The Abandoned Empress

When I vowed to get rid of the noble faction in earnest, I suddenly recalled one of the documents I received from Duke Verita. It was more detailed than the one I received from Baron Carot, where it detailed the relationship between the maid who poisoned me and Ian Belot.

Since all of the maid’s family disappeared, I tried my best to find out the trails of their escape and in the process I discovered his name.

The document pointed out that as he was the maid’s lover, the real mastermind could be detected by shadowing him. It also pointed out that unlike the maid whose contact with Earl Lanier was found several times, Ian Belot had no such contact, so it was not clear whether he was really related to the noble faction.

At that time, I thought it was trifling, but I smelled a rat when I examined his actions the other day and the chief of the palace affairs department’s evaluation of his personality. I couldn’t morally blame him for his extramarital relationship with the maid because his wife already passed away. But I was bothered by the fact that as someone who had a close relationship with Viscount Belot and who was reputed to be a man of good conduct, he was having an affair with the maid, the noble faction’s mole.That’s why Duke Verita, the prime minister of the empire, had his men keep an eye on him.

Besides, I know the fact that Duke Verita doesn’t even know. I know who poisoned the emperor, Ian Belot. As the man in charge of serving wine for the emperor, Ian could easily put poison into the wine glass without being caught. Besides, he had an additional advantage of being connected with the man through whom he could obtain the poison.

However, all this assumption was based on my doubt, so I didn’t have enough evidence to single him out as the main culprit. Wasn’t this incident related to the safety of the emperor?

So, I couldn’t handle this matter based on guesswork.

When I was about to close the documents with a sigh, I noticed one line among so many details.

‘Oh, that’s it!’

As some clue suddenly crossed my mind, I hurriedly pulled a pile of papers and checked them quickly. It was an incredibly large amount of documents, but after reading and reading the pile of documents, I could find out what I wanted to know.

< April Solmia. Born in 933 by the imperial calendar. She was born to the relatives of the Baron Solmia family. She is a niece of the baron. In 950, she was selected as a court lady (high-level maid), later promoted as one of the maids in charge of tasting the food at the Central Palace, but was fired in the second month of 964. Reasons for dismissal: arrogant attitude to her supervisor and frictions with her colleagues.>

‘Oh I see.’ The documents I found after a long search clearly showed that my guess was not wrong. The reason for their dismissal, who were kicked out at an interval of a few months, was the same. Disrespectful to their supervisors or violent behavior, and frictions with their colleagues.

These are all signs of the poisoning that the emperor and I suffered from. The fact that these men who were in charge of tasting food showed this kind of behavior clearly showed that there was a problem in the food served for the emperor.

I knocked on the desk lightly. If I could, I wanted to see and discuss it with my father right away, but he hadn’t yet returned home from Duke Verita’s house.

‘I wonder if I can see him tomorrow morning.’

With a sigh, I was sorting out the documents when I suddenly noticed a letter. The luxurious white envelope was stamped with the shape of a tree tangled by several branches.

This is the crest of the temple! How was it included here?

I slowly reached out and picked up the envelope. When I opened the letter, I found the handwriting familiar, which I had seen somewhere.

Now it’s been a long time since dawn.

It was already long past the time that the High Priest asked me to visit.

‘Well, I can’t help it. Let me visit when the day breaks. ‘

The next day when I entered the white and green space, escorted by an apprentice priest, the High Priest, who was reading the Lord’s scriptures and seated in front of a cradle, stood up with a faint smile.

Smiling at him, feeling sorry, I glanced at the little child sleeping in the cradle.

‘I see. He is the sixth High Priest.’

“May the blessings of life be with you. Welcome, Lady Monique. In fact, I have been waiting for you.”

“Sorry, Your Eminence. I came late because I checked your letter belatedly…”

“That’s fine. In fact, I was a little busy adjusting my schedule. Now, sit down here. ”

I sat down carefully on the chair offered by the High Priest, and bowed to express my gratitude.

“Thank you. Are you planning to leave as scheduled?”

“Well, I sent a message to him that if he wants to pray for my quick return, he would do so because I can’t leave for the time being. Maybe he is going to visit the empire sooner or later. ”

“Pardon? Then…”

I was surprised. Another High Priest visiting the empire? If that’s true, half the High Priests in the whole continent would be in the empire, including the baby in the cradle.

Watching me slurring, he said with a smile, “It is obviously unusual, but there is no other way than this. The top priests here might be complaining about me, but I decided to ignore them.”

“…I see.”

As I couldn’t respond anymore, I just looked down at the sleeping child. When I looked at his white hair, the exclusive symbol of the High Priests, I suddenly recalled my dialogue with my father this morning.

Only

“What are we going to do now? Are you going to check it by yourself? ”

“Yes. I think I should ask the High Priest for help.”

“High Priest? Well, that makes sense because you can’t trust the royal doctors completely.”

“Yes. In case this top secret is leaked out…”

“I know. But you never know even what the High Priest thinks deep down. So, take special care.”

In fact, it was easy to find out the main culprit by investigating Ian Belot and the wines he handled until now. As long as they didn’t know Ian was caught, the suspects would try to poison the emperor again. But it was impossible to order the investigators to check for poison. If there was a mole among the investigators, all the things kept confidential would be useless.

As a result, it was safest to ask the High Priest for help. Not only did he already know about it, but also he was the least likely suspect except for me and my father. If he had been involved in the poisoning of the emperor, there would have been no reason for him to reveal that the emperor was poisoned.

‘I will be fine. I prepared a contingency plan just in case. Let me trust him anyway.’