Chapter 67

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“……Grace?”

“Yes! That useless thing! Father saw it, too! The Crown Prince, who saw her getting uncomfortable with mother’s cake that day, blatantly took her side!”

Duke Alberton looked momentarily stunned at the sight of Marianne, who screamed with vigour.

However, as soon as he recalled Marianne’s words again and reflected on the situation in the drawing-room at that time. Duke Alberton remembered as Marianne said, that the Crown Prince’s eyes and behaviour toward Grace were unusual.

‘No wonder. That’s why the Crown Prince insisted on breaking the marriage more strongly than before. …Belial, you a$$hole! You must have seen all those words going back and forth in the Imperial Palace through Gregory! You told me only half of what you saw!’

Duke Alberton reflected on Belial’s strange giggling behaviour whenever he saw him these days. And comforted his eldest daughter, Marianne, whose neck was flushed with a bad temper.

“I didn’t know that. I just thought the Crown Prince did it because he hated you.”

“My mother immediately recognized it, but my father is so slow! Seriously, father, you should have seen how the Crown Prince was looking at Grace at that time. He is a man who had never, ever looked at me like that! How sweet and attentive he looked at that little thing!  … … I thought I was going to die of anger.”

“… … Yes. I’m sorry.”

When Duke Alberton handed over an apology, Marianne burst into tears.

She was so angry that she couldn’t stand it. She wasn’t particularly sad that the Crown Prince loved and his heart was inclined to another woman other than her.

No woman would love a monster who regularly takes the blood of mad women of Duke Felix to save his life.

So did Marianne. Anyway, for Marianne as long as he was there as the father of the child she would give birth to and as the person who would make her the empress. It didn’t matter whether there were hundreds or thousands of people as his lovers.

However, Marianne was unbearably angry that the prince tried to break the marriage with her, and the reason was that ‘Grace Alberton’, an insignificant one compared to her.

The idiot who was not born with magical powers and lived as a parasitic in the family like a rat that just eats food or livestock without taking on the responsibility and duty as the heir of the great Alberton family like herself.

Grace was just a little more fair-faced than she was, and she’s kind to servants and maids to the point that she wants to be subservient. The mean girl, who is unknowingly sympathetic to the people around her for simply that reason.

At an early age, she was instilled in the secrets of her family and her duties as heir to Duke Alberton and continued to train painfully every day. In the end, unlike her, who has to spend her whole life with a monster-like crown prince who doesn’t even love her, Grace was just like a weed growing in the field, a good-for-nothing girl, who luckily meets the monster and is loved by him.

‘I never thought that the darn idiot would take the crown prince’s heart.’

Marianne gritted her teeth recalling the scene of the drawing-room a few days ago, where Crown Prince Owen, whose body was sitting next to her, but his eyes were following only that [email protected] Grace.

Duke Alberton patted her shoulder with his rough hand and said.

“Don’t worry. Just wait a little longer, and Grace will die and disappear right before your eyes.”

“… … How long do I have to endure it? Until the Crown Prince breaks his engagement with me and ascends to the throne and abandons us, Duke Alberton? That [email protected] Grace is lucky enough to keep avoiding the curse!”

“No. Belial told me a while ago. At last, Grace has fallen under the curse.”

“…..Really?”

Marianne asked, looking back at Duke Alberton with a bright face. He nodded silently and replied in a low, subtle voice peculiar to that of a conspirator.

“Now all that is left is to safely kill Grace.”

“Avoiding that Monster Duke’s defence?”

“Yes, I’m sure Duke Felix will do his best to protect her. But I don’t think he can do anything about it. We have the Emperor and the Imperial family behind us.”

“Yes. Even if he is a member of the Imperial family and a lord and duke who owns the empire’s most elite knights, he cannot dare to disobey the orders of His Majesty the Emperor.”

Marianne replied with a smile at the words of her father, Duke Alberton, who was smiling slyly.

Arthur Felix, no matter how hard the monster duke struggles, it would be useless. He was already like a butterfly caught in the web laid by the Imperial family and Duke Alberton.

Duke Alberton looked at his eldest daughter, Marianne, whose expression was now slightly relaxed, and added.

