Chapter 4

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Translator: Harry Potta

Chapter: 4

Chapter Title: The Crown I'll Take from You

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Lady Quizin's words stuck in her throat.

She should naturally have answered the king. But she couldn't.

I'm not the king's person, but the Regent Duke's.

The Claudio Ducal House had ears here too.

If I say my master is the king here... the Duke will start to suspect me.

Regent Duke Claudio was as suspicious as they came.

He still couldn't fully trust her, constantly cross-checking her reports against the spies he'd planted in the palace.

If that paranoid heard about today's events, it might stir up needless suspicion.

"Of course it's His Majesty the King, right?"

"Why is the Head Maid hesitating like that over such an obvious question?"

The onlookers grew puzzled at the lengthening silence.

At that moment, Medea slammed the table beside her.

Bang-!

Startled by the sudden crash, the Head Maid hurriedly schooled her features into nonchalance.

But not before everyone had glimpsed her troubled expression.

"Was it a difficult question?"

Medea smiled brightly.

"...Your Highness."

"It seems your new position is still unfamiliar. You can't even answer right away."

Lady Quizin bit her lip.

"You're asking the obvious, and it's disconcerting! My master is His Majesty King Peleus."

"Is that so? Really?"

"Of course. Why does Your Highness twist such a profound truth to corner me like this?"

"Neril is a maid my brother, His Majesty the King, personally left with me before he departed. Before that, she belonged to his Royal Guard. Are you trying to break your master's hand?"

Oh no. The Head Maid swallowed nervously.

That little girl was backing her into a dead-end alley.

Damn it! Why is she acting like this today of all days?

For now, she needed to escape this situation. Lady Quizin replied with feigned calm.

"No matter if she was once His Majesty's Royal Guard, Neril currently belongs to the Royal Maids. So as Head Maid, I can summarily discipline a subordinate."

"The retired Royal Guard Captain is still in the capital, isn't he? I wonder if he'd agree to his painstakingly trained knight being summarily punished by the Head Maid."

"...Your Highness!"

The Head Maid ground her teeth.

The former Royal Guard Captain, who had served alongside the previous king, was still a heavyweight commanding the people's respect—a figure too burdensome for the Head Maid to touch.

The more she spoke, the more enemies she accumulated. She felt endlessly tangled in that little girl's silver tongue.

I don't know what wind blew into her today, but I need to crush her so she can't climb any higher.

She drew a breath and calmly reminded herself.

The Regent Duke's order was to decisively cut away that leech of a maid clinging to the princess.

"Impertinent as it may be, I don't even see the need for this conversation."

The Head Maid retorted coldly.

"The Princess is merely His Majesty's blood kin. She is not truly my master, nor the master of all the servants in this palace. Moreover..."

Malice glinted in Lady Quizin's eyes as she continued.

"If not for Your Highness, I would still be serving the previous king as my master. He was a sage who oversaw the realm inside and out, so I wouldn't need to offer such guidance today."

"......"

"But the late king met a tragic end. As you know, because of Your Highness."

The air around them froze.

Yet despite the blatant rudeness, Medea simply listened in silence.

"......"

"Without the generous forgiveness of His Majesty the King and the other royals, Your Highness wouldn't even be allowed to remain in this palace."

Emboldened, Lady Quizin pressed on without restraint.

The Queen Dowager despises that girl. The King is no different. Why else has he never returned even once since ascending the throne?

Peleus, Medea's full-blooded brother, had also been born with the stain of inferior lineage.

But despite that flaw, his exceptional talent and prowess had drawn the world's expectations early on.

No one dared mock the young king who had marched to the battlefield upholding his father's will, shouldering the nation's fate.

But Medea was different.

Disappointment had mounted from her outward shortcomings, compounded by the stigma of having killed her parents. Universal condemnation followed, along with the derogatory nickname "half-breed."

The princess had no allies in this palace.

And everyone knew it.

"Someone who sits in this position by His Majesty's grace now presumes to play the master."

Silence descended.

Seeing Medea's pale face, the Head Maid felt a surge of pleasure. She barked at Jena.

"What are you waiting for? Continue the punishment!"

Jena flinched, her eyes darting frantically between the Head Maid and Medea.

