How To Survive As a Villain on the Verge of Death

The sacred tree did not burn in fire and did not die even without water. It couldn’t be cut with a sword or axe. It was basic common sense in this world. Fortunately, there was no solution at all. The only way to get rid of the tree was to cut it down with the ‘Sword of Ryukan’, one of the five holy relics possessed by the empire. Of course, even if you cut it down, it will come back to life as long as it has roots. So, they cut it off down to its roots, sprinkled holy oil on it, and burned it. It was all done secretly overnight.

 

Terence said that he quietly succeeded in the task with the help of a spy in the temple. It didn’t matter if someone remembered or doubted the existence of the Holy Sword. Ryukan’s sword was originally an heirloom from the Grand Duke’s family, but it was known to have been stolen and disappeared decades ago. Terence found the sword with the information she gave him, but he has not announced it to the outside world yet. So, no one would doubt the Grand Duke family.

 

According to Bayan’s explanation, most people have no idea that trees can be cut down with a holy sword. Then no one would doubt it.

 

“Is this really a prophecy from God?”

 

Arentine asked his minister in disbelief.

 

“That’s right. Isn’t it clear that His Majesty suffered such a tragedy last night?”

 

“It’s definitely too coincidental to be a coincidence.”

 

Arentine’s eyes turned to her for a moment.

 

“Even so, please investigate further. Are there any suspicious circumstances?”

 

“I understand, Your Highness the Crown Prince.”

 

The high priest answered politely, but he seemed intent on somehow turning this incident into a prophecy from the Heavenly God. If it turns out to be a human act, he will have to take responsibility himself.

 

“We will discuss the matter of the Empress Dowager and the Second Prince again once the results of the investigation come out. Everyone, please leave first.”

 

“Yes, Your Highness.”

 

The ministers bowed politely and went out. Somehow, his attitude was more polite than before. Actually, everyone must have been sensitive to where the balance weight was tilted. Since the emperor became like that without a word of will, the next emperor was unconditionally the crown prince, Arentine. Moreover, Vilos was arrested after suspicious evidence was found at the fire scene. While thinking about that, she was about to get up from her seat when Arentin called them out.

 

“Eve, and the Grand Duke. You two should stay for a while.”

 

She sat down in her seat again. Everyone left and only she, Terence, and Arentine were left in the office. Arentine’s sigh became deeper. He asked Terence.

 

“Now won’t you tell me what happened?”

 

“Why are you asking Terence?”

 

“It’s because I don’t think you can explain it properly.”

 

‘No, your younger sister is me, so it’s too much.’

 

“I don’t have anything special to explain. Your guess is correct.”

 

He said they made the emperor like that and put the blame on Vilos and the empress. It may be unfair to those two people, but she was not really sorry. Because the Empress was the one who tried to frame her in the first place by setting up a self-harm story with Sorel. Not to mention Vilos.

 

“Why didn’t you tell me earlier?”

 

“I did it because I was afraid my brother would stop me.”

 

“I…”

 

Arentine tried to say something but trailed off. Why would he stop them? Was that really what it meant? It seemed like Arentine has a lot to accumulate from the emperor. Well, he knew all about how the emperor tried to kill her. He did the same to her, the princess, and the emperor must have also targeted Arentine in order to give the crown prince position to Vilos someday.

 

Arentine himself must have known that.

 

“Anyway, you will soon become His Majesty the Emperor. Congratulations in advance.”

 

“Your Majesty is still alive.”

 

“It won’t last long.”

 

When she spoke decisively, Arentine asked a little worriedly.

 

“If Sorel recovers, won’t we be able to treat Your Majesty?”

 

Somehow, the case was resolved quickly in the office. Arentine seemed to have thought that the Empress and Vilos should be dealt with quickly before the Emperor recovered. If the Emperor comes back to life thanks to Sorel’s power, everything could go wrong.

 

“Sorel has lost almost all of her sacred power. She won’t be able to do anything now.”

 

“She lost her holy power? Was that possible?”

 

“It’s possible to suddenly regain your holy power, right?”

 

Arentine looked at her blankly and suddenly seemed to realize another truth.

 

“Is it really you who did this?”

 

Instead of answering, she stayed silent. Because she didn’t do it. But Arentine interpreted her silence as positive and sighed alone.

