The emperor questioned Apollonia after staring at Kaness for a moment, “Do you wish to learn as well?”

Petra, who was next to him, spoke worriedly when she saw Apollonia nod in response to his question.

“I can’t help but worry for the princess if she starts learning such a thing. It’s too dangerous, and if she isn’t careful…” She wore a terrifying smile on her face as she looked at Apollonia. “It would be a shame if Her Highness were to break a bone or something.”

The emperor simply laughed at her words, saying that he would think about it a bit more, before dismissing everyone. Just ten days later, he sent Kaness to the border with the excuse of exterminating monsters. In such harsh conditions, Kaness lost half of his troops and the ability to use one of his arms, so he had to retire.

Apollonia was fourteen when Petra hit her in her face for the first and last time. She kicked Perris and Gareth out of her palace for ruining her mother’s keepsake, a book.

Slap!

A piercing sound rang out as Apollonia’s head was forcefully flung right. Her eyes filled with tears from pain and humiliation. What she felt even more intensely, however, was the sense of helplessness.

Petra warned her shortly and clearly when only the two of them were left alone in the princess’s room.

“Do not think of protecting anything you cherish as yours.”

The emperor didn’t say anything to Apollonia even though he saw her swollen cheek that night.

⋮

“Do not stand out one bit.”

Apollonia remembered first warning Petra gave her as she sat curled up. She clutched her knees tightly. She tried. She really did. However, after seven years, all of her hard work amounted to nothing. What next?

The answer was unexpectedly simple: she had to come up with countermeasures. Once she made the decision, her complex thoughts were simplified a little. Her scarlet eyes gleamed in the dark, and her head cleared as well as her breathing.

The young Apollonia hadn’t just wasted her time over the last seven years.

She remembered the second time Petra had warned her. “Do not think of protecting anything you cherish as yours.”

Thankfully, she didn’t listen to those words, which meant she still had many things she cherished. As long as she could stay focused, those things she cherished would protect her back.

* * *

Petra and the emperor thought they were in control of everything inside the palace, but they were wrong. The late emperor was a man who had more secrets than they thought.

First, they didn’t know that the detached palace Apollonia was living in had another function. She was originally supposed to live in the Princess’ Palace, but once Gaius ascended to the throne, she voluntarily headed to the detached palace, explaining that she didn’t need such a large space by herself.

The detached palace was located within the walls of the Imperial Palace, but it was far from the Emperor’s Palace, which was right in the middle. It was built by the late emperor so that he could let guests stay over.

At least, that was its purpose on the surface.

In reality, it was used to hide the emperor’s secrets from others. The late emperor built numerous secret passageways that led to not just other palaces, but even ones that led outside, as well as many secret rooms throughout the nooks and crannies of the detached palace. They were built just in case of an attack from within, and also to hide treasures that weren’t listed in the palace’s ledger.

There were many valuable things amongst those treasures like gold, crowns, and jewels, and even more precious than those were the magic stones, which were rarely discovered even throughout the whole continent. These magic stones were used for casting spells or included as an important component of indestructible instruments or weapons.

Apollonia used most of those treasures to gather information outside the empire, especially information about the Liepherr family. She, of course, couldn’t get close to any of Petra and her husband’s servants, but she still had some spies who were quite useful when telling her news about Petra sometimes.

Second, the servants of the detached palace serving Apollonia were all chosen by Syd Weihen himself and remained faithful to her.

Syd Weihen oversaw the detached palace and was once the late emperor’s right-hand man, as well as the Commander of the Imperial Knights. His feats in battle were acknowledged and he was bestowed the title of a count, alongside a fief, at a young age. Even Gaius couldn’t touch him because of his reputation.

Apollonia had told him about Gaius and Perris’s secret seven years ago, and back then, he didn’t hesitate to gather a few loyal servants to fill the detached palace since he had sworn his loyalty to her the day she was born. It was hard to get rid of all of Petra’s influence, but the servants who served and cooked for at least were devoted to her, with no worries about them defecting to Petra’s side.

If some servants who were on Petra’s side tried to get close to Apollonia, Syd would make up a suitable excuse to send them away.