“Yes. So, we must devise a way to kill Grace ‘well’.”

“If that’s the case, don’t worry. Father, I’ve just come up with a good idea.”

“Good idea? What’s that?”

When asked by Duke Alberton, Marianne pulled up her smooth, red lips, smiled like a viper, and whispered to her father.

Duke Alberton smiled as if he was satisfied with his eldest daughter’s evil plan, which was poured out in a gentle voice as if the spring breeze had swept through the leaves.

It was so cruel that it was difficult to call it the face of a person who just wants to harm someone with flesh and blood.

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She felt like my head was going to explode with a headache.

Inside the stone chamber, located in the deepest part of the basement of the east tower of Felix’s mansion. Grace, who was still trying her best to find the record there, leaned on the old sofa and covered her tired eyes with one hand.

Two hours after hearing the voices of her father, Duke Alberton, and the Emperor, which seemed to resonate in her head. The magical language suddenly changed to imperial language in front of her eyes. In the meantime, Grace searched for other records, but the miracle of changing the magical language in front of her to the Imperial language did not happen as before.

‘Was the thing a while ago just a coincidence? Or was there some kind of spell that automatically translated the parchment when I touched it?’

But Grace shook her head. If that was the case, then Arthur, who had collected these records, would have been the first to read them and come to the bottom of the matter.

Then it was certain that this had happened only to her, but Grace could not understand why it had happened.

So Grace scoured the books and the pile of parchment in the stone chamber. If she had been able to interpret all the records herself, she would have postponed it thinking that it would be okay to watch it next time. And if she had not been able to read them at all from the beginning, she would have given up neatly. What she saw at first was that she could read it, and after that, it was not readable at all, so she became obsessed with whether there was a hidden record that she could read.

“… … Ugh, my head hurts.”

After struggling with dusty books for so many hours, she was suffocated and had a headache.

Grace pressed her fingers against the throbbing temples. She was going to search a little more after her headache subsided and recovered her tired physical strength.

Knock, knock—

She then heard a knock on the door of the dimly locked basement from outside.

Perhaps she misheard it, so Grace leaned her ears. Then, after a moment of silence, another knock was heard on the basement door.

‘… … Arthur?’

He said he’d pick her up in three hours, so did he come down to keep that promise?

However, Grace did not deliberately reply to the knock she heard. The first door she came down was unlocked. Therefore, she thought that it was not Arthur who knocked on the door, but someone who came down with curiosity at the opened door.

After that, towards the basement where no sign of movement was heard, there was a sound of someone outside the door knocking on the door with their fists.

Bang, bang.

“Wife! Are you in there?”

“… … Oh.”

Fortunately, when Arthur’s voice was heard, Grace smiled faintly and walked out of the room.

And as she unlocked the latch of the second locked door from the inside, and opened the door, Arthur’s worried face came into her eyes. Arthur said as he hugged his wife Grace, who was smiling at him, covered in dust.

“Why didn’t you answer me when you were inside? Do you know how worried I am?”

“I’m sorry. I was wondering what if it wasn’t Arthur who knocked on the door. So I didn’t answer on purpose and waited. If it wasn’t for you, Arthur, I would have kept silent until he walked by.”

“… … Ah. I see. I didn’t think of that, but my wife is also very wise.”

“You’re welcome.”

Grace said as she looked up at Arthur, who still hugged her and gently brushed the dust off her fine silvery hair with one hand. Arthur smiled affectionately, making eye contact with Grace, and grabbed her hand.

“It seems that you have found something great here that I couldn’t find.”

“Yes, well. It’s not great, but I think I’ve found some information that can infer the situation to some extent. But, somehow, it’s not clear. I need more direct and concrete evidence…….”

As she spoke, she was frustrated, and Grace ruffled her hair roughly, and Arthur grabbed her hand and patted her shoulder as if to calm her down.

“In that case, it is necessary for you to rest for a while. I’d better call it a day.”

“……Do you think so? I have something to tell you, Arthur, about what I’ve found out today.”

“Since lunch is ready, why don’t you tell me what you found out over a cup of tea after lunch?”

“Very well.”

Grace answered, happily following Arthur, who was holding her hand and leading her up the stairs to the first floor.

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