Side Story 4

Instead of answering, Baroness Fordley gaped in astonishment.

Like someone with much to say but too shocked to speak, she could only point her finger at Alice.

“Ah, ah…”

Her face turned as white as if she’d seen a ghost.

Alice, sensing this wasn’t going well, tried to move past her—hoping to take Eva away before the Baroness fainted from shock.

But the moment Alice took a step, Baroness Fordley dropped her broom.

Thud—

“It… it really is… you…”

Has she finally accepted reality? Alice smiled brightly.

“Yes, Mother, it’s me. Alice Dearrut. Now, I’m busy, so if you’ll excuse me…”

“Darling! Darling!!”

Had her voice returned with a vengeance along with her grasp on reality? Alice had to check if her ears were still functioning properly as the Baroness’s voice echoed throughout the yard.

At that moment, Rocky Fordley, the Baron, flung open the door and rushed out.

“Gasp!”

The Baron’s reaction wasn’t much different from his wife’s. His eyes widened and his mouth fell open.

However, Baron Fordley regained his composure more quickly than the Baroness.

“How did you… Why are you…”

The same question as the Baroness.

Alice met Baron Fordley’s gaze with an exasperated sigh.

As she did, her eyes narrowed in apparent pain. These people were truly offensive just by existing.

Alice turned her gaze slightly away and parted her lips.

“Eva…”

But Baron Fordley suddenly cut her off.

“So you’ve finally come to your senses!”

What nonsense is this?

Momentarily startled by this unexpected outburst, Alice paused as Baron Fordley continued, straining his unsightly face.

“Yes, I believed in you. I knew you’d come begging for forgiveness! Of course, considering the humiliation you’ve caused us, I should sever our parent-child relationship right now…”

The Baron, who had been enthusiastically speaking, hesitated. He exchanged glances with the Baroness and hastily changed his words.

“Bu-but if you were to kneel and plead for forgiveness, I might forgive you just this once…”

But this was as far as she’d listen to a dog’s barking. Any more and her ears might rot.

Alice opened her mouth with a radiant smile.

“My, Father. Seeing you talk such rubbish at length assures me that you’re in good health.”

“What?”

The Baron’s expression momentarily turned foolish at her smile.

But only briefly—his face crumpled as he properly understood her sarcasm.

“You! How dare you call your father’s words rubbish! You still haven’t come to your senses…”

“Indeed. It seems you haven’t come to your senses yet, Father. Well, if you were in your right mind, you’d have come to beg for my forgiveness long ago. Ah, but you’re not allowed near the duchy anymore, so that wouldn’t have been possible.”

Alice looked at the Baron with feigned sympathy, causing his plump face to flush crimson—so intensely it seemed ready to burst at the slightest touch.

“Alice Fordley!”

“Still calling me Fordley… I wonder if you’re dim-witted or just tactless.”

“Wh-what did you say?! You…”

Alice was no longer smiling. This situation was starting to irritate her. Especially since she disliked looking at ugly things for too long.

She spoke quickly.

“Enough. I’m not here for you but for Eva, so I’ll just take her and leave quietly.”

“What, Eva?”

The Baroness, who had been hiding behind the Baron, poked out her bewildered face.

Simultaneously, the Baron also faltered.

“Eva? Why would you suddenly… be looking for Eva?”

What’s this? Why are they flustered?

In that moment, Alice recalled her final dream.

‘Now that I’m in the same situation as my sister…’

The words Eva had spoken while crying came to mind.

No way… have these people again…

With a hardened expression, Alice approached Baron Fordley and asked.

“Where is Eva now?”

Just as the Baron, tense from Alice’s extraordinary aura, parted his thick lips—

“Alice Fordley!!”

A fierce shout came from behind.

Alice exhaled a tired sigh and slowly turned her head.

“Like father, like son—both equally stupid.”

“What!?”

Eric Fordley.

Her disagreeable brother, whom she hadn’t seen in a long time, was glaring at her ferociously, looking as if he might rush over and strike her at any moment.

“Eric! Perfect timing!!”

At that moment, the Baron and Baroness Fordley rushed past her to their son, as if they’d found a savior at the edge of a cliff.

Standing beside Eric, the Fordley couple straightened their shoulders and glared at Alice together. Just like they had done at the duchy before.

And that posture, then and now, was just… absurd.

“Good timing. Because of you, I’ve been…”

As Eric was about to continue, huffing with anger, Alice raised her hand.

Eric involuntarily paused, and Alice’s soft voice echoed through the yard.

