Chapter 95
“—Madam, please wake up.”
“…Mmm.”
“Duchess…!”
Min-ha opened her eyes at the sound of a voice calling her name. Feeling as if someone had placed a heavy stone on her head and lower back, she raised her upper body with one hand on her forehead.
However, she glanced down at her hands and let out a short exclamation of ‘Ah’ as she felt her left hand lift up and her right hand follow suit. Both arms were tied together with rope, and when she peered around, she could see that the place where she had fallen asleep a moment ago was inside a carriage with iron bars.
Covered with thin sheets of iron to keep out rain and snow, the carriage was open on all sides except for the bars, allowing the wind to blow in.
‘…That happened.’
Min-ha smiled bitterly as she looked at the surrounding scenery trapped behind the iron bars. Since she was being falsely accused of being a witch, she was now taken to the Imperial Palace. Realizing the reality, she barely got up and leaned her back against the iron grate.
‘…Was it because of the structure of this carriage that I smelled the scent of flowers in my dream?’
Smelling the scent of summer flowers carried by the breeze, Min-ha shook off the sleep that hadn’t yet passed and soon pulled her body away from the bars of a rattling carriage.
Whether it was because they were traveling on a rugged road through the mountains, or because the carriage was so focused on the purpose of thoroughly ‘loading’ that they didn’t take into account the discomfort of the riders, the shaking was palpable.
“Duchess, are you all right?!”
“….!”
As she frowned and moved to the center of the carriage, a voice called out to her. When she turned her head at the sound, she could see the figure of Bediviel on the other side of the road, riding in a carriage similar to the one she rode.
Fortunately, he seemed to have been treated.
Min-ha replied to Bediviel as she huddled her body next to the iron bars again.
“I’m fine! Is Sir Bediviel okay? How are you injured?”
“I’m fine.”
“What about Sir Gareth?”
“He’s here as well. He was awake until a while ago and fell asleep again.”
“Thank goodness, Really, I’m so glad… I thought if something happened to the two of you…”
Min-ha swallowed her tears when she saw Bediviel lifting up a white cloth wrapped around his legs and arms as if he was unharmed.
Their carriage was similar to the one she rode in, but it looked even more fearsome because of the thorns stuck in the iron bars. Seeing Gareth lying in the middle of such a carriage and Bediviel sitting beside him, her heart ached to the point of death.
As she cried, Bediviel, who had moved a little closer to the grate as if to comfort her, spoke with a worried face.
“That’s what we want to say. Do you have any idea how long the Duchess has been asleep?”
“…Yes? Did I sleep a lot?”
After being led by the imperial knights to the carriage, she buried her face and cried a little, but it seemed that she had fallen asleep and woken up just like that.
When Min-ha asked, searching for memories, Bediviel sighed and answered.
“You didn’t wake up for two days after getting into the carriage. We couldn’t sleep, waiting for the Duchess to wake up, but I forced Sir Gareth to lie down because his injuries were worse than mine and so he needed to rest.”
“…Oh, my god. Me? I’m sorry… still, you should’ve just rested whether I woke up or not! You’re not even in good condition, so why…”
“No. The Duchess has woken up, and that’s enough. Besides, how can we rest when our lordship’s precious person is unconscious?”
“I’m sorry, because of me…”
Two days… she didn’t think she’d been asleep that long. In addition, when Min-ha heard that the two people who had been injured hadn’t been able to sleep properly because of her, the feeling of sorry and guilt doubled.
At the sight of her lowering her head, Bediviel shook his head.
“No, I’m really glad you’re okay.”
“Why don’t they just take me, why the two of you…”
“If the bracelet were indeed the issue, it would certainly implicate Sir Gareth and me. I thought that somehow the Vatican’s ruling had escaped his influence, but I had no idea that Viscount Guinivis would conspire in such a way.”
“Is he responsible for all of this? Why would…”
“I don’t know either. The Viscount Guinivis I know would have targeted His Excellency, not the Duchess… no, even if the Duchess was dragged in for another purpose, I didn’t expect that she would drag her into something dangerous like a witch trial…”
In response to her question, Bediviel muttered to himself with a troubled face, trying to make sense of the current situation.
But it was at that moment…
Bang, bang—!
A knight who was walking alongside the carriage struck the carriage in which Bediviel and Gareth were trapped with a club. Then, he shouted in a vicious voice.
“Hey, shut up! Why is there so much to talk about among sinners?!”
“As a knight, you won’t even allow me to check on the safety of my lord’s important person? The royal knights really have no humanity.”
“Shut up! Why don’t you say that kind of regard later when you go to heaven later! Even in heaven, I think your girl-like appearance will be quite acceptable.”
“So, don’t you want to taste the swordsmanship of a person with a girl-like appearance?”
“Hey, shut up!”
“I got it, I’ll be quiet! That’s all, right?”
