Chapter 2.0
The illegitimate daughter of Jenaire disappeared.
No matter how much Lezan and Eleanor tried to cover up the truth and secretly track her down, some facts always leaked out.
No one could guess how she managed to escape the strict security of the royal palace. It was as if she had never existed there in the first place—she vanished without a trace.
But everyone expected that she would be caught and brought back within two days at the earliest, five at the latest.
Where could a young woman, barely an adult, go in an enemy country with no connections?
That was what common sense said.
But Ines had not been found even after nearly three months.
All the knights guarding the palace entrance at the time of her disappearance were dragged in for questioning. Wanted posters were put up not only in the capital but across all of Lezan.
Every available force searched Lezan for three months.
Eleanor did the same.
But she was nowhere to be found.
At this point, it made more sense to believe she had crossed Lezan’s borders.
The situation surrounding Lezan and Eleanor shifted in a moment. Jenaire’s protest was inevitable.
“You clearly said it would take no more than a month, no matter what. Then what is this? It’s already been over three months.”
“We will find her. We must….”
“How many more times must I hear that word ‘must’? At this point, we can’t help but suspect something.”
“Suspect?”
“Did Lady Ines really disappear by her own will? Or is Lezan trying to politely reject Jenaire’s goodwill?”
The envoy from Jenaire arrogantly lifted his chin.
But things weren’t entirely comfortable on Jenaire’s side either. The haughty message from the Emperor of Jenaire carried a seed of unease.
Ines, the second princess of Jenaire, born between the Emperor and a wandering shaman, was said to carry an old, dark curse—an ill omen from Jenaire’s past.
Their plan to plant that curse in Lezan had failed.
What if she returned to Jenaire?
Though they had crushed her so she could never show her claws again, what if she came back, holding a grudge? That could not be allowed.
The envoy from Jenaire warned Lezan’s ruler sternly.
“Even if she is an illegitimate child, she is still royalty of Jenaire.
You must find her. Even if she is dead, bring back the body. And besides that, Lezan and Eleanor must find a way to appease His Majesty the Emperor’s anger.”
“…”
“Jenaire has nothing to fear. Emperor of Lezan.”
It was a blatant threat.
A single poor illegitimate girl had thrown the whole continent into the spark of war.
Her existence, which no one had ever acknowledged, was now tossing around the rulers of the continent.
It was like a tragic comedy.
In the end, Lezan had to make a decision.
The one who made a bold move was the crown prince.
“I will go to Jenaire, Your Majesty. Someone must fix this situation. No matter how powerful Eleanor is, Lezan cannot afford another war.”
“You’re saying you’ll go to an enemy country of your own will, Edgar? You say as an envoy, but you’re no different from a hostage.”
“Someone has to go to Jenaire to sign the new treaty anyway.
And if the crown prince himself goes as the envoy, they won’t be able to just keep threatening us like this.”
Edgar kept a calm face the whole time. As if, though unlikely, he had predicted this would happen.
“There’s no other way now, is there?”
The emperor sighed heavily.
“If we could just find that royal girl, everything would be solved. But where on earth did she disappear to? We even turned Eleanor upside down and still found nothing.”
The search had begun the night Ines vanished. It was quietly known that the Grand Duke, who had been in charge of dealing with the illegitimate girl, went after her himself.
For three months, he hadn’t returned to his duchy. His obsessive behavior was something usually seen only on the battlefield.
If anyone dared to defy him or resist without fear, he would hunt them down and crush them until nothing remained. Behind his emotionless, solid mask was a twisted madness.
And this time, the one he was chasing was an illegitimate girl. This strange chase looked very much like what happened ten years ago, when he personally crushed a rebellion in the duchy.
The illegitimate son of Eleanor, who had killed the former Grand Duke and Duchess, ran away for over a year. But in the end, he was caught by his relentless nephew and ended up just like the others—dead and discarded.
Even back then, and now too, Rayan had never lost control or been consumed by emotion. The more urgent the situation, the colder and more numb he became.
And that was what made him scarier. No one ever knew what he was thinking inside.
Because of that, the emperor couldn’t bring himself to blame the Grand Duke or order him to return to Jenaire.
“…That illegitimate girl will not end up well either.”
