Chapter 23 : Chapter 23
Chapter 23: A New Name
The man didn't answer, didn't even raise his head.
He simply thrust the sharpened wooden fork into the ground, rose to his feet, and walked to the water pool deep in the cave. He scooped water with a crude wooden bowl, walked back, and half-crouched before her.
“Drink.”
One concise word.
One hand supported the back of her neck while the other brought the bowl's rim to her lips.
His movements were fluid and efficient, without the slightest trace of tender care, as if applying lubricant to some mechanical part.
The ice-cold fresh water slid down her throat. Anneliya swallowed greedily, like a fish on the verge of death.
After a few mouthfuls of water, her muddled brain finally cleared somewhat.
“Where is this?”
She leaned against the cold rock wall, barely maintaining a trace of noble dignity, though her entire body was trembling.
“I am Anneliya von Sebastian, daughter of the Eastern Territory Grand Duke. You…”
“I know.”
The man interrupted her, finally raising his head to look at her properly.
Anneliya's breath caught.
Those were deep purple eyes, flowing with an eerie light under the firelight.
This face was very young and quite handsome, yet what lay within those eyes was even more ancient and cold than the rocks in this cave.
He stood up, walked to the campfire, and prodded the flames with the wooden fork. Sparks crackled.
“The Sebastian family's reward?”
He gave a light laugh, his laughter carrying undisguised mockery.
“Are you referring to gold coins, a title, or like that old Knight of yours, the 'glory' purchased with one's life?”
“Grandfather Gregory!”
Anneliya's heart felt as though gripped by an icy hand, her face instantly turning deathly pale.
“He… how is he?”
“Dead.”
Caesar's answer was like an ice-quenched blade.
He paused, pulling a piece of roasted potato that had turned golden-brown from the fire and setting it aside to cool.
“Very heroic. He turned himself into a fireball, burning your companions' corpses and those pursuers together into ashes.”
“Very clean. Saved me quite a bit of trouble.”
Tears could no longer be restrained and burst forth.
Anneliya bit down hard on her lower lip to keep herself from crying out loud.
Showing weakness before strangers was the greatest shame she'd been taught since childhood.
But the mountain that had sheltered her from wind and rain had collapsed.
Caesar paid no attention to her grief, as if it were merely meaningless rain outside the window.
He continued on his own, breaking apart the potato, blowing on it, and eating at a leisurely pace.
For a time, only the crackling of flames and the girl's suppressed sobbing remained in the cave.
After a long while, Anneliya's reddened eyes turned once more toward that cold man, carrying a final trace of hope and enormous doubt.
“You… just who are you?”
Her voice trembled as she asked that most critical question.
“Why would you be here? This cursed wasteland… aside from exiled criminals and cornered bandits, no normal person would come here!”
This was her greatest confusion.
Powerful lords looked down on this barren land, while weak nobles lacked the strength to establish themselves here.
This young man seemed neither criminal nor bandit. His very presence here was the greatest irregularity.
Caesar finally finished eating that piece of roasted potato. He wiped his hands with a piece of cloth, his deep purple eyes appearing even more profound under the firelight.
“An unlucky wretch abandoned by his family, sent here to wait for death.”
He looked at her, the corners of his mouth curling into a self-mocking arc.
“Miss Anneliya, in a certain sense, we are the same kind. Both pathetic creatures thrown by the world into this garbage dump to fend for ourselves.”
Anneliya froze.
She had never imagined such an answer.
The loneliness that flashed through this man's eyes caused her guarded heart to involuntarily loosen just a bit.
So… he's also…
“The people who attacked you, who were they?”
Caesar didn't give her much time for empathy. His topic shifted, becoming sharp once more.
“I don't know…”
Anneliya was thrown off by his sudden question and answered instinctively.
“They all wore identical black armor and used standard military crossbows, like an elite army.”
“They… they stole the tribute Father prepared for His Majesty.”
“Tribute?”
Caesar's eyelid twitched slightly. His body leaned forward, and an invisible sense of oppression descended.
“It was… it was an entire chest of Stellar Mithril.”
“Stellar Mithril?”
Caesar's breathing stopped for an instant.
The core material for crafting Temple Knight armor and legendary staffs. The value of one chest was enough for any duchy to wage a war.
He understood. Everything made sense.
For such a strategic-level treasure, deploying an elite force disguised as bandits to conduct a silencing raid, while “incidentally” disposing of the Grand Duke's troublesome daughter, was an utterly reasonable script.
Behind this lay a bloodless war among the Empire's upper echelons.
And he, this unlucky wretch scavenging in the garbage dump, had by sheer accident picked up the “eye of the storm” in this tempest.
Massive waves surged through Caesar's heart, but his face remained calm as still water.