“It’s Dearrut, not Fordley. And it’s ‘Duchess,’ not ‘you,’ you stupid bastard.”

“Stupid what?! How dare you!”

Eric’s face flushed hot like his father’s, and he rolled up his sleeve.

“Right, I’m glad I caught you today. Looks like you came alone, and without the Duke, so today I’m going to…”

“As if I’d die. Me, to someone like you.”

Alice cut off Eric’s words with a derisive laugh, which made his expression falter.

Alice took a step toward them with a chilling smile.

“You’re wrong from start to finish. We didn’t ‘meet well’ today. You should never have crossed paths with me today.”

“Wh-what?”

Eric took a step back.

He too had sensed it—that Alice’s aura was not ordinary.

She had seemed mad at the duchy too, but at least she hadn’t smiled then.

And among crazy people, the ones who go around smiling are the most terrifying.

As a chill ran down Eric’s spine, Alice’s smile deepened.

“But what can we do? We’ve already. Met. Now.”

As Alice finished speaking, a pure white light began to rise from her feet, creeping upward.

As the eyes of the three pieces of Fordley trash widened, Alice extended her hand toward them.

Simultaneously, a sacred energy extended forward in accordance with her will.

In an instant, the three unsightly members of the Fordley family, bound head to toe by streams of white light, screamed in succession.

“Eek!”

“Urgh! Ack!”

“Argh!”

Alice flicked her finger upward for their benefit. So they could breathe the clear air above and regain their senses.

Whoosh—The screams of the three people soaring skyward echoed through the air. And before they could collect themselves, their bodies plummeted toward the ground.

Alice stood before the three, who stopped just before their heads could crash into the earth.

“You are truly re-markable people. You’ve managed to draw out my tremendous power like this. And for the purpose of harming someone, no less.”

“How… can you… have such power…”

Eric trembled and couldn’t continue speaking.

Seeing that his face was now filled with fear rather than anger, it seemed the upper air had cleared his mind somewhat.

Alice withdrew her holy power.

Thud—

Alice looked down coldly at the three bodies collapsed on the ground.

“I had pledged to use this excessive power only for healing people.”

This was sincere.

After the dark specters disappeared and Alice gained control over her holy power, she had promised herself to use it only to save lives.

It was a power that could harm countless people if misused. Yet here she was, breaking her promise.

…I should confess this to Lord Helios.

“Pl-please spare… us… Duchess…”

Baron Fordley spoke, trembling.

Alice clicked her tongue and addressed the three people stuck to the ground like flounders.

“Whether you live or die depends on your answer. I’ll ask just one more time.”

“Wh-what…?”

Alice looked directly into the Baron’s eyes, which were trembling like rough waves, and asked:

“Eva Fordley. Where is she now?”

At the hour when the red sunset beautifully colored the sky.

A somber wedding was taking place in the small banquet hall of the Pieta Lord’s castle.

The protagonists of the wedding were the Pieta Lord, approaching sixty, and the beautiful young lady Eva Fordley, who had just come of age.

It was called a wedding, but in reality, Eva had been sold by the Fordley family. For the sake of her incompetent brother’s future.

Just as her sister Alice had been sold before her.

“How long has it been since his wife died… remarrying already.”

“What remarriage? He just bought himself a slave.”

“Heh. Well, he didn’t pay money for his previous wife. So how much did this one cost?”

“Not much, I heard. 10 gold pieces? A bargain. They say she’s never even held a man’s hand.”

The mockery, mixed with sneers, reached Eva’s ears clearly. But Eva neither got angry nor shed tears.

She simply stood before the aged lord like a doll, her face resigned to everything. After all, Eva had no hope.

With her dreams crushed, she would be trapped in the castle forever, slowly dying.

At that moment, the cleric said:

“The groom, please place the ring on the bride’s finger.”

The moment had come for Eva’s shackles to be fastened.

“Wife, give me your hand.”

The lord extended his hand to Eva with a disgusting smile.

Eva placed her hand in his, suppressing her nausea.

The feeling of the ring touching her ring finger was unbearably repulsive. Had her sister Alice felt this way at first too?

In that moment, Eva thought of Alice for some reason.

Her sister who had been foolishly kind. The first to be sacrificed by the family because of it.

But now… she was living better than anyone. Yes… that’s enough.

As the ring was about to slip onto her finger, Eva tightly closed her eyes.

But then, BOOM—the firmly closed doors of the banquet hall flew open.

Or more precisely, the door panels went flying.

As Eva slowly opened her eyes at the sudden noise, a familiar yet somehow different clear voice echoed through the hall.

“That’s far enough. This marriage is void.”