Chapter 1
Lionel Edmund Valheim.
Colonel in the Eschwald Empire’s army and commander of the northern revolution suppression.
And the empire’s hero who led the war to victory.
As befitting those splendid modifiers, Lionel was standing at the center of the wedding hall.
Wearing a military uniform with black collars instead of formal attire.
Yes, it was a wedding.
But no trace of a smile could be found on Lionel’s face.
His expression was as hard as a frozen winter river, and his gaze was directed forward without containing even a handful of warmth.
The shining chandeliers of the vast grand cathedral. The guest seats filled with royalty and great nobles.
It was a grand spectacle comparable to a state wedding, but from the organ, a somewhat ominous melody was flowing.
Like a funeral march on a battlefield.
Over the melody resonating through the organ’s pipes, people’s voices were overlaid.
“The descendant of the Valheim ducal family… marrying into the merchant class.”
“Still, it was once a family that even His Majesty the Emperor feared its power. Sigh, this is a disgrace to the nobility. How could such a marriage.”
“What can be done, it’s His Majesty the Emperor’s will, isn’t it.”
Gazes complexly intertwined with jealousy and admiration, contempt and ridicule came and went behind Lionel.
The sharp whispers of these people were all directed toward one person.
Toward the bride in a wheelchair entering at the end of the virgin road.
“Even a bride who can’t walk properly, tsk.”
A sharp sigh leaked from somewhere.
The bride, who clumsily rolled the wheelchair wheels and climbed onto the virgin road, was named Agnes Bardo.
She, the illegitimate daughter of the Bardo trading company’s owner, was trying not to lower her trembling head.
“Goodness, what does she intend to do as a dancer with legs like that.”
“It’s all her own karma, isn’t it? She didn’t know her place and tried to become an imperial dancer, ending up like that.”
“Still, for the price of losing one leg, it turned out quite expensive, didn’t it? The daughter of a merchant almost becoming a duchess.”
A commoner becoming a noble.
Is there a greater rise in status than this.
Words mocking her for dreaming something impossible and getting lucky once poured out without malice.
Indeed. It was a bizarre wedding.
The cold metal wheels of the wheelchair that did not suit the pure white dress.
And the expressionless groom.
They were truly things that did not suit the moment that should be the happiest in life.
The emperor, sitting in the upper seat and savoring all this as if appreciating it, smiled subtly.
“The moment the pride of Valheim is broken is being watched by the entire empire.”
With a rather satisfied murmur.
Finally, as Agnes arrived next to Lionel, the officiant’s voice crossed the cathedral.
“Lionel Edmund Valheim, will you take Agnes Bardo as your wife and love and cherish her for life?”
Lionel did not answer. Instead, he lowered his gaze.
Feeling that gaze, Agnes raised her head. Her light gray eyes, like gathered clear dew, shone.
With a sliver of hope, just in case.
However, as if shattering that expectation, Lionel twisted the corner of his mouth.
“Cherish, huh. Well, do you want that?”
How dare you.
Those words did not come out of his mouth. Contempt and cynicism seeped into Lionel’s eyes.
The brilliant and beautiful man like a god of war. At the chilliness rising in Lionel’s sacred blue eyes, Agnes’s shoulders trembled.
If I say I want it here, what kind of expression would you make.
From Agnes’s moving lips, different words eventually flowed out.
“…That can’t be.”
As if trying to gauge Agnes’s expression behind the veil. Lionel narrowed his eyes.
However, the interest quickly cooled.
Soon, with a cynical expression, Lionel arrogantly nodded toward the officiant.
“She says so.”
“Uh, ahem. Then continuing—,”
The officiant was flustered, but the ceremony proceeded as is.
After tedious sermons were exchanged, a ray of holy light spread. The ceremony proceeded toward conclusion.
“With this, we conclude the ceremony.”
As soon as the vows ended, Lionel turned his body to leave the venue.
His intention not to stay in such a place even a moment longer was clearly conveyed.
