Chapter 35
“Bang!!!”
A heavy crash filled the room.
The green-eyed man trembled as he looked at the man standing before him. Dull blond hair, and teal eyes that shone with a pretentious nobility. Those blazing eyes bore into him coldly.
“Do you realize that with your own hands, you have just blocked your daughter’s future?”
“I didn’t do anything…!!”
“Yes, of course. You did nothing. If that worm-like maid hadn’t made a mistake!!”
“Marquis Bellua…! Please…! Show mercy! I swear nothing like this will ever happen again…!”
“Won’t happen again? Do you even understand that the imperial family and that damned Anais Vincent now have their eyes fixed on the Luciella marquisate?!”
The man kneeling like a condemned criminal, begging forgiveness, was Selphius Luciella — head of the Luciella house and father of Osborne Luciella. And the man venting his fury in front of him, the rough-haired noble with dull blond hair, was the well-known leader of the aristocratic faction, Aren Bellua.
“How do you plan to deal with this mistake? If Anais Vincent has already visited, it means the imperial investigation team may soon determine the truth and convene a noble trial.”
“Th-that trial must be avoided…!”
“I had my people find the mana crystal in the Agrias Swamp for you, and this is how you handle things? Quelton. What do you think would be the best way to clean this up?”
Aren tilted his head and addressed the dark man standing beside him.
“Shall I kill him?”
“If the Marquis of Luciella dies, that child will be sad.”
“…Then I’ll make sure he doesn’t die.”
“Tch. I’ve already made sure the young ladies who attended that tea party keep their mouths shut. Nothing will leak.”
Still sweating coldly, Selphius bowed his head repeatedly in thanks while recalling what had happened. He feared the man before him, yet felt fortunate that this same man favored his daughter, Osborne Luciella.
Aren had once given him a sweet proposal — he would help place his daughter on the throne as Empress.
Selphius had never thought himself hungry for power. Yet that day, strangely, he had clung to the offer like a starving man begging for money. And as if the proposal were becoming reality, Osborne began to catch the Emperor’s attention.
Yes, she’s different from that villainess Elizabeth Arlesia. The true saintess, the protagonist of this world, the one destined to reign — my daughter, Osborne Luciella!
That thought slowly tightened around his mind, and before he knew it, he carried himself with pride. With Aren’s support and Osborne praised as a saintess admired by all, greed began to grow in him. A saintess shines brighter when there is a villainess.
But one thing never changed: someday, Elizabeth Arlesia would become poison to Osborne.
So he had planned this merely as a warning… yet something had gone terribly wrong.
“This is clearly a frame-up…! Please believe me!! Truly… I did nothing…!”
All Selphius had done was instruct a maid to put an extremely tiny amount of poison into Osborne’s teacup — just enough to cause mild stomach trouble. He hadn’t put it in Elizabeth’s cup because the goal wasn’t to kill her, but to brand her as a jealous villainess who had tried to poison Osborne.
If Osborne collapsed or complained of stomach pain, they would place all the blame on Elizabeth and bury her.
But—
The one who collapsed wasn’t Osborne. It was Elizabeth.
And the poison he used was only enough for slight stomach pain. He never imagined she would vomit blood.
They did not know that Elizabeth herself had also poisoned the tea meant for Osborne. Selphius’s poison and Elizabeth’s poison had combined, amplifying the effect. Aren had only supplied the poison at Selphius’s request and knew nothing of what happened afterward. None of them had expected things to become so tangled.
“…For now, we have no choice but to insist it was Elizabeth’s own staged act. If that fails, we’ll have to push that maid forward to smooth things over.”
At Aren’s low murmur, the dark man spoke.
“There’s no evidence strong enough to push the ‘staged act’ angle. A priest from the temple reportedly delivered the list of visitors to the Agrias Swamp to the Emperor on the High Priest’s orders.”
“Hmm… then using the maid is the best option. Selphius. Can you settle this situation?”
No matter how much Aren favored Osborne, the reason he treated Selphius like a useful limb was because Selphius was intelligent. He understood business and tolerated no mistakes when profit was involved. And yet now he had made one. Aren’s displeasure was only natural.
After a long silence, forehead pressed to the floor as he trembled, Selphius slowly raised his head and fell into thought. When he seemed to reach a conclusion, he began to outline his plan.
“…There’s no information about the maid anywhere. We brought in an abandoned orphan and used her as a servant. So if we frame her as a spy from the Peltan Empire who tried to assassinate the future Empress Osborne, but Elizabeth drank it by mistake…!”
“…Do you think that makes any sense?!”
Aren shouted thunderously, genuinely enraged. So this was the result of the clever thinking he prided himself on — nonsense that would fall apart instantly.
“Why would the Peltan Empire try to assassinate Osborne when she isn’t even Empress yet? Why would they send a spy at all? Right now that empire is already in chaos over the succession. If we mishandle this, the Emperor himself might send them a letter. Have I misjudged you? A lie that obvious would only hand them a bargaining chip.”
“Th-that…!!”
Selphius hurriedly tried to think again. There had to be a single logic tying it together: why send a spy, and why target Osborne? He knew the Peltan Empire was locked in a bloody succession struggle among its princes, and reports said their Emperor remained silent instead of mediating.
As Aren said, giving them leverage would be dangerous.
After thinking in silence for a long time, Selphius reached a different conclusion. There was no need to stop them from gaining a bargaining chip.
“…It might not be bad to make them use that bargaining chip.”
“…What?”
“What they want isn’t Osborne’s execution. It’s the truth. And the truth will be buried anyway. Even if the one harmed turns out to be the villainess, no one will pity her. People will simply call it karma.”
“So what exactly are you saying?”
“They know that even if the truth comes out, they cannot put Osborne on the execution block. If anything, the people and the other nobles would instead target the imperial family and the Vincents for cornering a saintess.”
“…So they must want something else.”
“Yes. What we want is for this incident to be quietly buried. And if they call our absurd story a lie and try to negotiate…”
“…then we use the lie itself to force mutual silence.”
Aren thought Selphius’s words had some merit. Knowing Anais’s temperament, she would never overlook someone who tried to kill her granddaughter. But if they presented a suitably mixed answer of truth and lies and swayed public opinion so Osborne appeared to be the victim, the situation might still be salvageable.
As for why someone would try to kill Osborne when she wasn’t even Empress yet, that was a question he could deflect.
If he brought up Elizabeth’s disappearance fourteen years ago, when she had been a Crown Princess candidate, Anais would shut her mouth on her own. No one wanted the truth of that day buried more than she did.
Elizabeth being kidnapped as a candidate, and someone trying to kill Osborne now — the contexts could be framed as similar. And Anais would know well that neither truth should be revealed.
The best option was negotiation with whatever terms they wanted. Yes, mentioning the incident from fourteen years ago would be the final safeguard — the means to silence Anais and stop anyone from digging further.
So you’d better come with acceptable terms… Anais Vincent.
“…Very well. Not a bad idea. But you’ll still need to be punished for this.”
“…!!”
Aren gestured lightly to the dark man. The man approached Selphius and murmured something to him.
A few minutes later, only Selphius’s screams echoed through his office.
And there was not a single servant in the estate who heard them.
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T.L: In Korean original the name of Osborne’s father was “Selfia”… it sounds feminine so I’ll be using “Selphius” instead.
