Frustrations of a Self-Proclaimed Villain Lord Chapter 52: The Grand Duke Meets the Crown Prince at Night (

"No, I do not."

I raised my brow at his straightforward answer.

How bold.

I liked that, a little. Not that it would change anything, though.

The Crown Prince unfolded the docunt and pushed it toward . It was a copy of the palace audience schedule. There were several nas were listed with most of them being ordinary court officials. Near the lower section, Lord Keeper Marcellus’s request had been marked deferred by empress authority.

Deferred.

A polite word for being blocked at the door.

"Has this happened before?" I asked.

"Rarely. My mother does not usually interfere with archival matters unless sothing touches imperial security."

"Then perhaps sothing has touched imperial security."

"Did sothing really?"

"Your Highness is asking whether I caused this."

"I am asking whether sothing happened outside the palace today."

Oh. He had heard, then. Perhaps with a lack of the fine details. But just enough for him to summon to the palace and ask. It looks like the Capital had ears, and palace ears were larger than most.

"Many things happened outside the palace," I said nonchalantly. I’m not lying either. Listing the things that are bothering so far, it could be counted as a lot. And the majority of it were inconveniences.

"Your Excellency." The Crown Prince said in a low, warning voice.

My tone retained its nonchalance. I’m not the one asking for things in the conversation, after all.

"Your Highness."

His eyes narrowed. "I am not asking as a prince trying to trap you."

"No. You are asking as a man that has realized the room has more doors than he was told."

That silenced him. His gaze lowered to the docunt.

After a mont, he said, "Last night, after the vault, I had another episode."

Another, huh? That just confird my suspicions. No wonder he was so panicked.

"Describe it."

The Crown Prince looked up. There was a slight pause, as if he had not expected to respond like a physician asking for symptoms rather than a noble avoiding involvent.

"My chest felt tight. My limbs went cold. I heard... ringing."

I tilted my head a little at this. "Ringing?"

"Yes. Like bells underwater."

Interesting.

"And?"

His fingers curled on the desk.

"I... had a dream."

I waited for his next words but he did not continue.

I sighed. "Your Highness, if you summoned privately in the middle of the night only to beco shy now, I will be very disappointed. I dislike wasting my ti, you see."

His lips pressed together as if unsure how he will actually continue. Then, to his credit, he spoke. Probably afraid that I will suddenly just go on my way and leave, which to be fair is a valid fear. I can and will actually do such a thing.

"I dread of a door beneath sunlight. Not ordinary sunlight. It was gold. A bright gold. I could not open it, but sothing behind it was calling."

"Calling what?"

"My na."

"Huh? Adrien?"

He shook his head slowly. My interest was piqued.

"What na?"

"I do not know."

I pursed my lip subtly. "How convenient."

"It felt..." He stopped, searching. "It felt like it belonged to , but I had forgotten it."

Ah. Alright. Now that was unpleasantly familiar. I suddenly recalled the field of white flowers, the laughing voice and the na I could not hear.

I maintained my pleasant expression through sheer discipline.

"Anything else?"

"The symbol appeared."

Although, I already had an inkling as to what symbol it was, I still made a show of asking.

"Which symbol?"

He reached into his desk drawer and pulled out a small sketch. A circle split by a descending line with three small marks beneath.

The sa symbol as we have seen so far.

"Where did you see it?" I asked.

"In the dream. It was carved on the door."

Great! Because this situation had not yet offended enough, it made it a mission to escalate things even more than it currently is.

"Have you seen it before?"

"Yes."

I stilled. Now that was sothing I didn’t expect. I have seen the mark just recently as we went deeper into investigating things.

"Where?"

His hand moved to his cuff. He hesitated for little but then unbuttoned it. Slowly, he pulled the sleeve back.

The skin of his wrist was marked.

It was not a tattoo or even a scar. The symbol rely laid itself beneath the Crown Prince’s skin, faint as old ink, the dark gold lines barely visible until the lamplight struck them. Around it were thin branching marks, like cracks spreading through porcelain.

My eyes narrowed.

"How long has that been there?"

"Since... I was ten."

The sa age the old warding formations were installed in his residence. That was both interesting and concerning. I find the two to be an unpleasant pairing.

"Does it hurt?"

"Yes, sotis."

"When does it hurt?"

"When I use too much mana or when I enter certain temple grounds. Sotis when old relics are nearby." His mouth tightened. "Or... when I lie too close to death."

"Ah, how poetic." I comnted on that last statent.

"Not intentionally."

"That’s good. Intentional poetry during these kinds of disclosure would be unbearable."

For so reason, he laughed faintly. Then he covered the mark again. I had a feeling that showing it bothered him more than it did , the audience.

"Do you know what it is?" he asked.

"No. I don’t. Even if I wanted to, I don’t know where to start."

His expression dimd.

"I know what it is connected to," I added as if I was only telling him about the weather.

He looked up sharply.

"Last night, that mark reacted to the black-gold relic in the lower vault. The sa symbol appeared on the relic’s box. Today, I found the symbol elsewhere."

His posture straightened. "Where?"

"At a chapel tied to a child transfer network."

The Crown Prince went still, seemingly unable to wrap his golden head around my words.

"What?"

I watched him carefully.

"The House of Gentle rcy and the Chapel of Saint Orwen have been involved in assessing and transferring children based on mana sensitivity, aura response, spiritual compatibility, and other unpleasant criteria. Three children were intercepted before dawn. The chapel’s underground chamber contained records, talismans, and that particular symbol."

