Chapter 37

Paternity Test (7)

My heart felt like it tightened and my whole body trembled.

“Oh! Oh! Oh!”

“Oh my gosh!”

“How did this happen?!”

The square was plunged into a melting pot of chaos.

“Oh my God! What the hell is this?!”

It seemed that even the High Priest himself had forgotten that it was the day he would retire.

“Caitlyn, you crazy woman…”

The Marquis of Abedes was breathing heavily with an absent-minded look.

“Lanella… That wretched thing should be punished for arranging affairs with Caitlyn!”

Marilyn slumped down and muttered.

I asked quietly, conscious of the dagger I was holding.

“…Where is that woman?”

“A week ago, something suddenly happened, and she arranged all of her property in the capital and left.”

Marilyn exclaimed, dripping with tears.

“Come to think of it, she sprung up as soon as the rumor that you were taking your paternity circulated!”

“Wait.”

Things that I hadn’t thought of because I was in a state of panic began to come to mind one after another.

“Everyone…see you later. And Marilyn, I’m sorry. I’m in a hurry.”

I pulled out my dagger and ripped the hem of my dress so that I could run.

“For now, I will go catch Reid.”

Fire flared in my eyes and anger welled up.

As soon as I spat out Reid’s name, an uneasy feeling swept over my body.

My paternity test was a huge topic of discussion in the capital all week.

From then on, Reid certainly behaved differently.

I thought it was because he was worried that I wouldn’t be able to win first place in the swordsmanship contest.

But when I thought about it, it was obvious that the secret would be revealed, so it seemed like it was because he was trying to figure out the future.

‘If Reid knew it all…if he was told that he and I were not brother and sister…’

Then he would’ve left like Lanella a week ago.

But he was awkwardly sitting in the mansion until this morning, so there were two possibilities.

The other was that Reid didn’t know that we weren’t blood related…

‘Assessment of property. ‘

He placed a lot of bets here and there and played with money quite a bit.

Therefore, he had to hold out as long as possible to recover as much money as possible.

Still, just in case, he ran away.

Maybe he hadn’t gone too far yet.

‘This motherf***er.’

In the meantime, it has been a while since I last swore.

I grinded my teeth countless times, but somehow I had to endure it because I thought it was not okay to do this between blood relatives.

However, the fact that they were not my blood relatives made me realize it was a waste of time to hold back.

‘Caitlyn died too gracefully. After putting so many people in pain, she enjoyed everything, lived up to her name, and then ended up in an accident.’

When I ran like crazy and got home, I felt my heart pound.

The house was a mess. Anything worth money had already been swept away.

So, that bastard Reid knew.

I mean, I was not the daughter of Marquis Abedes, I was just a kid who was swapped in a public hospital for having light purple hair.

From the messed up house, I headed to my room.

In the meantime, even the people who were working in the mansion were never by my side.

That was why I didn’t have anything in this house.

I took a deep breath and opened the closet in my room.

All of the expensive dresses that Marilyn had carefully crafted had been stolen by the maids.

Tears welled up.

My real mother, who gave birth to me, made these clothes for me, but they were taken away.

Caitlyn shamelessly took me from my parents and then wore the clothes my mother made and ate the food my father cooked. (pr/n: I didn’t even think about that WOW CAITLYN WAS A TWISTED BINCH.)

I had never worn my mother’s clothes in those 22 years and didn’t even try my father’s food.

Fortunately or unfortunately, five gray training suits that looked familiar were on the floor.

They were outfits thrown away the maids had never even thought of stealing.

I held back my tears and changed into the most comfortable one.

“I’m going to get back at Reid before I change my clothes.”

I tied my hair with an old leather strap and murmured resolutely.

I also picked out the sharpest and most comfortable sword in the room.

All the swords Caitlyn bought were cheap.

It cost more to maintain them than to buy a new one.

So I lived using any sword I could find.

“I’ll return what Caitlyn bought me back to her son.”

I was going to stab it deep in one place and return it.

Now, there was a place to check.

