Chapter 68
Johannes Beliar’s Circumstances (2)
The woman, with her blonde hair and pale face, had an overall delicate coloring. It seemed as though she would melt into the sunlight if it touched her.
She was more beautiful than anyone Johannes had ever seen. Comparing her to someone he had seen in the back alleys felt almost sinful.
The maids standing behind her wrinkled their noses at the musty smell that Johannes gave off, but the woman showed no reaction as if she couldn’t smell anything.
She neither smiled nor frowned.
Just a blank expression. And yet, it suited her perfectly.
She parted her cherry-like lips and spoke.
“There’s no need to even verify parentage. You are unmistakably a spitting image of the Marquis. It’s strange that you weren’t found until now.”
With that, she waved her delicate, pale hand as if her business here was done.
“Take him. Bathe him first, and make sure he’s presentable before the Marquis returns.”
“Understood.”
The man tried to take Johannes away again, but Johannes dodged his hand and approached the woman.
The others gasped and attempted to restrain him, but she raised her hand and stopped them all.
“So, do you have something to say?”
“Wh-what will happen to me?”
Her audacious question drew sharp intakes of breath from the others, but the woman showed no reaction.
With her characteristically cool face, she explained briefly.
“You will grow up as the sole heir of the Beliar family.”
“Beli…ar?”
“Yes. Judging by that foolish expression of yours, you have a long way to go.”
“Then…”
She cut him off, as if refusing to allow any further questions.
“Ask someone else about anything else. I am not here to answer your questions.”
Her voice was gentle, but carried an authority that could not be defied.
Johannes pursed his lips and quietly followed the man out of the room.
From behind him, she murmured as if flowing past him.
“You are fortunate. Among so many noble families, you were born as a Beliar illegitimate child.”
Johannes would later understand what she meant by “fortunate.”
Everyone had been trembling because the woman was the Marchioness of Beliar.
Though she was not from a noble family, she had developed a romantic relationship with the Marquis of Beliar and managed to marry him despite opposition from his family.
The couple’s relationship was very harmonious, yet after three years, they had no children.
Unable to produce an heir, their relationship began to deteriorate. The Marquis spent more time outside, rarely visiting the Marchioness’s chambers.
Eventually, the family physician cautiously diagnosed that one of them was likely infertile. However, there was no way to determine the specifics, so it remained unclear for several more years.
At that time, the Marquis discovered that a maid who had disappeared long ago had given birth to his child.
With the Marchioness confirmed infertile, the existence of an illegitimate child came into play.
However, the Marquis did not tell anyone about the child.
Logically, he could have dismissed his infertile wife and taken a new one.
But he still had feelings for the Marchioness and could not easily decide to divorce. Eventually, he gave her a choice: either divorce him or bring the illegitimate child to be raised as his son and heir.
The Marchioness chose the latter, and thus Johannes came to the Beliar household.
On the day Johannes learned the truth, he finally understood what the Marchioness had meant.
Had there been no issues and a legitimate heir already existed in the Beliar family, Johannes would not have existed.
She added that if he had lived, either she or the Marquis would have killed him for the family’s honor, which was why the maid had run away.
In reality, both the father who raised him and those who brought him had disappeared without a word. Johannes assumed they were probably dead.
In other words, Johannes truly was a “fortunate” child.
Johannes knew that the Marchioness did not regard him warmly. Yet, she could not bring herself to hate him entirely.
He was evidence of her husband’s infidelity, but he was also the child that allowed the Marchioness to remain in the Beliar household.
Without him, she would have been expelled eventually for failing to produce an heir.
In any case, Johannes grew up receiving proper education as the heir of the Beliar family. Officially, it was said that he had been adopted as a distant relative of the Marquis.
Although illegitimate, he was still the Marquis’s only child. The Marquis treated those close to him well, and naturally, he cared for Johannes.
He was not the type of father to lavish affection outwardly or die for Johannes, but he provided everything a father could.
Yet Johannes was not satisfied. His gaze remained fixed not on the Marquis but on the Marchioness.
From the moment he first met her, he could not stop noticing her. Unlike the Marquis, she treated him as if he did not exist, which sparked a peculiar stubbornness in him.
He vowed to earn her recognition someday, to make her accept him as her son.
He longed for a trace of emotion to appear on the face that always looked at him with no expression.
But the Marchioness never showed any emotion toward him. As if, for a mere child like him, even her feelings were a luxury.
It was not romantic interest. Johannes swore he had never seen her that way.
He simply wished for her to look at him as a mother would.
Perhaps it was a craving stemming from growing up always told he was motherless.
As the subtle tension lingered in the mansion, rumors about the Beliars swirled outside.
People praised the Marquis for not divorcing his wife, seeing it as a testament to his devotion. Some called the Marchioness kind for raising a child who was not her own husband’s.
But contrary to the rumors, the relationship between the Marquis and Marchioness continued to rot internally. They gradually spent less time together, and eventually, the Marchioness secluded herself.
And one winter, when Johannes was about fifteen,
he ran toward the Marchioness’s chamber at the sound of a maid screaming down the hallway.
The Marchioness had collapsed on her bed, coughing up blood. While the maids rushed to fetch a doctor, Johannes ran to her side to see what had happened.
A small glass bottle lay on the floor beside the bed. The faint scent of Jheron flowers lingered. Jheron flowers are notorious for killing without causing visible physical damage.
In other words, the Marchioness had not fallen ill—she had poisoned herself.
Johannes quickly lifted her into his arms.
“Why did you do this?”
The Marchioness barely opened her eyes and looked at him silently.
Johannes did not cry. Instead, he calmly poured out what he had long wanted to say.
“If you were going to do this, why not just leave the Beliar household? Why make this choice?”
“…”
“Why never give me your heart? If there is any fault of mine, it is being born an illegitimate child from a maid’s body. That is not something I can control. Strictly speaking, it is not even my fault.”
“…”
“Couldn’t you have smiled at least once? When I was dragged here by strangers and stood before you, I was only seven. Did you feel no pity at all for a child in that position?”
The Marchioness moved her lips in response. Johannes leaned in, straining to hear her voice.
“You will never be my son.”
“…!”
Coughing up blood, the Marchioness continued.
“I should never have brought you here.”
For the first time, she smiled at Johannes. A relieved smile, as if freed from all shackles.
“I curse you. For life.”
She closed her eyes without giving him the answer he wanted.
After the Marchioness’s funeral, Johannes often had nightmares. In them, she appeared covered in blood, mocking and scolding him.
He woke screaming multiple times, feeling a fury rising like hellfire within him.
His anger was aimed at the Marchioness, who had never looked at him, yet she was already dead, leaving his rage nowhere to go.
He wished he could dig up her grave and tear her body apart, to stab and mock her until his anger subsided.
To show her that the child she had scorned could laugh at her, and that her curse meant nothing.
Yet, he retained just enough reason not to rush to the grave.
Instead, he took out his anger on the innocent—maids or servants, sometimes striking them or uttering insults.
Perhaps Johannes was already ensnared by the Marchioness’s curse.
