Chapter 12

The woman disappeared suddenly in the same way that she would abruptly appear to rattle his life.

He didn’t hear it wrong. He never heard it wrong.

“…Was she hiding in the palace?”

For the past three years, he’d been continuously swayed by a woman who appeared one day like a storm. It wasn’t enough that he must scour the entire continent for a ring that he didn’t even know if it truly existed, but he must also succumb to earthly pleasures with her whenever she wanted.

The amount of shame for being weighed by her was insurmountable. Nevertheless, he cooperated without hesitation because she threatened him.

On the other hand, the memory of her crying when he first met her, when she was pleading to him… It kept lingering in his mind.

“F*ck.”

It was such a disgusting thought. Even when he was angry and couldn’t stand it any longer, the face of the woman who cried so forlornly overlapped with the vicious smile she had, and so he couldn’t resist.

As he entered the bathroom, he poured cold water over his head so that he could cool down.

He had a vague guess. Until a year ago, the girl who had been with him day and night, constantly absorbing his energy, disappeared at some point one morning. That time coincided with the period of staff selection at the palace. At first, he thought that she broke her promise and tried to seduce more men, but there weren’t any signs of that.

It was only today that his suspicions were slowly solidifying. Feeling strangely unpleasant, Odil bit his lower lip.

As he wore his uniform roughly, he loosened his tie and headed to the meeting room. Odil, who always arrived first without fail, sat on his chair, crossed his arms and closed his eyes.

If she was really in the palace—if he really found her… What then?

These thoughts that led to nothing were halted as they began to grate on his nerves again. Just in time, Ares and Endymion entered the room.

“Odil.”

“Good morning.”

Watching the two take their seats, Odil frowned. Organizing his chaotic thoughts was like ironing out a crumpled piece of paper to return it to its original state. Regulus, who was definitely sleeping in, had yet to come, but it was better if he wasn’t here to listen to what Odil had to say.

“That wicked woman is in the palace.”

Odil said nothing else, but Ares and Endymion instantly knew who he was talking about.

“Do you mean the succubus?”

“Ack— R-Really?”

“I’m sure. I think she managed to slip in when many people got hired last year. She made a slip of the tongue and ran away at dawn. Flustered.”

“Ran away? That woman?”

Both of them looked surprised when they heard that the woman—who acted however she wanted, shamelessly, irresponsibly—got flustered. And Endymion immediately furrowed his brow.

“That’s strange. It’s hard to say that we’d be able to find her in the palace.”

“…That’s right. Even if we search the entire palace, it would be difficult to comb through everyone. But if we think about it a little, we could at least take a guess.”

“That means she’s watching us closer than we think. Perhaps she’s among the people we’ve met so far, or among the people we regularly see.”

“…Heok!”

Ares gasped. Even Odil felt frustrated even as he talked to Endymion. It was infuriating, maddening. At one point, he was feeling this way again, and he had to hold himself back from cursing again.

There was no clear answer. They didn’t know how to find her, nor did they know what the hell to do. Odil just wanted to let them know.

When she slipped and revealed this information, the casual way she did so irritated him to no end because this was something that affected him so much, yet it was like nothing to her. That’s why he wanted to know, to some extent, who she was.

Endymion, who pretended that he was fine, spoke calmly—but there was a strange thirst running down his throat. Perhaps, maybe, it couldn’t be. But sometimes, he remembered the succubus having the same smile as someone else. With mixed feelings, he spoke.

“Odil. What are you going to do if we find the succubus?”

Odil frowned as though he had been stabbed. There was no way that he could say that he just wanted to see her.

As he hesitated unexpectedly, Endymion tilted his head to the side and smiled thinly. He thought that Odil would say something like killing her as soon as he found her, so Endymion was going to stop him somehow, but it didn’t seem like he needed to do that.

“Sorry, I overslept!”

While everyone was lost in thought, Regulus barged into the meeting room with a loud voice. Odil sighed when he saw his unkempt uniform and messy golden blond hair.

Nothing had been concluded, but it was clear that Ares and Endymion wanted to know who she was, just like Odil. Whether today or tomorrow, the succubus would come to them anyway.

Odil was slowly learning how to deal with her, even though he felt pathetic for never being able to resist.

“Wow, I’m really speechless. I’ve been working hard all this time.”