"Playing the master."

Then a low voice emanated from Medea. The calm tone carried an oddly profound weight.

The Head Maid faltered, but dismissed it—what could that brat possibly do?

"Don't dawdle! Get moving!"

"Very well, then."

Medea turned as well. The onlookers assumed the princess would shield her with her body, just as Neril had.

But contrary to expectations, the princess grasped the long switch lying beside the whip with her small, white hand.

"Head Maid."

"Yes."

"Come lift my skirt."

Everyone doubted their ears.

"What did you just say?"

"Surely your ears aren't going deaf?"

The most incredulous was the Head Maid herself.

No matter how brazen she is, does she really intend to clash with me now?

"No way. You don't mean with that switch—on me—"

"I'll respect your words. Piling on more to Neril's punishment would indeed be clear overreach, as you say."

Her white fingers slowly traced the switch's glossy surface. The gesture was utterly elegant—and eerily familiar.

For an instant, the switch in Medea's hand appeared not as a mere rod, but a longsword in the spectators' eyes.

From the princess facing down the Head Maid emanated a sharp, solemn aura, like a knight on the verge of slaying some vile beast.

And this from a princess who had never once left the palace grounds, let alone gripped so much as a tiny dagger.

"Yet our Baldina royal family has this law: If one charged with palace duties shirks their responsibility, the king may punish them."

"Yes. Then when His Majesty returns, I'll beg for punishment."

The Head Maid scoffed in response. As if the princess would still be here by then.

"And in the king's absence, that authority falls to his designated proxy."

Medea drew a seal from her bosom and shook it.

"It's the seal my brother left me. You stamped your own appointment with it—you should recognize it."

Before departing for the battlefield, Peleus had left his sister this seal to handle internal palace affairs.

As long as she bore the king's proxy seal, no one could ignore her existence—or erase it.

It was proof that he still acknowledged her as a princess, and the weapon to protect her.

Back then, she had been too foolish to grasp its meaning.

"Which means I can punish you directly."

The Head Maid's face flushed red then purple.

"What—I've never heard of such a—"

"Going to claim it doesn't exist? Even though the Regent Duke invoked this very clause to harshly punish the Interior Department while the previous king was at war?"

The onlookers recalled it.

"Right. Back then, Minister Sachi and most of the Interior Department got shredded."

The maids' whispers reached the Head Maid's ears.

It had been a massive scandal—numerous capital houses exterminated, dozens executed. And a Royal Head Maid claiming ignorance?

But then they remembered: she had entered service through remarriage, laundering her status anew.

Too busy buying her title with body and soul to notice the noble bloodbath back then, perhaps.

"My goodness, Head Maid. You truly know so little."

Medea tilted her head, as if genuinely baffled how she'd risen that far.

She tossed in one more barb.

"You said you couldn't serve Father as your master because of me. If you resent it and miss him that much, why not study the late king's reign more closely? It might even help temper your regrets."

What would her uncle make of it—the Head Maid he'd maneuvered to undermine his dead brother supposedly missing him so dearly?

That girl is cornering me without end!

The Head Maid bit her lip.

"...Your Highness is correct. So I'll carry out my duty. You have no objection to that, do you?"

At this point, it was a matter of pride.

She, nearing her forties, couldn't kneel to some fresh-faced girl.

"Do as you like."

The princess nodded without expression.

"You heard her? Jena, continue."

"H-Head Maid..."

"Now!"

"Y-Yes!"

Under the Head Maid's command, Jena's hesitating hand finally moved first.

Crack-!

It was the Head Maid's preemptive strike—and her provocation.

See clearly what that child's rashness brings upon her.

The Head Maid glanced sidelong at the princess's reaction. But Medea's face was unreadable.

"Head Maid, lift the skirt properly."

Swish-!

Even as the white birch switch bent elastically in the princess's grip, the Head Maid harbored no doubt.

That timid half-breed lacked the guts to truly swing it.

The princess isn't that foolish. She knows full well what treatment she'd face in the palace if she opposed me—

Crack-!

Her thoughts shattered. Her mind blanked white.

Or had the searing pain ignited first?

Gasp. Even the surrounding maids drew sharp breaths.