“Why do you look like that?”

“I thought I perfectly masked my emotions…”

Rishe frankly displayed her melancholy and held her cheeks with her hands.

“Myria-sama didn’t look well. I’m worried that she was pretending to be calm while hiding her tears.”

“…”

Arnold heaved a sigh and tossed the scroll in his hand to Rishe.

“Open it.”

What exactly was it?

While wondering, Rishe untied the tied string. She unrolled the paper and gasped at the content.

“This is…”

The first thing that caught her eye was the words “Investigation Report.”

The familiar appearance of the carriage, the scattered drawings of what appeared to be parts, plus the notes supported one of Rishe’s speculations.

I was going to slip out of the shrine one of these days and go check it out for myself.

In the center of the paper, there was a large drawing of a certain part.

It was an axle that connected what seemed to be the front wheels of a carriage.

“The front wheels of the Jonal family’s carriage that caused the accident had been tampered with.”

“…”

Her heart started to beat faster, not because the carriage had been tampered with.

Rishe was ruffled because Arnold was looking into the accident.

“That carriage does not belong to the Jonal family. The day before leaving the mansion, the Duke’s daughter made a fuss about riding in a white carriage. The Duke listened to his daughter’s demand and arranged for a white carriage.”

“… So, you suspected it wasn’t a curse, but that someone intentionally contrived the accident?”

“Wouldn’t you have done the same anyway?”

He threw the question as a matter of course, but she could not nod immediately.

Rishe knew firsthand that there were mysterious forces at work in this world.

Just as she lived her life on the loop, it would not be surprising if an event beyond human comprehension had befallen someone else.

The possibility that Myria was such a person could not be dismissed until there was a conclusion.

However, that possibility was highly unlikely. Furthermore, Arnold’s investigation showed that the accident was caused by human intervention.

“I’ve always thought it was odd to begin with.”

Arnold rested his languid cheek on the armrest.

“The previous Maiden Priestess died 22 years ago, and her sister also died 10 years ago. Consequently, there was no one to serve as the Maiden Priestess, and the festival has not been held for 22 years.”

“…Yes. The previous Maiden Priestess’s sister was too weak to succeed her sister.”

The last woman born to the Maiden Priestess’s bloodline was her sister.

It was said that only a few males remain of the Maiden Priestess’s bloodline.

As they waited for the birth of a baby girl, the days passed without any festivals being held.

“There’s no way they set up a ‘proxy’ now without a reason.”

There was no hesitation in Arnold’s words.

“It’s sophistry to say that the congregation has become so vocal that they have appointed a proxy to reopen the festival, if only formally. For a religion that believes in the existence of a Goddess, a ritual by proxy is meaningless.”

Hearing that, Rishe was convinced.

His Highness Arnold was skeptical about it all along.

Perhaps since he first saw Myria.

I thought there was no way His Highness could see through her right away… But, come to think of it, this man can read the original sacred poetry.

It wouldn’t be strange if he knew from the beginning about the traits of a person qualified to be the Maiden Priestess.

Arnold looked straight into Rishe’s eyes and said, “A Maiden Priestess with the blood of the Goddess is said to have floral-colored hair.”

“…”

Myria’s hair was pale purple.

It was a very beautiful shade of hair, like a flower blooming in spring.

“The commonly known sacred poem does not mention the physical characteristics of the Maiden Priestess. Perhaps they intentionally translated it differently from the original, in case it was necessary to ‘hide’ her from the world.”

“…As in this generation?”

“I knew you’ve figured it out too.”

He pointed it out in an amused manner, but she still couldn’t nod her head.

It wasn’t that Rishe “figured” it out. To be exact, she had known it long ago.

[This girl isn’t my daughter. Myria is a precious person someone entrusted to us…]

The memory that popped naturally to her was a confession she heard from her fourth life.

It was said that the deceased Maiden Priestess of the previous generation had a younger, sickly sister.

Unable to serve as a Maiden Priestess, that woman spent most of her life in the temple and risked her life to give birth to a daughter.

And Rishe carefully watched over the girl who was raised in secret.

Arnold was unaware of this fact, but he spoke indifferently.

“――That kid is a real Maiden Priestess, a qualified one.”

That’s for sure…

Rishe stared straight back at the gaze that seemed to see through everything.

That’s why you’ll try to kill her in the future, isn’t it?

T/N: Okay, so the color of spring has now turned purple…