Chapter 146

“Ahem, hem! For the details, please see for yourself. I did the best I could in my own way, but I’m sure there are many shortcomings.”

Lucian let out a small chuckle as he watched Hans clear his throat, as if shaking off a chill.

“No need to be so modest. For your first time acting as the lord’s deputy, your handling of things was remarkably clean. I’m very satisfied.”
“Thank you.”
“If you just keep performing at this level, you’ll be fine—so make sure you get the feel for it. I may have to entrust you with the position of acting lord again before long.”
“—Pardon?”

Hans, who had been sighing in relief, stared wide-eyed at Lucian’s words. After all the hardship he’d endured—enough to make him never want to do it again—they were saying he might have to take it on once more? Just as the horrified Hans was about to protest, Lucian voiced a question that had crossed his mind.

“By the way, I don’t see Sir Aizen. And Felicia has returned after quite some time—I thought he’d come out to greet her. Is he resting in the castle?”

At that, Hans closed his mouth, his face turning pale. Sensing something amiss, Lucian turned his head to study Hans’s expression.

“What is it? Don’t tell me something’s wrong?”
“Actually… his health isn’t very good.”
“What do you mean by that?”

No sooner had Hans finished speaking than Felicia cut in with a sharp voice.

“My father was in good health right up until I left Asagrim. And now you’re telling me his health deteriorated in such a short time? What on earth happened?”
“Ah, nothing happened at all! He’s merely lost a bit of his vitality!”

Hans answered hurriedly at her interrogative tone, but Felicia continued to glare sharply at him. Faced with her gaze demanding a more detailed explanation, Hans let out a deep sigh.

“Lady Felicia, I understand your concern for him, but truly, nothing happened. Who would dare try to harm the Sword Saint? Setting aside intent, there’s no one with the ability to do so.”
“Then my father’s declining health is…”
“Please consider his age. It wouldn’t be strange for his health to worsen from old age. This may sound irreverent, but I’ve never seen anyone older than him.”

In other words, purely in terms of age, it wouldn’t be surprising if he were to die at any time.

Unable to find a retort, Felicia stepped back with a darkened expression. As Hans had said, Aizen’s lifespan had nearly reached the limits of what a human could endure.
Yet Lucian felt a sense of confusion at Hans’s answer.

‘What’s going on? Sir Aizen should still have about five years left on his lifespan.’

In his previous life, the Sword Saint Aizen had died five years later. According to rumor, he had remained so vigorous that he never skipped his sword training even the day before his death. And yet now he was so weakened that he couldn’t even come out to greet his beloved Felicia.

“Are you sure nothing happened? You didn’t notice any signs of illness or anything strange?”
“It’s definitely not an illness, but… if I had to describe it as something strange, it felt as though he’d lost his will to live.”
“Lost his will to live?”
“He often said things like, ‘I’ve accomplished everything’ or ‘I have no regrets.’ We even found a will he’d started writing but never finished.”

At Hans’s reply, Lucian let out a hollow laugh.

Only now did Lucian realize why Aizen—who had lived five more years in his previous life—had lost his vitality.

***

After returning to the White Palace, Lucian sought out Aizen first.
Aizen, lying in bed, wore an apologetic expression at Lucian’s visit.

“Your Majesty, congratulations on your triumphant return after achieving such great deeds. Please forgive my discourtesy in greeting you while confined to my bed, unable even to come out and welcome you.”
“There’s nothing to forgive. Don’t force yourself to get up—just rest.”

Lucian gently pressed Aizen back down as he tried to prop himself up.
Though the force was light, Aizen’s body could not resist and sank back into the bed. Seeing how weakened Aizen had become, Felicia knelt down, her eyes glistening with tears.

“Father.”

“You silly girl—the prince is watching.”

Though his words sounded like a rebuke, his eyes were filled with affection.
At Aizen’s loving gaze, Lucian let out a sigh inwardly.

‘So it really was because of me.’

More precisely, unlike in his previous life, the problem was that Aizen no longer had any lingering attachment to life.
In his former life, the Sword Saint Aizen had regretted until the very end that he had failed to leave behind a proper successor. Naturally, he must have been unable to let go of that regret even at the moment of death.

But in this life, Lucian had introduced Felicia to him, allowing Aizen to cast aside all such regrets.
On top of that, he had lost his liege lord, Grand Duke Sigmund, and Lucian himself had become independent enough that he no longer needed the Sword Saint’s help.

‘So he couldn’t find a reason to keep living. To think that losing the will to cling to life would hasten death.’

For Aizen himself, his life now was probably several times better than it had been in his previous one.
To live merely five more years at the cost of carrying lifelong regret would be nothing but suffering.
Yet Lucian could not shake the thought that he had caused Aizen to die earlier than he was meant to.

Aizen, on the other hand, seemed to misunderstand the shadow that had fallen over Lucian’s face and offered a faint smile.

“Your Majesty, please do not torment yourself so. As a human, one cannot escape the ravages of old age. In fact, isn’t it something of a miracle that I’ve lived this long without ever properly falling ill?”
“Sir Aizen.”

“If you truly worry about this old man, then tell me what happened beyond the snowy plains. I think hearing of Your Majesty’s and Felicia’s adventures will give me renewed strength.”
“Gladly.”

Lucian sat down beside Aizen and calmly began to recount what had happened beyond the snowy plains:
the extreme cold so severe that even northerners were stunned, the people who claimed to be descendants of dragons, and Marius’s prophecy;
the chieftain’s desperate attempts to eliminate Lucian, and the trials that resulted from it all.

