The House of Duke Dragunaut
The Canaria kingdom is a small country that isn’t even one-third the size of the Ad-Astera Empire that is located in the east.
Since the territory of the Canaria kingdom includes demonic beast habitats like the Titis forest, Mount Skim, and the Kataran desert, the kingdom is constantly under threat.
However-
Many people still visit the kingdom’s capital, Horus, and it’s always lively there.
Of course, there were reasons for that.
Although demonic beasts cause a lot of problems, they were only at the front lines. Due to cities such as Ishka and Belka, infiltration of demonic beasts is kept to a minimum. As long as the people lived within the city walls, one could live their life without ever seeing the shadow of a demonic beast.
Even the merchants who travel from city to city; they know that they would not run into any danger as long as they use the proper designated roads.
Since the Kingdom of Canaria has a sea to its north and a big desert to its west, only the Ad-Astera Empire to the east and the Holy kingdom of Karitas to the south can be called its neighboring countries. The Kingdom of Canaria has kept a good relationship with both of those countries in the past few years, so the people do not have to worry about being invaded by another country either.
That is why the kingdom’s capital, Horus, flourished.
But the stronger the light is, the darker the shadow becomes. The flourishing royal capital was also a place with dark shadows lurking.
And one of those shadows was creeping up on Duke Dragnunaut’s residence that is located in the center of the royal capital.
The house of Duke Dragnunaut is a prestigious family that had been around since the kingdom was founded. They were the biggest noble family in the Canaria kingdom as well as the royal family’s protectors.
There is probably nobody in the kingdom of Canaria who doesn’t know of the name Dragunaut.
Especially their head of the current generation, Pascal. As the leader of the dragon rider corps, his nickname『Thunder』was known even in other countries.
Pascal had two daughters. The older one was named Astrid, the younger one was named Claudia.
The older daughter is a talented dragon rider who is serving as the vice commander of the dragon riders. The number of times she was getting referred to as “Thunder” in place of her father had also been increasing nowadays as Pascal made the shift to be more active in the royal palace.
And that Astrid was currently pacing back and forth before the front door with a heavy expression on her face.
After a short while, a horse carriage stopped in front of the Duke’s residence. Her father Pascal had returned from the royal palace.
Astrid rushed up to the carriage, but the moment she saw her father’s face as he got off the carriage, she got the message right away and looked down with a gloomy face.
「……Father, As I thought?」
「Yeahh…His majesty had told me directly. Prince Azar and Clau’s wedding had been cancelled 」
「*Tsk*…Just when we finally got rid of the poison in her and started to get somewhere! If they give us more time, I’m sure that-! 」
「I said that as well…but I was told that the marriage had already been delayed for a year, he cannot wait for any longer than that」
「But!」
「Then he said, “Besides, even if the poison is cured, if the curse on her heart is not lifted, she would not be able to bear a child anyway, right?”…」
「That’s…*tsk*」
Astrid made a fist in frustration after she heard her father’s words.
Claudia Dragunaut, Astrid’s sister and also crown prince Azar’s fiancee, was currently under attack by an unknown curse.
It was a curse that caused her entire body intense pain regardless of time and place. Not only did magic and miracles not work on the curse, antidotes, medicines, and even full recovery elixirs that they went through much trouble to get had no effect on it either.
…Well, to be exact, the elixirs did have an effect. They were able to ease her pain temporarily.
But after a short while, the curse would reactivate. It would come back repeatedly, no matter how many times they tried.
Claudia was a bright, cheerful, lively girl. Even though she was still young when her mother passed away, she was such a strong girl that she bit her lip and suppressed her tears so that she wouldn’t make the people around her worry.
That’s why she tried resisting the curse at first as well. She did her best to smile as if she was telling her father and sister that everything was alright.
However, the curse strengthened gradually like it was mocking Claudia’s smile.
If she could endure the pain of stage 1 then it goes to the 2nd stage. If she was able to bear that then the pain would increase to 3rd stage.
3, 4, 5, 6…The curse strengthened in stages as it mocked the young girl. It did not stop even when Claudia started to cry.
After Claudia succumbed to the pain with her heart broken, she had finally cried out and begged her father and sister to kill her. Astrid and Pascal had to make a decision.
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In order to release Claudia from the pain, they used a painkilling medicine that was made with Tanasia grass on her.
The medicine’s effect is strong, but it leaves the user’s body with a heavy burden. To put it clearly, it’s a painkiller made for terminally ill patients or heavily wounded people that will not escape death.
