When the Guide Stopped Playing a Villainess, the Obsession Began - Chapter 14
From the beginning, race had never been important—to Espers, at least.
After all, the empress Calix once chose had also been a rabbit werebeast.
Of course, it wasn’t as if someone like her was daring to covet that position.
But if Lea could help Calix, if she could do something for him with her abilities…
Wouldn’t she, at the very least, no longer receive that look of contempt from him?
So first, she would have to win over the man who was both her mother’s hand and Ilion’s older brother.
“Sir, I am a Guide.”
“……”
Lea thought Zion wouldn’t be all that surprised, since he had already experienced her guiding before.
She gave an awkward smile and continued speaking.
“You already knew, didn’t you? I guided you that day.”
Contrary to her expectations, Zion looked truly shocked.
There was a clear difference between assuming something and having it confirmed by the person involved.
“…From that day on, I kept having dreams. In the dream, a radiant light warmly embraced me.”
To Zion’s wistful murmur, Lea gently reached out and brushed his face as she began to guide him.
“Ahh… O Divine…”
Looking at her as though witnessing something miraculous, he placed his forehead on her lap in reverence.
It was this easy. Espers, they…
When faced with a Guide, they bowed their heads without hesitation.
Of course they would.
If someone who could keep you alive stood before you, that would be the natural reaction.
She wanted to mock her past self, who had turned down this simple, fast path just for a scrap of her mother’s affection, and had ended up shunned even by the Espers.
Hiding away her cynical smile, Lea looked down at the now-upright Zion and gave him a benevolent smile instead.
“Why have you kept it a secret all this time?”
His low voice still trembled faintly, soaked in joy.
“Her Majesty the Empress commanded my silence…”
“How could that be…”
Zion let out a quiet breath, his expression showing he didn’t understand.
“As her daughter, I couldn’t disobey my mother’s orders… but even so, I…”
Lea slowly shook her head with a somber expression and continued,
“I could no longer ignore Espers who suffer like you do, Sir.”
He began to revere her as though she were divine.
Lea conveyed her words with firm resolve.
“But for now, I intend to follow Her Majesty’s command. So please… keep this just between us.”
To ask the commander of her mother’s personal knights to keep a secret?
No one else would have agreed, but she knew he would.
The thing Espers were always thirsting for.
A personal Guide, just for themselves.
If he had a Guide who was his alone, would he really reveal her secret?
And once he started receiving guiding from Lea, he might even refuse Bianca’s orders at a critical moment.
If she could gain even that single opportunity, she was ready to guide Zion at any time.
With a gentle gesture, Lea cupped his chin and attempted a more powerful guiding.
She could feel the refreshing energy that had accumulated in her body being drawn rapidly into Zion.
Even if he had received guiding from her mother, it must have been at a pitifully low level, because the impure energy inside him was tangled like threads, in complete disarray.
Each day must have been a living hell.
“Haa…”
Letting out a long, drowsy sigh, Zion looked at her with eyes that had grown noticeably clearer and answered in a firm voice.
“I swear on my life that I will never speak of your secret, Lady Haisley.”
A knight had sworn on his life.
Lea slowly curved her red lips into a harmless smile.
“I trust you, Sir.”
Now, it was time to go see her mother.
She couldn’t help but think about what to do with the person who had thrown her life into ruin.
But because it was such a pleasant dilemma, a faint smile briefly touched Lea’s lips—then vanished.
