Classified (UNDER CONSTRUCTION)

File 2, Part 12 - Her Imperial Majesty

My older sister and I spent the next few days trying to make sense of the information I gathered, and so far, I could summarize them into the following:

1. I found a delicate pendant necklace among the gardener's belongings, tucked deeply into the pocket of his trousers from the bottom pile of neatly-folded clothes. It was etched with the symbol of the House of B.B. I recognized it instantly—my father, the late Emperor, had gifted it to my sister when she was just seven. The pendant granted her the power of invisibility whenever she wore it, and it was the only authentic one of its kind in the entire empire.

I queried my older sister about it, asking how such a powerful, enchanted artifact had ended up among his possessions. Composedly, and not the least bit surprised, she replied, "I gave it to him, just because. He wanted to roam the fields at night, and wearing the pendant was safer than not."

I understood at once: it was for anything but merely wandering the fields—it was for slipping unseen into the shadows to meet her in secret.

It was a relief that I discovered it first, and hopefully, nobody else knew about it. It was one thing to speculate how the gardener met with my sister; it was another thing to specifically use the pendant of the House of B.B. for that purpose. Such information, if discovered by the wrong person, could ignite dangerous rumors.

2. Among his belongings, I also found a fountain pen and sheets of paper—items that could just as easily spark rumors. Why would a gardener need to read and write, let alone possess such fine stationery?

But my discovery did not end there. Hidden carefully beneath the thick stacks of paper were pages upon pages of letters for him, written in invisible ink, the elegant script spilling out emotions, secrets, musings, and plans. I didn't bother reading them in depth; they were far too long, far too much even for my consciousness. Each was signed with L.—my sister's childhood nickname. While L. was a common enough nickname that could avoid immediate suspicion, the content of her letters could easily betray her true identity. I couldn't predict the consequences if those letters fell into the wrong hands.

3. The poison in his body was Mitternachtsblut – a rare, synthetic toxin – just as I suspected. Otherwise, it would have come at a cheaper price and been much weaker and slower to act. It was crafted by another kingdom, and if I am not mistaken, it has been banned from the empire since my grandfather's time, making its acquisition not only costly but highly illegal. The liquid was clear, and skin contact could kill a man in several minutes. If ingested or injected, the time frame became significantly shorter.

4. The poison was most likely administered by injection. Although initial observations showed no puncture wounds, upon closer inspection, there was a faint mark at the base of his neck. He must have woken up to the sharp sting, seen the perpetrator, and screamed in his final moments, knowing he was going to die.

5. The killer likely had a solid understanding of medicines and their administration, given how precisely they injected the Mitternachtsblut while leaving minimal traces. They were likely present within the gardener's quarters during the entirety of my sister and the gardener's tryst. As such, my list of suspects included anyone present in the palace between the start of the trysts (around 10 PM) and the gardener's death (6:30 AM).

6. It was also possible the killer possessed the ability to turn invisible, suggesting they owned or had access to invisibility cloaks or potions. Such items, if not present in the royal potion storage, were readily available on the black market. I had already verified the records in my potion storage, and the inventory remained consistent, further supporting the theory that the item was acquired illegally.

7. Given this information, the royal physicians were included on the suspect list. However, they had a strong alibi. They were all sleeping in a single, large chamber from 10 PM to 6:30 AM. One of them only rushed to the crime scene after I summoned him. None of them had invisibility cloaks or potions, either.