Throne of Magical Arcana
chapter-302

In fact, at the very beginning, before he arrived at No. 116 Gesu District, Clown did consider the possibility that Professor and Lucien Evans would work together to frame him, say, Lucien Evans would pretended to be severely injured by him, and then the princess and Camil would arrive right on time and stop him. Then he would be caught for sure, or even killed right on the spot.

However, after a careful analysis, Clown did not think that they were going to do this because of the many points questionable through the whole plan. If the princess killed him right on the spot, those leaders who were on his side from the Inquisition definitely would not simply accept the result, instead, at least they would require an interrogation against Lucien Evans, which was of course not a good thing for someone like the musician, who had so many secrets related to Professor. Even as a princess, Natasha could not say no to the Inquisition's reasonable demand. After all, a question would be part of the procedures when things like this happened. No matter how powerful and influential the princess was, she could not interfere with the balance between the Church and the nobles.

And if they could not kill him right away, there was big chance that he could still prove himself as innocent. He had so many questions to ask—how did Lucien get hurt? What did the wounds look like? Was it possible that the wounds were left by his Blessing? Why Lucien Evans showed up in the middle of the night at No. 116 Gesu District?

And the most important thing was that he could directly ask the Church to use the divine spells to test whether he was lying when questioning Lucien Evans.

However, Lucien Evans just died like that, which was totally out of Clown's imagination. The picture of Lucien Evans falling to the floor kept lingering in his mind, and he was not able to get rid of it.

At this moment, he believed that Lucien Evans really died. Since the cost of faking Lucien Evans' death was too much to bear—that meant that the great young musician would never show up again, and Clown would never know that Lucien Evans had decided to abandon this identity as a great musician forever.

After losing himself in his thoughts for a few seconds, Clown's eyes suddenly became alert.

He saw the gorgeous princess, Natasha, who was wearing a fancy purple dress, show up in the air. Her lips were red, and her eyes were full of light. It seemed that she was here to meet her lover.

However, a second later, Natasha's eyes had lost their focus. As if she had lost her soul, she unbelievably stared at the flesh and blood on the floor and the walls.

Run… Run. Run!

That was the only thought left in Clown's mind. He would not want to stay here even a second longer in front of the powerful woman who just witnessed her beloved man's body on the floor in pieces!

At this moment, she would not listen!

Clown instantly exerted all his strength and power, and countless invisible strings rose in the darkness. Stepping and grabbing the strings, Clown rushed into the forest behind the house very quickly.

At this time, he heard the bellow full of anger and brief, or it was more like a plaintive cry, making the air and the ground shake.

Clown knew that the princess was coming after him. As soon as he started moving again, a silver sword hacked his back.

The light of the sword pierced the light of the divine items covering Clown like cutting a pile of paper. Clown's body suddenly became distorted, and it suddenly became like a doll covered with black strings.

The strings were broken by the hacking, and a deep gap appeared in the back of the black doll.

A second later, Clown showed up from the strings again. However, part of his body on the right side fell onto the ground. Pieces of guts and blood were everywhere.

Clown started to lose his consciousness, but he knew that he could not stop. He needed to seize every tiny chance if he wished to run away from a radiant knight who had the strongest Blessing.

As long as the princess did not kill him with the first hacking, he still had a chance to survive!

Like he said, Clown did have strong enough willpower to keep running as fast as he could, despite the horrible injury he suffered that could make most of the cardinals feel limp in their legs. In the darkness, as he was running, Clown calmly wriggled what was left on the right side of his body and covered the wound by a layer of invisible film to prevent his blood from coming out more, so he would not leave any marks.

Although Clown knew that he would not be able to avoid the princess' second round of attack, he would not give up until the last second.

Despite the fact that he disliked Lucien Evans a lot, Clown agreed on the spirit of perseverance contained in Lucien's music.

Miracle happened. Until Clown disappeared in the darkness, the second round of hacking never arrived.

...

"Are you trying to stop me, Waldo?" Holding a silver sword in her hand, the coldness in Natasha's eyes looked terrifying.

In the strong air flow caused by Natasha's fury, Waldo's hair became tangled and messy, but he was still standing in front of the princess and said to her calmly, "I've sent the night watchers out to get Clown. Before things become clear, I think it's better to keep him alive. So… What happened, Your Highness?"

A distance away from them, Camil was still following the princess, but the distance was purposefully left.

"Clown killed Lucien." Natasha answered with restrained great fury. Her silvery-purple eyes were as cold as ice.

