What Became of the Tyrant After the Pregnant Empress Left - Chapter 189

“Still to the east, then.”

Kazhan gritted his teeth as he muttered at the tracking spell that had been pointing unwaveringly in the same direction for two days now.

Unless one was flying on a wyvern, maintaining such a straight, unwavering path by any other means was nearly impossible. Even if Runellia had allied with the wyvern-riding dark mages, it was unlikely they’d boldly traverse the skies when secrecy was paramount. After all, witnesses would inevitably spot them.

Most likely, they were holed up somewhere—but whether that was good or bad, Kazhan couldn’t say.

If the ones who’d taken Ysaris were lying low in hiding, it was the best-case scenario. But if not… the worst possible outcome might be waiting for him.

She could already be dead, buried in some unmarked grave.

“Tch.”

Kazhan dragged a hand through his hair, trying to shake off the grim thought. He didn’t want to dwell on the worst, but the longer this dragged on, the harder it became to imagine Ysaris unharmed.

There were usually two reasons someone would kidnap a noble: ransom or revenge.

……And the Dowager Empress, who’d taken Ysaris and Mikael, had more than enough reason to despise them. Worse, she hadn’t even demanded ransom—just vanished without a trace.

“Damn the Logitens…”

Grind.

His jaw clenched, teeth grinding audibly. The Logiten family’s lands were close to the capital, and their second son worked in the imperial palace. He’d never imagined Runellia would dare act so brazenly.

No wonder their family was conspicuously absent from the hunting tournament—they were preparing to flee.

He’d slaughtered every last one of them, but the brief window of time had been enough for his wife and son to disappear. Rage simmered under his skin. He should’ve eliminated the Dowager Empress sooner, instead of hesitating for Ysaris’ sake or the Prime Minister’s opinions.

“Please be safe, Ysaa.”

His grip tightened on the wyvern’s reins, knuckles whitening. Following the faint glow of the wedding ring’s tracking spell, his eyes sharpened as a sprawling city came into view at the horizon’s edge.

At first, he’d assumed Ysaris’ captors wouldn’t have gone far, hence the wyvern’s speed. But now, he reconsidered. If they’d used unconventional methods, it’d be faster to hop between the major cities of Uzephia via teleportation circles, narrowing the search along the ring’s trajectory.

“We land there. We’ll teleport eastward, city by city, closing the distance.”

“Understood, Your Majesty.”

Temisian, mounted on the nearest wyvern, acknowledged the order. The hastily assembled pursuit team—a handful of wyvern knights scraped together from the capital’s outskirts—soon entered the city.

Using imperial signals to prevent panic at their wyverns’ arrival, they procured maps and marked the eastern cities with teleportation circles. At first, Kazhan thought it’d be straightforward.

But when the tracking spell pointed past the first city, then the second, then the third—his expression hardened with each hop.

“……This is absurd.”

By the time they reached the easternmost city of Uzephia, Kazhan couldn’t suppress the twist of his lips.

The wedding ring’s light still glimmered, unrelenting, toward the east.

* * *

“Where is this place, you ask? Why does it matter?”

“You wouldn’t be curious, if you’d been kidnapped to gods-know-where?”

Ysaris stared flatly at Trienne, who was meticulously applying ointment to the crude gash on her arm. The sting had dulled—probably laced with painkillers—but gratitude was the last thing she felt. Disgust curdled in her chest instead.

This man would bleed her dry, just not enough to kill her. She’d almost prefer cold indifference; his polite honorifics and faux kindness made her skin crawl.

“Even if you knew, you couldn’t escape. And you wouldn’t recognize the name anyway.”

“Fine, suppose that’s true. But the Emperor will come for me. Aren’t you afraid of his retribution?”

This, too, baffled her. The dark mages had been exiled centuries ago, surviving in the shadows. What gave them the audacity to act so boldly now? Had they amassed enough power to defy Uzephia itself?