That was it. That was everything Apollonia cherished. Even with everything combined would she have a hard time trying to fend off a single move from Petra.

“Syd, prepare for a night visitor.”

Apollonia called over the middle-aged knight, whose hair had gone white. His gray eyes that resembled his hair was once the symbol of a demon of the battlefield that terrified his enemies, but to her, he was a sliver of warmth in this cold Imperial Palace.

“Is it the Duchess? Or is it the Emperor?” he asked.

At a glance, he seemed to be asking the important questions, but in reality, he was looking to see how his master was feeling. It was quite horrible to ask a sixteen-year-old girl whether the one who wanted her dead was her aunt or her uncle.

“For now, it’ll be from my aunt. I don’t know whether she’s going to send an assassin or a spy, but she’s going to send someone here in secret.”

“If it’s a spy, I must look through our new employees closely, and if…”

He couldn’t bring himself to talk about the other possibility Apollonia had mentioned. However, she didn’t seem to mind and finished his sentence for him.

“And if it’s an assassin, predicting when they’ll strike will be the problem.”

“That’s right, it’ll take a few months though. Whether the duchess sends them without the emperor’s knowledge or tries to persuade him, it’s still going to take some time.”

In any other situation, he would be right, but Petra was one to strike without giving her opponent time to prepare.

“Three days,” Apollonia curtly declared. “They’ll come in three days, just before the commotion over what happened at the banquet dies down.”

Catherine Roenheim’s scandal would be the perfect cover to keep the princess’s death quiet.

Syd’s eyes widened in surprise but he soon accepted. The young mistress he served would sometimes have such good insight that it was almost like she could see into the future, and even though he couldn’t understand her, she was always right. The fact that she was still living was proof of that.

“We don’t have much time.”

“I’ll use the barrier I told you about before. That’ll be enough.”

Apollonia wasn’t so convinced, but she nodded.

Syd continued to speak as though he noticed her unease, “Please evacuate just in case. How about getting someone else to take your place?”

“Such shallow tricks won’t work,” Apollonia told him flatly. They would surely notice that it wasn’t her, even from a hundred meters away, if they were an assassin hired by Petra.

“I’ll die anyway if they report that I went somewhere else. No matter who it comes, they will enter my bedroom, but never get out again.”

Syd once again agreed upon hearing her judgment.

“Don’t worry. There are only two swordsmen who can get through barriers created by magic stones. One is me, and the other is the current emperor. It would be impossible for them to do such a thing, even if they are sent by Petra Liepherr.”

Apollonia nodded again, feeling slightly more reassured than earlier.

“The problem would be not letting them escape after they fall into our trap. I could even clear Aunt Petra’s suspicions if we succeed.”

“Don’t worry, we will.”

They went over their plan a few more times and started to prepare. Everything seemed reasonable and well-thought-out. Apollonia would definitely be able to overcome this obstacle of hers.

However, there was something that they didn’t expect, and that was the fact that the Liepherr family had a genius on their side that even Petra herself didn’t know about.

The Silver-haired Assassin.

Apollonia’s prediction was right. An assassin visited her on the day after the banquet, even less than the three days she mentioned.

It was midnight when they arrived.

When the banquet to welcome the Imperial Mistresses was finished, the lively night of the capital died down, and a silhouette slipped through the shadows in the streets facing the silent palace.

It was Uriel Viche, the Sword of the Underworld.

He belonged to the Liepherr family and was raised by Saphiro, who dedicated his entire life to training assassins, spies, and thieves. Saphiro had found him in the slums and considered him his lifelong masterpiece.

All the killers that Saphiro had trained were called Saphiro’s Wolves, and they were all orphans who underwent harsh training and torture. They dwindled in number as he got old due to his inability to train anymore, but he was once so well-known that every killer in the underworld would tremble in fear if they ever heard of Saphiro’s Wolves.

However, none of them were like Uriel.

He had already finished his training by the time he was thirteen and had completed all of his missions perfectly over the last four years. He was the master of infiltration and a genius when it came to swordsmanship. He didn’t show his face to anyone except Saphiro when carrying out his duties. Saphiro made all his trainees like that so he could have full control over them.