The One Who Won't Be Abandoned - Chapter 67

“…Are you trying to compare our fathers now? You’ll regret it.”

“You bastard! Fine! I’ll finish what Father started. I’ll burn D’Hel to the ground! I’ll show you the price of mocking me!”

Andrei stared calmly at the crown prince’s increasingly deranged face. Whether emperor or prince, they were all the same—fools drunk on power. So many lives had been wasted because of men like this.

“I’ll send royal knights and soldiers to D’Hel. It’ll run red with blood!”

“Hah… And this thing is the crown prince? It’s a miracle the empire hasn’t collapsed.”

“What?! How dare you!”

Blinded by rage, the prince’s fear gave way to fury. He lunged to punch Andrei in the face.

But Andrei—who had trained more in close combat than swordplay while in Siamos—easily leaned back and dodged the blow.

“Your Highness, try to maintain some dignity.”

“What? You dare lecture me about dignity after insulting me to my face?! You arrogant wretch—!”

The prince swung again, but this time his foot caught on the table leg and he nearly toppled over. He barely regained his balance, his face flushing red with embarrassment. If he couldn’t land a punch, he’d break Andrei’s spirit with words instead.

“I’ll have your father’s head! I’ll have everyone tied to House Kaiman executed! Anyone with the slightest connection to you will die, and I’ll raze your lands to dust! You’ll watch it all—bound, helpless—as everything you love is destroyed before your eyes!”

Avoiding the teacup trembling atop the unstable table, Andrei slowly rose from the sofa.

“You really are pathetic.”

“You—!”

Andrei’s calm disregard finally made the crown prince snap. His cheek muscles twitched as he glared at Andrei, and then suddenly, he remembered the maid who had come all the way from D’Hel to the capital for Andrei. And she wasn’t the only one—Kaiman knights were also stationed in the imperial city.

The crown prince’s lips parted once more, and this time, he said something that could cost him his life.

“Let’s start with that loyal maid of yours who followed you to the capital. Then your knights. I’ll strip them naked and burn them alive! Damn you all! You think I’ll just sit back and let you and those bastards who support Tim Ferrier get away with this?!”

For the first time since entering the room, Andrei’s expression—until now only marked by quiet disdain—hardened.

“What did you just say?”

“Ha! Beg all you want—none of them will leave the palace alive!”

Seeing Andrei’s shift in demeanor, the crown prince felt a surge of satisfaction.

“What? Are you afraid now? Have you finally realized how foolish you were to defy me?”

The crown prince raised his chin, hands on his hips, looking up at Andrei—who was a head taller—but savoring the sight of Andrei’s stiffened expression.

“Arrogant fool. Kneel now, and I might spare your life.”

“What did you say you’d do to my maid?”

“I said I’d strip her and burn her—ugh!”

Andrei’s large hand seized the crown prince by the throat, lifting him clean off the ground. The prince dangled, feet kicking helplessly.

“You—bastard…!”

The crushing grip around his windpipe left him unable to think. He could only let out rasping, pitiful gasps.

“Your tongue just shortened your already pathetic lifespan.”

“Ghhk… guhhh…”

“I never got the chance to kill the emperor myself—that was my greatest regret. But I’ll settle it now by choking the life from the man who inherited his cowardice.”

The more the prince struggled, the tighter Andrei’s grip became. He watched as those brilliant violet eyes—the mark of the imperial line—turned bloodshot with terror.

“Gkk…!”

Just as the prince’s eyes rolled back and his body went limp, there was a knock at the door.

Knock, knock.

“Your Highness. I’ve brought the Captain of the Royal Guard.”

It was Rousseau’s voice.

A flash of hope appeared on the crown prince’s ashen face. If that door opened, he would live. That sliver of salvation made him thrash even harder. Andrei, momentarily distracted, loosened his grip just slightly.

“Your Highness… pardon me.”

When no response came, Rousseau entered the room with the guard captain.

“What in the world… Lord Bukovatz!”

Rousseau froze in shock at the scene before him. But as soon as he registered what was happening, he turned to the man following behind him.

The crown prince, confident that the guard captain would rescue him, glared at Andrei triumphantly.

But what happened next was completely unexpected.

Instead of rushing to save the prince, the captain unsheathed his sword—and turned to lock the door.

With a cold expression, Bastian looked around the room and spoke quietly.

“Andrei. This wasn’t part of the plan. Why has it come to this?”

“This bastard enraged me, Bastian. If you’d been humiliated like I was, you’d have carved that smug face to pieces right here.”

Their composure was terrifying. Even as he choked, the prince stared in disbelief.

Rousseau was the first to act.

“It can’t be helped. Framing it as a suicide is the best option now.”

Rousseau, acting swiftly, went to a small desk against the wall. With practiced hands, he found a pen and blank paper and began to write something quickly.

“You… you bastards…! Kkugh…”

The crown prince, summoning the last of his strength, managed to shove Andrei’s arm away. Caught off guard, Andrei released him, and the prince crashed hard onto the floor, landing on his backside with a loud thump.

“You—you’re all in on this?!”

“Not exactly,” Bastian replied, taking slow, deliberate steps toward the prince, his presence chilling. “We merely agreed to keep silent about what we saw and heard.”

