The place Sir Manfredi returned to after trudging was the castle of a minor lord who had been dispatched as a place to stay. He saluted Prince Alfonso, who was occupying the largest bedroom.
“Manfredi, back in the unit!”
After dinner, Alfonso dismissed all his entourage and was having a cup of tea with Ariadne.
He answered blandly, not even looking up at Sir Manfredi as he was cleaning his two-handed greatsword, Kaledbuch.
“Manfredi, it’s later than I thought.”
“Because I work very meticulously.”
He glanced over to make sure there were no outsiders, including the original owner of the castle, and then took out a letter and threw it down on the table. He looked exhausted.
Sir Manfredi reported not to Prince Alfonso, who was unaware of the whole story anyway, but to Countess de Mare, who was sitting next to him.
“...My Lady, you were right. Miss Bedelia never received the letter I sent her.”
Sir Manfredi, who burst into the Rinaldi household wearing full armor, was almost struck by Count Rinaldi with a longsword.
Count Rinaldi had a habit of attacking anyone he didn't like with his sword.
Sir Manfredi jumped up, took off his helmet, and explained that he had come by order of His Royal Highness the Prince to ask Lady Bedelia de Rinaldi something, and only after that was he allowed in.
Miss Bedelia, who resembled her father in her belligerence, also attempted to attack.
As soon as her ex-fiancé showed up in the living room of her house, she tried to slap him again.
Fortunately, her advance was blocked by the Sergeant Jump of Sir Manfredi, who had not forgotten the pain of the slap he received the previous time and was protecting his body from the moment of entry.
“I got the letter? You liar! No matter what you say, something that is not true will not become true! Let go of my hand! You deserve to be beaten!”
Miss Bedelia refused to listen to his explanation at all.
Sir Manfredi, who was not prepared to go straight to Count Rinaldi's house after leaving the de Mare mansion, stopped by his parents' house in the capital and took the open envelope letter he had sent, which turned out to be a stroke of genius.
Miss Bedelia, who had stubbornly denied Sir Manfredi's claims, was now speechless upon receiving the tattered old envelope.
She read the letter quietly.
The content of the letter was as usual from Sir Manfredi. It was rambling and pointless. But one paragraph caught her eye.
"This endless desert is truly a weary, tiring, and tedious land. I dare to use the word hopeless. When I think of waking up tomorrow and facing this dust and pagans again, I even lament, "Oh, why didn't the Lord take my life today?"
At such times, I think of Miss Bedelia. I think of the conversations we shared, of the future we talked about together, and of the support I will receive from this mission for you and our child.
No, actually, it's not that far in the future, is it? You are the only reason I'm alive and breathing today. "
Miss Bedelia burst into tears, holding the letter in both hands.
The young man who had received the summons on his behalf was standing by the side of the dying man. He spoke softly to the envoy of the Holy See.
“As you can see, I am in no position to go. The abbot of Aberruche...”
Anyone could see that he was about to receive the call of heaven. But the envoy of the Holy See was resolute.
“The Holy See has ordered that if you do not comply with this summons, you must be prepared to be excommunicated.”
The young man in the plain robe did not answer, for what he had wanted to say—what good would it do if he were dead?—was most inappropriate for a priest.
“Vice-Director!”
Meanwhile, the young priest who was holding the hand of the dying Abbot of Aberruche cried out in surprise.
“The abbot, the abbot...!”
The young man put his hand under the old abbot's nose and nodded slowly.
“He has passed away.”
The man made the sign of the cross with his pure white hands.
“May the soul of the abbot be guided by the heavens to a good land.”
"Amen."
"Amen."
Everyone present made the sign of the cross after him. The envoy of the Holy See did the same.
The envoy made the sign of the cross and bowed his head with a slightly embarrassed expression.
The priests of the Abbey of Aberruche hastily covered the corpse's face with a hastily brought shroud and then placed it whole in a coffin that had been prepared in advance.
The young man asked the representative of the Holy See.
“...Is it now certain that the abbot cannot respond to the summons to Trevero? We must make funeral arrangements, so please go back now.”
But even the death of the abbot was no shield against the summons from the center.
“I have received orders from His Holiness the Pope to summon the director of the Abbey of Aberruche to Trevero!”
The summons of a Cardinal may be trampled upon, but the command of the Pope, who can pronounce excommunication, cannot be ignored.
The envoy of the Holy See looked the young man up and down haughtily.
“It doesn’t matter if it’s a fluffy baby or something.”
It would have been better if a young fox had come instead of an old fox.
“If the representative cannot come, the entire monastery will be excommunicated.”
The people preparing the funeral for the abbot flinched and shook at the mention of the 'excommunication'. The young man asked in a calm voice.
