The outcome already looked decided.
The Crown Prince was emptying everything inside him onto the floor. How long is this going to take to clean up?
I began glancing around at the people nearby.
To anyone watching, it probably looked like nothing more than a stronger man tormenting a weaker one.
His gaunt frame, the ragged gasps tearing out of him, the way he writhed in pain — even I, his enemy, found it a pitiful sight.
Leo felt the same. *So a person can really be this weak.*
"What do we do?"
"Even so, by the traditions of the North-style duel, we have to continue until he surrenders or falls unconscious..."
"I suppose that's how it has to be."
I walked slowly toward the Crown Prince to extract his surrender.
He glanced up at me, and something shifted in his eyes — the dawning realization that something had gone very wrong.
*A scheme devised by the Grand Duke of the North, perhaps.* That seemed to be what he was thinking.
But we were in the middle of a North-style duel right now, and no one else could intervene. This was a struggle between two men alone.
"What will you do? Are you going to surrender?"
"Kgh..."
"Now that you've gotten everything out of your system, feeling a bit better?"
The Crown Prince could no longer advance on me.
But Leo had no intention of ending the duel.
If anything, the only thought in his head was that the Crown Prince had gotten back up, so the fight had to be seen through properly.
I didn't particularly want to go easy on him.
"What do you think you're doing to His Highness the Crown Prince! You northern savages!"
"What was that? Did you just say savages?"
"Yes! How dare you harm the sacred person of His Highness!"
With this uproar breaking out, I needed to bring things to a clean finish — without showing any mercy.
I moved to seize the half-dead Crown Prince from behind.
I grabbed hold of his body.
A meaningless fist swung at me, but it carried no weight behind it — I barely felt it graze my face.
*Time to end this.*
I hoisted the Crown Prince up and threw him down so his back faced the floor.
"Your Highness the Crown Prince!"
"Your Grace the Grand Duke!"
Chaos erupted from both sides.
Even Daniela was shouting. *At least cheer for me, would you.*
The Crown Prince and I were rolling across the floor — with the Crown Prince pinned firmly beneath me, of course.
I sat on his back as though it were a chair.
Complete suppression.
But Leo still showed no intention of calling the duel.
*You want me to keep going from here?*
"Let go — let go of this!"
"We're in the middle of a duel!"
*It's complete chaos over there too.*
Quite a crowd had gathered before I'd even noticed.
Then again, if word got out that the Crown Prince and the Grand Duke of the North were going at it one-on-one in a room of the villa palace, I'd have come to watch too.
Then I'd better give the audience a swift conclusion.
"Leo. This is the last of it. Watch closely — whether he surrenders, or whether he goes down unconscious."
"U-understood. Your Grace."
"Good."
I wrapped one arm around the Crown Prince's throat, where his hands had been folded together. I locked the other arm over it. Like a noose tightening around his neck, I prepared to render the Crown Prince unconscious.
*How many times has it been now, winning like this.*
I locked my legs firmly around the Crown Prince's body.
Then — with a sharp twist of my torso — his body turned with me.
"Kgh — ghhk — !"
"Just go under. It's simpler."
It didn't actually take long.
When the throat is properly compressed, a few seconds is all it takes for a person to lose consciousness.
The Crown Prince thrashed and struggled, fighting to break free.
But I could feel the strength draining from his body, slowly and steadily.
It was rare for someone to drop all at once.
Most people faded gradually, the fight seeping out of them.
The Crown Prince was, in the end, only human.
"Leo, confirm it!"
"Y-yes!"
Leo immediately checked the Crown Prince's condition. Completely unconscious.
I released the choke I'd applied. His throat had gone a deep, vivid red.
Victor of the North-style duel.
Leo began to speak the words that announced the duel's outcome.
But I could barely hear him.
The noise around me was overwhelming.
"Leo, sort this out."
"Yes — yes, Your Grace!"
I gathered my discarded clothing and put it back on.
*Seems I've just given someone a basic lesson in who deserves to sit at the head of the table.*
I dressed myself and climbed the steps.
In truth, the conclusion of a North-style duel was for the victor to pass appropriate judgment upon the defeated.
In severe cases, they'd take the man's head.
That was precisely why North-style duels had eventually been prohibited — because it had gone too far. There were simply too many people who couldn't resist taking it all the way to a life.
Not that it matters much now.
"Seems it's been settled — who gets to sit at the head of the table."
"Indeed, Your Grace."
"Good. Very good. This is the proper order of things."
I checked the set of my clothes.
