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“—Tell me, do you think I want to be having this pointless conversation right now?”
The moment she heard that annoyed voice, Emilia landed on a larger ice foothold, leaned her back against the wall, and held her breath—Regulus’s voice was coming from a room in the chapel right behind her.
—Emilia had learned a lot in just a short time running all around the tower. First of all, there were no signs of any cultists other than Regulus at that tower—she could not see any trace of anyone other than his wives. She had struggled to believe it, but she had even carefully approached the control room for the floodgate, so it was safe to say the tower’s defense was full of holes.
It was hard for her to determine if it was from carelessness, confidence, or was just natural given Regulus’s impossible strength, but she took it as good news that they did not have to worry about anyone other than Regulus here.
But that was still not enough. She needed to get something more decisively useful. And just as she was thinking that, she heard his voice. Emilia created a foothold from ice just beneath the window to his room and hid there, listening to what was happening inside. Her nerves tensed when she realized he was talking to someone. She was afraid it was one of his wives, in case he was about to attack her like he just had #184. If that happened, she would have to stop him, even if it meant revealing her rebellious intentions.
“ ”
Emilia pursed her lips as she made a mirror of ice in her hand and carefully peered into the room. The cool mirror reflected a waiting room on the second floor of the chapel. Unlike the control tower, it had a majestic appearance appropriate for a building where ceremonies were held. The waiting room was not gaudy; instead, it gave off a tranquil and sublime feeling.
—Or at least, it would have if not for the ominous and dreadful white-suited figure standing in the middle of the room.
“…No one’s there?”
Tilting her ice mirror to look around the room, Emilia furrowed her brow. There were no other people visible in the room. Had it only been a loud complaint to himself? That would not have been that shocking, but straining her eyes, Emilia realized it was not that, either. He was definitely talking to someone—more specifically, he was addressing a mirror in his hand.
“How many times must I repeat myself? I only came here to find my fated bride. And having found her, I am holding a wedding. A wedding is something to be celebrated—and certainly should not be disrupted. A brute who would do such a thing betrays themself to be a petty, small-minded villain who begrudges others their happiness. Though I am well aware you all have always been filth.”
Regulus was talking to someone on the other end of the mirror. It was a conversation mirror—a metia that allowed its user to speak with whoever had the other mirror, wherever they were. Regulus was using it to talk to someone somewhere else.
“It is not as if I have any particular interest in your actions. But opening the floodgate, that is unacceptable. It is not a part of the plan. And I can only interpret your willingness to do something unplanned that upsets my bride as a desire to ruin the wedding I’m painstakingly preparing. And clouding my bride’s face, sullying the joyful occasion of my blessed marriage—what should be the most sunny and happy of stages in my life—that is an injurious infringement of my rights.”
Regulus’s annoyance was growing as he spoke. Emilia could feel a burning sensation on the back of her neck as she realized that he must be talking to another cultist, seemingly one connected to the flooding that had just hit the city—
“—!”
“You are aware, are you not, that I can see your tower quite clearly just across the city from here?” Regulus said, suddenly throwing the window open.
Just beneath the window, Emilia stifled a shout at the sudden movement. She held her breath, praying that he would not notice her below as she focused on what he was saying. Fortunately, he seemed oblivious to her presence and continued speaking from his vantage point like nothing was out of the ordinary.
“It isn’t even so far away that I can’t see it. It would be a simple matter for me to blow your tower away from here if I so desired it. A word of caution: Do not assume that you and I are equals. You’d best treat this with the imperative of an order… What?”
Judging from how Regulus was looking off into the distance, Emilia gathered that the person he was talking to was in the tower directly across the city. And that person was—
“You weren’t the one who opened the floodgate? What sort of excuse do you think that is supposed to be? You were the one who made that grandstanding threat on the broadcast, were you not? Claiming now that you were not the one who opened the floodgate is utterly unconvincing… You shouldn’t tell such pointless lies, you repulsive reprobate.”
“ ”
“Well, either way, I’ve conveyed my demand. And after your tactless display, at least the people in the city won’t interrupt the proceedings between my bride and me… Once the stage is properly set, I shall hold my marriage, and then I will leave the city with my wives. It is on you to achieve whatever it is you want before then.” Spitting that out, Regulus closed the cover on the mirror in his hand. Standing at the window, he narrowed his eyes as he brushed back his hair.
“What an asinine excuse. ‘Some rat sniffing around.’ Do you take me for a fool? Trying to hide your own incompetence while treating it as a word of caution. You only confess your own pettiness by clinging to such trivial pride. And assuming just because you were had that others would be, too, is the mark of a rotten character, though that is not the only thing rotten about you, I suppose.”