“Is it okay for a representative to just go?”
"Exactly."
“Then I will go.”
At those words, the young detectives became agitated and clung to the young man.
“Vice-Director!”
“If it’s because of us, you don’t have to do that!”
“What if those people harm the deputy director?”
However, the envoy of the Holy See asked him in an overbearing tone, as if asking if he had the right to represent them.
“Who are you?”
“I am the sub-abbot of the Abbey of Aberruche.”
“Your name, your name.”
The young man took off the hood of the robe he was wearing. His dazzling white skin and even whiter silver hair reflected the candlelight and glowed softly.
“I am Raphael de Baldessar, the sub-abbot of the Abbey of Aberruche.”
Alfonso and Ariadne's journey to Trevero was impeccable, except for the oppressive late summer heat.
Because of the eyes of others, Ariadne spent more time with the Cardinal in the de Mare family's carriage than with Prince Alfonso.
“You have to cut down all the roots of the grass.”
When Ariadne asked about CEO Caruso's work as if it were a friend's business, the Cardinal answered firmly.
“Even though it’s a fight I can’t win?”
The Cardinal looked at her with green eyes that were identical to Ariadne's.
“Are you going to just lie flat on your stomach for the rest of your life?”
Ariadne was startled by her father's gaze.
“If I’m weak, the best way to do it is to hide in plain sight. But the fight has already started.”
"Yes."
“Then you have to do your best to bite them. If you stay still, neither soup nor bread will work. Even if you are a rat attacking a cat, you have to clearly show the other person that you are a rat with very sharp teeth, so they won’t attack you again.”
Cardinal de Mare's attitude towards Ariadne was certainly different from before.
“All the important documents in the house are kept in a secret safe in my study.”
“Is there a secret safe in that study?”
It was the first time Ariadne heard about it. The Cardinal explained it in detail.
“If you look under my desk, you’ll see that the floor is a little different. It opens like a lid. You just have to go down the ladder. It was made in advance when we built it.”
The Cardinal added.
“That’s why the central staircase in our house is a bit higher than others. We had to secure the ceiling height.”
Ariadne opened her eyes wide and looked at her father.
“I never dreamed of it.”
Cardinal de Mare nodded.
“That’s fortunate.”
At the time he built this mansion, he was a bishop who had just come to the capital, so he could not do things like kill all the workers who were mobilized for the construction or cripple the designer.
It was purely a matter of luck whether or not the secret facility would be revealed to others, and if even his own talented daughter didn't know about it, then he would have been successful.
“In it, there is money I owe to others and...”
There was evidence that Count Cesare de Como had been given the identity of Duke Cesare de Carlo, the son of the King's younger brother, who was a vain man.
Cardinal de Mare was a very meticulous man, and he had the habit of keeping some of the new parchments he bought each year in a separate place while they were still new.
The most difficult part about forging documents was that if you used new paper, the degree of fading would be different and would be obvious at a glance.
To avoid being caught, he purchased and stacked the very same parchment used by the Holy See each year.
“Well, there’s a lot of stuff inside. Open it when I’m dead.”
When Leo III learned of Cardinal de Mare's meticulousness in the affair of Duke Cesare's laundering of his estate, he was greatly pleased.
As expected, the Cardinal's work is the best in San Carlo, and no one will find out.
The newly forged birth certificate of Leo III's nonexistent younger brother was completely complete.
Cesare's birth register, stored in the basement of the Holy See, could not be completely swapped because it also contained other people's names. Instead, it was forged by carefully changing the father's name after cutting off a thin layer of the register.
However, the very thinly sliced birth register of Cesare remains a time bomb in Cardinal de Mare's safe, ready to explode at any moment.
“How to open it is like this and...”
The Cardinal handed over the half key from his bosom.
The real key was still kept by him, but he was given a spare key in case he was suddenly arrested and had no chance to hand it over.
Ariadne took it and examined it closely.
It was made of copper, and the grooves on its vertical surface showed that two of them were joined together to form a single key and could be turned.
It had a blue rust tint to it, indicating it had not been used often.
“Ask the butler after I die.”
Just as Ariadne was about to answer, the carriage came to a screeching halt. As she opened the curtain on the window and looked outside, Cardinal de Mare spoke calmly.
“It’s Trevero.”
Before Ariadne's eyes appeared a magnificent golden wall and an even taller, steep spire.
It was an overwhelming majesty she had never seen before.
In San Carlo, the loosely laid-out architecture along the hillside was at its best, and as a result, the walls and spires of Trevero seen today are taller than any building in San Carlo.
At the top of the spire was a huge cross with the gon of Yesak hanging from it.
Yesak's Gon, cast in gold, looked down at the group with compassionate eyes.
