Chapter 240 - Faye Dorothy

"Whoa. What’s with that look? I haven’t even said anything yet."

Emelie, realising the weird look she’s been giving him, snapped out of it and relaxed her posture took a long. "Sorry. I just... argh. Continue with what you were saying."

"That was weird. Emy. You got something to say, just say it."

"I will, alright. But you first since you brought her up."

"Hmm... Fine. It was before the start of the tournament’s second day," Kurt began, recounting the events. "While I was on my way to the academy, I got picked up by a royal carriage. Princess Faye, along with her siblings, were inside."

Emelie listened at full attention, not interrupting him once as he laid out the entirety of the encounter. Kurt summarized their conversation inside the moving carriage – Faye’s sharp, probing questions about his movements, the subtle pressure she applied regarding his sudden prominence in the city, and finally, the core of her personal request.

"She asked me to find her mother’s killer. The cultist who took down the Queen years ago. She said if I bring him to her – dead or alive – she’d grant me whatever reward I asked for, backed by royal authority."

He paused, studying Emelie expression. "So... that’s the story. Before I committed to anything or started poking around cold cases, I figured I’d get your take on it. What do you think, little miss regressor?"

Deep in thought, Emelie idly traced a circle on her plate before setting it down. "... It’s a good thing you came to me first, Kurt."

"Oh? Why?"

"Because the one who orchestrated the assassination of the late Queen of Eldoria, Caroline Dorothy... was none other than her daughter, Faye Dorothy."

Kurt froze.

His brain took a second to process the weight of the sentence as his single eye widened genuine shock.

"What? Wait... so you’re telling me that the Princess of Eldoria is..."

"A high-ranking member of the Cult, yes." Emelie finished his sentence cleanly.

"Hold on just a second. Wasn’t she just a kid when the Queen died? How old is she again?"

"She’s twenty-eight. The assassination occurred eighteen years ago."

"Which means she was ten years old. No wonder whatever personal investigators and inquisitors they have found nothing. They spent nearly two decades chasing their own tails; looking for outside enemies while the mastermind was sleeping right under their noses."

He leaned back and let out a heavy sigh, trying to steady his thoughts. "So how did a ten-year-old orchestrate this assassination? Why would she kill her own mother?"

"In order to answer that, I need to tell you about Faye Dorothy. You see, the root of all this stems from a deep, cancerous hatred for both of her parents."

She folded her arms and thought deeply back into old memories. To a cycle that no longer existed.

"In a past cycle – one of my more... unhinged ones – while I was a member of the cult, I worked directly under Faye. Throughout my time with her, I slowly learnt more and more about her private life. Before all of this... Faye had a half-brother."

"A half-brother? So a bastard-child?"

"Yeah. A child born from the King and a jester he fancied."

"A jester? That’s unexpected."

"Mmhm. Understandable. Just looking at that brooding old man now, you’d think he wouldn’t know the meaning of the word entertainment. Anyway, of the two half siblings back then, Faye was always the black sheep.

"She was irresponsible, loud, a persistent troublemaker, and virtually talentless when it came to anything magic related. Her half-brother on the other hand, was her complete opposite – brilliant, polite, and a prodigy in every sense.

"Yet, despite his talent, the boy never overstepped his boundaries with Faye. As Faye herself put it in herself, he was the only person in the entire palace who was always "on her side" when the adults tore her down.

"It isn’t right to say her parents didn’t love her – they did, in their own distant way. The king and queen were still going through relationship problems, so they barely had time for her. And when they did, it was forced.

"But out of everyone in that cold castle, her half-brother showed her true, unconditional love. Their sibling bond was unbreakable.

"Then... the political drama unfolded. Infighting erupted within the royal court. One faction demanded that Faye inherit the crown, arguing that a bastard child should never sit upon the throne. The opposing faction argued that the boy should inherit it, claiming that leaving the nation to an unruly and talentless girl like Faye would spell the doom of Eldoria."

"Yeesh. Vultures fighting over meat."

"Exactly. Months went by like this. And so, on the night of the boy’s ninth birthday, while he was visiting his mother outside the palace walls... he was murdered alongside her.

