Chapter 2
Atalante considered herself to be lucky.
It was nothing short of a miracle that a newborn child abandoned in the forest without a name had grown up with all of its limbs intact.
Children from the slums, with no adults to protect them, had to learn how to defend themselves and their friends.
On the day she lost half of her loved ones and friends in a war fought to fill the bellies of the highborn, Atalante killed her first person.
She was only eleven years old at the time.
Atalante gathered the surviving children and formed a ragtag organization called ‘Argo’.
It was the name of an expedition group that a minstrel once told her about, consisting of all sorts of heroes. The name sounded impressive, but in reality, they had to take on grueling, often gruesome missions. They frequently saw disturbing scenes, but there was no other choice.
A small villain.
Because of this, by the time she was barely fifteen, she had earned a reputation that was far from cute.
Since then, she had fought to survive, and before she knew it, Atalante had become one of the most notorious villains in the empire.
Well, she wasn’t upset about the label of “villain” since she’d done enough despicable things to earn it.
She didn’t particularly want anything. Sometimes, she thought that she would simply live a life of wrongdoing and die that way.
“You must be a good girl, Atalante.”
Sometimes, she would hear the distant echo of her foster father’s voice, but all she had to do was close her eyes and block out her ears to make it go away.
The man was already gone from this world, and she had crossed too many irreparable rivers to ever become the “good girl” he had wished her to be.
If she said she didn’t want to wash her hands of this dirty underworld, that would be a lie.
In a world where yesterday’s allies often aimed for each other’s throats today, it had become rare for her to get a proper night’s sleep since she started leading the organization.
“What’s this?”
While lost in her thoughts for the first time in a while, someone pressed a knife against her neck. Perhaps because she was so accustomed to such attacks, she felt more annoyed than scared when the blade met her skin.
“Who sent you? The Four Associations? The Seven Stars faction? The Sicilian gang?”
Atalante muttered the names of the criminal organizations she had been clashing with recently and, in an instant, drew a dagger hidden in her sleeve and broke the intruder’s longsword.
It was an absurd thing to witness. How could such a small girl have this kind of strength?
The man, taken aback by the unexpected retaliation, didn’t even have time to groan before he was crushed beneath her boots.
“Answer properly, and I’ll let you go.”
She wasn’t sure where he would be sent, but it was clear it wasn’t going to be home.
Before he could make a move, Atalante swiftly drew a pitch-black revolver and aimed it coldly at his head.
He had barged into her room, brandishing a knife, yet the intruder was now trembling at her feet.
Atalante looked at the man, dressed in a black mask, with disdain, scanning her surroundings. She was on high alert, but there wasn’t even the smallest hint of a presence.
Had he come alone, without any backup? Against Atalante, the leader of Argo?
“Tch, scratch that. You came alone, trying to kill me without even bringing friends… How embarrassing.”
She stomped on the man’s abdomen with force, and a disgusting cracking sound filled the air.
As he was about to scream in pain, Atalante shoved the barrel of her revolver into his mouth to silence him. She couldn’t afford for the noise to wake up Yuffie, who had just been put to sleep.
“Answer me.”
“Ugh… ugh…”
“Who sent you?”
Atalante pulled out another revolver that looked exactly like the one she was holding and pressed it to the man’s chest. He began to thrash and scream incoherently in a distorted voice.
Satisfied, Atalante removed the revolver that had been muffling his screams.
But the answer that came from the intruder’s mouth was completely unexpected.
“Th-the Emperor…! His Majesty the Emperor…”
“The Emperor? What kind of name is that for an organization? Are you lying?”
The man looked to be at least ten years older than her, but Atalante didn’t care and looked down at him with contempt. In this business, age was nothing—what mattered was who had the power to survive.
A vicious smile spread across Atalante’s face as she applied more pressure to the foot that was stomping on the man.
“Ca… Caesar! His Majesty Emperor Caesar has ordered your capture!”
The man, holding back the urge to scream in pain, spoke in a voice that was almost on the verge of tears.
‘Caesar?’
The name sounded absurd in the context of the underworld bosses she knew, but wait a minute—Caesar Thessalia?
