Until the Substitute Saintess is Loved: The Sister Sent to the Convent as the Villainess Heals Everyone's Hearts with Her Healing Powers - Chapter 22

Inside the swaying carriage, I watch Lupina as she continues to gaze out the window.

My decision to accompany her had been made immediately after the royal decree was issued.

I recall two weeks ago.

At that time, blood had rushed to my head all at once.

“Don’t be absurd! Are you out of your mind?!”

I couldn’t help but slam the desk with all my might. The inkwell toppled from the recoil, the black ink grotesquely staining the documents.

“Don’t get so worked up. This is something His Majesty has approved.”

My older brother before me offered a troubled, wry smile and calmly righted the inkwell as if nothing had happened.

“You’re sending Lupina to the Margrave’s domain alone?”

“Not alone. The knights will accompany her as they do every year.”

“But there’s only one Saintess! If it’s as per usual, you should send at least one more, no, two more with her. Lupina is a former Saintess, not the current one.”

Moreover, that girl isn’t even using healing magic on herself anymore. I’d received a report from the Head Priestess that she can no longer perform poison treatments either.

The magical beasts of the Rolt Margraviate are targets for annual subjugation.

It’s an event that takes place around this time every year, and I don’t object to that itself.

But the number of Saintesses dispatched from the royal capital in a given year is usually two or three. To designate only Lupina is unthinkable.

I’ve accompanied the magical beast subjugation several times. Of course, the number and strength of the enemy matter, but whether or not we have a healer drastically changes our casualty situation.

“I suppose the Margrave of Rolt was never satisfied with the treatment afforded to Lady Lupina Ivor,” he said. “He wanted her in a frontier monastery to the very end, not one in the royal capital.”

I remember that incident well.

At the time, even I thought a royal capital monastery was too lenient a punishment. Even a frontier monastery was. If it was to be a punishment for Lupina, I thought she should spend her life serving the miners in a harsh mine.

(But the way she is now…)

I recall the sight of her administering healing to patients until her magical power was depleted.

Magical power depletion is agonizing.

Symptoms much like anemia, accompanied by nausea and dizziness.

The less magical power one has, the more severe the symptoms become.

Lupina back then had hit rock bottom. Having experienced it once myself on the battlefield, I knew exactly how excruciating that state was.

A pain that would make even me, a man trained daily as a knight, want to drop to my knees. And yet, Lupina endured that suffering and continued to devote herself to her patients.

I could no longer claim her environment was lenient.

“Do you feel nothing about this treatment of her, Brother?”

“You seem quite dissatisfied, Landrick. I rather thought you’d be pleased. You repeatedly voiced your displeasure about her behavior towards Lady Bejular, did you not?”

Mention of Bejular made me choke up momentarily.

I never condoned the harassment against her.

Absolutely not.

After Lupina stopped appearing at the royal castle, Bejular became noticeably brighter.

I often saw her strolling happily through the gardens with Brother Fairile, too.

Back when Lupina could freely come and go at the royal castle, I don’t think Bejular wanted to leave her room much. Especially not the central gardens of the castle, though the Prince’s Palace was somewhat better.

It was immediately clear she was trying to avoid Lupina as much as possible.

After Brother Dangard became friendly with Lady Haruhina, the Viscount’s daughter who serves as the Royal Palace Librarian, Lupina began targeting her as well, so the harm to Bejular had decreased somewhat.

But living in a state of constant uncertainty about when they might run into each other had clearly worn Bejular down.

I tried to stay by her side whenever Brother Fairile wasn’t there, but even that wasn’t enough to fully protect her. If I stayed too close, the gossip-loving court sparrows would slander Bejular with vulgar speculation, treating it as if it were fact.

My relationship with Bejular is that of childhood friends; in the future, she will be my sister-in-law.

I care for her deeply as a childhood friend and a future family member, but I hold no romantic feelings for her beyond that.

“…Brother Dangard, do you want Lupina to disappear?”

His relationship with Lady Haruhina doesn’t seem to have progressed much even after his engagement with Lupina was dissolved. To begin with, there was never the kind of vulgar relationship between them that Lupina imagined.

Brother just loves books and spent all his time holed up in the Royal Palace Library, and Lady Haruhina is simply an unparalleled bibliophile.

Even when subjected to Lupina’s unbearable stream of abuse, she responded with a smile and simply said, “I’d rather you didn’t cause a disturbance in the library.”

Like Bejular, she’s a petite woman, but she seems to have no interest in anything besides books and appeared to hold no particular feelings towards Lupina other than considering her a noise nuisance.

“If I thought that, I wouldn’t have brought this matter to you, Landrick. I have no healing power, and the knowledge I’ve crammed into my head isn’t particularly useful in actual combat. But you could accompany her, couldn’t you? We refused the Margrave of Rolt’s initial request regarding Lady Lupina Ivor’s treatment. A second refusal would lead to distrust of the Royal Family. If we fulfill that Margrave’s request, and furthermore, if a member of the Royal Family is among the dispatched knights, he would be grateful, and it wouldn’t pose any problem.”

“No, that…”

It absolutely misses the mark of the Margrave of Rolt’s intentions.

Probably, the Margrave of Rolt wants to pin further faults on Lupina, doesn’t he?

Yes, I suspect he’s anticipating some folly like her fleeing from the horde of magical beasts, endangering many soldiers.

If it were the Lupina of before, she would have refused to accompany them in the first place.

Even if it didn’t go that far, if she were to disgrace herself as the Saintess dispatched from the royal capital, then this time, she would surely be transferred not to a royal capital monastery, but to a frontier monastery.

