9 – 9. Lemon
“It was really good.”
The Empress Yeonhwa sighed.
It had been a day since she received Sillosibin. She felt regretful that she couldn’t reverse the disappeared effects.
At first, she didn’t even want to swallow it. The unidentified medicine smelled like mud.
And Sienna, who brought it, was her stepdaughter who always played wicked tricks. She used to play pranks when she was young.
“I just ate it to save Anais.”
She forced herself to eat it, thinking she could soothe her by being polite. She wanted to save her stepdaughter, Anais, from an external injury.
But soon after, the magic began.
“Sienna… why did your hair suddenly turn white?”
“It’s silver.”
It wasn’t an exaggeration; the world became colorful. The dull office swayed like a dance as the water filled it.
Surprised, she closed her eyes, and then something strange happened. Her body started floating.
“Oh, please catch me…!”
“Don’t worry, you’re stuck to the ground.”
What did they give me to eat? She silently sobbed for a moment. Questions arose in the Empress’s mind.
Am I uncomfortable right now?
Come to think of it, not at all. Her body felt light, and her mind was clear.
From Noble mtl dot com
Wow, she murmured, and suddenly, a captivating melody she had never heard before began to ring in her ears. She quickly brought the seven-stringed zither.
And from that moment, a magical time began…
There was a brief commotion in the middle, but the Empress easily resolved it and immersed herself in playing again.
She couldn’t stop. She couldn’t explain what was happening, but the melody looked mature in her eyes. She hoped this moment would never end.
But that’s just her whim.
“Ended too quickly, didn’t it…?”
Siena, her bodyguard, and the effectiveness of the potion they brought had all disappeared without a trace.
It’s regrettable. Truly regrettable.
Empress Yeonhwa decided to savor the aftertaste while regaining her appetite.
No, rather, she wanted to eat first.
Usually, she could barely swallow a few sips of food prepared in the style of her homeland, but now anything sweet would do. Scones, pudding, cake, and so on.
She wanted to see her husband after a long time. He was a cute man daring to claim the title in a country so small that it couldn’t be compared to her motherland.
Even with so much to do, unfortunately, there was an insistent petitioner.
“Mom. It’s not too late, please…!”
Her daughter Anais had been desperately pleading for hours since Siena left, refusing to give up and clinging to the empress.
“Anais, stop.”
“Say it was a delusion caused by confusion from pickled something. Honestly, Mom was acting strange earlier, right? Suddenly forgetting manners and not playing the instrument, not laughing elegantly. Mom isn’t normally like that…!”
Manners, what?
The empress thought she shouldn’t speak gently and hardened her expression.
“What kind of person was I originally? If you know, tell me.”
“No, it’s just…”
“You seem to want to say that the potion is suspicious, but it’s absolutely not. Before bringing it to me, Siena’s bodyguard took several doses of that potion. But he was standing fine.”
“Alan Maydoff? That guy is a knight. An expert.”
“Do you think a master has immunity to all kinds of potions? That’s a strange notion.”
Anais finally closed her mouth.
If her daughter, who was cornered, didn’t deserve pity, it would be a lie.
But what was wrapping around her here had the potential to be poison to her daughter instead. She didn’t know if she would bring even greater harm by hesitating to turn the tide of the fight she had already started.
Above all, compared to the mistakes Anais had made, she had concluded things in a mild manner. According to the standards of the Empress, it was not unusual for dozens of people to die.
“Just surrender, Anais.”
“Mother!”
Anais sat back in her place, rubbing her palms together, but the Empress didn’t waver. It wasn’t solely because she wanted to keep taking Sirocivine.
“This is also for her sake.”
After a while, the Empress defeated her daughter and went to meet her husband with light steps.
**
Two more days passed, making the Empress happy.
News came from the Minst Palace where Princess Anais resided. Of course, from our perspective, it was good news, but for the people involved, it must have been a tragedy.
“Dryden Viscount, Soneon Viscount, and Aegis Marquis voluntarily went to the Imperial Guard and confessed to the crime of sacrilege. And Her Highness the Third Princess requested an audience with His Majesty the Emperor and requested their titles be stripped.”
Reports that three nobles belonging to that faction sacrificed themselves, carrying their weapons.
They were not the heaviestweights in the Britannia Empire’s economic world, but they were at least heavyweight figures. They couldn’t even compare to the bonus Sienna had sorted out yesterday.
“It’s like cutting off one arm and leg. Just this alone.”
Princess Anais, who was not on par with Princess Victoria, but at least boasted a superior position compared to Sienna, was in a state of great damage due to this incident.
“I heard rumors have already spread to the Academy. They must be in hell by now.”
Sienna vowed to continue tormenting her sister in the future.
And then she turned to me with a very satisfied expression.