She moved her red lips and muttered a name she had heard somewhere before.
The man, upon hearing this, nodded his head frantically.
Caesar Thessalia. That name, known even by the common people, belonged to the ruler of the Thessalian Empire.
—
Inside the dim, windowless room, only the faint light of a candle flickered weakly. Atalante had expected to be invited to the imperial palace when the Emperor summoned her, but perhaps it was just an idle hope.
‘Is this how it is for someone born of humble origins? I can’t even set foot in the palace…’
Atalante smiled bitterly as she looked at the figure sitting in the old chair. Despite the years marked by wrinkles on his face, there was an undeniable air of authority emanating from the man, who was presumably the Emperor. Even though he wasn’t wearing lavish clothes or a crown, perhaps it was because of his noble bloodline that such power exuded from him.
“Are you Atalante?” The old Emperor’s voice was unnaturally deep.
Atalante tried her best to hide her nervousness and spoke up.
“Is it really the Emperor?”
The man who had barged into her room earlier had even shown the royal guard’s insignia, but Atalante still couldn’t fully believe him.
The old man, who had been staring at her with meaningful eyes, broke into a smile.
“How amusing.”
After a long moment of chuckling, the man slowly removed his robe.
“Would you believe me now?”
“…I don’t believe it, but I have no choice but to.”
Atalante replied in a resigned tone.
The jet-black hair and sky-blue eyes in front of her were symbols of the Thessalian Imperial family. Even someone like her, born of humble origins, knew this much.
Another characteristic of the royal family was that they didn’t go grey with age. The man in front of her, despite his wrinkled face, still had hair as black as night, further proving his noble heritage.
‘They say the eyes of royalty are so beautiful… and they truly are a stunning color.’
Unconsciously, Atalante found herself staring at the Emperor’s mysterious, dark eyes. As the man leaned back in his creaking chair, he spoke.
“You hold your head too stiffly.”
“I never learned proper etiquette, being of low birth. Please be understanding.”
Upon hearing the Emperor’s comment, Atalante didn’t kneel but instead showed her teeth in a smile. Speaking with formality felt awkward, too—it wasn’t something she had ever done properly in her life.
The Emperor narrowed his eyes in discomfort at her reaction but didn’t try to teach her etiquette. What use would it be for the boss of a criminal organization to learn the manners of nobility?
“…I’ve heard of your notorious reputation. It seems the rumors were true. You completely ruined my most trusted guard.”
“Oh, that weakling… I mean, the knight.”
Atalante referred to the man as weak, which caused the Emperor’s face to scrunch up again.
Surprisingly, the man she had defeated earlier had been the Deputy Commander of the Royal Guard.
But it was true. His ribs had broken after being stomped a few times by her, weak as he was.
“Could you please get to the point? As you can see, I am a commoner who doesn’t know how to show respect or admiration for royalty, so I’m likely to ruin your mood.”
“…Isn’t a commoner still a citizen of the Empire?”
“I don’t get treated like one.”
In the Empire, it was only the nobles—or even the wealthy commoners—who were treated as true citizens.
Atalante bit back the rest of her words and smiled slightly.
“Sounds like you’re blaming the Empire.”
“Interpret it however you like.”
“Haha, what a rude girl you are.”
‘Girl?’
She had a slender build and a youthful face, but Atalante was the leader of the largest and oldest criminal organization in the underworld.
The Emperor still dared to call her a girl after seeing her subordinates, the ones she cared for, completely ruined by her hands.
Well, it didn’t matter. Atalante had no interest in the Emperor. She had no intention of flattering him.
Whatever had brought him to call for her, she was certain they wouldn’t meet again. Their worlds were simply too different.
‘There are about fifteen—no, maybe twenty guards lying in wait near this villa. He brought quite a few.’
Although Atalante wanted to deal with all of them and dispose of the Emperor as well, she knew that could lead to the downfall of the Empire, so she had to exercise patience.
The Empire had done nothing for her, but she didn’t want to become a displaced person either.
“The matter I want to discuss with you is very simple. I have an urgent request for you, the boss of Argo, Atalante.”
