A Mad Lady’s Confession - Chapter 79

The banquet hall was no different from a hell created by human hands.

A place filled with sinners, where they failed to repent and committed sin once again. At least, that was how it looked to Alicia.

At first, most of the nobles attending the banquet hesitated when they saw the tall, blond men.

Surely not everyone from Catalman looked like that, yet all the men onstage looked alike, as though someone had deliberately intended to evoke a particular person.

Besides, they were being told to throw stones at people. At an imperial banquet, no less.

Klaus was the one who urged them on.

“What are the empire’s faithful subjects hesitating for? Those men sought to desecrate your country, your land, and your God! As citizens of the empire who rightfully possess the privilege of punishing them, do not hesitate!”

A brief silence followed his shout.

Then a stone flew in a high arc from the distance and struck the shoulder of a man onstage. The man bound with ropes groaned and staggered.

After that, everything happened in an instant. Stones began flying one after another. Some missed their targets, while others struck various parts of the prisoners’ bodies.

This was the imperial palace, and this was a punishment sanctioned by the crown prince. They were noble beings who rightfully possessed the privilege. The masks covering their faces became excellent screens that concealed even the smallest fragments of their conscience.

One by one, they grew intoxicated with the authority the crown prince had granted them. Smiles formed beneath their masks, and the punishment soon became entertainment.

After staring blankly at the spectacle in stunned disbelief, Alicia hurried toward the crown prince. She roughly turned Klaus around as he watched the prisoners suffering onstage with a languid smile.

“What the hell are you doing?!”

“Why, Alicia? Why don’t you throw one too?”

“Are you insane? Stop this right now! Tell them to stop!”

“This is a sacred moment in which criminals are being punished.”

Music began playing somewhere. It was a somewhat cheerful melody, as though intended to make the moment comical. The screams of the Catalman prisoners, the nobles’ snickering, and their inciting shouts mingled chaotically within it.

“Didn’t you say this was to commemorate Prince Rüntgen?”

“We’re commemorating the prince while punishing criminals, so it carries the meaning of purification, doesn’t it? What greater honor could there be for a prince who departed after living less than a year?”

“…You’ve truly lost your mind….”

Alicia murmured quietly. They weren’t merely empty words. The Klaus before her wasn’t the brother she knew.

They’d never been particularly close siblings, but she knew Klaus had once been sly and playful.

His debauchery had grown excessive over the past few years, but even then, he hadn’t been this bad. Suddenly, something strange caught her eye.

“Klaus, are you ill?”

Alicia’s gaze moved beneath Klaus’s shirt, whose collar rose all the way to his neck. His skin looked strangely mottled.

“Shut your mouth, Alicia.”

Klaus’s demeanor suddenly turned sharp. When Alicia’s eyes wavered in confusion, he continued with a sinister smile, “Why? Does watching that stir up your pitiful sense of goodwill? Then go stop it with your own body. Stand in front of them and shout that the poor people of Catalman are citizens of Römern too. Shield them with your own body.”

“Do you realize this is the worst thing you could possibly do? No matter what, this is….”

“What? Ah…. Do the men on that stage happen to resemble someone?”

Klaus snickered at the end of his question, then whispered, “Or should I bring out female prisoners? I could have them wear their brown hair long, just like you. Would you like that, Alicia?”

Goose bumps rose across her skin. She imagined a prisoner who looked like her being punished, and Klaus terrified her as he casually spoke of it and mocked her for amusement.

Alicia bit her lip, turned away, and headed toward the stage. Pushing through the noisy crowd, she shouted, “Stop! Stop this right now!”

Just as she reached the lower edge of the stage, something struck with a thud, followed by a sharp sound like something breaking.

At the same moment, the tallest prisoner collapsed to the floor. Red blood flowed from the man’s head, which had been split open by a wine bottle rather than a stone.

Alicia felt it was a miracle that she didn’t faint.

When she saw Matthias in the corridor after barely escaping the banquet hall with the attendants’ support, the tears she’d held back finally burst free.

“Klaus has lost his mind!”

Alicia rarely cried. Although she was unpretentious and candid for someone of her status, she was still a member of the imperial family and therefore skilled at concealing her emotions. That made the sight of her trembling now, unable to control herself, all the more unusual.

“Matthias! You have to stop him! This… none of this is remotely normal! Everyone in there has lost their minds!”

He looked down at Alicia. Her face was deathly pale, and not even her lips held any color.

“Return to your room for now, Your Highness.”

“Matty….”