Ariadne gasped in excitement.
'This is... Trevero...!'
“Manfredi, back in the unit!”
After dinner, Alfonso dismissed all his entourage and was having a cup of tea with Ariadne.
He answered blandly, not even looking up at Sir Manfredi as he was cleaning his two-handed greatsword, Kaledbuch.
“Manfredi, it’s later than I thought.”
“Because I work very meticulously.”
He glanced over to make sure there were no outsiders, including the original owner of the castle, and then took out a letter and threw it down on the table. He looked exhausted.
Sir Manfredi reported not to Prince Alfonso, who was unaware of the whole story anyway, but to Countess de Mare, who was sitting next to him.
“...My Lady, you were right. Miss Bedelia never received the letter I sent her.”
***
Sir Manfredi, who burst into the Rinaldi household wearing full armor, was almost struck by Count Rinaldi with a longsword.
Count Rinaldi had a habit of attacking anyone he didn't like with his sword.
Sir Manfredi jumped up, took off his helmet, and explained that he had come by order of His Royal Highness the Prince to ask Lady Bedelia de Rinaldi something, and only after that was he allowed in.
Miss Bedelia, who resembled her father in her belligerence, also attempted to attack.
As soon as her ex-fiancé showed up in the living room of her house, she tried to slap him again.
Fortunately, her advance was blocked by the Sergeant Jump of Sir Manfredi, who had not forgotten the pain of the slap he received the previous time and was protecting his body from the moment of entry.
“I got the letter? You liar! No matter what you say, something that is not true will not become true! Let go of my hand! You deserve to be beaten!”
Miss Bedelia refused to listen to his explanation at all.
Sir Manfredi, who was not prepared to go straight to Count Rinaldi's house after leaving the de Mare mansion, stopped by his parents' house in the capital and took the open envelope letter he had sent, which turned out to be a stroke of genius.
Miss Bedelia, who had stubbornly denied Sir Manfredi's claims, was now speechless upon receiving the tattered old envelope.
She read the letter quietly.
The content of the letter was as usual from Sir Manfredi. It was rambling and pointless. But one paragraph caught her eye.
"This endless desert is truly a weary, tiring, and tedious land. I dare to use the word hopeless. When I think of waking up tomorrow and facing this dust and pagans again, I even lament, "Oh, why didn't the Lord take my life today?"
At such times, I think of Miss Bedelia. I think of the conversations we shared, of the future we talked about together, and of the support I will receive from this mission for you and our child.
No, actually, it's not that far in the future, is it? You are the only reason I'm alive and breathing today. "
Miss Bedelia burst into tears, holding the letter in both hands.
***
The young man who had received the summons on his behalf was standing by the side of the dying man. He spoke softly to the envoy of the Holy See.
“As you can see, I am in no position to go. The abbot of Aberruche...”
Anyone could see that he was about to receive the call of heaven. But the envoy of the Holy See was resolute.
“The Holy See has ordered that if you do not comply with this summons, you must be prepared to be excommunicated.”
The young man in the plain robe did not answer, for what he had wanted to say—what good would it do if he were dead?—was most inappropriate for a priest.
“Vice-Director!”
Meanwhile, the young priest who was holding the hand of the dying Abbot of Aberruche cried out in surprise.
“The abbot, the abbot...!”
The young man put his hand under the old abbot's nose and nodded slowly.
“He has passed away.”
The man made the sign of the cross with his pure white hands.
“May the soul of the abbot be guided by the heavens to a good land.”
"Amen."
"Amen."
Everyone present made the sign of the cross after him. The envoy of the Holy See did the same.
The envoy made the sign of the cross and bowed his head with a slightly embarrassed expression.
The priests of the Abbey of Aberruche hastily covered the corpse's face with a hastily brought shroud and then placed it whole in a coffin that had been prepared in advance.
The young man asked the representative of the Holy See.
“...Is it now certain that the abbot cannot respond to the summons to Trevero? We must make funeral arrangements, so please go back now.”
But even the death of the abbot was no shield against the summons from the center.
“I have received orders from His Holiness the Pope to summon the director of the Abbey of Aberruche to Trevero!”
The summons of a Cardinal may be trampled upon, but the command of the Pope, who can pronounce excommunication, cannot be ignored.
The envoy of the Holy See looked the young man up and down haughtily.
“It doesn’t matter if it’s a fluffy baby or something.”
It would have been better if a young fox had come instead of an old fox.
“If the representative cannot come, the entire monastery will be excommunicated.”
The people preparing the funeral for the abbot flinched and shook at the mention of the 'excommunication'. The young man asked in a calm voice.
“Is it okay for a representative to just go?”
"Exactly."
“Then I will go.”