 

“Ha, what are you…”

 

No, she didn’t cut and burn the holy tree. Terence interjected quietly.

 

“There was a reason to eliminate the holy tree.”

 

“For what reason?”

 

Terence’s eyes turned to her. He seemed to be asking how far he would tell Arentine. She thought for a moment and then opened her mouth.

 

“That tree was a tool of witchcraft.”

 

Well, there’s no need to tell him in detail, but she guessed she could tell him this much.

 

“Witchcraft?”

 

She explained the situation to Arentine as briefly as possible. Sorel’s mother was a shaman. It was Sorel’s work that she lost her holy power and regained it. The Emperor tried to curse her by asking Sorel. The ingredients used for it were flowers that bloomed on sacred trees. The story was that the tree had to be removed to prevent something like that from happening again.

 

“Could it be that that’s why Sorel got sick?”

 

“That’s right. It probably won’t be easy to recover from.”

 

She suddenly remembered that Arentine had told Sorel’s answer earlier.

 

“Where did you hear that Sorel couldn’t cure the Emperor?”

 

“The servant I sent to the princess’s palace came after hearing that answer. He heard it from Sorel’s maid.”

 

It was like that too.

 

“Sorel is currently trapped in the basement of the princess’s palace.”

 

“She’s locked up?”

 

She also told him that Sorel had been forcibly tortured and put under a fake spell.

 

“Your Majesty and Vilos… No matter what, you would do something like that.”

 

Arentine seemed shocked to hear that those two had worked together to torture Sorel and curse her.

 

“What do you plan to do with Vilos and the Empress?”

 

Since things have come to this, someone must be the culprit who tried to assassinate the emperor. A story with a clearly identified culprit would be easier to persuade people than an absurd story where a fire suddenly broke out in the imperial palace bedroom and the emperor burned to death. There was also a somewhat understandable reason. The current crown prince was Arentine, but Vilos had lost any hope of becoming the successor after his biological mother, the empress, was driven out. If she were to say that he tried to harm his father out of spite, people who don’t know much about the circumstances of the imperial palace would easily believe it.

 

Arentine seemed to have similar thoughts and muttered quietly.

 

“There is no need to kill the empress. But Vilos…”

 

As for the Empress, her family had already fallen, and it is okay to just lock her up somewhere, but it seemed that this meant that Vilos, who could be his rival, couldn’t be kept alive. Although cruel, if Vilos had become emperor, he would have killed Arentine as well. Of course, she wouldn’t have been safe before that.

 

“Just take care of that.”

 

The affairs of the imperial palace should be handled by the people living in the imperial palace.

 

“I want to meet Sorel.”

 

* * *

 

Sorel was still in the dungeon. The soldiers and servants who guarded Sorel’s palace were arrested by knights sent by Arentine. The attendant who came with her opened the prison door. She entered the prison and approached Sorel.

 

“Sorel.”

 

Sorel was so thin and pale that she was unrecognizable. She seemed like a terminally ill patient suffering from a fatal illness. This was what it meant to lose one’s vitality. The spark of life literally seemed to be dying out within Sorel’s body. Sorel, who was lying on the floor, opened her eyes with difficulty.

 

“Eve… sister…?”

 

“Yes, it’s me.”

 

Sorel listened to her and closed her eyes again. It seemed like she was so lethargic that she couldn’t come to her senses. She gave orders to her servants.

 

“Move Sorel to the bedroom and call the doctor.”

 

The attendants carried the desiccated Sorel upstairs. The maids washed and changed the unconscious person. A doctor was called, but of course he couldn’t find out the name of the disease.

 

“I’m sorry, but I don’t think you have any special illness. It looks like she was just incarcerated for a long time and her body was damaged.”

 

“Right. Bring me some healing medicine.”

 

The spell failed, but Sorel ended up looking like this in return for trying it.

 

“Ah…”

 

After a moment, Sorel slowly lifted her eyelids.

 

“Are you awake?”

 

Sorel’s dull silver eyes slowly came into focus.

 

“What about father?”

 

As soon as Sorel came to her senses, she first asked about the emperor’s well-being.

 

“Father is seriously injured and he probably won’t be able to survive.”

 

Sorel sighed quietly as if relieved at those words.

 

Here was one more person who would rejoice in the emperor’s death.

