The Emperor’s Gift

The guards surged forward.

They grabbed Guillaume’s limp arms from either side and dragged him away across the floor.

A single sentence spoken outside the bounds of decorum was leading to an extreme outcome.

Chloe stared at the wine pooled on the pavilion floor like a shallow puddle and thought hard.

Would it really benefit her to let Guillaume disappear beneath the executioner’s blade?

If she wanted to deceive Hector Montparnasse just enough to leave this place, what should she do?

The situation could not be allowed to escalate any further.

Only if the truth behind the murder was investigated solely within the Larouge household, and the Emperor took no interest, would she have room to maneuver.

She was also uneasy about what could have happened within the organization to drive Guillaume to suddenly pretend to be an adopted son.

There were many ruthless experts in the organization besides Guillaume.

They were the kind who would put her on an execution list for killing Philip Larouge and chase her to the ends of the world.

If Guillaume’s death were added to Philip’s, the organization would mobilize all its power to punish the traitor Chloe.

The Eternal Covenant Society….

It was both an assassins’ guild and a secret religious cult.

Its members were raised as killers while simultaneously worshiping their leader as a god.

As the master of the Society, Philip had long been revered as a living deity.

Though he had bought the Larouge countship with money and transformed himself into a noble, his true identity was that of an assassins’ guildmaster and a false prophet.

Chloe ground her teeth silently as she imagined an assassin striking her from behind.

No matter how she weighed it, Guillaume losing his head was not advantageous for her.

Not only would it be difficult to secure her safety, the situation would only worsen.

Fear rose to her throat, and her teeth clicked together.

She released a ragged breath, then lifted her eyes toward Hector Montparnasse, lowering her gaze with pitiful fragility.

“Your Majesty, I beg you to show mercy.”

For Chloe, this was a life-defining decision.

Guillaume was unconscious and would never know she had intervened, so there would be little gratitude to gain later.

Abandon him, or stand by him.

Between the two choices, the scale tilted by the slimmest margin toward helping him.

But to Hector Montparnasse, who stood at the summit above all others, the situation was nothing more than an easy snack.

His displeased gaze turned toward her.

“Do you wish to lose your head as well.”

The Emperor did not make idle threats.

At the thought that a single misstep could cost her life, her lips trembled like dew-soaked petals.

“Given the circumstances, Guillaume had ample reason to suspect me.”

“I am deeply wounded as well, but if he dies, the family will be thrown into danger.”

“There is no reason for me to grant your request.”

Hector Montparnasse turned fully and approached her, still utterly relaxed.

As he brushed back his dark blue hair, the eye revealed beneath it was as vague as fog.

Chloe looked up at him with moist, shimmering eyes, playing the part of a fragile victim.

The only thing she could rely on now was her overlapping memories.

In her previous life, in the days before the hunting festival, she had devised a plan to seduce the Emperor at the count’s villa.

And in this repeated present, she had already received his help and was staying at the imperial villa.

In the past, Hector had taken a strong liking to her.

Even now she did not know exactly what his tastes were, but since she had once succeeded in being embraced by him, it was safe to assume he did not entirely dislike her appearance.

Chloe hesitated, wondering whether she should use her trump card now.

She did not want to.

But there was no sharper option if she wished to survive this moment.

“My talents are meager, but if there is anything Your Majesty desires, I will serve you with all sincerity.”

Emotions were a luxury far removed from her.

Her only weapon was her body, so she had to make full use of it.

In truth, it was no different from carrying out a survival mission, but she wrapped it in a respectable shell.

She met his eyes shyly, then lowered her gaze, before carefully looking back up again.

Hector’s dark brows twitched almost imperceptibly.

A strange light entered his blue eyes.

“It seems the Larouge household breeds nothing but insolent creatures.”

“Do you expect me to take just any woman who wags her tail at me.”

His brow tightened slightly, impossible to read no matter how closely one looked.

As the guardian of the throne, he was naturally adept at mind games.

The emotions he revealed on the surface were extremely limited.

She could not tell whether his displeasure meant she did not catch his interest, or whether her approach was simply too blatant.

