Chapter 313: Missing Motive
The assassination of Zircon Iondora.
"That is a prophecy I would never predict."
Cecilia began.
"As expected of a time traveler."
After all, only Ruby, someone who had lived this world’s future, could say this for sure and was not afraid it would backfire on herself. It meant she was sure the assassination would happen whether it would kill Zircon or not.
Which brought Cecilia to the next layer.
The assassination and death of Zircon Iondora was not impossible. In fact, Cecilia could see so many people pull it off. But for it to happen, first, someone must have a motive for it.
The old spider had spun his web across decades, accumulating enemies like other men accumulated debts.
The lords who had seen their sons sent to die in his wars. The merchants who had watched their trade routes nationalized. The concubines, the dismissed ministers, the branches of heirs he had disinherited.
Oh yes, the capacity for murder existed in abundance. But could they pull it off?
Someone had to want him dead, wouldn’t be deterred by the prophecy of a literal Saintess, and of course, someone who could pull it off after the empire fortified the security tenfold its original thanks to the prophecy.
Cecilia imagined the Iondora palace. Guards doubled at every gate, every servant interrogated, every shadow considered hostile.
The paranoia of power exposed, the vulnerability of emperors made manifest.
Although a lot wanted Zircon dead, someone who checked the box was zero. They either could pull it off but have no motive, or have motive yet having no capacity to pull it off.
Unless there were people Cecilia didn’t know that possessed both.
If such people exist, then Cecilia wouldn’t be surprised that she also wouldn’t know how they did it either. Which means, Cecilia wouldn’t be able to solve the murder.
But counterintuitively, narrowing it down this way, Cecilia knew only a few people that would possibly do it.
Someone she wouldn’t know that they had the motive for. Someone who could pull it off. Someone who could do it without her able to solve the murder by how they did it.
To escape her detection required not merely competence but a particular quality of mind. A capacity for deception so complete that it could deceive itself, a relationship with truth so fractured that motive and action could exist in separate chambers of consciousness, never touching, never informing each other.
Two names.
And they were siblings.
Angela May Iondora and Damon June Iondora.
These two fuckers were the only two Cecilia knew could lie to the world about whether or not they had motives or whether or not their motive were rational and followed common sense enough hence they’d do it anyway or not.
And she was sitting in front of them now.
"Gross," Damon suddenly clasped his mouth, almost vomiting.
Angela chuckled. "Heh, now you see who you’re calling hot, Brother?"
"If I knew she’s Lady Sees, I’d never think that. Aeugh, it’s my sister’s best friend? Gross." Damon narrowed his eyes, his murderous crown prince persona crumbling. "This is your fault. At that banquet, you came off as an older lady,"
"You like older ladies, Your Highness?" Cecilia tilted her head.
"Only older ladies deserves the term ’hot’," Damon raised his chin, his face cold, menacing and prideful. "It doesn’t mean I have a bias for them."
Cecilia giggled.
She had come in the guise of Lady Sees today after Damon’s summon. She actually had been ready in the capital after Ruby dropped the prophecy, because, as mentioned above, it was definitely a prophecy she had gotten from living her future before regression, and Cecilia had learned to treat such warnings as appointments kept by fate itself.
Though, facing Damon Iondora again made her feel nostalgic.
In the banquet, she did see him among the guests, even attending with Zircon. Arkai just raised his glass at them once and it was enough. There was no need to explicitly greet them because why would he? Their standing in the world was equal after all.
She wouldn’t have a reason as Lady Sees to explicitly greet them either.
But that wasn’t what made this meeting nostalgic.
It was their surprisingly normal relationship.
To her, Damon was truly like her best friend’s older brother. That was it. No more, no less.
They were distantly acquainted, in the sense that they didn’t know each other that well, but also almost like closely related, like an extension of a sibling. A sibling’s sibling, because to her, Angela was her sister. Then what, a cousin?
Cecilia knew very well that Damon had zero romantic intention to most women in this world, including her, especially because she was already categorized as his sister’s sister, the extension of his sister, which also felt like his own sister.
Sometimes she wondered if he was an aromantic person.
Especially after the Cassian Twins’ whole thing.
In short, quoting Angela, this brother of theirs was... dumb.
Romantically stunted.
"Let’s go back to the assassination," Cecilia said, repositioning herself on the couch, in the room she was hosted in, the upholstery of Iondora guest quarters.
Damon had summoned ’Lady Sees’ saying that since her miracle elixir had saved the youngest prince, she would be granted a reward, while her presence was also invited to monitor the young prince’s aftercare after the administered elixir.
The official narrative that was neatly constructed was gratitude, medical necessity and the crown’s commitment to the welfare of its own.
The unofficial reality, though, was that Cecilia had been summoned to solve an impossible murder.
At the same time, Angela was brought up from the dungeon as a special order regarding their father’s death so she could be given a chance to ’mourn’ him.
Cecilia looked at these siblings, these two fuckers and architects of their own inscrutability, and narrowed her eyes. She had spent the journey here reviewing her memory of their files, histories, and their pathologies of power. She knew what they were capable of. She knew what they were capable of concealing.
"Be honest with me," she said. "Which of you killed your father?"
Damon and Angela sighed.
"It wasn’t me," they said at the same exact time. "So it must be him/her."
The final words collided, and all three sets of eyebrows raised to the sky.
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A/N:
As you’ve already noticed, our gorgeous cover art from our beloved artist, Nay U, has been taken down 😭🥀 It was up for around a month and a half, and suddenly, it got flagged for "pornographic content." Which is weird, because why now, after a month and a half, and after three or four different feature placements?
But then, I received some words from fellow authors who notified me that "someone must have reported it." Which made me think... Hmmm, so creators can get away with a "pornographic content" cover as long as no one reports it?
Oh well, I guess our luck has run out, guys! 😂 Me personally, I find this funny. The one who has taken this situation the hardest is actually our artist, Nay U, who is my good friend, whom I commissioned for the cover, and who is also one of the artists for the upcoming promotional comic.
It is what it is, though. This is just how the art and literary creation world works. Don’t worry, Nay U’s art will return with a different version of it! (Because I love her art, and you guys have sponsored me enough to give her all the financial love she deserves!)