Listening with interest, Aizen burst into hearty laughter at the part where those who had once belittled Felicia changed their attitude in a single day.

“Hahaha! To think that those fools who looked down on her for being a woman knelt in submission after just one day! That must have been quite a sight!”
“More than just quite a sight. Simply passing by with Felicia at my side, they worshiped her as if welcoming a goddess.”
“If only I had accompanied Your Majesty, I could have seen such a spectacle myself. What a shame.”

After laughing his fill, Aizen wore a pleased smile, but regardless of his mood, his body seemed short of breath.
Seeing this, Lucian rose from his seat, concealing the bitterness welling up inside him.

“There are still many stories I could tell you, but since I’ve only just returned and work has piled up, I should take my leave now.”
“Oh dear, it seems this old man has kept Your Majesty far too long. My apologies.”
“Not at all. You two have plenty to talk about as father and daughter, so I’ll leave Felicia here. You can hear the rest of the story from her.”
“Thank you for your consideration, Your Majesty.”

Lucian returned Aizen’s gaze with a smile, then quietly left the room.
The moment the door closed behind him, the smile vanished, and with a hardened expression he went to find Hans.

“Hans.”
“Yes, Your Highness.”
“I’m asking just in case—does Sir Aizen know what’s been going on outside?”
“He does not. I thought there was no need to burden someone already in poor health with bad news, so I did everything I could to block the information.”
“Well done.”

Even if he had known, there would have been little Aizen could do about the merchants pressuring Hans.
Aizen was a Sword Saint, not a politician skilled in schemes and power plays.
Hearing about it would only have made him worry excessively and worsened his condition.
Conversely, that meant that without Hans’s preemptive measures, Aizen’s state might have deteriorated even further.

“Summon the merchants.”

Turning to Hans, Lucian issued the command in a cold voice.

“It’s time they paid their overdue debts.”

“T-this lowly merchant humbly greets His Grace the Duke, master of Asagrim and the rightful heir to the northern royal line!”
“We greet His Grace the Duke!”

The heads of the various merchant guilds who had been summoned knelt before Lucian, trembling all over.
Conscious of their guilt, every one of them had gone deathly pale.

Lucian looked over the bowed heads of the merchant guild leaders once before speaking in a flat, emotionless tone.

“You’ve come. You’ve already heard from others why I summoned you, haven’t you?”
“I heard you intended to settle the outstanding debts, Your Highness…”
“That’s right. Anyone who is human must repay their debts. I intend to repay the debt I owe you—here and now.”

At those words, the guild leaders’ faces brightened and they lifted their heads.
They had worried he might feign ignorance, but to think he truly meant to pay the outstanding balance!
However, Lucian was not finished.

“And the debt you owe me will also be collected here.”

“You lot pressured the deputy I appointed with paltry conditions. Just how lightly did you take my authority to pull such contemptible tricks?”
“Y-Your Highness…”

“If there’s any reason I shouldn’t cut off your heads here and decorate the castle walls with them, then speak.”

At the voice brimming with killing intent, the guild leaders trembled violently, their faces drained of all color.
They had felt reassured by Dominic’s words, but now weren’t they on the verge of losing their heads?
At that moment, Dominic—the only one among them whose expression remained calm—opened his mouth.

“How could there be any excuse? This lowly merchant sought petty gain and incurred the displeasure of His Grace the Duke; even if I were to die a hundred times, I would have nothing to say. However—”
“However?”
“If you would spare this wretched life, I will devote my utmost loyalty and service to Your Highness and seek forgiveness for my sins. I beg you to show mercy.”

Lucian barely managed to suppress a laugh that threatened to escape.
Was there anything less trustworthy than a merchant’s oath of loyalty?
And if that merchant happened to be none other than Dominic of Steel, then all the more so.
Swallowing his laughter, Lucian put on an intrigued expression, as though he knew nothing at all.

“And just how do you intend to serve me? I’ve accepted the oaths of loyalty of knights before, but never that of a merchant.”
“There are many ways for a merchant to prove his loyalty, but at this moment, there seems to be only one way for me to prove mine to Your Highness.”
“Stop stalling and speak. My patience is not limitless.”

Urged on by Lucian, Dominic drew a deep breath before opening his mouth.

“I will present to Your Highness a metal comparable to adamantium—
in a quantity sufficient to fully equip ten thousand soldiers with heavy arms.”
“…Ten thousand?”

At Dominic’s utterly unexpected words, everyone let out a silent scream.
A metal with strength on par with adamantium?
When had such a metal ever been newly discovered?
And not only that—it could supposedly be mass-produced in quantities enough to outfit ten thousand troops at once?

“Are you trying to deceive me right now? Stop spouting such nonsense.”

While everyone else was stunned, Lucian did not withdraw his cold gaze.
Startled by the unexpectedly icy response, Dominic nevertheless continued in a composed voice.

“I know how dubious this sounds. That is why I intend to prove it directly before Your Highness.”
“So you’re spouting any lie you can think of just to stay alive. If your words are proven false, what then?”

Deceiving an acting lord might be settled with the head of a guild master.
But deceiving the lord himself—especially a duke—would not end with just one head rolling.
Faced with that threat, Dominic replied with a stiff expression.

“I will offer up my head, along with everything belonging to the Dominic Guild. It will be granted to Your Highness as your rightful claim, and no one will be able to dispute that right.”

Hearing the answer he wanted, Lucian gave a chill smile and nodded.

“Do not forget those words.”