Chapter 21

I approached Sam, who had fainted.

Ricardo followed me with a curious gaze.

“Why was he dead, no, he fainted?”

I opened my lips to speak in a stiff tone.

“Sam tried to kill Ricardo under the guise of a curse.”

After it was revealed that Ricardo’s illness was not a curse of a wizard, I didn’t know what kind of behavior he would display.

So I purposely prepared a way to knock him out before he could act.

As an honest person, I didn’t have the talent to overcome his brilliant sophistry, but I don’t need to go so far as to manipulate someone.

Instead, I squatted next to Sam, who fainted, and raised his green hand to show it.

“Sam’s hand contains a green liquid from Roltanne leaves.”

One of the healers standing there stiff like a stone asked.

“Roltanne leaves…?”

“Yes, the Roltanne leaves were famous for being a poisonous plant.”

I raised Sam’s hand and said.

“If you bake the leaves of roltanne leaves for a long time, a light green liquid would appear on your fingertips, and the half-moon part of your nails turns black. It’s like the spring we have now.”

The other healers also knew very well about the leaves of Roltanne.

I opened my mouth and continued to explain.

“Ricardo, do you have any herbs that Sam gave before? Check it out. It’s similar to cetyl grass, which is a sleeping herb, but it smells different.”

Other healers ran near me to hear my explanation as well.

One of the healers muttered absurdly.

“…Really, it’s a Roltanne leaf. Well, then Sam was trying to kill Ricardo?”

Another healer added.

“Come to think of it, it was also Sam who first judged Ricardo as cursed!”

“…I, I only believe what he said and…”

They looked at each other with embarrassed faces.

“So, why did you only trust that guy’s diagnosis?”

There was a turmoil among the healers, and each one of them blamed one another.

But it’s no wonder that they believed Sam’s words unconditionally.

Sam was basically a genius of manipulation and contempt.

In addition, he had a dark artifact that could easily control and manipulate others through speaking with them.

Would I knock him out without any evidence?

Besides, Ricardo’s notoriety of running through the battlefield would easily have been judged as a curse by ordinary healers who feared him.

I nodded.

“Then it makes it even clearer. If we went further here, Ricardo would have died soon. Today, or he might have died tomorrow.”

I looked down at Sam and spoke…

“The people in the castle would have firmly believed that Ricardo’s death was due to the curse.”

Ricardo spoke harshly.

“…The last time you treated me, you might have been suspected of killing me!”

The atmosphere became even heavier.

Only Sam, whose head was bleeding on the marble floor, was unaware of this.

I glared at Sam with a satisfied face.

Sam, who had framed Count Vietry and our family to ruin, then fled to the castle of Duke Anais like a bat.

‘If I study about his artifact, I might find more about why Sam fled to the Duke Castle. But there’s a better way to do that.”

“I don’t think Sam was the only one who did this… Maybe there’s someone else behind, who was trying to kill Ricardo.”

Ricardo’s expression was horrendous.

My hand trembled seeing the terrifying expression from grandpa’s face.

(N: Astel calls Ricardo grandpa.)

“As soon as the truth was revealed, I was afraid that Sam would choose to take his own life, so I had no choice but to light a Black Rose scented candle in advance. Since the rose candle and the leaves of Roltanne don’t match, Sam who had touched the leaves of Roltanne before would faint. So he won’t be able to kill himself.”

At that time, a healer who everyone believed to have been closest to Sam opened his mouth carefully.

“Well, first of all… But more than that, shouldn’t we look into it and find out more?”

“You shut up— I’ll figure it out.”

Ricardo growled at him.

The end has come.

While Ricardo and the healers were arguing, I quietly squatted near Sam and glanced at his chest.

‘If it’s not now, I could never go back…’

I quietly rummaged through Sam’s chest and opened my mouth.

“I’ll look through his things if he had any more suspicious herbs.”

That’s exactly what a spy would do.

Since Sam was always thinking of betraying and harassing others, he couldn’t trust anyone who approaches him with good intentions.

Sam, who couldn’t trust anyone, always carries the artifact that the final villain gave to him in his arms.

I was finally able to sneak out a tiny artifact disguised as a brooch in his arms.

It was an artifact that ended with a few simple lines of description in the original, but eventually Cassian couldn’t find it and it played a role in driving him to his death.

As soon as I hid the brooch in my pocket, Ricardo, who finished arguing with the healers, came right in front of Sam and me.

“I need to investigate this guy properly.”

He grabbed Sam’s neck with a rough hand and recited a spell.

Sam’s body floated in the air.

It was a pretty ridiculous posture with both arms and legs lifted.

“Bastard! I’ve never been expelled in my life, I’ll never let you live! How dare you try to kill me?!”

Ricardo was inherently grotesque and all healers feared him, because he once made a beast run away like a rat in front of a cat.

Everyone, including me, faltered because of the words he spewed.

Now that I saved this grandpa who almost died, I pretended to investigate and secretly stole Sam’s artifact.

Wouldn’t the news about Sam being caught would soon reach the other two spies inside the Duke castle?

Everything to this day has been 100% successful.

However, it seemed that today’s plan could be 120% successful.

“Ricardo.”

“What’s wrong?”

“I think I might be able to know whose behind this, so could I participate in the torture process myself?”

I could get more hints if I talk to Sam.

“Wha-what torture? A child like you shouldn’t see such things, no!”

Ricardo with a serious expression on his face said.

“I’ll put that guy in Hellfire, so come see him later when I take him out for a while.”

I had no choice but to accept Ricardo’s words.

The Jaguar family’s Hellfire torture… I heard that it was incredible…

‘Rather than watch him being tortured, this situation would make it easier.’

Come to think of it, if I saw the torture process in person, I’d become stressed for someone with a weak heart.

“I’ll see you again later”

Ricardo nodded and turned around and walked out from the tea room.

The fainted Sam followed Ricardo’s steps as if bound by an invisible rope, floating in the air.

* * *

A few hours later, at the tea party.

It was a leisurely time for Astel, the Duke’s guardian, to drink afternoon tea.

As usual, there were many maids standing by Astel’s side, but now they’re quite different from usual.

The Golden Retriever maids were watching Astel’s tea party, hiding behind a curtain with bated breath.

“When I checked roughly, you were absolutely right. I didn’t ask because you said you were digging through it.”

Astel answered bravely with unexpected consideration.

“Thank you for your consideration.”

“Yes, first of all, he was locked up in the hellfire of the Jaguar family for now, so make porridge or bread on your own.”

“Eh, eek! Re-really hellfire…”

Sally, who was hiding, hurriedly cried out.

The hellfire of the Jaguar family was a fire that would never be extinguished.

Sam was going to burn in torture forever, unable to live completely with it or die comfortably in it.

That was the price for killing my parents, pushing Vietry into destruction, and trying to kill Ricardo.

“And it was.”

Ricardo stared at Astel with an overly fond gaze.