Regulus expressed a heartfelt loathing for someone who belonged to the same organization that he did. Sitting outside the window, Emilia was the only one who heard his muttering, and recognizing Regulus’s remoteness from others, the way he was in conflict with everyone and made no effort to change that, she felt a gloomy despair.
Just then, there was a knock on the door.
“—May I enter, sir?”
“…Come in.”
A woman stepped into the waiting room. Another woman besides #184, though she was also beautiful and similarly dressed up. It was clear at a glance from her frozen eyes and expression that she was another one of Regulus’s wives.
“The preparations for the ceremony are continuing apace. We have begun the interior decoration, however…as you requested to direct the interior design personally, I came to let you know we are ready,” the woman responded with a polite curtsy.
“Ah, it’s already time? Yes, right. Let’s get to it, then.” Regulus nodded.
He walked away from the window and left the room together with the woman. The door closed, and Regulus’s presence faded into the distance. Silence fell over the waiting room.
“Haaaah… That was close. I almost made a sound.”
Emilia patted her chest as she hopped through the window and into the room once she was sure it was safe. She still had plenty of mana in reserve, but that bit of covert movement had drained her mental reserves. Taking a deep breath at clearing the first hurdle, Emilia parsed what she had heard.
“The control tower visible straight across from here… If I’m right, this is the third district’s tower, so the one across the city is in the first district—and based on the conversation, the one there should be the Archbishop of Lust.”
Parking herself where Regulus had been standing, she looked out in the same direction he had, confirming her guess for the location. He had not mentioned a name, but he had identified the person he was talking to as the one behind the broadcast and called them a reprobate, which all but confirmed he had been talking to Lust. That meant that Lust was based in the first district, and Regulus was in the third. Even just that much should be at least a little bit useful for the others.
The only remaining problem was—
“How do I tell them?”
Emilia cocked her head in thought as she crossed her arms. Sharing the information she had gathered was the most challenging part. Even though she had managed to get something worthwhile, it would be meaningless if she could not find a way to share it.
The only thing she could think of was perhaps making a big sheet of ice on top of the tower and writing it out on that, but that would be visible to anyone and would likely fail.
She could maybe rush over to them directly to tell them and then slip back into the control tower as if nothing had happened…
“If I was out that long, it would definitely get noticed…”
The defenses seemed full of holes, but counting on that to save her was as good as acting without a plan at all. She could not endanger so many people’s lives on such a risky gamble.
“If only there was some reliable way… Huh?”
As she looked around the room, desperately trying to think of something, she arched her brows. It looked the same as when she had peeked in using the ice mirror, but there was something on the desk that caught her attention. The conversation mirror that Regulus had just been using. He had tossed it down in a fit of frustration after he was done. Picking it up, Emilia stared at it.
“If would be nice if it could just connect to any mirror…”
But unfortunately, conversation mirrors were not that convenient. They could only communicate with mirrors imbued with matching magic. There were some capable of communicating with more than just a single paired mirror, but for the most part, they only worked in fixed pairs. Even if Emilia activated it, the person on the other end would be none other than the Archbishop of Lust.
“It would be nice to try to talk with that Lust person once.”
But Emilia didn’t have it in her to hold a composed conversation at the moment, and it would only reveal that she was moving around behind Regulus’s back. Thinking about it realistically, she had no choice but to give up on using the mirror to communicate with everyone.
She could also just break it there to keep Regulus out of contact with the other cultists, but—
“It doesn’t really seem like they are working together anyway. What do I do…?”
She could not afford to take a pointless risk that would reveal the presence of a mole.
But while Emilia grappled with what to do, something happened.
—The mirror she had set on the desk activated, and a white light shone out from behind the cover.
“Ah.”
Emilia took a step back from the desk in surprise. But the light from the mirror did not stop. It meant that the person on the other end was trying to connect. All Emilia had to do was open the cover, and it would connect. But she was not sure what to do.
It went without saying that the person on the other end was almost certainly someone connected to the cultists, if not Lust herself. There was no benefit to answering, but it was also possible for things to be leaked via the mirror, as they had been when she overheard Regulus. In one sense, it was possible to justify turning a blind eye to the downsides.
After worrying and thinking about it, Emilia decided to—
“ ”
She flipped the mirror so it was pointing away from her before opening the cover. The two mirrors connected, but the person on the other end would not be able to see Emilia. They would surely notice something was off, but if she was lucky, they might let something slip first. That was her working theory, at least, and she ended up getting rewarded from an entirely unexpected angle.
“—Oh, there’s a response. Wait, there’s no one there. What’s going on? That ain’t how it’s supposed to work. Did I mess something up?”
“Eh?”