Alicia hesitated as though she had something to say. Matthias’s gaze moved to her hand clutching the sleeve of his jacket. Her fingertips trembled faintly.

She looked around. Her maid and the imperial knights were still nearby. Matthias instinctively realized that his cousin had something she wanted to tell him.

“I’ll escort you.”

When he offered his arm, Alicia nodded and placed her hand on it. Her hurried steps, as though she’d just escaped from hell, carried her away from the corridor outside the banquet hall.

Only after they reached her room did Alicia speak.

“Something is wrong with Klaus. Do you know that?”

On the way to her room, Matthias heard a general account of what had happened in the banquet hall. He nodded as though agreeing. What Klaus had done to the people of Catalman was far too extreme.

“I don’t mean only what happened in the banquet hall….”

Alicia continued in a whisper, “Do you know there’s a strange smell coming from Klaus?”

They were alone in the room. Even so, as though wary of merely speaking the words aloud, Alicia’s eyes darted around their surroundings.

“I used to think he simply wore too much perfume, but now I’m certain. He uses it all to cover another smell. There’s a rancid smell coming from Klaus….”

It was different from the fishy smell of a fish. It was a rancid odor like something rotting away. She’d clearly realized something was wrong when she approached Klaus earlier.

“I saw inside his collar, and parts of his skin were mottled as though covered in bruises. When I asked whether he was ill, he became angry with me instead. His makeup keeps getting more and more excessive too. In any case, something is wrong. Klaus… doesn’t seem to be in a normal state.”

Neither physically nor mentally.

Matthias understood the rest of what Alicia couldn’t bring herself to finish. He’d sensed it too when he faced the crown prince. He simply hadn’t examined the matter because something else was more important to him.

“Matthias, I’m so uneasy…. Something keeps feeling wrong. Prince Rüntgen… he was a very healthy child. Ever since he was born….”

Alicia anxiously bit her nails. It was a habit ill-suited to a modest and elegant princess, but it clearly revealed how agitated and unstable she was now.

“Matty, will you go look at Klaus? Check him yourself. I-I’m honestly too frightened to ask him anything. I’m afraid to find out.”

When had it begun? It felt as though everything surrounding her was growing mold. It had spread from the distant edges and now seemed to have reached her very doorstep, filling Alicia with suffocating anxiety.

Matthias sighed quietly and nodded. “All right. I’ll go and check now before I leave. So calm down for the moment, Alicia.”

At Matthias’s words, Alicia finally managed to breathe and nodded. After watching her, Matthias instructed the maid outside the door to bring tea. He rose from his seat only after seeing color return to Alicia’s face.

“Matty.”

As he was about to leave the room, Alicia spoke from behind him.

“…Be careful.”

Of what?

But he didn’t ask further and merely nodded.

His long legs carried him across the corridor.

In truth, he didn’t care whether something was wrong with Klaus or what condition his body and mind were in. More precisely, nothing mattered to him unless it was related to Eleanor Brynhill.

But he couldn’t coldly refuse Alicia’s request after seeing how unstable she was. In any case, he needed to assess Klaus’s condition accurately.

He still hadn’t dismissed all his suspicions and thoughts. At least until everything was conclusively resolved, Klaus needed to remain in full possession of his mind.

Matthias entered the crown prince’s palace with practiced familiarity.

Klaus was already gone when Matthias returned to the banquet hall. According to an attendant, he’d become drunk and returned to his palace.

Except for the two knights guarding the entrance, the palace was quiet. Lately, the crown prince’s palace had been empty like this.

For some reason, Klaus had steadily reduced the number of people around him throughout the year. Aside from a few trusted attendants who served him at close range, he was reluctant to allow even palace maids into his quarters.

Matthias passed through the corridor, which felt almost desolate, and entered the private chambers. Light was spilling from inside the bedroom.

Drunken muttering drifted from within. Matthias took a step forward and reached the bedroom entrance.

Then he stopped abruptly.

A woman sat beside Klaus, who lay sprawled across the bed, with her back toward Matthias. She wore a plain, unpatterned dress, and her cyclamen-colored hair was neatly pinned up.

What was happening today? Had he thought about the woman so much that he now saw things resembling her everywhere?

He wondered whether she was the woman who’d been kissing the crown prince in the corridor, but something was different. Besides, the scene before him didn’t look like a secret tryst in any way.

Between the woman’s two hands, raised high toward the ceiling, was a sharp-pointed blade.

“What are you doing?”

The startled figure turned toward him. The instant his eyes met those of the woman wearing a black cat mask, his heart dropped with a heavy thud.

“…Eleanor?”