At those words, the young detectives became agitated and clung to the young man.
“Vice-Director!”
“If it’s because of us, you don’t have to do that!”
“What if those people harm the deputy director?”
However, the envoy of the Holy See asked him in an overbearing tone, as if asking if he had the right to represent them.
“Who are you?”
“I am the sub-abbot of the Abbey of Aberruche.”
“Your name, your name.”
The young man took off the hood of the robe he was wearing. His dazzling white skin and even whiter silver hair reflected the candlelight and glowed softly.
“I am Raphael de Baldessar, the sub-abbot of the Abbey of Aberruche.”
***
Alfonso and Ariadne's journey to Trevero was impeccable, except for the oppressive late summer heat.
Because of the eyes of others, Ariadne spent more time with the Cardinal in the de Mare family's carriage than with Prince Alfonso.
“You have to cut down all the roots of the grass.”
When Ariadne asked about CEO Caruso's work as if it were a friend's business, the Cardinal answered firmly.
“Even though it’s a fight I can’t win?”
The Cardinal looked at her with green eyes that were identical to Ariadne's.
“Are you going to just lie flat on your stomach for the rest of your life?”
Ariadne was startled by her father's gaze.
“If I’m weak, the best way to do it is to hide in plain sight. But the fight has already started.”
"Yes."
“Then you have to do your best to bite them. If you stay still, neither soup nor bread will work. Even if you are a rat attacking a cat, you have to clearly show the other person that you are a rat with very sharp teeth, so they won’t attack you again.”
Cardinal de Mare's attitude towards Ariadne was certainly different from before.
“All the important documents in the house are kept in a secret safe in my study.”
“Is there a secret safe in that study?”
It was the first time Ariadne heard about it. The Cardinal explained it in detail.
“If you look under my desk, you’ll see that the floor is a little different. It opens like a lid. You just have to go down the ladder. It was made in advance when we built it.”
The Cardinal added.
“That’s why the central staircase in our house is a bit higher than others. We had to secure the ceiling height.”
Ariadne opened her eyes wide and looked at her father.
“I never dreamed of it.”
Cardinal de Mare nodded.
“That’s fortunate.”
At the time he built this mansion, he was a bishop who had just come to the capital, so he could not do things like kill all the workers who were mobilized for the construction or cripple the designer.
It was purely a matter of luck whether or not the secret facility would be revealed to others, and if even his own talented daughter didn't know about it, then he would have been successful.
“In it, there is money I owe to others and...”
There was evidence that Count Cesare de Como had been given the identity of Duke Cesare de Carlo, the son of the King's younger brother, who was a vain man.
Cardinal de Mare was a very meticulous man, and he had the habit of keeping some of the new parchments he bought each year in a separate place while they were still new.
The most difficult part about forging documents was that if you used new paper, the degree of fading would be different and would be obvious at a glance.
To avoid being caught, he purchased and stacked the very same parchment used by the Holy See each year.
“Well, there’s a lot of stuff inside. Open it when I’m dead.”
When Leo III learned of Cardinal de Mare's meticulousness in the affair of Duke Cesare's laundering of his estate, he was greatly pleased.
As expected, the Cardinal's work is the best in San Carlo, and no one will find out.
The newly forged birth certificate of Leo III's nonexistent younger brother was completely complete.
Cesare's birth register, stored in the basement of the Holy See, could not be completely swapped because it also contained other people's names. Instead, it was forged by carefully changing the father's name after cutting off a thin layer of the register.
However, the very thinly sliced birth register of Cesare remains a time bomb in Cardinal de Mare's safe, ready to explode at any moment.
“How to open it is like this and...”
The Cardinal handed over the half key from his bosom.
The real key was still kept by him, but he was given a spare key in case he was suddenly arrested and had no chance to hand it over.
Ariadne took it and examined it closely.
It was made of copper, and the grooves on its vertical surface showed that two of them were joined together to form a single key and could be turned.
It had a blue rust tint to it, indicating it had not been used often.
“Ask the butler after I die.”
Just as Ariadne was about to answer, the carriage came to a screeching halt. As she opened the curtain on the window and looked outside, Cardinal de Mare spoke calmly.
“It’s Trevero.”
Before Ariadne's eyes appeared a magnificent golden wall and an even taller, steep spire.
It was an overwhelming majesty she had never seen before.
In San Carlo, the loosely laid-out architecture along the hillside was at its best, and as a result, the walls and spires of Trevero seen today are taller than any building in San Carlo.
At the top of the spire was a huge cross with the gon of Yesak hanging from it.
Yesak's Gon, cast in gold, looked down at the group with compassionate eyes.
Ariadne gasped in excitement.
'This is... Trevero...!'
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