MMFHRK-Chapter 19

Chapter 19: Everything About You—I Know It All~

For a brief instant, Lilinai thought she was seeing a ghost.

Those violet eyes were glimmering with an unfathomable amusement.

“Miss Lilinai, what sort of expression is that? How funny~”

“How are you… here…”

Lilinai gripped her chest and asked blankly.

She couldn’t comprehend the scene before her eyes.

“What a strange question, Miss Lilinai.”

Airiya tilted her head with an artless expression, her snow-white long hair like a stretch of rime frost.

“What does that question mean? Are you asking why I’ve appeared here, or asking… why I’m still alive?”

“…”

Lilinai said nothing.

She had watched with her own eyes, at the tea party that afternoon, as Airiya drank the tea she had poisoned.

Yet now Airiya stood before her without a scratch, wearing that same gothic long dress from the daytime, carrying her everyday mocking expression.

Why…

“Haah, Lilinai, oh Lilinai.”

Looking at the girl at a loss for what to do, the Witch sighed.

She snapped her fingers, and the vines and branches stirring restlessly all around slowly drew back, opening a path for her.

Lilinai couldn’t help retreating; pain lanced through her palm, and the longsword fell to the ground.

Only after colliding with a tree was she forced to stop.

“I know a great many things, and I can do a great many things, Miss Lilinai.”

The white-haired girl slowly approached.

Her tone carried not a trace of exaggeration or boasting—she was simply stating facts.

“Herbs, magic potions, poisons—Miss Lilinai, did you think only that assassins’ organization taught such things?”

“…!?”

Lilinai’s heart lurched.

Could it be that Airiya knew about her past 5 years?

“Does Miss Lilinai know? Every magic potion a Witch concocts during her period of study must, in the end, be drunk by herself. Though you may not care, I have long since wandered the border between life and death countless times from poisoning. I know that sensation, and I know even better how to guard against it. If Miss Lilinai thought poison alone could kill me, that was truly far too naive~”

Her tone was gentle, yet it made one instinctively want to retreat a great distance.

“What a Witch can accomplish is far more than Miss Lilinai imagines.” Lilinai had never found Airiya’s smile so terrifying. “To be astonished now is rather premature—do you remember? I can hypnotize you and control you at any time. Imposing interference upon the mind of someone who can’t use magic is nothing more than a trifling matter. So, you see…”

“…!”

Once again, Lilinai felt the prickling, numbing sensation rising across the surface of her skin.

She suddenly recalled those rumors about Witches she had once heard.

To explain the current situation, there was only one possibility—

“Could it be that you can read my mind…?”

“Correct~”

Airiya clapped her hands with a beaming smile, her intonation like someone praising a small child.

“Every single one of Miss Lilinai’s thoughts—I know them all perfectly well, you see?

“Ever since that session of discipline in the study ended, every moment we’ve spent together—

“On the chair, on the sofa; in the room, on the balcony; beneath the desk, by the lakeside—

“Miss Lilinai’s complaints, Miss Lilinai’s bashfulness, and Miss Lilinai’s forbearance and humiliation—

“I know—every—last—bit of it, you see?”

“How could this be…!”

Lilinai clenched her teeth in despair.

The Witch could read minds?

What was this supposed to be!

Didn’t that mean there was no possibility of her deceiving the other party?

And besides…

Airiya had been hiding it from her the whole time; every thought in her heart over these past days, Airiya had known.

She had been reveling in it from beginning to end, savoring the sight of the girl left with no recourse, forced to bow and serve her!

At the thought, Lilinai’s small face flushed crimson with shame and rage.

“Well, there’s really no need to worry too much.

“I’m not reading minds every moment either, so Miss Lilinai needn’t fear her privacy being exposed~

“Although… at least while we were at it, I very much enjoyed the little conflicts deep in Lilinai’s heart, you see~”

Airiya twisted the knife.

Lilinai’s body went limp and she braced herself against the tree trunk.

Had she not sworn to complete her revenge, at this moment she’d have half a mind to cut her own throat and be done with it.

And even if that shame and rage didn’t swallow her whole, the sheer hopelessness of her present situation alone… left her unable to see any hope at all.

Her act of poisoning a Witch, of attempting to kill Airiya, would certainly not be let off lightly.

Could it be… that everything was going to end here?

Lilinai lowered her head and clenched her fists.

“However—”

Lilinai raised her head in confusion.

Airiya looked at her hand, at that strip of linen seeping blood, and said in a shifted tone:

“I’m truly surprised, Miss Lilinai.

“Even faced with such humiliation, even forced to endure to such a degree, reality still failed to make you bow your head.

“Your courage and conviction—I acknowledge them, Miss Lilinai. And so, I’ll give you a chance.”

“A chance…?”

Lilinai furrowed her brow.

Going by past precedent, whenever Airiya made an offer like this, in all likelihood she intended to find an excuse to toy with her and then do lewd things to her.

“What are you scheming now? Don’t tell me you want to do that to me again—”

“Pick up the sword.”

Airiya’s tone turned abruptly frigid.

Lilinai froze for a moment.

“You needn’t pick it up if you don’t want to. But you only get this one chance. So my advice is: pick it up, Lilinai.”

“…”

Lilinai pressed her lips shut.

She bent down in silence and picked up the sword that had fallen to the ground.

By the dim moonlight, Airiya’s gaze settled on that sword, and she nodded.

“Not a bad eye you have.” The Witch narrowed her eyes and offered her assessment. “That’s a Western Regions Botewei sword, standard model, a lightweight composite-alloy blade. This sword has some years on it—it comes from the collection of the mansion’s earliest owner. The blade is forged smooth and beautiful, and its design holds considerable collector’s value. You should be able to tell that it’s a custom piece. The pattern engraved on the crossguard suggests it was made for a woman.”

“You know about swords too?”

The purple-haired girl was somewhat surprised by the Witch’s breadth of knowledge.

Everything Airiya said was correct, because Lilinai knew all of it as well.

Only, her reason for choosing this sword had nothing to do with how expensive it was—it was purely that it handled the best, and nothing more.

“I know a great many things.” The Witch smiled provocatively. “But what about Miss Lilinai—how many things do you know that I don’t? Or is it that Miss Lilinai is the one who’s all show and no substance?”

Lilinai pursed her lips and snorted.

“This sword,” she said, meeting her point for point, “is an import; the locations of its assembly and finishing were both outside the Luolunbao Kingdom—because on its blade there’s an inscription engraved in the traditional manner describing how a Botewei sword is to be used: ‘Without cause, draw not the sword; without honor, let it never leave the scabbard.’ Add the smith’s signature, and one can tell it’s an orthodox Botewei sword.”

“Miss Lilinai’s learning is truly admirable.” Airiya said with a smile. “Indeed—in the years after the Kaoenxier family’s collapse… Miss Lilinai was not idle.”

“So? What did you want me to pick up the sword for? Don’t tell me you want me to perform a sword dance for you?”

Since her plan had already been exposed, Lilinai simply couldn’t be bothered to pretend anymore.

She asked in the manner of one smashing an already-cracked pot, wanting to know the Witch’s true intentions.

“Mm, something like that.”

Airiya said, unexpectedly.

She raised an arm, moved a few steps, and came to the flat ground in the middle of the forest.

“Come—try and kill me, Miss Lilinai.”

“…!?”