Chapter 65

They'd been talking like that for some time when Iberin suddenly felt the room spin.

Her hands trembled out of nowhere, and the strength drained from her whole body in one long pull.

And Lyssel didn't miss it.

"Iberin?"

"…"

Iberin couldn't manage a reply — just a small pained sound.

Only then did Rotte and Pons realize something was off, and they hurried to check on her.

"Earlier!"

Lyssel's voice cracked through the room like a thunderbolt.

"Earlier — you got pricked by that leaf, didn't you?"

"…Ah."

"I was worried it might have been poisonous."

Lyssel's face had gone serious as he caught her with one arm.

She could feel the heat radiating off where their bodies touched.

She must have been running a fever.

"Which tree?"

"It was dark, so I couldn't see clearly, but I snapped a piece off and brought it."

Lyssel pulled the branch he'd tucked into his pocket back out.

"Call the physician immediately."

"Yes."

While Rotte and Pons grabbed the branch, Lyssel scooped Iberin up into his arms.

The kids, who'd just been wrapping up their training, walked in and spotted Iberin slumped limp in Lyssel's arms.

"Mommy?!"

"Lady Iberin, what's wrong?!"

"We're taking her to her room for now — come with us."

Lyssel kept his voice calm as he steadied the children.

"I'm fine…"

Iberin hadn't lost consciousness.

It was just that her strength had drained out of her so fast that she couldn't move at all.

Lyssel kept murmuring it was probably nothing, as much to settle himself as to settle the kids, and laid her gently on the bed.

"I called the physician — we'll know what caused it soon enough."

A moment later the physician burst through the door, sweat pouring down his face.

"My lady!!!"

Iberin's health was the physician's own well-being.

When Iberin fell ill, the whole of Lecashe went into an uproar, which meant nobody fretted over her condition more than he did.

Of course, putting that aside — he just didn't like seeing her hurt.

"Let me look at the wound from the branch first."

"A branch?"

Ether tilted his head and asked.

When Lyssel filled them in on what had happened, Ether's face creased with worry.

"…It's not a serious wound. I checked the branch Lady Rotte brought, and there's no toxin on it."

"Then why is she like this?"

"It looks like her vitality's giving out."

"Vitality?"

"Yes. Rozelia gave her holy power before, but you know how that goes — it's only a temporary effect."

"…Oh."

"Then I just give her some holy power again, right?"

"That should do it."

Rozelia didn't hesitate — she walked straight to Iberin and channeled holy power into her.

Bright light spread through the room, and only then did some of the tension ease out of Iberin's face.

"Lady Iberin, you feel better now?"

The feeling of something dragging her body down was gone.

"Yes, thanks to you. Thank you, Rozel."

"It's nothing. If you really want to thank me, you have to take holy power from me every week from now on."

"Hmm?"

"What if you suddenly lose your strength again? You could get sick."

"Rozelia's right."

"Yeah, Mommy."

"It's only been a week, and look at you now. Take it every week."

It wasn't that losing holy power would make her sick enough to die, but they settled on a once-a-week schedule anyway.

"You sure you feel all right, Rozel?"

Iberin was more worried about her than herself.

Rozelia's holy power might be overflowing, but only part of it was actually usable.

She hadn't thought of it at the time, but what if Rozelia kept feeding pieces of that small usable portion to her, and ended up getting sick herself?

"I'm fine."

That was why Iberin had turned down the once-a-week arrangement at first… but Rozelia had begged so insistently that there was no refusing her.

Honestly, Iberin's body did need holy power on a regular schedule, so once a week was probably about right.

"If anything feels off, you have to tell me."

"Yes, yes. I really promise."

Rozelia smiled like don't worry about it.

Iberin had been turning it over in her head, and she suspected the partial movement of Rozelia's holy power had something to do with her calling the god's name.

She couldn't think of anything else that would've triggered it.

The thing that nagged at her was that the holy power hadn't moved right away — there'd been a delay.

"If you're hurting, you'd hide it, wouldn't you? Fine — I'll give you a quadrillion gold."

"…Rozel, you don't have a single coin."

"…Ow. I think you just broke a few of my bones."

"Sorry."

"I don't have it, but I'll sell my organs to get it to you!"

"Even your organs wouldn't be worth a quadrill—"

"Anyway, I'll give it to you!"

Rozelia must have gotten choked up — she shouted at Iberin with a hurt look on her face.

Iberin laughed and reached up to stroke her hair.

She kept mumbling thank you the whole time.

She could say it every day and it still wouldn't be enough.

---

Iberin had collapsed, technically, but compared to before, it passed easily.

That was all thanks to Rozelia.

The moment she got one round of holy power, Iberin recovered her strength and immediately turned her thoughts to having a talk with the nobles of the Gelta region.

"They won't bite unless they actually get a look at the gem first, right?"

"Shall I send word?"

"Yes, please do. Or — should we throw a party?"

"A party?"

"Yes. If Lecashe is throwing a party, they'll show up just out of curiosity. Worst case, nobody comes — but if we hook them with a what's going on over there, there'll be nobles who can't help showing up."