 

“Vilos and the Empress were arrested as criminals.”

 

Sorel just listened to her quietly. The news about those two people didn’t seem to be the slightest bit curious.

 

“I came because I had a question for you.”

 

She sat down by the bed and sent the maid inside the room.

 

“You tried to call me during my wedding, saying you would tell me a secret related to the sacred tree’s flower.”

 

And not long ago, the emperor also used that as an excuse to send me a gift containing a bomb. From then on, she was curious about what the secret was. At first, she thought it had something to do with the spell that cursed the saint. Because that flower is an ingredient for magic. But no matter how much she thought about it, there was no way Eve would ask Sorel that. Sorel revealed the truth in a faint voice.

 

“Okay, I’ll tell you now. There was no special power in that flower. It was through witchcraft that sister perceived an ominous feeling when she saw the flowers.”

 

“Witchcraft?”

 

Flower? Flower of sacred tree?

 

‘How did Eve know about witchcraft?’

 

It was something she didn’t understand, but she couldn’t ask what happened because she would be suspicious if she asked.

 

“My sister said that when she saw that flower, the flower of the sacred tree that Her Majesty the Empress gave to the Grand Duchess, she felt a strange feeling.”

 

Fortunately, before she could ask, Sorel began to tell the story in detail.

 

“It was a spell that made the disease worse. It was a lighter curse than a spell that made you sick, but still… It was fatal for Her Majesty the Empress, sister’s mother.”

 

“Then the person who ordered it…”

 

Sorel spoke as if she had nothing to hide.

 

“Yes it is. It was His Majesty the Emperor.”

 

“…”

 

She summarized the situation based on Sorel’s story. So, the emperor sent flowers with a spell to the former empress, Eve’s biological mother. It was a spell that made her illness worse.

 

The former empress was a foreign princess. When a foreign royal dies suspiciously, it becomes a diplomatic issue. He even requests an autopsy from there. However, if you get sick and die naturally, no one will suspect anything. The emperor must have sent flowers aiming for that. But when young Eve saw the flower, she felt something strange. So she later asked Sorel if she thought the flower had some unusual power. Why did she ask Sorel? Because Sorel was a saint like herself. Because she had much stronger abilities than her.

 

She was probably wondering if Sorel could feel something from that flower. Stupid Eve could only think that far. She seemed to have suspected that her mother’s early death might have been due to some evil force within her, but she could not connect it to the emperor or witchcraft. Sorel would have told the emperor exactly that.

 

‘The emperor must know this. It is said that Eve noticed that the Empress’s illness was worsened by magic.’

 

Perhaps that influenced the Emperor’s first plan to frame Terence for Eve’s death. He trapped the Grand Duke, and he himself became a victim, losing his daughter. It would have been better to be able to kill the annoying daughter at this point.

 

She remembered that the Emperor had sent her a sacred tree flower made of gray crystal, borrowing Sorel’s name. If you gave her something like that, she would take it to the mansion to take a closer look.

 

‘What a disgusting human being.’

 

As she was pondering her hatred for the Emperor, Sorel’s quiet voice continued.

 

“And just like sister saw… He also gave the flowers to the Grand Duchess… I don’t think the Grand Duchess, who was weakened after giving birth, did live long.”

 

What? The Grand Duchess that Sorel was talking about was probably Terence’s mother. The Grand Duchess loved the flowers of the Sacred Tree. So she first brought up that fact and gave Terence the flowers of the Sacred Tree. She and the former Empress and Grand Duchess were friends. Their detailed circumstances were unknown, but it appeared that the Empress, who was lying in her sick bed, distributed the flowers she had received to the Grand Duchess. She became the Grand Duchess and gave birth to Lot, and died shortly afterward.

 

She said the flowers the Empress gave her had an impact.

 

“Then the flower…”

 

Sorel’s detailed knowledge of the situation meant one thing. Sorel looked at her with deep, watery eyes.

 

“His mother was such a strong shaman that she did not die even after successfully performing such a spell. She has been bedridden for several years.”

 

That was the work of Sorel’s mother, the woman who was the Emperor’s shaman. After all, the Emperor was the enemy of both Eve and Terence for killing their mothers. Coincidentally, they both avenged that resentment together, so it could be said to be fair retribution.

 

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