As the knight continued to speak degradingly of Bediviel, banging his club against the bars of the carriage, as if it had startled even Gareth, who was lying there with an exhausted look on his face, he writhed and squirmed in pain.
At the sight of this, Bediviel clicked his tongue and stopped talking while Min-ha shouted at the knight to stop and shook the grate.
“Anyway, don’t make any more noise! It won’t make your sin any lighter!”
Fortunately, the knight relented and went back to the back of the carriage.
Min-ha breathed a sigh of relief and gestured to Bediviel, who glared at the knight with sharp eyes, to calm down before slumping back down to the floor of the carriage. Perhaps because of mental fatigue, her body felt extremely heavy. The energy she gained from sleeping for two days was ridiculously gone.
Feeling the rattling of the carriage, she forced herself to sleep. Since they wouldn’t let her talk, she felt like she should at least get some rest.
The carriage carrying the three people continued to run day and night, and only arrived in the Capital a day and a half later.
Upon arriving in front of the Capital, the imperial knights took out a black cloth and covered the carriage on all sides. Apparently, it was to prevent someone from conspiring with anyone who might be in the Capital.
Min-ha waited to arrive at the courtroom to arrive as soon as possible as she leaned on the carriage, which quickly became dark.
And just like that, they moved again.
It was after at least three or four hours had passed that her vision brightened as she was sitting in the dark carriage. Min-ha asked the women dressed in white, who opened the carriage door after the black cloth covering the carriage had gone.
“…Who are you, and where am I?”
“I can’t give you any details.”
To her question, the middle-aged woman answered in a blunt voice and then nodded to the other woman standing behind her. Then, two women approached her and put their arms around her sides, forced her to get out of the carriage, and began to drag her somewhere.
In the meantime, Min-ha turned her head around, trying to get even a small clue as to where they had arrived.
‘Endless dark stone walls and long corridors… what’s this? It looks like a monastery rather than a courtroom?’
She thought as she walked down the long hallway to nowhere.
Strange inscriptions carved between the stone walls and the faint sound of footsteps… the atmosphere was eerie yet somehow orderly. Just when she was beginning to wonder if they might have called her a witch and dragged her somewhere other than the imperial palace, she could see the end of the dark hallway.
“….!”
Min-ha, who was dragged away by the white-clad women without being surprised by the bright light shining through, trembled involuntarily at the sight before her as she crossed the end of the corridor.
It seemed like a completely different world from the hallway she had just walked through. The space, which was brilliantly whitewashed from wall to floor, was divided into two tiers, with her standing on the lower one.
As Min-ha turned her gaze to observe the high dais at the height of her knees in front of her, the tall dais looked like it might be twice her height and had three high-backed chairs.
There were three men dressed in white sitting there, but strangely, the man sitting in the center had a black mask covering his face. On either side of the black-masked man were two similar but narrower podiums, and it was only the left dais that the man was standing on.
There, too, stood a middle-aged man dressed in white. He had an elegant appearance, but for some reason, he was staring at her with a look of displeasure.
‘…Who is that person, and why is he glaring at me?’
Seeing the man’s expression, Min-ha narrowed his brows and turned his head. It was only then did she notice a small desk in the center of the three podiums. Stacked high with papers, a nervous-looking man was sitting on it while writing something down.
‘What are they recording?’
The sight of the man looking back at her and scribbling something down wasn’t pleasant, and just as Min-ha was quietly frowning, the women on either side grabbed her tightly and dragged her off somewhere else.
‘Even if they didn’t do this, I wouldn’t run away…’
As she was dragged along by their vicious grip, the place Min-ha was taken to was in front of an old chair facing a high platform, just a few steps away.
Standing before them, the women finally let go of her arms and pointed at the old chair.
“Please have a seat.”
“….”
Min-ha frowned slightly at her tingling side and slowly sat down in the chair.
Then, seeing that she had taken a seat in the chair, the man wearing a black mask on the highest dais spoke in a solemn voice as if declaring.
“We will begin the third courtroom of the Heresy Tribunal in the Imperial Palace, No. 1209, the witch trial. High Priest Resitia, let those who will observe the trial and witnesses enter.”
“Yes, Your Majesty.”
Min-ha’s eyes widened in surprise at the conversation she had heard.
If their conversation was correct, it meant that the man in the black mask was the Emperor of the empire, and the man standing on the dais to the left was the High Priest Resitia and the father of Grand Duchess Blaine.
She thought with a bitter smile.
‘…So, this is what Seth was talking about.’
It was only now that I realized this trial wasn’t in her favor at all.
Still, she kept thinking positive thoughts as if to erase the anxiety from her mind. As Seth said, she couldn’t receive help from anyone. In other words, she had to overcome all of this by herself from now on, so she needed to be strong.
‘…I can get through this on my own. That’s what I made up my mind when I first came to this world and wanted to live somehow.’
Letting out a long sigh, Min-ha quietly closed her eyes.
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