I ran to the gambling house where Reid had been working hard. As I headed there, I couldn’t stop thinking.

Thinking about it one by one, there were a lot of strange things.

“The people of the Marquis of Abedes didn’t look like me at all.”

Rather, my eyes were similar to Oscar’s and Aaron’s, and my figure was similar to Marilyn’s.

‘Even then, a woman named Lanella ran away because she was surprised to see Marilyn and I together.’

It was obvious that she went far away and came back to the capital before because nothing had happened for more than 20 years.

All kinds of emotions flocked.

Not only sadness, but also joy and excitement.

However, all of those emotions were buried in soaring anger.

I was mostly angry that Caitlyn was already dead and I couldn’t kill her.

‘Lanella and Reid, I will kill them with my own hands.’

Arriving at the gambling house, I found out that Reid immediately converted the house document this morning with a cancellation fee.

So, while I was heading to the square humming, the jerk organized everything and ran away.

I thought I knew where the jerk was.

“My best friend is the largest slave trader in the capital. I am an expert at this.”

I had no idea when I heard him say that.

Slavery was linked to black magic.

Because Robert was going to get rid of it with the help of the main characters, he was only worried that he might get entangled with me.

“If you ever find yourself in a situation where you have to hide, you can go to him.”

The largest slave trader in the capital was where Robert went on this secret raid.

Even though he couldn’t catch Prince Carlon behind him, it was still the place where the first meeting of the male and female leads took place.

Come to think of it, I think that day was today.

On the day of the High Priest’s retirement ceremony, Cessianne would hear a revelation from the gods and sneak out of the temple to pursue the slave issue and get entangled with Ian.

‘That’s not my business.’

All I had to do was drive out Reid’s life while Ian and Cessianne worked hard to drive out the evil forces.

So, even if they were in the same place at the same time, everyone had to do their own thing.

Of course, God’s proposal for me to save the world was no longer in my mind.

It wasn’t an agreement with each other, it was just a unilateral request.

‘It’s not that I can’t save the world, it’s a world where I can do well on my own.’

The protagonists with the strongest abilities, great personality, and excellent cooperative spirit will be fine.

It meant that I didn’t have to associate with any of those three traits.

‘I’m sure they were in the basement of the Ronopodia general store building.’

It was information that Robert worked really hard to find out in the original story, but how good was it that I could just recall it.

I even knew the password to enter.

‘The door will open late in the afternoon… I’ll go and see it.’

It was the time when I was about to run to the Ronopodia general store again when I made up my mind.

“Annabelle!”

Someone jumped off the roof and grabbed my arm.

“Where are you going?”

I stared blankly at the man holding me.

No, why the hell did Ian come out here?

Ian said while panting out of breath.

“Did you know how worried I was when you suddenly disappeared with that look on your face…!”

“…Worried?”

The person in the world who wouldn’t worry about me the most was Ian.

When I asked in amazement, Ian shook his head and added hastily.

“No, I mean the Rainfield family is concerned!”

Suddenly, I felt a tingling sensation in my toes.

I wondered what it felt like to know that someone really cared about me.

“Ah… Are they all ok? Oscar seems to have collapsed…”

“I know what you are thinking.”

Ian said bluntly.

“You can’t find Reid right now anyways, it’s right to meet your family first.”

“But I have to cut that bastard off as soon as possible!”

As I screamed, Ian looked me in the eye calmly and said.

“Did you think about the people who were left like that back there waiting?”

“…Huh?”

“It’s good to get revenge, but you have to be considerate of those who truly care about you. What would the Rainfields want, having just found their daughter?”

“…”

“Do you want to scour the capital to kill Reid, or do you want to talk to your real family?”

I dropped my arm trying to shake off Ian. His words made sense and they were correct.

“I’m not saying you shouldn’t take revenge. But I’m telling you to have a proper conversation, even if it’s a short one, and reassure your mind for now.”

When my shoulders dropped in despair, Ian slowly reached out to me as if he were comforting me.