For the Margrave of Rolt, having Lupina killed by magical beasts would probably be the most satisfying outcome.

“The royal decree has already been issued, and notification will be sent to the monastery. But the arrangement of the knights heading to the frontier… if you, Landrick, are accompanying her, then you should be able to choose them. I was prepared to try and persuade you if you were reluctant, but that worry seems unnecessary.”

Brother Dangard adjusted his glasses.

During his time as Lupina’s fiancé, Brother was always at her mercy, constantly cleaning up her messes.

I thought it was out of obligation as her fiancé, but did Brother harbor deeper feelings for Lupina after all?

My chest grew strangely unsettled, and I grew further agitated by that very unsettled feeling.

Even if Brother did have feelings for Lupina, it has nothing to do with me.

Right. It has nothing to do with me.

I shook my head lightly and switched gears.

If our departure is in two weeks, I need to select the knights to dispatch quickly.

“…Lord Landrick?”

Called by a timid voice, I started.

Lupina, who had been looking out the window, was now looking at me from behind her veil.

Recalling my conversation with Brother, it seemed my consciousness had drifted too far into the past.

“My apologies, I was a bit lost in thought. Is something troubling you?”

Although the timeframe of two weeks was short, I believe I managed to strictly select knights with no behavioral issues to accompany us to the Margrave of Rolt’s domain.

I also intended to choose those who held no particular grudge against Lupina, but I wonder…

“No, not particularly…”

Her words were hesitant.

She glanced at me briefly through her veil, then gently averted her gaze.

“I had the feeling I was being watched. But it seems I was mistaken.”

Ah, I see.

Though absentmindedly, I had been continuously watching Lupina’s profile.

From Lupina’s perspective, she was being silently stared at, so of course she’d be bothered.

“Do you know about the Margrave of Rolt’s domain?”

It’s a place she always refused to go to before.

But I want her to have some understanding of it before we arrive.

“Yes. It’s the land that bears the brunt of the magical beast damage in their territory every year. I’ve learned that around this time, a creature referred to as the King of the Magical Beasts appears.”

“Ah, that’s correct.”

Even though it was a place she detested so much, it seems she had still acquired prior knowledge.

The Rolt Margraviate is originally an area where magical beasts appear, but the beasts in this period, just before winter, become even more ferocious.

That’s because the entity known as the King of the Magical Beasts appears.

The King, whose form changes every year, was a White Wolf last year.

“I only hope the Venomous Black Serpent doesn’t appear as the King.”

“Why that particular beast?”

“I researched it at the library. The only poisonous magical beast in that Margraviate was the Venomous Black Serpent. I prepared a good amount of antidote, but it’s best if we don’t encounter it at all.”

…I’m surprised.

I never thought she’d research the types of magical beasts.

I remember Lupina’s appearance at the clinic well.

But who could have predicted that she would research the species of magical beasts inhabiting the area beforehand and bring along medicine to counter them?

What changed that Lupina so drastically?

The stripping of her Saintess title, the annulment of her engagement to Brother Dangard, and then life in the monastery.

Did all of that break her arrogant spirit?

“There are confirmed reports of the Venomous Black Serpent appearing in the Margrave’s domain, but their numbers are extremely few. Besides, that species is too weak to become the King of the Magical Beasts.”

“Even though it possesses a lethal poison, it’s weak?”

“Yes. While it’s still a threat to humans, the individual that becomes the King of the Magical Beasts is, in most years, a species that is naturally large-bodied.”

“I’ve heard last year it was a White Direwolf. The year before that, I believe it was a snow-white Magical Leopard?”

“…You’ve researched this well.”

“It’s only superficial knowledge, but I thought it better to know than not.”

Her hesitant manner of reply bore no resemblance to the Lupina of before.

She only started going to the library herself after Lady Haruhina became acquainted with Brother Dangard. I can state definitively that there was absolutely no vulgar relationship between those two like Lupina detested, but I don’t think Lupina ever set foot in the library for any reason other than to denounce them.

The fact that Lupina, even if it’s just cramming, researched magical creatures and even understands past Kings of the Magical Beasts is a welcome miscalculation.

“Is there some reason there are so many white-clad magical beasts?”

“No, there’s no correlation. In fact, the King five years ago was the Moonlit Black Bear. As for the King before that, records state it wasn’t even a magical beast.”

“Not a magical beast?”

“Ah. It was a Magical Butterfly. It seems we struggled quite a bit, being misled by its illusions.”

“I always thought butterflies were beautiful, but for one to become the King of the Magical Beasts, the original creature must have been quite large, I suppose?”

“Have you never seen a Cloak of Illusion? It’s a coat that shimmers with unique hues depending on the light. They’re mainly issued to the Royal Palace Mage Corps, but… ah, that’s right, the mages we’ve brought along this time are wearing them. You should ask to see one later. Those cloaks are made by processing the wings of the Magical Butterfly. One butterfly yields enough for one cloak.”

“If it can produce enough for a person’s size, then indeed, a Magical Butterfly must be different from a normal butterfly.”

“I suppose so. But precisely because it’s large, it’s easy to spot even within the forest. While it causes hallucinogenic symptoms, if you know it’s there, it’s easier to deal with.”

The individual that transformed into the King of the Magical Beasts was apparently quite troublesome, but ordinary Magical Butterflies aren’t much of a threat. The hallucinogenic symptoms are a nuisance, but the mages can handle them, and it shouldn’t put Lupina in any danger.