"Well, I say murdered, but his body was never actually found. Only his mother’s corpse was recovered. The men who carried out the assault were royal guards belonging to the faction pushing for Faye to take the crown."

"They slaughtered a nine-year-old boy just to clear the path for her?"

"Mmhm. And it completely devastated Faye. But what truly destroyed her was the utter lack of response from her parents."

"Let me guess. No fancy public trial? No mass executions?"

"None. According to Faye, now that the ’bastard child’ was dead, the King and Queen felt a small wave of relief. The court headaches ceased, the emergency noble meetings stopped, and the political infighting died down.

"They didn’t even properly punish the guards who killed the mother and missing child – they were given a single year of comfortable house arrest and a slap on the wrist, protected by the high-ranking court nobles who backed Faye’s claim.

"Seeing such sickening injustice... Faye decided to rebel in a different way. She completely altered her behavior.

"She studied relentlessly, fixed her attitude, presented herself as a devout follower of the Goddess Bula, and trained until her hands bled in the magical arts. Everyone thought she was finally shaping up to be a worthy ruler. But she renounced her right to the throne out of pure spite for her parents.

"This forced their hand. They needed a new heir to secure the bloodline, which led to the eventual announcement of the queen’s new pregnancy."

"But I thought her parents weren’t getting along."

"Turns out, this was exactly what their relationship needed. A fresh start. Something to look forward to."

"Brutal."

"You can say that again. Continuing on, the entire continent was overjoyed at the news of new royal babes. Everyone... except Faye. Because now, her grand rebellion meant nothing.

"They would all move on, her parents would have their precious new heir, and the memory of the half-brother she loved would be erased forever.

"So, she went to the only place she sought solace, church. That was where she met him – a cult fanatic embedded within the clergy. He was immediately infatuated with her. A sickening creep, by all accounts, but Faye was smart. She used his obsession to her advantage and gained a means to an end."

"What did she do?"

"She manipulated his lust for her," Emelie stated plainly.

"Always teasing, always baiting him, offering him false hope, but never giving him what he truly desired – her virginity. This sick game of manipulation lasted for months, until finally, on the eve of her mother’s delivery date, Faye gave him his ultimatum.

"She told him he could have her... if he led an assault on the inner palace and slaughtered her mother during the night of the birth."

Kurt’s face contorted with absolute disgust. "And the creep took the deal."

"He accepted without hesitation," Emelie said. "I am sure you can surmise the rest of that tragic night. Faye personally led them inside the palace through a secret back entrance, providing the cultists with a clean, unguarded path to the Queen’s chambers. The assault was a resounding success."

"What about the cultist? Did she actually go through with it?"

"Of course not. While the palace was drowning in blood and chaos, she lured him into a secluded private study under the pretense of fulfilling her promise. Before he could even touch her, she drove a black dagger through his heart, killed him instantly, and had her loyal personal retainers dispose of the corpse in the incinerators."

"How cutthroat."

"For the next two decades, she laid low. She couldn’t kill her father – after the Queen’s death, Maxwell became hyper-vigilant, paranoid, and utterly obsessed with hunting down the cult.

"So instead of acting recklessly, Faye used her position as the grieving princess to silently strengthen her grip over the cult’s network in Eldoria. She rose through their ranks effortlessly, leveraging her connections to high-society nobles."

Emelie tapped her finger lightly against the wooden table and looked at him seriously.

"Which brings us to right now. To you, Kurt."

"Ahhh shit."

"Over the past few months, a single unknown factor has been flushing out cultists left right and center and liquidating their key operatives. Faye is not stupid. She knows someone is hunting them down with terrifying efficiency. She fears that it is only a matter of time before your investigation leads straight to her doorstep."

"So her request in the carriage was a trap."

"You guessed it. By tasking you with finding a ’killer’ who has been dead for nearly twenty years, she lulls you into a false narrative. Either she leads you to a dead-end scapegoat with false information, or she uses the task to draw you into an ambush and kill you. Either way... her eyes are firmly set on you.

"Now that you know her true story... what do you plan to do?"

Kurt set his hands flat on the table, closing his eye before opening them with terrifying resolve.

"Isn’t it obvious, Emy?" He answered with a deadly smirk. "I’ll kill her."