Unexpectedly, the voice she heard through the mirror was a man’s voice. She was caught off balance after having assumed she would be connected to Lust. But that was not the only reason for her shock. The voice was familiar. She had heard it just that morning at the Water Raiment Inn—
“—Al? Is that you, Al?”
“…Whoa, whoa, hold up, it went this route?”
Emilia flipped the mirror, blinking as she saw who was on the other end. It was Priscilla’s black-helmed retainer, Al. Naturally, he could see her, too, and even though she could not see his face through the helm, she could tell he was shocked as well.
“Um, this is unexpected. How did you happen across this conversation mirror?”
“The truth is: I’m in the middle of sneaking around investigating things. And just as I was looking around the room where this mirror happened to be, it started flashing… Oh, right!”
“Wh-what?”
“Hey, Al, can you get in contact with Subaru and the others? There was something I wanted to let them know.”
Eyes sparkling at the miracle of someone she knew having been on the other end of the mirror, Emilia decided to make the best of the situation. Caught up in her momentum, Al responded without thinking too deeply on it.
“Y-yeah…I guess so? I’ll let him know you’re safe and want him to come save you…”
“Tell him Regulus, the white-haired Archbishop, is in the control tower in the third district. And also the Archbishop of Lust is apparently in the first district’s tower. There aren’t any other cultists in the third district, but Regulus is really strong, so don’t let your guard down.”
“ ”
“It would be better if I could investigate the other towers, too, but I don’t know where Sirius is. But there was that broadcast, too, so tell him to make sure to protect Beatrice, too. And, um…”
“—Wait a second.”
Emilia was going through the list of things to tell Subaru when Al stopped her. Hearing that, she looked surprised as she asked, “What is it?”
“I knew you were tough and hyper-positive, but there’s gotta be some other things on your mind, too, right? Considering the situation you’re in and all.”
“This was all I could manage after thinking hard about what to do and following through… Was there a better way I missed?”
“Nah! That’s not what I mean… I mean you don’t have to be trying so hard, forcing yourself to do this and that. You’re a captured princess, after all.”
“Hmm…”
Emilia’s eyes wavered as she caught her breath, taken aback by his strong tone.
“No need to be reckless or try the impossible. It’s okay to want Bro…Subaru Natsuki to save you…”
“I’m sorry for worrying you, Al. No, I should say thank you—but it’s okay.”
“It is…?”
“I’m not forcing myself to keep going. And it might sound a little strange, but—”
Emilia naturally broke into a smile. Despite being all alone behind enemy lines, despite being so close to such a powerful being, and despite being in the most danger she had ever been in in her life.
“—I never doubted that Subaru will come save me. That’s why I want to do everything I can to make it less dangerous when he eventually does.”
“ ”
That was unmistakably how she truly felt. She was absolutely sure that Subaru would come save her. But she was also determined to not just sit back and leave everything to him.
“Please, Al. I’ll be sure to apologize to Priscilla later for asking for your help with such a selfish favor…”
“…You really don’t doubt that there will be a later, do you? Damn, that’s sure something.”
Touching the seam of his helm with his finger, Al heaved a deep, heavy sigh.
“Fine, I got it. I’ll let them all know what you told me. You can rest easy and just play the captured princess now. All that’s left is for you to wait for Prince Charming to save you.”
“Subaru’s the one who will save me, though, not some prince…”
“Ah, right! Bro, right! My bad! I messed that up! But seriously, just sit still and don’t do anything crazy. This isn’t a game.”
“Mm-hmm, I understand. You be careful, too, please.”
Emilia nodded at the serious warning that followed Al’s joking response.
Hearing that, Al snorted a little and then shut off the mirror. The light disappeared from Emilia’s end, and it went back to being a simple mirror.
“…Phew. Now it will at least get back to Subaru and the others.”
Blessed with an unexpected opportunity to share what she had learned, for once Emilia was grateful for her fortune.
Putting the mirror back on the desk, she left out the window again, careful not to leave any traces of her having been in the room, and then returned to the control tower and back to her room.
She judged that she had reached her time limit for wandering around gathering information. The mirror’s connecting to Al had been a coincidence, not something that would ever happen again. Considering that, she really had been blessed. It was unbelievably lucky that it had just happened to connect with someone outside the Witch Cult so she could send a message—and that that someone had been Al, of all people.
—If it was Al, he would definitely be able to get her message back.
“…Huh? Why am I so sure of that?”
Emilia was confused as to why she was so confident that her preparations were perfect after having left the rest to Al. But an answer soon started to form in her head.
Something about Al reminded her almost of Subaru. That was probably why she was so sure.
Emilia did not think about it more deeply than that as she scrambled back up the ice scaffolding.
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