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Chapter : 7
“I’ll head to the capital first as well.”
After sending an urgent report to the imperial palace, Evan departed for the capital ahead of us.
“Father says he’ll come to the capital as soon as he finishes things in the west, so please keep that in mind, Your Highness.”
Evan glanced at me, his eyes seeming to issue a warning.
As if to say I should end all my mischief before the duke returned.
So only the duke and Evan get to use something that good, huh.
Regardless, the only thing that caught my eye was the teleportation portal Evan would be using.
I really wanted it. It had to be faster than a carriage stuffed full of money, right?
The rich are always the stingiest.
But because the duke had set up a barrier before leaving, I couldn’t use it.
And I’d even gone through all that trouble trying to find it, forgetting that fact.
Anyway, the carriage of Marquis Cal, which I rode in, was incredibly fast too.
So fast that it made trains and airplanes seem laughable compared to magical buffs.
“Your Hiiiiiighness!”
“Lady Jane Cal! It’s dangerous, please let go! You can’t do this here!”
“I swear I’ll explain everything properly to His Majesty the Emperor so I can attend to Her Highness!”
Which meant we arrived at the Elvenard Imperial Palace before I even had time to fully plan anything.
“Lady Jane Cal! You’re a dignified woman—why are you acting like this? I told you you can’t go in from here!”
“Madam, restrain yourself! Anyone would think you’re sending off your husband!”
Meanwhile, the imperial palace was perfectly prepared to receive me.
“Your Hiiiiiighness!”
My arms were bound by maids as I was dragged off somewhere.
Once she could no longer follow me, Lady Cal burst into tears.
I guess it would seem strange.
Even to me—who had directly meddled with another woman’s control window—it felt like I might have gone a bit too far.
“Your Highness will be staying here.”
How long had we walked?
With a clack, my back was shoved into darkness.
A chilling cold brushed against the nape of my neck.
Wait a second. Where is this?
Before I could grasp the situation, the door was locked from the outside.
“I’ll ask you this once, and only once. Are you truly confident that you can save His Highness the Crown Prince?”
“Huh? Yes!”
I turned around and met the maid’s gaze.
At that moment, a control window appeared beyond the bars.
[Bella, C-rank, Palace Maid of the Imperial Court]
So she really was from the imperial palace.
“I am confident.”
“I see. Then surely there will be a good outcome, one way or another.”
I answered deliberately and firmly, but the woman merely nodded.
“Wait. Where is this? A prison?”
I urgently asked Bella as she turned to leave.
Between a room and a prison, prison seemed more accurate.
But at the same time, the facilities weren’t that bad for a prison.
“When can I get out of here?”
I escaped those obsessive leeches only to end up locked in some bizarre prison.
Every single day was precious—do these people have a hobby of locking others up?
“If things go quickly, about a week. If not… well, I suppose only that person would know. I can’t give you a definite answer.”
That ended the conversation.
‘That person’ must mean the Emperor.
So I’ll meet the Crown Prince within a week.
Bella spoke cryptically, but I could roughly guess what would happen next.
The problem was that the Ariyan fruit was near the temple.
In this confined state, I couldn’t obtain it.
Without the Ariyan fruit, everything’s pointless.
What should I do—ask them to let me out so I can find the fruit to save the Crown Prince?
No.
The decision would rest with the Emperor anyway, and there was no way he’d believe me.
More than anything, I couldn’t just casually reveal the existence of an SSS-rank item like the Ariyan fruit.
Why is there no one here?
After Bella and the maids left, not even an ant showed up.
If there’d been even a single guard, I might’ve tried controlling them to escape.
“Damn it.”
All the strength drained out of me.
I flopped down onto the floor.
“Hey, Irago. Come out. Is there another way to open a gate?”
I asked the empty air.
“I don’t care what it is, as long as I can escape this world.”
[If it’s this world…]
Ding. At the same time, a dialogue window with Irago opened in response.
[If the original story is twisted, the dimension collapses. After that, escape becomes possible.]
“I already know that. That’s the standard transmigrator route.”
I sat up again.
Destroy the original story.
