Albert—if Audrey was addressing him with the honorific "-sama," she had to mean that Albert.
Albert Ararat.
My older brother, born as the second imperial prince, who had spent decades as the Crown Prince.
An ambitious man, he had attempted to stage a coup to force our father—who was still Emperor at the time—to abdicate, but I had seen through the plot and stopped him.
A coup was, simply put, high treason. Under Imperial Law, the sole punishment for the principal offender was execution by waist chop, and depending on the severity, it could even entail clan extermination.
Clan extermination meant the eradication of the entire bloodline. In this case, not only Albert's children, but even his wives, their relatives, and all their retainers faced the very real possibility of being put to the sword.
Such was the gravity of high treason under Imperial Law.
That was why I had devised a scheme.
By framing Albert's rebellion as having "repented at the eleventh hour and committed suicide," I had it treated as merely an attempted rebellion. That allowed Albert alone to shoulder the blame, averting clan extermination.
"All of Albert's children should be in the imperial capital. After what happened, they've been placed under the virtual surveillance of the Imperial Household Ministry."
Audrey gave a slight nod.
Prefacing her response with "I am aware," she addressed my doubts.
"It appears that in the aftermath of that incident, one of Lord Albert's favored concubines managed to flee, giving birth to a baby boy six months later."
"Six months..."
"Yes. For a woman, that is ample time to be certain the child belongs to the man she lay with, and more than enough to convince those around her."
"Hmm..."
Pinching my chin, I pondered the matter.
"Is it truly Albert's child—no."
I gave my head a shake. Enough of that; there was no point getting hung up on such details now.
After all, the Empress had taken action in person.
I pivoted my questioning.
"Is it certain that Albert laid hands on her?"
"Yes, multiple eunuchs have testified to it. I looked into the matter, and official records remain as well."
I nodded.
For an emperor—and for a crown prince, who was effectively a quasi-emperor—official, public records were kept detailing every person with whom they engaged in sexual intercourse.
An incognito tryst outside the palace was one thing, but as a concubine, the deed would have taken place within Albert's estate.
If that was the case, meticulous records were guaranteed to exist.
"The birth took place six months after Lord Albert's passing, resulting in a normal, full-term delivery. It was neither premature nor overdue."
"I see."
I nodded.
Under imperial doctrine, the Crown Prince was treated as a "quasi-emperor."
At the time, as the Thirteenth Imperial Prince, I was Albert's brother by blood, but in our formal standing as Crown Prince and imperial prince, our relationship was that of lord and subject.
That quasi-emperor status extended to various other aspects as well.
In this context, numerous eunuchs had been assigned to Albert's estate to attend to his legal wives and concubines.
Stationing castrated eunuchs who had lost their reproductive capabilities was a measure to prevent even the slightest possibility of illicit affairs that might taint the imperial family's bloodline.
Since the empire went to such drastic lengths as castrating human beings, equally strict protocols were enforced in all related matters.
With multiple eunuchs attesting to it, there was virtually no doubt that the woman under Albert's roof had been touched by no one other than Albert himself.
And if it was a normal, full-term delivery six months after Albert's death, the child was almost certainly his.
"Of course, it remains merely circumstantial evidence, but..."
"No, this is Albert we're talking about."
Slowly extending my hand, I manifested Leviathan.
A sword with a shape that struck most as sinister materialized before Audrey and me.
Leviathan—formerly Leviathan.
The Magic Sword of Water for which Albert had sacrificed a staggering 120 lives just to deliver it to me.
That single deed was enough to lay bare his ruthless nature.
"Her pregnancy would have been blatantly obvious while Albert was still alive. Knowing him, he would have investigated thoroughly. The fact that the woman survived proves the paranoid Albert was entirely convinced the child was his."
"That makes sense."
This, too, was circumstantial, but in this world, an individual's character often served as the equivalent of hard evidence.
Albert's temperament was a prime example.
He cared nothing for the lives of his subjects, and he harbored an all-consuming obsession with the imperial throne.
Naturally, there was no way he would tolerate the blood of an adulterer sullying an heir of his—a child to whom he anticipated passing the throne in the future.
Had he discovered that a pregnant concubine had laid with another man—no, even if he merely suspected it...
Albert would have slaughtered her without hesitation.