Realizing he was completely alone in the room, the crown prince was struck by a wave of fear. His legs trembled so violently he couldn’t even stand.

“You think—think you’ll get away with this… ugh!”

Bastian abruptly kicked him in the face. The blow was strong enough to send the prince tumbling across the floor with a heavy thud.

“Did you think I forgot what you did to my sister? That I’d just let it go like it never happened? Because of you… she took her own life. My mother lost her mind.”

With his sharp features twisted in fury, Bastian looked truly terrifying. The prince, face throbbing and pride shattered, was too afraid to get up. Still, his arrogant tongue moved on reflex.

“You bastard… I—I’ll kill you…”

“My father and I have been waiting for this moment. Waiting to watch you and your father wallow in filth like pigs. You think the emperor’s body lies in his grave? No. The corpse buried there is a vagrant’s from the slums.”

“B-blasphemy…”

The prince’s mouth bled, possibly from biting his tongue when he was kicked. Blood trickled down his jaw, and Bastian’s eyes glinted briefly with satisfaction.

“The emperor’s corpse was torn apart and fed to pigs. And you’ll soon join him. I’ll throw you into the same pen, and you can enjoy your father-son reunion in a pig’s belly.”

The crown prince could feel the truth in Bastian’s words. His killer instinct was unmistakable. The prince staggered to his feet and ran to Rousseau. But even then, he didn’t dare pass Andrei, who stood by the door.

Rousseau was hunched over the desk, writing with careful precision. Gripping his arm, the crown prince pleaded:

“Rousseau! Stop him—get the guards, now!”

But even before he could finish, Rousseau looked over at him with a cold, annoyed glance. That look told the prince everything: even Rousseau had betrayed him.

Trembling with betrayal and fury, the prince shouted at the top of his lungs:

“Guards! Soldiers! Come in here, now! They’re committing treason!”

“It’s useless, Your Highness,” Rousseau said calmly. “The men guarding the hall are all loyal to the captain.”

The crown prince didn’t want to believe it. But the fact that not a single guard responded to the commotion in the room confirmed it.

“I…”

His face contorted in despair and disbelief. He was terrified, realizing his life was genuinely at risk—and he couldn’t understand why it had come to this.

Volvdy had simply been born crown prince, and so he lived as one. He believed he was chosen by the gods to die as emperor.

Then his eyes locked on the paper Rousseau had been writing.

[I, Volvdy Dysnya Sendfinden, have sullied the imperial line by contracting an incurable disease…]

The letter filled half the page, clearly written as a suicide note. The prince immediately recognized the handwriting—it was his own.

Rousseau, who often handled tasks in his place, had imitated it perfectly.

“This… this can’t be happening.”

Shaking his head, the crown prince stumbled backward. The realization he might truly die here gave him a sudden surge of courage. He spun around and made a break for the door—only to be instantly seized by Andrei.

“Let go! Let me go!”

“You said you’d burn D’Hel to the ground, didn’t you?”

“Let go! Guards! Anyone—stop this man—!”

Andrei pulled him close, their faces nearly touching. His voice came in a low, feral growl.

“You also said you’d strip my maid and burn her alive, didn’t you?”

Andrei raised his free hand and gripped the crown prince’s throat with both hands.

“…Spare… me… guhk!”

Dragging the full-grown man by the neck toward the window, Andrei’s steps were light and unhurried.

“Your father was cruel, ruthless… and stupid.”

He looked down at the prince’s reddened face—bloated with pressure, on the verge of bursting—with calm, steady eyes.

“He toyed with the families of those who defied him, treating their despair as entertainment. He never imagined one of them might one day stick a blade in his back. He got complacent. Thought no one could ever strike him. And so he nurtured the seeds of his own ruin.”

“S-spare me… Andrei… please…”

Andrei opened the large window. The prince’s body was now halfway out, suspended over the edge. Dangling with his feet off the ground, the prince writhed in panic, pleading desperately as dread overtook him.

“You want mercy? If I spare you, will you pretend this never happened?”

“Yes! Guhk…! Y-yes, I swear!”

Andrei let out a small laugh. He leaned close and whispered gently:

“Do I look as stupid as your father?”

Before the prince could reply, Andrei squeezed. Hard.

Crunch.

A sickening crack echoed through the room—the sound of a neck breaking.

“Gghk—”

With a brief, blood-choked gasp, the crown prince’s body went limp. His eyes, wide with terror and disbelief, remained open in death.

Like discarding trash, Andrei released his grip.

There was a dull thud from below as the corpse hit the ground outside.

With a calm expression, Rousseau stepped beside Andrei and looked down through the window. The prince lay in a grotesque heap—his neck, arms, and legs twisted at unnatural angles.

“Let’s go with this: The crown prince, in a fit of instability, summoned the two of you. Then, in a rant condemning the council and the military, he threw himself from the window before we could stop him.”

“I don’t care. As long as I can leave this cursed palace with Jeanne as soon as possible.”

Andrei meant it. He wanted nothing more than to leave this suffocating place and return to Jeanne.

Behind them, Bastian stood trembling slightly, his head bowed.

“Jael… Jael…”

He whispered the name of his sister—who had died too young, never given a chance to bloom. His voice was heavy with sorrow and quiet devastation.