The sun rose.
The palace gates opened.
A golden carriage stop in front of the palace.
The young master of the Miller marquisate and the priestess Margaret came out along with some knights from the Miller's marquisate and a paladin who seems to be a close aide of Margaret's.
"I welcome you all to the emerald palace. Without further ado, let us go to a room and talk business shall we"
They followed me. They were confident that I was the one who was wrong and that I was the one who should be apologizing and not them.
"Sit and make yourself comfortable"
"W, what is the captain of the imperial knights doing here?"
Margaret ask with a confused expression.
Other than Charles Miller, everyone else was wondering what the empress' bodyguard is doing here.
"I, Frederick von Theano, swear under the name of the imperial family that everything I will say today will be the truth and only the truth as a witness of that day"
"He swore an oath. Is this good enough for you Sir Charles? Or do you perhaps want to call the empress herself? If you do want to, I will ask her myself you know"
"No need to. The oath of the young duke of Theano is more than enough"
"Wait!"
Margaret intervened while we were busy getting onto the main subject.
"I am sure it was Sir John and not Sir Frederick that was with you that day. Shouldn't it be Sir John that is supposed to be here and not Sir Frederick?"
I stop rummaging through the documents and look at her.
"Priestess Margaret, that day, Sir Frederick was eavesdropping on us by the order of the empress. I then later found out about it and am now using it now to make sure that you all will believe my words if someone trustworthy speak about the events of that day. No?"
She bit her lip and quietly sat down.
She didn't knew that Sir Aiden was there at the time for reconnaissance purposes.
We started with Sir Charles saying that priestess Margaret went to their house, crying about being insulted that she was a prostitute who would spread her legs to Sir Charles to earn his family's support as well as the other priests and knights in the temple.
While Sir Charles narrated it in great detail, the paladin and the knights behind them started to glare at me with pure hatred.
When Sir Charles was over narrating what Margaret told him, Sir Aiden stood up and said what he heard that day.
He said that I only told to the priestess that she was a two-faced backstabbing b*tch who even killed her own family to experience the pleasure of having a good and easy life.
On contrary to what I had expected, this only flared up their anger on me even more.
"Now, those were the words I said. I never said anything about priestess Margaret being a prostitute who happily serves men day and night"
"Even if it is different, it does not change the fact that you insulted her of killing her own family!"
Sir Charles yelled with anger.
I then laid out the documents that I was organizing earlier in front of them. Documents that showed Margaret bough poison and other killing tools and equipment as well as the transaction copy of her making a deal with an assassin who has ties in the underworld(Black market).
"This, all of this is fabricated!"
Margaret shouted.
"If you want I will call for the witnesses and other involved individuals regarding this matter"
"What are you even trying to prove here?! Huh?!"
The paladin who was holding back was not able to endure his friend to be treated this way and shouted in response.
"You all are here to defend her about something I never told her. Now that you knew what I told her that day, you all refuse it. And now that there is evidence right in front of you, you will yell at me with an idiotic question?"
I walk towards the paladin and stared at him.
"Did you came here without knowing what you are here for? And you have the audacity to yell at me while making zero sense"
Bang!
The sound of the slapped was loud and showed how hard I hit the paladin.
"Let me remind you that you all are here in front of me to determine who is correct and who is wrong. To determine the correct side we are talking in a proper and mature way. Yelling at me is the same thing as disrespecting me"
I went back to my seat and crossed my legs.
"If you want me to respect you then you better respect me first. Besides, I will gain nothing by lying therefore I am only saying the truth. Do you seriously think I have the time to frame someone for attention? If you do then you are nothing but a narrow minded man-child"
Everyone, including Sir Aiden, except for Sir Charles froze and was unable to speak in fear of being hit by me.
What I said made sense and they knew that.
Who would even yell in the middle of a proper conversation anyway?
"I am sorry for my rude action lady Emond. I hope you can forgive me this one time"
After regaining his composure, he apologize sincerely. It was so that he can avoid dragging down the name of the church due to his actions.
With the captain of the imperial knights in front of them, they cannot act like how they do in front of other people since Sir Aiden can report back to her majesty which can affect them and their family.
This was the reason why Sir Charles was so composed the entire time.
"Now, let's go back to business, shall we"