"There will, yes."

Nobles loved to gossip — they'd come.

If they were going to do it, Iberin figured they might as well go big.

"Calling in a few people for a sit-down versus dropping the news in front of a whole crowd — the second one's got way more impact, doesn't it?"

"It does."

In the end the decision came down on the side of let's start preparing a party.

There were only six Gelta-region nobles.

But the southern region was huge.

"Are there any friendly southern nobles?"

"None."

The answer came back instantly.

True — given the way Lecashe had been treated up till now, it would've been a miracle if there had been any.

The butler had had to go all the way to the capital just to source goods, after all.

"We'll need to pull up a list of the southern nobles."

"Will there be a lot of them?"

"It's a wide region — they're out there."

"Really?"

In that case, maybe there was no need to even bother with the Gelta Six.

Iberin tapped the table absently, lost in thought.

---

Invitations went out to every noble in the south, all bearing the same wording.

She'd considered cutting Gelta out, but figured even if she sent them, they probably wouldn't come anyway, so the invites went out as a set.

They couldn't let themselves become a joke to the rest of the aristocracy, so Lecashe started preparing for the party by the book.

Pons and Rotte handled the hall decoration in full.

Getting outfits made for the kids, Lyssel, and Iberin was a priority, and on top of that, they needed a jeweler to cut the ijet.

Because the gems were going to be worn the night of.

"It has to be someone without greed and with a tight mouth."

Bringing a jeweler in from a neighboring territory left a bad taste in her mouth.

They needed a Lecashe man.

Iberin was mulling it over when Lyssel spoke.

"Hm. You've got connections in the capital, don't you?"

"Sorry?"

"Lawyer Nais."

"Right!"

Bad of her — but ever since she'd come to the territory, she'd completely forgotten about him.

"He'll have been working all this time, so he must have built up some kind of network by now, no?"

"I'll send word right away. I hope he's doing well at it."

She'd worried about him picking up clients at all, being known as Lecashe's man.

If he'd helped a few people in trouble, he was probably making a decent name for himself by now.

---

As luck would have it, word came back that Nais had represented a jeweler.

So she'd had a message passed to the jeweler in question, and he'd said he too owed Lecashe, that he'd do anything they asked, and that he'd come at once.

The jeweler — who'd come running at a sprint — was shown the ijet.

"…Th-this!"

Apparently, jewelers knew their stones inside and out — the moment the gem was laid in front of him, he sucked in a sharp breath, astonished.

"You recognize it?"

"I-Ijet…?"

"You do recognize it."

"Hah, haah."

The jeweler shifted on his seat, not knowing what to do with himself.

He looked overcome.

"I — in my whole life, I never thought I'd see uncut ijet…! How did you…?!"

At Lyssel's words, the jeweler dropped his jaw practically to the floor.

"Can you do it?"

"Yes — yes! I was prepared to help with anything, but this — this is an honor to me. Thank you…!"

The jeweler bowed his head and called it out.

Iberin, standing beside them, tilted her head.

"Is it really that incredible?"

The jeweler answered, his voice shaking.

"Of, of course. Ijet is so rare we don't even know where or how it forms in the first place, which is why even the finished gems are scarce. And since it gives off a white light, in Aleta you can't just buy one because you have money."

She pictured the ijet packing the cavern walls.

"…The only people in Aleta with ijet are His Majesty the Emperor and the ducal-rank nobles, and not many of them at that."

"That bad? Then if we suddenly put a quantity on the market—"

"Put it on the market? Just the ijet sitting in front of us right now would set the place on fire."

Iberin had wanted influence in the south, basically — but listening to him talk, the scale of this had clearly shifted into something else.

"What if we sold these?"

"Sell them?! These?! Why?!!"

The jeweler shouted in his excitement, then caught himself and dipped his head before answering.

"You'd take a loss selling them, no matter what. The whole continent for sale wouldn't buy these."

"Even if there were a lot?"

"…A lot? Th-that, that would depend on h-how many exactly…"

The jeweler stammered through his answer.

Going by his reaction, even a lot might not be enough to justify selling.

"…You can do the cutting?"

"I'll consider it the honor of my house and pour my whole self into it!"

Pons, beside her, closed the lid of the jewelry case holding the ijet and handed it to the jeweler.

The jeweler took the case with hands so careful they barely seemed to touch it.

Then he was led off to the workshop they'd set up for him.

"…A few of the stones, and the whole continent goes upside down. Did you know it was that serious, Lyssel?"

"Even I didn't realize it went that far."

"And he didn't sound like he was making it up…."

On top of that, the jeweler had said ijet was a mineral nobody knew the origin of.

The fact that it formed in that cave naturally meant the conditions there matched.

There could easily be more deeper in the forest.

They wouldn't know until they looked, of course.

"Let's get the ijet we've already given the jeweler made into a matched set first, then talk about the rest. The fact that ijet hasn't been found in so long has given it almost a holy aura — there's an element of that we can use."

"There would be, yes."

"More than that — it'll look beautiful."

"Sorry?"

"Ijet, on you. I mean."