She had been refused, but it was too ambiguous to call it a failure.

Compared to how harsh he had been with Guillaume, the difference was stark.

He had not scolded her, nor spoken of punishment, and his attitude was subtly lenient.

“That isn’t what I meant….”

As she faltered, Hector waved his fingertips indifferently.

“We’ll leave the rest for another time.”

“Everyone, withdraw.”

“And remove that one who talked back.”

Covering her cheek as if embarrassed, Chloe cheered inwardly.

This was the outcome she had hoped for most.

She had avoided provoking the Society any further and maintained distance from Hector as well.

If she had been forced into bed with her sworn enemy, she doubted she could have hidden her hatred to the end, so his rejection was a relief.

As they brushed past each other, his low voice rode the breeze.

“I will have a special gift sent to you.”

A bad premonition flashed through her mind.

She wanted to ask what kind of gift it was, but Hector left first, giving her no opening.

Before the day was over, a large wooden box arrived at her guest room.

Chloe dismissed the attending maid, intending to open it alone.

Feeling stifled, she opened the window.

She stepped out onto the terrace, the pitch-dark night sky like the belly of a beast behind her.

A cool breeze blew in with starlight scattered like silver dust.

She did not look at the beautiful scenery beyond the railing.

Even at midnight, the vivid red of the flowers filling the garden stood out unpleasantly.

The blood-soaked bedding Philip had lain on and the wine that had poured over Guillaume’s head overlapped vividly in her mind.

‘Haah, my body feels so heavy.’

She was so drained she could barely move a finger.

Dealing with Hector in particular had consumed an enormous amount of mental energy.

One of the two men she could never forget even in a second life was Hector.

Any hope of resolving that grudge was distant.

She had risked her life just to kill Philip.

Going after that man as well was utterly impossible.

She steeled herself not to attempt anything reckless.

Yet facing Hector was an ordeal beyond words.

She had tried to eat calmly at dinner, only to end up with indigestion and take medicine the moment she returned to her room.

Even the flowerbed behind him had been unbearable to look at, so other things were even worse.

Showing him proper courtesy and fabricating false expressions had exhausted her.

He was a man who had once tangled with her in wanton intimacy.

His body had been hot, his heart cold.

She had never once received even a shred of affection.

And once his lust cooled, he killed her without hesitation.

‘Don’t dwell on it.’

That was just the kind of man he was. It wasn’t as though he had treated only her cruelly.

The boundless hatred manifested physically.

When she faced him, her breathing grew tight and her limbs went numb.

When she met those blue eyes that scrutinized her closely, her pulse turned erratic.

Pretending to be calm so he would not notice her condition quickly exhausted her.

She truly loathed that man.

Just thinking of him made her nauseous.

If her hatred overflowed at the wrong moment, she might lunge at him with cutlery in hand.

She prayed she would succeed in escaping before her self-control ran out.

Thinking back on it, trying to seduce Hector had been an excessive gamble.

The moment instinct overpowered reason in the bedroom, she would make a fatal mistake.

Chloe rubbed her dry, aching eyes.

Then she stood up from the window and stopped in front of the gift box.

No matter what was inside, she had no doubt it would bring her trouble.

If it were ordinary jewelry or clothing, it would mean the Emperor had taken a liking to her.

It was a feeling she never wanted.

Anything else would be even worse.

She wanted nothing to complicate matters further.

‘What did he send?’

As she opened the lid with a hand heavy with worry, she froze like a statue.

Inside the box were a dagger and clothes.

The clothes she had worn the previous night were folded with the hem of the skirt facing upward.

A vivid bloodstain spread clearly across her field of vision.

The knife she had used to kill and thrown away in the forest had returned intact.

Hector had already sent people to search the forest and recovered the evidence.

The message of the gift was unmistakable.

It meant he had already identified the culprit behind the count’s murder.

There was also an implicit threat.

He would keep silent, but only in exchange for an appropriate price.

Burying the incident out of goodwill, without conditions, made no sense.

He had already rejected her seduction.

What he wanted instead, she could not begin to guess.