He merely added another dead branch to the campfire, watching the flames lick at the new fuel, burning ever more vigorously.
Anneliya, daughter of the Eastern Territory Grand Duke.
A Grand Duke's daughter who owed him a life-saving debt.
She wasn't trouble.
She was one of his tickets to eventually escape this damned wasteland!
Risk? Of course there was risk.
The force behind those black-armored soldiers could crush his current self as easily as crushing an ant.
But from the moment Caesar had transmigrated into this world ten years ago and begun playing the role of worthless trash for a full decade, he had understood one principle: risk and reward were always proportional.
To overturn the table, one had to stake all their chips at the most critical moment.
He looked at this girl still sobbing before him, her eyes confused and despairing, like a starving gambler looking at the ace that could decide fate.
He had to hide her.
His camp, a bunch of single men—suddenly adding such a canary-like young woman would be like a torch in the night, practically begging to be noticed.
No good.
He had to hide her.
Hide her… in a crowd.
A military camp with only men wouldn't work, but a village with men, women, elderly, and children… or even a town?
In the bustling crowds, amid the trivial daily routines, among children's crying and women's scolding, a brilliant pearl could be mistaken for an ordinary fish eye, attracting no attention.
Where would the people come from?
Caesar's mind instantly conjured that filthy, crowded yet vitally resilient slum in Grayrock Town—the Rat's Nest.
Nearly two hundred of the desperados under his command came from there.
There, they still had starving families.
A mad and audacious plan, like a bolt of lightning, split apart the fog in his mind and illuminated the path forward.
He would “dig” those people out of the Rat's Nest!
With family members as weaknesses and bonds, that group of unruly undisciplined soldiers would truly treat this place as their home, and loyalty would no longer be an issue.
With a large population, especially women and children, his territory would become a true “settlement,” perfectly concealing Anneliya's existence.
And that fortune he'd obtained through Hundredfold Amplification would finally have the perfect use!
Let these new subjects, organized by family units, like countless ants, quietly go to Grayrock Town's market and move grain, tools, salt… bit by bit back to his nest.
The deadly trap of a child carrying gold through a marketplace—solved!
Killing three birds with one stone!
An overwhelming light burst forth in Caesar's purple eyes, a flame mixed with excitement, greed, and cold calculation.
This girl's appearance wasn't trouble. She was the catalyst heaven had thrown to him!
The opportunity forcing him to advance this game of chess into the next stage ahead of schedule!
He lifted his head from this blaze and looked at Anneliya once more.
“Look at me.”
His voice wasn't loud, but it carried an irresistible force.
Anneliya instinctively raised her head and met those eyes burning with purple flames.
“Anneliya von Sebastian, the Eastern Territory Grand Duke's beloved daughter, while escorting tribute, encountered a bandit attack. To protect her family's honor, she and her loyal guards together… heroically sacrificed themselves.”
Caesar stated this slowly, as if reciting an already-composed tragic epic.
“That's a fine story, isn't it? On the surface, it temporarily preserves both your father's and the Sebastian family's dignity while giving the Empire an explanation.”
“It also buys us enough buffer time to see the situation clearly and contact your family.”
Anneliya's pupils contracted violently. Her entire body went ice-cold, as if stared at by a venomous snake.
“As for the current you…”
The corners of Caesar's mouth curled into a cruel smile. He extended his hand toward her, as if to pull her from the abyss of her past.
“From today on, you're called Anna.”
“A war orphan I picked up on the road, nearly starved to death.”
He wasn't negotiating. He was proclaiming a fact.
The only fact that would let her survive.
“Only by accepting this identity can you stay alive.”
Caesar's voice was like a devil's whisper, filled with temptation and unquestionable authority.
“Since those people dared to rob the royal tribute and kill the Grand Duke's daughter, they won't leave any survivors.”
“They'll come again. They'll dig three feet into the ground to find you, then make you… like your old Knight, burn to ashes.”
“Survive, as Anna.”
“Or right now, go follow your Knight and maintain your worthless pitiful dignity.”
“Choose one, Anna.”
Those last two words fell like a heavy hammer, thoroughly shattering all of Anneliya's pride and illusions.
She looked at this youth before her, colder than any devil, more terrifying than any bandit. Enormous fear and humiliation seized her heart.
But at the same time, an equally enormous instinct called survival also surged up from the deepest part of her heart.
Tears fell again, but this time, no longer from sorrow.
She opened her mouth, broken syllables emerging from her throat.
Finally, under the gaze of Caesar's purple eyes that seemed to see through everything, she humiliatingly, slowly, nodded.
Caesar withdrew his gaze with satisfaction.
He knew that from this moment on, this noble canary had been completely locked in his cage.
Her life was his now.