“This is all thanks to you, Alan. I admit it.”
“Thank you. I’m glad I kept my promise.”
Now, it was a way of telling her to keep her promise as well.
The Empress was happy, and the reputation of the Third Princess wasn’t dragged through the mud. It was not only satisfying Sienna’s curiosity, but also politically beneficial. We were able to suppress the step-sister who was climbing up from below.
In return, I received one million talers and a long vacation.
But… would Sienna really keep her promise?
I had my doubts because she was the kind of person who could be unpredictable. It was hard to guess what she was thinking as she lightly touched her chin and smiled. Fortunately, she seemed to be in a good mood, but she was the kind of woman who could do something bad even when she was happy.
“Yes, Alan. I made a promise to you.”
“Yes, you did. You also said you would give it to me in person.”
“I will keep it, of course.”
It was a pleasant statement, but judging by Sienna’s expression, it didn’t seem like she would keep it willingly.
It felt like she was going to add conditions that we hadn’t discussed beforehand…
It wasn’t because Sienna was dirty, but because it was human nature. How many employers would actually cleanly give out the promised bonus without any written agreement? Of course, I wasn’t in a position to demand a contract from Sienna back then.
My ominous premonition was right.
“I’ll give you both. In return…”
“….”
“The medicine I gave to the Empress. Can you tell me about Sillosybin?”
Sienna seemed impressed by the effects of the hallucinogenic mushrooms.
It was only natural. I had witnessed the astonishing change in the Empress, who had been withering away in the inner palace. And my medicine didn’t even turn her into a beggar. Didn’t she say yesterday that she showed off her golden hairpin while taking a rare walk with the Emperor?
“It wouldn’t hurt to just let her know.”
Anyway, even if I told her, she couldn’t commercialize hallucinogenic mushrooms.
To commercialize them, you would eventually have to mass-produce them through artificial cultivation.
But with the agricultural technology of this ambiguous 17th-century world, it was impossible.
Cultivating mushrooms artificially was a very complicated task, and they didn’t just grow well if you cultivated them properly. I could do it because I learned about it in college, but there was no chance of that happening. Anyway, I only had to give it to the Empress.
Should I just explain briefly and move on?
But in the next moment, my careless thoughts were immediately overturned.
It was because of the words Siena suddenly blurted out as if she had just remembered.
“Oh, Alan. How about adding lemon to the silocybin when you offer it to the Empress next time?”
“Lemon? Are you serious?”
“Yeah. Maybe because it’s made from mushrooms, I felt a bit disgusted because of the texture and smell. Wouldn’t it be better if you consume it with lemon?”
The idea of making silocybin with lemon.
It might not be a big deal, but suddenly I felt a chill.
“How does she know about lemon tech? How on earth?”
After eating silocybin mushrooms, the effects didn’t start to appear until at least 30 minutes later.
But if it was mixed with lemon juice or lime juice and drunk as tea, the time could be shortened to less than 10 minutes. It tasted better, and it was also a way to enjoy it on the mainland.
Logically, she wouldn’t know why she was saying that.
But Siena was a person who turned every idea into an efficient evil act.
She probably came up with the idea of mixing op*ium with port wine because it tasted bitter when eaten alone, and the idea of covering the unpleasant taste of the pill made from mushrooms with lemon fragrance. It was forbidden to pass on knowledge to such a woman.
It would be better to beat around the bush. I immediately started telling lies.
“…Your Grace. I apologize, but I don’t know the details either. Indeed, discovering the existence of Siloshin was also a coincidence.”
“Really?”
“How could I lie? The truth is… during my internship in the Academy’s third year, I happened to encounter an elf named Siloshin. I learned about the existence and efficacy of that mushroom from him. Even the name of the medicine was borrowed from that elf.”
“You learned something from an elf? Our elves don’t have a good vibe.”
“We became friends by chance. Besides, elves are a race that sustains themselves with herbs and mushrooms. Old elves seek special mushrooms with unique effects to pass their free time. Despite their elegant appearance, they indulge in things darker than they seem.”
For something made up on the spot, it seemed plausible even to me. I had insulted the elf in the process, but it was inevitable.
“Yeah. If you say so, then it must be true.”
“I will personally prepare Siloshin for the Empress in the future. There are over 80 types of mushrooms that look similar, making it difficult for others to distinguish.”
“…”
Sienna stared at me intently and eventually nodded.
It didn’t seem like she believed everything. It was probably just going along because of the significant achievements I had made recently. She might think I was avoiding talking because I didn’t want to reveal my shortcomings.
Sienna was definitely not an easy person to deal with. I had to stay alert at all times.
Nevertheless, I had to accept what was coming.
“Your Grace. Please provide the promised reward and vacation as agreed.”
Now was the time for settlement.