"What?!" Including Waldo, all the night watchers were shocked.

Juliana's face suddenly became very pale.

Lucien Evans, the great musician, died?

This was totally out of their expectation as well!

Natasha closed her eyes, as if she agreed to leave this to the night watchers, since the grief in her mind was too heavy to bear, "I saw Lucien die with my own eyes, and Clown was right there."

Her voice was full of sorrow and great desperation.

Waldo unnoticeably gasped. He saw the pieces of flesh and blood drops on the grass. Based on the motivation and the way of killing, Waldo had to admit that it could be Clown who did this.

"Your Highness, I understand how you feel…" Waldo crossed in front of his chest. "Mr. Lucien Evans is so outstanding and brilliant that the God of Truth wants him to go and play his music in Mountain Paradise."

After comforting the princess for a bit, Waldo became serious, "But I'm sorry, Your Highness. Right now I have to ask you some questions and check if this is Mr. Evans' blood. I'm not doubting you, but I have to follow the procedures of the Inquisition. I hope you can understand, Your Highness."

Before Natasha nodded, Waldo was very cautious. He was afraid that the princess would lose her mind out of great sorrow, and her power was just beyond horrible.

After several seconds of silence, Natasha opened her eyes. The light in her eyes was cold.

"Go ahead," she said.

Waldo sincerely appreciated the princess' courage. He first asked several night watchers who did not go after Clown to collect the blood left, and then he asked the princess carefully, "Your Highness, why did you come here tonight? Wasn't Mr. Evans still taking his rest?"

Natasha put on a sad but stunning smile, "He used to live here. In the bedroom, he played the first movement of Moonlight for me. So we wanted to come here tonight in memory of our past…"

Natasha covered her face with her hands to stop herself from crying.

Hearing that, Waldo looked down upon himself for those vulgar thoughts he had had in his mind.

"I see." Waldo slightly nodded.

After asking a few more questions, a night watcher of bishop level came to him and whispered in his ear, "Moonlight Blessing. It is Lucien Evans' blood."

"Mr. Waldo, Clown was severely injured by me, and he should die within an hour. I hope you can find him as soon as possible." Natasha told Waldo the true reason why she stopped chasing after Clown.

When Natasha looked to the side, she saw an iron ring on the grass. So she flew down there and picked it up. The look on her face was extremely sad but seeing the ring seemed to warm her heart up a bit.

Seeing the moment, Waldo felt that this was like a dream. The princess was not usually this feminine, but more heroic and decisive. The look on her face was as gentle as the moonlight in Lucien's music.

Waldo knew well what the iron ring was. It was the broken Holm Crown Ring left by Natasha's mother, and now it seemed that it was also a token of love.

"It's our fault, Your Highness." Waldo comforted her again, "We did not catch Clown in time."

"It has nothing to do with the Church. After all, the Church has made the decision to sentence him to death." Natasha slightly shook her head.

Hearing that, Waldo nodded out of relief. What he felt concerned the most was that, because of Lucien Evans's death, the Church and the future ruler of Violet would have an unfixable gap between each other.

"You're such a dedicated follower, Your Highness, and a wise leader," praised Waldo.

When the night watchers started to check the house and the surroundings, Natasha unnoticeably released a sigh of relief. She felt it quite cheesy with what she just said. But she also had strange feelings when she was talking about what once happened between Lucien and her.

But what was more important was that Waldo did not show suspicion for what she said, and things were going the way they wanted them to.

As a devoted follower, Natasha was fine with putting some pressure on the Church to help and protect her good friend and to maintain the status of the nobles, but she would not be willing to do great damage to the reputation of the Church and the balance between the two sides despite the fact that there was a chance, since she still had her bottom line, and she hoped that Lucien could understand.

...

In a house, a man wearing a black hood sat down in the armchair, weak and limp.

"Morning Star… He didn't talk much. It was totally out of my expectation that he was the traitor, until I saw his response when knowing where the Congress was," signed Philosopher. He looked weak from losing a lot of blood.

Professor was still wearing the black robe. He reached out his hand and wrote down letters with the blood on Morning Star's back.

"The end of the betrayer. Professor."

"Why do you want to leave the words and the body, Mr. Professor?" asked Philosopher. "Morning Star's dead, and we can just put all the blame on Clown and the Church. Now, you're catching all the attention."

"To teach other traitors the lesson." Lucien smiled. But in his mind, he said to himself that Natasha had helped him a lot, and he would not bring more trouble to her.