The Governor's Weakness

Rhea rubbed the sticky substance between her fingertips.

"It's oil. They were going to burn it."

"I distinctly told you not to come any closer."

"Your Highness. This is unmistakably contraband."

Carion's gaze shifted. Embezzlement by a regional powerbroker to line his own pockets was not something one typically called smuggling.

"And what makes you so certain?"

Rhea placed a piece of charred wheat in her palm and studied it.

"It's highland wheat. It can't be cultivated anywhere on the continent. The Governor of Poema has been running an illicit trade with the Outlanders."

Carion felt the man whose collar he still gripped begin to tremble, and turned his head. The man made a strange sound, something between a groan and a dog's whimper — the reaction of someone in despair, seized by terror. His response was as good as an admission that the princess was telling the truth.

Outlanders.

Though the Empire had swallowed the continent whole, not everyone had submitted to imperial rule. Those who opposed the Empire had crossed the mountain range into the lands of the wild folk.

The Aurel Mountains formed the boundary between the continent and the lands beyond. Those who lived on the far side of the range were treated as barbarians by the Empire and called Outlanders. The Empire paid little mind to the Outlanders beyond the mountains, but it would not tolerate them setting foot on continental soil.

If it came to light that an imperial governor was trading with the Outlanders, not only the governor himself but the entire region could be razed to the ground.

Carion threw the man down as if discarding him and approached her.

The man's eyes flashed with venom as he watched Carion's back. He scrambled toward the pack he had thrown aside, snatched a dagger from it, and lunged.

"Look out!"

The instant Rhea cried out, Carion had already sensed the attack and slipped aside. He spun with fluid grace, putting the momentum of his turn into a fist that smashed into the man's face.

"Guh!"

The man went flying and tumbled across the ground. Carion picked up the dagger he had dropped.

"Your Highness."

Rhea caught his sleeve.

"Don't kill him."

She shouted toward the fallen man.

"If you want to live, stay still! I'll persuade His Highness to cover this up!"

Whether he understood or had simply passed out, the man remained motionless and silent.

Carion frowned.

"What exactly are you trying to do?"

"First we need to clean this up. We have to restrain them and secure the evidence here."

She whispered, very softly.

"If we want to blackmail the Governor of Poema."

Carion was so incredulous he couldn't speak. At the same time, he was intensely curious about what she was thinking.

Rhea knew Markel, the Governor of Poema, at least a little.

Even more than a decade later, the governor of Poema was still Markel. People mocked him as the very picture of a spineless sycophant who attached himself to whoever was convenient, but he was a different man than his reputation suggested.

Around the time Rhea had earned the infamy of the Red Phantom, she met Markel for the first and last time. That day was their first meeting, but it was a connection that continued steadily thereafter. Without the food and weapons obtained through illicit trade with Markel, Rhea and the wanderers would never have survived.

The imperial capital sucked in all the wealth of the continent, flourishing more with each passing day. The brighter the light, the deeper the shadow.

Poema was the most neglected of all the territories the Empire had absorbed. It had never been a wealthy kingdom to begin with, and after annexation, even its one unique specialty was stripped away and exploited. Markel, a cadet of the Poema royal line who had become governor, had thrown himself into dangerous work to secure the funds needed to care for his people.

Rhea held Governor Markel in higher regard than she had in her previous life. She hadn't expected him to already be smuggling in this era, with the Empire watching so keenly. To never be caught even once, and still hold the governorship more than a decade later — he was a truly remarkable man.

"Your Highness. Don't let this opportunity to hold the governor's weakness slip away."

"If I cover this up, he'll have something on me as well."

"The governor has far more to lose. It'll be fine."

"And why should I go to all this trouble?"

"Why shouldn't you?"

The force of her tone, as if she were scolding him, left Carion speechless. There was a strange dignity in the way she looked him straight in the eye.

"If Your Highness covers this up, you'll be granting an enormous favor to the governor and the people of Poema. The governor's life is on the line — he would never dare betray you."