This was the so-called official route—the method by which transmigrators could escape the dimension.
“But isn’t there anything else? An unofficial route or something—ah!”
At that moment, a memory flashed through my mind.
Right. There was an unofficial route too.
[Meet your death at the hands of an A-rank individual.]
At the same time, Irago’s guidance window changed.
[If you die by an A-rank individual, a ‘mid-route exit’ that ignores the ending will be recognized.]
“That’s it. There was a way—getting killed by an A-rank.”
Under normal rules, even if I jumped into a river or hanged myself, I wouldn’t die just because I wanted to.
Because you have to die according to the predetermined ending.
Twisting the original story to change even that ending was the official route.
And then there was one exception.
Being killed by an A-rank individual.
The unofficial route—narrative allowance.
Only agents at headquarters knew about this method.
“Show me all the A-ranks.”
I urgently ordered Irago. Familiar faces passed by one after another.
The Emperor and Duke Rekaten.
Among the five male leads of the original story, Arno and Lysis.
And then—
[Lastly, ‘Grand Duke Kaize Knox Perzen’ has been located.]
The image of a man with jet-black hair and blue eyes appeared.
“……”
For a long moment, I stared quietly at that sculpted face.
Kaize Knox Perzen.
There hadn’t been many opportunities to see Perzen at headquarters.
Politely put, he was too valuable; bluntly put, he had little screen time.
For someone with so little presence, his visuals are ridiculously extravagant.
He looked convincing enough to be the main male lead.
Perhaps that was why he felt more unfamiliar than the others.
“Bring me everything on Perzen. Personality, settings, relationship maps, even the calendar recording what happened on that day—everything.”
Irago went quiet for a while, as if starting another massive search.
[Executing the order of Main Controller Agent Baek Jua.]
With those words, countless result windows unfolded.
[Kaize Knox Perzen, A? B? S? S? A?……]
But Perzen’s rank wouldn’t stabilize and kept glitching.
After flickering like that for quite some time—
[Re-adjusted to final F-rank.]
“Re-adjusted to F-rank? What kind of bullshit is this—”
[History deleted, history deleted, data deleted, data lost, no records.]
“Huh?”
At the subsequent results, I couldn’t even curse.
I was staring blankly when—
“Is it you?”
Ah—damn it!
Startled by a man’s voice coming from somewhere, I spun around.
“Who are you?”
“I asked first. You’re Diel Ekaterina, right?”
A black shadow stood beyond the bars.
At first I thought he was wearing a robe, but that wasn’t it.
No control window is appearing.
He stood right in the middle of the darkness.
Because I couldn’t recognize his face, not even a control window showed up.
The place I was trapped in was dark to begin with, but the area around the man was strangely different.
Only his surroundings seemed blurry, like another world altogether…
That said, his body is really something.
Only his overall silhouette was clear.
Long legs, broad shoulders, solid arms—they naturally drew my eye.
“So, how does it feel, stealing a look at my body?”
“What?”
“This isn’t so bad either.”
I closed my mouth and just stared at the man in the darkness.
…Is he a pervert?
“Give me a proper answer. That’s how I’ll recognize you.”
I could just barely see the corner of his lips lifting.
But I had no idea what he was talking about.
“The habit of crossing your arms when you’re tense—it’s the same.”
What? How would he know that?
I checked reflexively—and sure enough, I was standing there with my arms crossed.
Even if I was in Diel’s body, that habit was undeniably mine.
“That look in your eyes, like you’re staring at a dead bug—that’s the most similar. No, it’s exactly the same.”
The man spoke with a constant hint of laughter.
What was so amusing about locking someone up? Was he really a freak?
“See? I could draw your face with my eyes closed now.”
That was… unsettling.
Putting together everything he’d said, it oddly felt like he resembled me.
Not ‘Diel,’ but ‘Baek Jua.’
Who the hell is this guy?
What if he suddenly broke in through the door? Fear clenched my chest.
“Seriously…”
I tried to step back, increasing the distance little by little—
“I missed you.”
Those words grabbed my ankle and stopped me cold.
