Chapter 523: Chapter-523
Heena adjusted her heavy leather cloak, her face instantly dropping the playful smirk and falling back into the cold, untouchable mask of the Vanguard Madam.
As she walked down the white marble steps toward the outer courtyard, she noticed a massive, highly intimidating figure standing near the Vanguard carriage.
It was Grandpa Marcuset.
The old warlord had just finished his own battle in the imperial courtroom. He was standing with his hands clasped behind his back, his heavy armor gleaming in the afternoon sun. The surrounding civil officials and minor nobles were actively giving him a wide, terrified berth, practically pressing themselves against the courtyard walls to avoid his gaze.
Hearing her boots clicking against the stone, Grandpa Marcuset turned. A booming, incredibly proud laugh erupted from his chest.
"There she is!" Grandpa roared, not caring in the slightest who in the palace heard him. He marched over and clapped a massive, heavy hand onto her shoulder. "The terror of the martial grounds! You should have seen the look on the Minister of the Right’s face, Seera! I chewed him up and spit him out right in front of the Emperor! The old fool practically wet his robes!"
Heena offered a genuine, sharp smile. "I assume the Emperor dismissed the charges, then?"
"Dismissed them?" Grandpa scoffed, waving his hand dismissively. "He practically called the Marquis’s nephew a blind idiot! It was a complete victory. And you? How did it go with the little royal terror?"
"Flawlessly," Heena replied, her eyes glinting with dark amusement. "I expanded his horizons. He is currently writing a deeply emotional essay on the aerodynamics of livestock. I believe we made a real breakthrough."
Grandpa stared at her for a second, completely failing to understand what she had just said, before simply bursting into laughter again.
"I have no idea what that means, but excellent work!" Grandpa declared, gesturing toward the carriage. "Come on. Let us head back to the estate. We need to celebrate our absolute domination of the capital today. I will have the kitchens prepare a feast!"
Heena stepped up into the plush carriage, feeling a rare wave of accomplishment. For once, everything was going exactly according to plan. Her grandmother was safely on her way to the southern borders, the court was too busy reeling from the morning’s scandal to notice, and she had successfully bullied a prince.
But as Grandpa Marcuset climbed into the carriage behind her and the driver snapped the reins, a frantic voice called out from the palace gates.
"Wait! Lord Marcuset! Madam!"
The carriage lurched to a halt. Heena frowned, leaning out the window.
One of the Vanguard estate’s financial stewards was sprinting across the cobblestones, looking absolutely panicked. His hat was falling off, and he was clutching a massive, thick scroll of parchment in his hands.
He reached the carriage, gasping for breath, and bowed deeply.
"What is the meaning of this?" Grandpa Marcuset demanded, his good mood instantly vanishing. "Why are you running around the palace gates like a headless chicken?"
"Forgive me, My Lord!" the steward panted, his face completely pale. "I rode out to intercept you before you returned to the estate! It... it is an absolute emergency regarding the household finances!"
Heena’s heart suddenly skipped a beat. A cold sense of dread began to pool in her stomach.
"What finances?" Heena asked slowly, her voice dropping to a dangerous whisper.
The steward swallowed hard, holding up the massive, heavy scroll. It looked less like a receipt and more like a detailed map of the entire empire.
"It is the young master, Samuel," the steward whimpered, visibly trembling. "He... he went to the prime merchant district this morning. With your jade token, My Lady."
"I know he went shopping," Heena snapped, her eye twitching. "Spit it out. How much did he spend?"
"He didn’t just go shopping, Madam," the steward cried, unrolling the scroll so it cascaded down to the ground. "He bought out the entire Spring Blossom Silk Pavilion. Then he bought the Golden Crane Jewelry forge. Then he hired three hundred carpenters to begin entirely renovating the east wing of the estate for a ’grand wedding hall.’ He is currently negotiating to purchase a small mountain range on the outskirts of the capital because he liked the shape of the trees!"
Grandpa Marcuset’s jaw hit the floor.
Heena just sat frozen in the carriage. The soothing, peaceful energy from the Aura Stone on her wrist was completely overwhelmed by the sudden, violent spike in her blood pressure. The tumor behind her eye instantly began to throb like a war drum.
’A mountain range?’
> ’’[Host...]’’ the System’s voice echoed nervously in her head. ’’[I think your husband is trying to bankrupt the military.]’’
>
Heena reached out with a trembling, leather-gloved hand and snatched the receipt from the steward. She stared at the astronomical string of zeroes at the bottom of the page.
"Turn the carriage around," Heena commanded, her voice sounding entirely hollow, stripped of all humanity.
"Seera?" Grandpa asked cautiously, suddenly looking a bit terrified of his own granddaughter. "Are you alright?"
"I am going to kill him," Heena whispered, her eyes completely devoid of light. She looked out the window, her voice rising into a furious, bloodcurdling shout. "Driver! To the merchant district! I am going to become a widow today!"
The Vanguard carriage did not simply roll through the capital streets. It launched forward like a heavy artillery shell.
Under Heena’s completely unhinged, blood-chilling command, the terrified driver had cracked the whip with everything he had. The massive military draft horses surged forward, their hooves striking the cobblestones hard enough to send actual sparks flying into the afternoon air.
Inside the cabin, the luxurious velvet curtains whipped wildly in the wind. The carriage wheels literally caught air every time they hit a bump, making the heavy wooden frame groan in protest.
Grandpa Marcuset, the legendary, blood-soaked warlord who had just faced down the Emperor and the entire civil faction without blinking, was currently gripping the leather hand-straps of the carriage for absolute dear life. His massive armored shoulders slammed against the wooden walls with every violent turn.
He managed to peel one eye open, looking across the violently shaking cabin at his granddaughter.
Heena wasn’t holding onto anything.
She was sitting perfectly straight in the center of her seat, her hands folded neatly in her lap, riding the violent turbulence of the carriage as if she were a statue bolted to the floor. The terrifying, bottomless black aura of pure, murderous intent radiating from her body was so thick it practically choked the air out of the cabin.
Suddenly, Grandpa Marcuset blinked.
He didn’t know why, and he certainly didn’t know how, but as a shadow passed over Heena’s completely expressionless, deadly face, she looked exactly like her grandmother.
Not just a passing resemblance—it was an identical, horrifying copy of the exact same face his wife used to make right before she set fire to a rebel stronghold.
’’Damn genes,’’ the old general thought, a cold sweat breaking out across his weathered forehead as he watched her eye twitch with homicidal rage.
Suddenly, everything in the universe made perfect, terrifying sense to him.
He finally understood exactly why he was so immensely, fiercely proud of this girl, yet simultaneously possessed a deeply ingrained, instinctual urge to run away and hide in a trench whenever she got angry. She was the absolute mirror image of the woman who had terrorized his youth. She was the weaponized version of his wife!
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