Satisfied that everything fell cleanly into place, I approached Daniela and Marquess Roland.
It was still chaos here.
Just before the Crown Prince was carried out, the girl from House de Bosch and Baron Remi moved to follow after him, rushing to descend the stairs.
But I had something for them first.
"And where do you two think you're going?"
"Wh-what is this! Why are you blocking our way?"
"I won the duel, so I will take the seat above the Crown Prince. No objections, I trust?"
"Kgh..."
The textbook grimace of a villain denied their satisfaction.
I planted myself in front of House de Bosch and did not move until they lowered their heads.
The meaning was plain: if they wanted to pass, they would show proper courtesy.
I imagine they understood.
The girl from House de Bosch and Baron Remi bowed their heads.
"Understand this clearly. Your house is nothing more than a family with no connection whatsoever to the imperial line — not yet."
"...That is so."
"Then I cannot fathom why you have continued to show such discourtesy toward us. Is a southern baronial house truly so much greater than a northern ducal house?"
"It is not."
"I trust this will be the last of your insolence. Girl of House de Bosch. And Baron Remi."
They gave their final answer.
Their scheming would not end here.
No — that much was certain. It had likely been House de Bosch behind the push to force a duel in the first place.
The way the ring had been thrown — that too had looked like someone acting on a cue.
Beyond that, they might try to call for another duel, or arrive with some new scheme entirely.
They had no shortage of things to attempt.
"Well then. Quite a gathering of guests. But why are so many people crowding the stairs?"
I looked out at the assembled guests and spoke.
At that, people began descending the stairs, and some guests made their way outside entirely.
Something caught my attention, though — every noble who left through the doors was someone who had some manner of falling-out with Daniela.
But there were those who remained.
Likely people who wanted to forge some kind of connection with the North.
"At any rate, let's consider this settled. Everyone present witnessed the duel."
The Crown Prince was carried out, and the servants began clearing away what he had left behind.
*That needed tidying.*
"Know this, at the very least. While Wintergard is present, we stand above the Crown Prince in precedence. Keep that in mind."
A single sentence. That was all.
I settled into the chair and looked around the room.
I had never cultivated deep ties with the southern nobility, so I knew few of the names before me.
And then —
"Marquess Roland."
"Yes, Your Grace!"
"You as well. Step down."
"Pardon?"
"I said, step down."
*Hmph.*
Marquess Roland read the room, then began descending the stairs.
*Think of it as old debts being repaid.*
In a sense, it was thanks to him sending Daniela to the North that I had gained a Grand Duchess.
But it was equally true that he had driven her out of House Barth.
This much repayment, I could accept.
"Long live the Grand Duke of the North! Long live! Long live!"
*Ah. A most fitting tribute.*
—
"Disgusting northerners. As if they're the only ones who ever invented anything."
"Quite right, Kartina. Savages. Sly ones at that."
The people of House de Bosch sat at the Crown Prince's side.
The Crown Prince lay with his eyes open, but his mind was elsewhere — blank, adrift, occupied with nothing but thoughts of how to bring humiliation down upon the Grand Duke of the North.
He could no longer endure it.
How many times now had this man insulted the imperial house?
"What plan do we have?"
"What about sending another assassin?"
"That won't be enough. If the Grand Duke of the North dies now, we'll be the first ones suspected."
"Tch. The timing is terrible."
House de Bosch set about weaving their schemes anew.
The Crown Prince was still staring at nothing.
In that small room, plans were born and discarded one after another.
Setting aside a second duel for the moment, they turned their minds to what mattered most.
"The one thing that's certain — if we take the Barth gold mines, victory is ours."
"That's true. That's what all of this has been for, in the end."
"Then if we could drive a wedge between House Barth and the Grand Duke of the North..."
"Hmm. That seems impossible. Far too unrealistic."
The most critical objective remained the same: seize the Barth gold mines by whatever means necessary.
If they could gather enough of the other houses behind them, the outcome might yet tip in their favor.
But how?
"I'll have to take the lead. I'll go to the young lords of the other marquessate houses."
"You mean the southern admirals and their like?"
"Exactly. Those young lords will listen to me."
If hearts could still be swayed — how far could Kartina go, with the Crown Prince's name at her back?
The Crown Prince pushed himself upright.
"K-Kartina! My love! P-please, do not do this. Let me — once more! Let me prove the power of love!"
"Your Highness."
Kartina took the Crown Prince's hand again and gently laid him back down.
She repeated her reassurances — do not worry, do not worry.
But Kartina's scheming had only just begun.