Damian, who was in the Kingdom of Evan at the southern end of the continent right now, and had been here for the past three months after leaving Ciel, crumpled the message sent by a carrier pigeon using his divine power.

Why was that person there when he’d been searching all this time?

In addition, the news brought to him just left him in a state of confusion.

Until a while ago, he was in a good mood because he was being treated kindly as a precious guest and given delicious food after a long time, and he couldn’t just be happy that the hardships of the past three years would end in vain.

“Sir, did you like the food?”

“Ah, yeah, it’s really good. I enjoyed the meal.”

However, he couldn’t vent his anger to the hostess who talked to him with a gentle smile, so he smiled back nicely and tried to soothe his mixed feelings. Then suddenly, the woman looked away, and he could see a lingering longing in her warm orange irises.

“Oh, I’m sorry, I thought I saw my daughter. I’d be glad to see her even for just a little while.”

“She must be far away.”

“…Yes, she’s very far away.”

Damian responded blithely and almost clicked his tongue at the sight of the woman with tears in her eyes. With him being good at sarcastic remarks but never words of comfort, spoke hurriedly.

“That, um, she’s probably in a good place. Ah, well, I was. On the reserve corps though. Would you like me to pray for your daughter?”

“Goodness, you’re a holy knight?”

“Not anymore, but I’m still a knight. I changed my nationality.”

He didn’t actually want to reveal that he was a holy knight, but this was the greatest kindness he could offer. Embarrassed by the sight of tears glistening in the woman’s eyes, he scratched his cheek and spoke.

“I’m from Ciel.”

“Oh, goodness. My daughter is in Ciel right now.”

“…?”

“She’s working at the palace. We exchange letters often, but it’s already been three years since I’ve seen her personally, so I don’t know if she’s doing well.”

“…Ah.”

Damian could feel his cheeks burning up. He thought that a healthy young woman was dead. No matter how fast one could travel between Evan and Ciel, it would take at least ten days, so the woman wasn’t wrong when she said it was a faraway place.

The woman smiled as she looked at Damian, but he only wondered if he made another mistake.

“So you’re a knight from Ciel. This must also be fate. If you don’t have a place to stay tonight, please take a rest here.”

“Is this place also an inn?”

“There’s one guest room free. Of course, you don’t need to pay a fee. There’s no one else coming from such a faraway place, so I just want to hear some stories. If you don’t mind, can you tell me some?”

“Then, alright. But since you prepared dinner and you’ll prepare breakfast for me, I’ll pay for the food separately.”

Originally, he was going to set off already this evening, but Damien was still feeling apologetic for thinking that the woman’s daughter was dead.

Looking at the hostess, he nodded gladly, and she was instantly delighted. Damian looked around the neat establishment. He didn’t know when he started liking it here, but he hummed quietly.

He couldn’t help but laugh. Because he had no family, he loved this atmosphere.

“What’s your daughter’s name?”

Damian’s voice was much softer now.

“It’s Lily. But oh, that’s a nickname. Her real name’s Lilith. Pretty, right?”

“Do you know which department she works in? I’ll greet her when I return to the palace.”

“Well, I didn’t ask her specifically, but she talks about books a lot, so I think she’s working at a library.”

He wasn’t familiar with the name, but it wouldn’t be difficult for him to find her since he knew she’s from the Kingdom of Evan. Seeing the woman smile happily, Damian was proud that he seemed to have done a good deed after a long time. But then, he also had a question.

“Why did your daughter go all the way to Ciel? Were there no jobs for her here?”

“Oh, we’re not originally from here. We lived in Spiruna before we moved here.”

“Ah.”

“I was separated from my daughter during the war, but I later found out that she’s in Ciel.”

There was no malice or resentment in her voice as she said this, but Damian felt awkward by himself.

Spiruna was one of the numerous kingdoms that was destroyed due to Ciel’s war of conquest. There were many people like the hostess who fled the country like her, but there were also people who died right then.

Damian usually didn’t care about this, but he felt strangely uncomfortable today.

“Don’t worry, sir knight. You don’t have a lot of luggage with you, but I’ll show you to your room first.”

The woman spoke as though she was really fine, but Damian could only think that she didn’t bring it up for no reason.

The room she guided him to was wider and cleaner than he thought. He was going to look around because he came here for the first time in a long while and had some time left. But Damian sat in an empty seat and silently said to himself, ‘It’s also been a while since I’ve been back.’