Knowing his true nature far more intimately than Audrey did, I was certain the child was Albert's.
"Is that child in Enlil Province?"
"Yes."
Audrey nodded and continued.
What spilled from her lips was a tale that threatened to bring a level of disgrace far beyond my darkest expectations.
After bearing Albert's child, the woman passed away only a few years later.
Evidently, the constant dread and anxiety over her child's safety had worn her down to the grave.
It was entirely understandable.
Even though I had concocted a scheme to sweep the truth under the rug, not only my imperial father, but everyone in our circle understood what had truly transpired.
In other words, while Albert's treason had been formally classified as an attempt, he had practically nocked an arrow and aimed it straight at his target.
Placing the arrowhead against the bowstring might still pass as a mere attempt, but once the string was drawn taut, one could hardly blame others for seeing it as full-blown treason.
Albert's actions on that day had ultimately become an open secret among the imperial family and the ministers.
Yet I had forced the issue.
I insisted that so long as the arrow had not been loosed, it was nothing more than an attempt.
That interpretation was not strictly wrong; while exceptionally lenient, it held up to reason.
Consequently, I faced no censure. Father, the ministers, and those at the heart of the empire knew me well.
I was unyielding when it came to the law, but I was not devoid of compassion.
Before Albert, our eldest brother, Gilbert, had orchestrated a plot to assassinate Father.
That conspiracy had actually been set into motion, leaving no room for defense.
Even so, in my capacity as Royal Minister of Justice, I had submitted a petition for a "stay of execution by waist chop."
While execution by waist chop was unavoidable, a lifelong stay of execution could be attached to the sentence.
With a lifelong reprieve, the Emperor could order the execution whenever he wished.
In practice, that meant the execution could be deferred until natural death.
Even in the face of an unforgivable crime, Father had hesitated to execute his own son.
To accommodate that, I had stretched the interpretation of the law to its absolute limit.
There was that precedent, along with countless others.
Thus, no one was surprised by my ruling, nor did anyone object.
Albert's confidants eagerly seized upon my judgment as well.
Since Albert had perished following the failed coup, his inner circle were the only witnesses left. When those retainers testified in unison that "Lord Albert regretted his actions at the final moment and took his own life," and with the rebel troops halted just before marching out, my ruling as Minister of Justice stood as fully legitimate.
Furthermore, my approach garnered widespread support on humane grounds.
Condemning Albert for high treason would have made clan extermination unavoidable, but treating it as an attempted rebellion spared his children.
Had clan extermination been enforced, relatives by marriage would have faced the chopping block as well, and a substantial number of ministers were linked to Albert, the Crown Prince, through marital ties.
Those ministers were profoundly grateful to me.
Above all, the supreme authority—the Emperor, my father—raised no objection.
Though an open secret, not a soul complained.
That should have been the end of it.
However, that was merely the perspective of the imperial family and the ministers—the elites at the top.
The woman who carried Albert's child had fled the imperial capital, seeking refuge in the provinces.
She had drifted to a remote land where the machinations of the central government were completely unfathomable.
It was only natural for her to live in terror, fearing that a posthumous purge—a frequent occurrence throughout history—might unearth the crime and see the executioner's ropes bound around their wrists.
Indeed, as Audrey explained, the concubine had lived in perpetual dread of that fate, ultimately cutting her life short.
Following her death, the young boy—Albert's flesh and blood, and my nephew—grew up without proper guidance.
He fell in with local ruffians and eventually became one of them.
Upon reaching adulthood, he took a wife and fathered a daughter, but he never held down an honest job, ending up behind bars time and again for assault, fraud, and similar offenses.
And then came the earthquake.
The man's wife perished in the disaster, leaving him alone with his daughter.
Just recently, that girl—my grandniece—had broken down in tears before an elderly neighbor she had known for years: the very eunuch mentioned earlier.
It seemed he had drifted to this distant province alongside them.
According to the girl's desperate plea, her father had been acting bizarrely of late.
He looked at her with lecherous eyes and was frequently seen associating with brothel keepers. Terrified of what was about to happen to her, she had come weeping for help.
Appalled by the revelation, the eunuch had frantically mobilized his old connections to establish contact with the imperial family, desperate to intervene...