PHATFO 34

Chapter 34

As Armian’s presence grew more menacing, the man before him trembled in terror.

“I-I swear it’s true! She was limping badly, yet insisted she had to leave this village. She pushed me aside and ran…”

Could it be true?

Or was he lying, having hidden the woman somewhere else?

“Stop spouting nonsense—”

Just as Armian reached to seize the man by the collar, he saw them: footprints beginning near the carriage wreck and continuing in a single direction.

They were Bella’s tracks, the same pattern he had followed through the Rotten Forest.

As the man had claimed, the steps were unsteady, her limp evident in the staggered stride. Armian threw the man aside and sprinted after the tracks.

But at the point where the trail abruptly ended, he faltered and collapsed heavily to the ground.

“Your Highness!”

The man had spoken the truth. Bella had fallen from the cliff into the raging waters of the waterfall far below.

What were the chances of survival for someone injured, plunging from here?

Even a healthy man might not survive such a sheer drop, and Bella had never once left her family’s estate in her life. She would not have known how to swim, nor any survival skills. The probability was almost nonexistent.

No.

Armian bit hard into his lower lip, forcing away the wave of despair.

No… We haven’t found her body.

He could not afford to falter here.

“Your Highness, are you all right?”

No—he had to be all right.

Ignoring the hand offered to him by one of the knights, Armian rose to his feet on his own.

“Search the base of the cliff first, but don’t neglect the river downstream. It’s possible Bella was carried away by the current.”

“Yes, Your Highness!”

The knights scattered at his command, though several remained behind him.

The prince had shown an inexplicable obsession with the woman ever since appearing at the Duke’s manor. Though he seemed calm for now, they feared he might suddenly hurl himself off the cliff in despair.

This was a royal who had returned after a year presumed missing. They could not risk losing him before even reporting his survival to the imperial family.

Armian ignored their presence and retraced his steps back the way he had come.

Several knights were beginning to collect the charred remnants of the destroyed carriage when—

“Don’t touch that!”

His voice, ragged with fury, froze them in place.

Armian rushed into the wreckage, sifting through the ashes with his bare hands in a frantic search for any trace Bella might have left behind.

Soon his dirt- and soot-covered fingers uncovered a pouch of gold coins and a bundle of clothing.

The clothing was soaked with blood, proof that she had indeed been injured. He untied the gold pouch—it held 270 gold coins.

From the 300 gold she had received at the jeweler’s, the amount left after paying the innkeeper and coachman matched perfectly.

It seemed in her desperation, Bella had fled without even stopping to gather her belongings.

The fragile hope that this might all have been an elaborate ruse on Bella’s part to throw off pursuit was extinguished.

Someone capable of planning so far ahead would never have abandoned everything and run.

That could only mean she was in far graver danger than he had imagined.

…And perhaps he would never see her again.

Armian held his breath, unable to dispel the suffocating dread closing in on his mind, when—

“Your Highness.”

A lilting voice spoke from behind him.

The tone was pitched deliberately high to sound sweet, but it carried a forced awkwardness.

“I came in haste, even at this late hour, for I heard you had found the young lady…”

He had never heard this voice in this manner before, yet it felt familiar. That was because he knew its owner spoke in a very different tone under normal circumstances.

“I don’t know what troubles weigh on you, but if I can offer Your Highness any comfort—”

“Comfort?”

Armian turned, his gaze locking upon the speaker.

When he confirmed that the woman was Charlotte, a slow, one-sided smile curled his lips.

“I am deeply curious as to what form that ‘comfort’ would take.”

He kept his voice to a whisper, as there were knights surrounding them.

Charlotte, blushing as though shy, cast her gaze to the ground. But when she lifted her head, she was met by the searing intensity of Armian’s eyes.

She gasped, her breath catching.

No change in demeanor could ever make her forget that face looming so close.

“N-no… it can’t be…”

“It’s been a while. Or perhaps not so long—it’s been less than a month since we last saw each other, hasn’t it?”

Armian confirmed her worst suspicion.

Charlotte forced strength into her quivering knees and shouted,

“Lies! You can’t be the prince. You were just a sla—!”

The knights’ expressions hardened, and Charlotte clamped a hand over her mouth.

The air was thick with a suffocating killing intent and the acrid smell of char. Reality crashed down upon her.

“N-no, I’m wrong.”

Gasping for breath, Charlotte tried to back away from Armian.

Her father’s command to win the prince’s favor at any cost meant nothing now. Every nerve screamed for her to flee this moment.

“T-there’s no way. That slave died in the cellar! He was dead and disposed of… This is a joke, isn’t it? You just look very much like him—ah!”

Babbling in panic, desperate to escape the weight of her own guilt, Charlotte finally broke Armian’s last shred of patience.

He seized her and yanked her close, undoing a single button to bare his shoulder.

“Look carefully. The scars you left are still on my body. Even now. Will you pretend you don’t recognize them?”

Charlotte recoiled in horror, but she averted her eyes.

“I-I don’t know! I don’t know those scars!”

“Feigning ignorance now, are you?”

How brazen.

Armian’s mind was already boiling with fury over Bella’s uncertain fate, and Charlotte had just poured oil onto the flames.

“Then I suppose I will have to help you remember.”

He decided he would be merciless.

“Someone once told me that when you cannot recall something, recreating the same event can often jog your memory.”

He released Charlotte, and she collapsed, trembling violently. The oppressive weight of his presence was crushing.

“We are going to have a very pleasant time.”

Armian turned away.

Only when the knights seized her arms and forced her upright did Charlotte register what he had said.

“No! Don’t! Please spare me! Spare me—ahhh!”

She thrashed, but the knights’ strength was insurmountable.

Charlotte, who had hoped to bury the disgrace of her social ruin by becoming the prince’s bride, was dragged away.

Her elaborately adorned dress, the last vestige of her ambition, was shredded and muddied by the dirt as she struggled. No one spared her a glance.

Despite his words, Armian did not lay a hand on Charlotte.

There was no reason to drag himself down to the same level as this vile woman.

“N-no! I remember! I remember everything, please! Please spare me—hkk!”

Merely pretending to drag her down to the cellar was enough to make Charlotte faint dead away.

Armian was almost speechless.

To faint from a few words meant only to frighten her…

She must have found the idea of being treated as she had treated others utterly intolerable.

“Hah.”

He let out a humorless laugh.

“What shall we do with her?” a knight asked.

Armian fell silent, considering.

Venting his anger on her would be easy. The Rohiltern family was not powerful enough to make him worry about the consequences.

And Charlotte had certainly wronged him. Even if he killed her, her family would not dare raise so much as a murmur in protest.

Yet Armian was cautious.

If the truth of what she had done—enslaving him and committing her depraved acts—were to become known…

The Rohiltern family would face execution.

He cared nothing for the rest of the Rohiltern vermin, but Bella…

For Bella’s sake, this matter had to be buried in silence.