His quickly distancing steps were merciless, like a war victor ignoring a fallen enemy.
Agnes, turning the wheelchair, hurriedly tried to follow Lionel.
“Wait a moment—, ah…!”
However, the thick golden carpet was not suitable for the wheelchair to pass.
Eventually, the carpet bunched up and got caught in the hastily moving wheels.
Thud!
The wheelchair lost balance and toppled over.
Whirr.
The wheels of the overturned wheelchair spun uselessly in the air. Agnes’s body, ejected from the wheelchair, sprawled haphazardly on the floor.
The voluminous hem of the dress spread widely on the floor.
“My, my! What kind of disgrace is that!”
“She doesn’t even know shame. She’s really something!”
No one tried to help the fallen Agnes up.
They were just watching like viewing a monkey in a zoo.
Lionel, who had stopped at the commotion, looked back.
“……”
But that was all.
After briefly staring at the dress scattered at his feet, Lionel stepped on and passed over the white fabric hem with his military boots.
Black marks imprinted on the clean fabric.
Lying face down on the floor, Agnes looked at the blackened hem of the dress.
The jet-black traces stamped in a regular pattern told her.
That this marriage today was, for Lionel, an extension of the war.
To drive out the dirty merchant’s daughter who led his family to death.
***
Night fell on the Valheim ducal residence.
In one corner of a bedroom too cold to call the bride’s room, Agnes was sitting alone.
A bed adorned with golden decorations, curtains with red embroidery.
Everything was beautiful. Because it was beautiful, it felt even colder.
Agnes stared at her reddened palms.
It was a wound from falling at the ceremony earlier.
“Fortunately, it won’t leave a scar.”
That alone was enough.
Agnes roughly wiped off the hardened scab and opened the box on her lap.
Then, a pair of faded toe shoes revealed themselves.
The white ribbons attached to the shoes were worn out. The toe parts had traces of being mended multiple times.
As if proving countless practices.
“……Rael.”
Agnes quietly called Lionel’s childhood nickname.
Yes.
These toe shoes were a gift from Lionel to Agnes.
Though it was long ago.
“Agnes! When you get on stage later, make sure to invite me. No, since I’ll be playing the piano next to you, no invitation needed. Right?”
Young Lionel’s bright, innocent voice lingered in her ears like an illusion.
At that moment.
The sound of the door opening roughly broke the illusion.
It was Lionel.
He was still in his military uniform. He never wore formal attire in the end.
The black uniform with medals told her.
That the Lionel before her eyes was no longer the boy from those days who dreamed of being a pianist.
That the long fingers that once danced over the keys now existed only to pull the trigger toward the enemy.
As if proving it. A faint smell of gunpowder emanated from Lionel.
How did it come to this.
“……Do you no longer play the piano?”
After a moment of silence.
Lionel, with a sneer on his lips, took out a cigarillo and lit it.
“Piano?”
The smoke from the bent cigar slowly curled in the air.
“Funny. While I was rolling in the mud, you must have lived in a fairy tale, Agnes Bardo.”
His light blue eyes turned to the toe shoes box.
“Well. That’s why you must have been fussing around wanting to be a dancer.”
“I didn’t mean that—,”
“But too bad. Unfortunately, I didn’t have the leisure to reminisce about childhood dreams like someone with a good fate.”
Lionel, who had pressed the cigar end into the ashtray, strode over.
Because of that, the box slipped from Agnes’s lap.
Lionel unbuttoned his shirt with irritable hands.
“So stop that disgusting talk and take it off.”
“……!”
“Isn’t this why you begged His Majesty, paid a high price, and bought me?”
Lionel’s voice was cold, and his gaze was sharp.
Lionel seemed not to remember the toe shoes he had given Agnes long ago. He kicked the worn-out box with his military boot.
Then, he spat out a voice distorted with contempt.
“Neither that father of yours nor you. Selling weapons by weighing human lives, the money earned wasn’t enough to satisfy that greed.”
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