by horseback, we should be able to meet up a little after lunchtime.”
Sir Manfredi began to stutter.
“No, I, I, I’m an adjutant. I have to look after carriages and things like that.”
His face turned pale and then bright red. It felt like his cheek, where Bedelia had been hit last time, was starting to sting again.
“I, I, I have to take charge of that too.”
He finally asked with a tearful face.
“What on earth am I going to say to Miss Bedelia now?”
Ariadne specified simply.
“What can you say? Ask Miss Bedelia whether she really never received the letter, and tell her the date it was sent and that it was opened.”
She gave a sharp rebuke to Sir Manfredi, whose face was still flushed.
“Who wants to go back and date again? This is work, work.”
Nevertheless, while Sir Manfredi was mumbling with a sad face, Alfonso, who had finished his walk with Cardinal de Mare, appeared.
He followed Ariadne's side as if it were a dog returning home after a walk.
"Ari!"
Alfonso pulled Ariadne around the waist and hugged her, gently kissing her forehead. He must have even gotten permission from his father-in-law to do so, so there was nothing he could do.
Ariadne took Alfonso's arm and pointed to Sir Manfredi.
“I’d like to ask him to do something in the morning. Is that okay? He’s stopping by one of the noble houses in San Carlo, so he can join our group in the afternoon.”
Sir Manfredi opened his mouth and looked at Ariadne. Prince Alfonso gestured without looking back at Manfredi.
“Have a nice trip.”
Manfredi jumped.
“Your Highness! You didn’t even ask what’s going on! I only listen to your orders, and the Knights’ chain of command is...”
As Manfredi began his first sentence, Alfonso slowly turned to the side.
The tower-like upper body faced Sir Manfredi head-on. Sir Manfredi gulped.
Prince Alfonso's expression was terrifying.
'This is the face I made when I was made to roll around the parade ground 30 times...'
Fortunately, Alfonso said only one word without mentioning the parade ground.
“Have a nice trip.”
Sir Manfredi immediately saluted loudly.
"Yep!"
And it was not in the afternoon of that day that Sir Manfredi, who had set out on the Rinaldi route, caught up with the party that had set out north first, but at the agreed-upon first night's lodging place.
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