It is definitely not something that should be used on a 12 or 13-year-old girl.
But since no other medicines could do anything for Claudia, she would probably die from the overbearing amount of pain anyway if they didn’t do anything. There was nothing else they could do.
In the end, Claudia was barely able to cling on to her life.
However, even with the Tanasia grass medicine, it could not ease all of her pain. The poison from the medicine settled in Claudia’s body and made her weaker day after day.
In order to help Claudia as she became thinner every day, her father and older sister looked everywhere for solutions, but even famous medicine masters or high level priests could not do anything to save Claudia.
After exhausting all possibilities, Astrid dropped to her knees.
It was exactly at that moment…A slit-eyed merchant came to Duke Dragunaut’s mansion and presented an unfamiliar fruit to them.
The fruit of the Jiraiaooks tree. A fruit that has great detoxification capabilities that could even cure the poison of the basilisk.
Neither Astrid nor Pascal believed the words of this merchant named Fedor right away.
If anything, they were suspicious of him instead.
However, the father and daughter of the Dragunauts were too cornered to send him away.
That’s why they let Claudia eat the fruit as their last hope.
The results were dramatic.
Out of the curse and the poison that was eating away at Claudia, at least the effects of the poison had been visibility diminished.
Needless to say, Astrid and her father were delighted.
The underlying problem was still there, but at the very least, Astrid’s little sister’s life won’t be in danger any time soon.
If they have the Jiraiaooks fruits, they can keep the side effect of the Tanashia grass medicine to the minimum.
With Claudia’s pain under control, they can once again start investigating the curse and learn more about it. Then, they will be able to free her from all the shackles.
…Just when Astrid was set out to do that, Claudia’s engagement with the crown prince was broken.
◆◆◆
It’s the king’s duty to ensure that the lineage of the royal family is maintained. Not only is Claudia not able to bear children in her current state, no one even knows if she will even recover from now on.
The king could not welcome Claudia to be the crown prince’s wife like that, and no one can go against his wishes.
Even more so when there’s a chance that the curse that has been eating away at Claudia could infect the crown prince as well.
However, there were some other intentions behind the engagement being called off this time as well.
「The imperialists are already pushing for the prince’s marriage with princess Sakuya to replace Claudia」
Astrid then replied to her father with the same loathsome voice her father used.
「Marrying with the Ad-Astera’s third princess…That’s like inviting invaders into this country. Why do the imperialists not understand that? 」
「Well, do they not know? Or are they doing it because they know that…?」
The bitterness did not disappear from Pascal’s voice.
The reputation of Duke Dragunaut is high, and the trust the king has in him is so strong that the king even wanted the duke’s daughter as the future queen.
Pascal was the kingdom’s honor and he held the king’s favor.
However, since it’s natural that he would be envied by the people around him, a fraction of the courtiers, referred to as the imperialists, were working behind the scenes to go against Duke Dragunaut with the Ad-Astera Empire backing them up.
The engagement incident this time was definitely part of their work.
Pascal was suspecting that Claudia’s curse was also related to the imperialists as well, but he found nothing that could back up that claim no matter how much he investigated.
After a long silence, Pascal opened his mouth,
「…Regardless, I should be prepared. I’m most likely not going to leave the capital for a while. I’m sorry but I’m entrusting the dragon riders to you. Meanwhile, about what happened at Ishka…It’s quite hard to believe that there’s a young man who managed tame a wyvern by himself」
「It’s true. I have seen it with my own eyes. I look forward to seeing your reaction when you see the indigo wyvern, father」
「To be honest, I still can’t believe that right now…Winning over an indigo wyvern was the only thing that I could not achieve. Just how the heck did he accomplish that? I want to hear his secrets if everything is true…No, I have to. It’s a chance to fulfill the dream I had for the last 30 years. I have to hear it from him even if I have to open my secret 30-year-old bottle of white for it」
After Astrid saw her father toss away that heavy expression he had on him until now and return to his usual enthusiastic self again, she made a faint smile.
Her little sister, the royal palace, the empire…All those things were headaches to her, but her father should be under so much more pressure than she was since he was the head of the house.
At a time like this, nobody would blame him if he were to forget about all those difficult things for a moment and think about the things he finds fun.
Even though it only got these reactions out of her father, she thought that having talked with that young man was all worth it still…Astrid recalled the look on that young man’s face when they met during the time she went to thank Fedor, and then she smiled once more.