Chapter 14
“No. I grew up as an orphan.”
At my answer, Lloyd’s eyes flickered slightly, but he quickly regained his composure and looked at me.
“Do you know about the Rosevelier family?”
A direct, blunt question. Was he expecting me to answer, “Yes, I know very well. I was actually supposed to be adopted by the Roseveliers. If I had, I might have become the Ibelianna or a Rosevelier you were looking for”?
I wasn’t an idiot. Ignoring the story from the novel, I spoke only of what Kaede could realistically know.
“Are you talking about the duke’s family?”
“Do you know anything about them?”
“Well… a few months ago, I read in the newspaper that a large fire broke out in the Rosevelier mansion.”
“I see.”
Silence fell again.
“It’s done.”
Despite the tension, my treatment went slightly slower than usual, but my skill remained unchanged. The large, blood-soaked hand was completely healed, not a single scratch visible.
Not only that, but all the smaller cuts and bruises from before had disappeared as well. Lloyd stared intently at his perfectly healed hand.
“I… I’ll go back to work now.”
I bowed, but he said:
“Come again.”
What? Come again?
He abruptly got up and left the barracks.
Come again…?
I groaned inwardly.
No, don’t come! I said don’t come!
After being treated by Kaede and returning to his quarters, Lloyd sat on the edge of the bed, staring at the hand she had healed for a long time.
A woman with the exact same face as Ibelianna.
How could he forget? Every painful moment before the reincarnation—the mansion burning, his heart ripped out—was vivid in his memory.
So when he arrived in Dorkan, he immediately recognized her.
The woman who quickly hid whenever their eyes met. Her shining white hair and stunning beauty could not be hidden. Even among noble ladies, she had always stood out, and now among commoners, she was impossible to miss.
He had intended to find the hiding Ibelianna and exact revenge—slice open her heart and make her suffer as he had before.
But when he merely touched her arm, he met her small, trembling body, the fearful eyes silently begging for her life. He couldn’t bring himself to kill her.
He exhaled, recalling the memories.
Three months ago.
A shadowy figure appeared in a corner of the Rosevelier villa.
“Here? A secret passage to the basement?”
Today, he vowed, he would find her and end it.
While casting a trace-erasing spell, Lloyd muttered under his breath:
“According to reliable sources, it’s here.”
Davien, masked, answered softly.
Before the reincarnation, Ibelianna, the only child of the duke, had disappeared like smoke. Only the elderly duke and duchess remained. The entire capital had been searched, but no trace of Ibelianna was found. The only place left was the Rosevelier mansion.
They risked breaking into the mansion to find the hiding villainess. They searched the knight barracks, training grounds, the main hall, and every annex, but found nothing.
Finally, a spy hidden in the mansion reported a secret passage leading underground in one of the annexes.
“So, she’s at Rosevelier,” Lloyd muttered.
“Let’s see… hmm.”
Davien examined the corner wall of the annex closely.
After staring for a while, Davien smirked.
“Ho, these kids really used their heads.”
She gestured at the wall, and a magic circle began to appear in the air.
“Here, Lloyd. The entrance to the secret passage.”
The magic circle grew, eventually transforming into a black door.
“Hah, Ibelianna… what are you so afraid of? Hiding this much?”
As Davien opened the black door to the underground passage, a horrible stench of blood hit them.
“Ugh! What is this smell?”
The stench of rotting corpses and blood darkened the twins’ expressions. This had to be the place where a bloodthirsty Ibelianna would dwell.
“This must be where Ibelianna is.”
They drew their swords and carefully descended into the basement.
“Aaaargh!”
“No! I’ll do as you say! P-please! Aaaargh!”
The piercing screams of countless children filled the air.
It was a hell on earth. Children were trapped in iron cages, wailing in pain.
“W-what is this…?”
Lloyd was speechless.
People in robes tied tiny struggling children to chairs and injected them forcibly with mana-laden syringes. Unadapted mana tore their fragile flesh. The children writhed in pain, spat blood, and eventually died. Standing beside the corpses, directing his minions, was… not Ibelianna, but the elderly head of the Rosevelier family.
“Ugh! Why are all these orphan kids so weak? How much did we invest? Hey, chief! Bring more! This time, make sure they’re useful!”
He showed no compassion. Nearby, surviving children attacked each other magically to survive, while the duchess sipped wine on a sofa as if watching a sport.
The duchess’s only promise to dying children was that the strongest would be adopted into the family. But the children had no interest in adoption—they only wanted to survive.
Limbs were blown off by magic, and the last surviving child collapsed, gasping for breath. Only one survived, clinging to life on the cold basement floor.
“Ibelianna isn’t here, Lloyd. We have to leave now.”
Davien told him. They had to leave no trace. But Lloyd couldn’t leave the dying child behind.
He quickly cast healing magic and lifted the child.
“Ah, but we can’t leave like this, right?”
Before leaving the basement, Davien muttered and swung her sword, engulfing the basement in flames.
“Fire! Fire!”
Shouts came from outside. Davien and Lloyd quickly hid.
They returned to the mansion having found no trace of Ibelianna, only the ugly truth of the Roseveliers.
And…
“Ugh! Please… save me…”
The child, drained from forced mana injections, mental trauma, and exhaustion, died two days later despite healing magic and potions.
After that, Lloyd couldn’t focus on anything.
Was Ibelianna Rosevelier truly created that way?
An innocent girl forced to survive by killing others, injected with mana, eventually becoming a monster…
Perhaps that’s why the eyes of the child begging for her life reminded him of hers.
He let her live. Seeing her trembling, pleading eyes, he softened.
I shouldn’t… but…
He needed revenge, yet another part of him whispered that perhaps the villainess might only be acting, deceiving everyone.
Kaede, silently doing her work, was completely different from the Ibelianna he remembered.
The Ibelianna who punished sweaty knights was gone. The girl now treated dying soldiers and washed blood-soaked sheets. The Ibelianna who bathed in the blood of virgins to summon a demon lord no longer existed. What remained was Kaede, sharing food with stray cats.
‘Is this really not Ibelianna?’
Lloyd’s heart was torn. Part of him wanted to kill her immediately; part of him wanted to watch a little longer.
The memory of her small, warm hands performing healing magic lingered in his mind.
‘Let’s just check one more time.’
If she ever revealed her bloodthirsty self again, he could end it then.
He quickly summoned his subordinate.