His face lost more color.

"Children."

He murmured in disbelief

"Yes."

"How many?"

"Enough that I am annoyed."

His eyes lifted to mine. For a mont, there was no prince there. No polished heir and no careful political animal testing whether Sonomi could be trusted.

There was simply rage.

Good.

I did not like weak pity. Pity sat around weeping into handkerchiefs. Rage moved and if properly trained, it could cut whoever and whatever it is directed to.

"Who is responsible?" he asked.

"That is what I am currently determining."

"Tell what you found."

"Your Highness, information has cost."

I replied drumming my hands at my lap with a faint smile.

His eyes sharpened. "What do you want?"

That’s a better question.

"Access."

"To what?"

"Palace records. Temple correspondence. Anything linked to Lord Keeper Marcellus, the Chapel of Saint Orwen, the House of Gentle rcy, and the old symbol on your wrist."

His jaw tightened. "That is not simple."

"Nothing worthwhile is ever simple."

"If I move too openly, my mother will know."

"She already knows more than you think."

He looked away. There was a flash of pain again in his face.

An expression of a child, however grown he was, when discovering that the adults around him had built walls around him in the na of protection.

I knew the feeling.

My parents kept secrets too. The difference was that mine did it with enough competence and affection that I only beca moderately resentful.

The imperial family seed less efficient in emotional managent.

How tragic for them.

"Do you trust her?" I asked.

The Crown Prince did not answer imdiately.

Then, quietly, "I do not know."

How honest. I should give him another point.

"Do you believe she ans to harm you?"

"No."

That answer ca faster.

"Then do you believe she is willing to control you?"

His silence answered my question before he even uttered a word.

I nodded. "Then you can treat her as a powerful ally with conflicting priorities."

His mouth twisted. "That is cold."

"Politics was never warm. It would be stupid to think of it that way."

"And family?"

"Huh. Family makes politics worse."

He looked at , curious.

"Are you speaking from experience?"

"Well, if it counts, my parents are coming to the Capital."

His expression blanked for half a second.

Then he laughed. It startled him more than .

"You are worried about your parents? You? The Grand Duke of Sonomi?"

"Worried is too weak a word for it."

He looked almost delighted. "The Eastern King actually fears sothing?"

"Everyone fears sothing. I fear my mother very much."

That made him laugh again.

He looked younger when he laughed. Less like the future emperor. More like soone who might have been pleasant had the palace not wrapped him in gold thread and secrets.

It was a different picture. Alas, I preferred him politically useful, not sympathetic.

"You are fortunate," he said after a mont, voice softer. "To fear your mother in that way."

I did not respond. His words carried envy.

Heavy envy.

I could have mocked him. It would have been easy. But sothing in his tone made mockery feel inefficient. Besides, he doesn’t even know a smidgen of truth as to why I fear Lady Konstantin. Only those who have experienced it will know.

So I said, "Perhaps."

He looked toward the window. "My mother loves ."

"That sounds like a fact you are trying to convince yourself of."

"It is a fact."

"Then you should stop saying it like a defense."

His gaze snapped back to .

The room quieted.

Then he lowered his eyes.

"You truly are impolite, Duke Skandar."

"I have warned you about it."

"You said this was you being polite."

"True. It is."

A faint smile returned, but it did not last. He pulled another docunt from his desk. This one was older, its edges worn from repeated handling.

"This is the first record I found about my condition."

I accepted it. It was not a dical report. It was a prayer record from the imperial temple branch, dated eleven years ago. The language was formal and heavily coded, but certain phrases stood out clearly.

His vessel remains stable.

The mark has accepted the offering.

The fracture did not widen after the rite.

Continued suppression recomnded until ascension.

Ascension?

Is it referring to the coronation? Or sothing else entirely?

"What offering?" I asked.

The Crown Prince’s face beca cold. "I do not know."

"Who perford this rite?"

"The record nas three officials. One is dead. One retired. The last one beca Lord Keeper, Marcellus."

Ah. There he was again. That snake in archive robes. He was beginning to truly irritate .

"Marcellus was previously temple-affiliated?"

"Before becoming archive keeper, yes."

A temple man beca keeper of imperial archives. A priest under the sa old symbol signed off on the child transfers. The Crown Prince bore the symbol from a rite at ten years old. The relic beneath the palace reacted to him. The empress installed wards and Marcellus recently tried to see the emperor after the vault incident and was blocked.

The shape of the beast beneath the cloth beca clearer but it was still not enough.

I wanted it to solidify its form even more so I could hack it to pieces.

"Your Highness," I said, "did your symptoms begin before or after this rite?"

"Before. That is what I was told."

"What do you rember?"

He was silent. It felt like a dangerous silence.

"What do you rember?" I repeated.

His fingers curled.

"I rember being sick. I had high fevers. High enough to see shadows on the ceiling. I rember my mother crying when she thought I was asleep." His voice lowered. "I rember Father Caldus."

I stilled.

There it was. The chapel priest.

"You rember Caldus?"

"Yes. He was younger then. He stood near the bed and kept telling to listen for the blessing."

"Blessing? What blessing?"

The Crown Prince’s eyes turned distant.

"He said if I heard a voice call my na, I should answer."

The room chilled. Not physically. Not even magically.