Carion gazed at the back of the man walking two paces ahead. Two of the three had been bound tightly, and they were returning to the garrison with only the guide in tow. Once they arrived, the guide would go back to the site with soldiers.

"Are you certain he can't hear us?"

"Yes. He can't hear a thing."

How, exactly?

All she had done was stuff scraps of cloth in the man's ears and tell him that if he wanted to live, he must not remove them. After physically blocking the guide's ears, Rhea had used her spirit's power to scatter the sound. He was probably hearing nothing but a dull hum. It was a method whose effectiveness had been thoroughly proven in her previous life.

"If Your Highness takes our party to the capital, His Majesty will recognize your merit — and you'll find yourself the target of every faction around you. You need to start making allies now, even if it's only one."

This woman was crossing a line. Even a close advisor would hesitate to say such things, yet a woman he had known for mere days was speaking without the slightest reservation.

Carion's brow twitched, and her mouth opened again.

"If you expose their smuggling and report it to His Majesty, what do you actually gain? A pat on the back for a job well done? If that's the praise you're after, I suppose there's nothing I can do about it."

This woman was as rude as breathing.

And yet he couldn't understand why he wasn't angry. It was strange that he was swallowing this insolence without a word. Watching her back as she strode several paces ahead, Carion fell into thought.

The moment they returned to the garrison, he quietly summoned Luke and sent him into the forest with his closest guards. Before heading into the woods, Luke glanced back at Carion and Rhea with a peculiar look.

The two of them entered the inner courtyard through the same back door they had used earlier at the residence.

"It's late. You'd do well to get some sleep if you mean to leave early in the morning."

"Are we still departing tomorrow as planned?"

"We'll wrap this up before sunrise."

"…Have you decided what you'll do? His Majesty the Emperor won't treat this as the governor's personal transgression. Countless people will die. You wouldn't want that, would you?"

Carion realized why her overreaching interference did not bother him. Her gaze, straight and clear, carried no impure intent to pick him apart. It was not the naivety of someone ignorant of the world, either. It was the feeling of someone willing to meet him head-on, honestly.

In the world he had lived in, people did not hold each other's eyes for long. A gaze, they believed, carried emotion — and through it, one's inner self could be read. He had never exchanged a look with anyone for this long.

He clenched his fist, putting force into his hand. He had come within a breath of touching her face, where the moonlight lay. Then he realized his gaze had fallen to her red lips, and he turned away at once.

Rhea watched until his retreating back — he had left without answering — disappeared from sight, then lightly slapped both her cheeks with her hands.

Get a hold of yourself.

She had mistaken whatever had just passed between them for some kind of connection. When he suddenly turned away, it felt like a one-sided severance, and for a moment she was hurt. She could not afford to feel such strange emotions. Their relationship had to remain a transaction.

Rhea let out a short sigh and walked toward her room. She had gone all the way to the forest trying not to get caught by Penny.

Wait. I've been meeting that man every night since yesterday?

If Penny found out… she could almost hear her old nanny's scolding, and she quickened her pace.

Anyway, is he all right?

Judging by how easily he had handled those men in the forest, he seemed fine. I thought he'd ask about the spirit's rampage. If he had asked, she would have told him everything she knew. She was reluctant to bring up something he hadn't asked about first. He called his condition a curse. It's a sensitive matter for him.

Rhea had no way of knowing whether his rampage had fully subsided or not. The spirit knowledge Nella had taught her was general theory passed down from ancient times. Spirits had to be learned through direct experience and observation. That was why she had gone through so much trial and error in her previous life.

On the way back to her room, Rhea let out a small laugh. He's rather… rigid, isn't he. Taking responsibility just because they had kissed. Rhea had assumed the reason he had said he would "take responsibility" in the forest village was because of that kiss. Strict about rules, stubborn, inflexible. At least he was consistent.

She hoped he would show some flexibility regarding the Governor of Poema — that he was a man who possessed at least a minimum of compassion.