Chapter 30
The banquet with the central nobles as guests of honor continued this evening as well.
Ninia, seated in the Grand Duchess’s seat as always, moistened her lips with soup. But perhaps due to a lack of energy, she couldn’t taste it properly.
‘Do I have a fever?’
Ninia found it difficult to judge her own body. A large part of it was because she had always been protected by holy power, but there was also the reason that she didn’t know how to take care of herself.
Ninia let out a feverish sigh. Not only did she have a slight fever, but the seat was even more like a bed of thorns because of the guest glaring at her from across the table.
‘It was definitely Miss Miernelle.’
It was Miernelle who had been peeking into the Grand Duke’s bedroom. She had looked shocked, as if she hadn’t known Ninia was there, and had immediately disappeared from the corridor.
Ninia, while confused, also thought that she shouldn’t stay here any longer. The dress she had been wearing was lying in a heap under the bed, its shape not even preserved.
She had no choice but to call a maid to bring her clothes. Barely out of her nakedness, Ninia forced her trembling body to move and returned to her room.
Unlike when she had fled as soon as their eyes met, Miernelle at the banquet was openly glaring at Ninia.
Ninia eventually put down her spoon. Although she kept her eyes lowered, it was also a breach of etiquette to keep looking only at her own lap. Her eyes, searching for a place to rest, fell upon an empty seat.
‘The Count… he said he wasn’t feeling well, didn’t he.’
Before the banquet began, the servant in charge of Raid had delivered news of him. Had he said he was bedridden with a belated travel sickness? Ninia knew the servant’s words were not the truth, but she didn’t step forward.
She now glanced at Tarahan. It was so careful, and so brief it could hardly be called a glance, that no one would know Ninia was looking at him.
After she had returned to her room alone, Tarahan had not called for her again.
Today was a quiet day, even for the distinguished guests.
The Marquis, who had previously addressed Tarahan with subtle mockery, had received it back several times over and no longer spoke to him at the dinner table.
“Hasn’t the food gone cold already? What on earth is the kitchen here doing?”
“My apologies. We will bring a new one.”
Instead, the Marquis took his anger out on others. It became visible even to Ninia’s eyes that the Marquis was gradually accumulating complaints.
Around the time the Marquis was getting irritated with the servants, Tarahan stood up from his seat.
“The Marquis is fortunate to have been born in the capital. Here, meals vary depending on one’s usefulness.”
With those words, Tarahan passed by Ninia.
Ninia’s fingers, which had been resting demurely on her lap, curled up. It was because his words felt as if they were directed not only at the Marquis but also at her.
The dinner ended in a frozen state. Ninia had to return to her room, feeling her empty stomach churn.
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“The Grand Duke seems to have forgotten my past as well.”
Having returned to his room, Marquis Villian was forcing down his anger. He kept circling the room around the sofa where Miernelle was sitting.
Until Tarahan received the title of Grand Duke, the Marquis had been able to look down on him. Was that all? Wasn’t the lowly half-breed a race that dared not even reach the tip of the Marquis’s toes?
Such a person had eventually risen to the position of Grand Duke. The Marquis ground his teeth and growled.
‘Cut off anything that would benefit Danteore and come back.’
It was the Empress’s directive. The Marquis also desperately wanted to ruin Tarahan and drag him back to his original place.
He was the Empress’s faithful hound. But this command, in particular, was difficult.
‘There’s nothing to find fault with.’
It was also the Emperor’s command to revive the desolate land and grow crops.
It was clearly an absurd task, but the Grand Duke had used waterway construction to create a site underground.
The central people didn’t know, but there were quite a few plants that could grow with very little light and become food.
Once the construction project was finished, the Grand Duke would have accomplished even the Emperor’s seemingly impossible command. If the Empress were to see that, she would not let the Marquis off first.
‘There won’t be a second time.’
Even when the Marquis had taken command of the war and made a mess of the victory and defeat, the Empress had turned a blind eye once.
But the Marquis knew well that it was the Empress’s final mercy, seeing a follower who worshipped her to no end.
‘The only fortunate thing is…’
The Marquis’s pacing, which had been circling the room, stopped in front of Miernelle. He slowly scanned the beauty, who was considered one of the best even in the capital.
There was no progress on the Empress’s command, but Miernelle was different. He trusted the woman who had become his niece.
“You must do well.”
Marquis Villian asked as if to remind her, but Miernelle silently lowered her eyes.
“Why is there no answer? Do you want to be out on the streets again?”
At the Marquis’s pointed remark, Miernelle bit her lower lip hard. Her clear green eyes once again shimmered with venom.
Miernelle was originally a woman who sold flowers on the street. Selling flowers in the back alleys meant selling oneself. Miernelle had lived like that since before she came of age.
The reason she had arrived from the capital to the Danteore territory without once falling ill was that life in the carriage was far more comfortable than her past.
‘There is no hunger or cold. On top of that, I can always be beautiful and elegant.’
If she could maintain this life, she would do anything. Meanwhile, the life on the street that she had forgotten was constantly clashing with her current self, pretending to be a noble.
Miernelle, reminded of her forgotten past, raised her eyes and asked.
“Is it really true that His Excellency is not interested in Her Highness the Consort?”
Anxiety was laced in Miernelle’s voice. It was a fear with clear evidence. From what she had heard from the Empress and the Marquis, the Grand Duke’s attitude toward the former Saintess was said to be truly terrible.
Miernelle had been confident. She had judged that she would be far more skilled at seducing a man than a high and mighty former clergywoman who was a purity-advocate.
“Didn’t the Count guarantee it? He might have at least dressed her properly now because there are eyes watching, but when he saw her, she had no clothes to wear, so she picked up and wore a dress that the Count’s concubine had thrown away.”
The source of the evidence was Count Troyd.
The Count still had a line of contact with the Empress. The Count had reported in detail what kind of treatment the Grand Duchess was receiving in Danteore.
“You saw it just now, didn’t you? The Grand Duchess’s complexion didn’t look good, but he just left her and went out.”
This was a fact Miernelle also knew. But now, such stories alone could not completely erase her anxiety.
“…But.”
Until she saw that scene, Miernelle had been confident. That’s why she had gone to Tarahan’s bedroom.
But the master of the bedroom was absent, and there, the former Saintess, bearing the Grand Duke’s traces, was covering her exposed body with a blanket.
‘Maybe he just needed someone to vent his lust on.’
Miernelle thought as positively as she could. If that was the case, she still had a good chance of winning.
Miernelle had not only learned from the streets but had also completed all the training to please men from various teachers under the Empress’s instruction.
She was confident she could send the Grand Duke to heaven, even while coyly twisting her body.
“Just crawl into his bedroom naked. His Excellency is also a man in his prime, so he won’t just leave you be. Besides, doesn’t he seem to like you?”
The Marquis instilled confidence in Miernelle. There was no way a block of wood with a tongue that couldn’t distinguish between tea and filth could satisfy the Grand Duke.
At the Marquis’s words, Miernelle nodded. Blood had started to well up on her lower lip, which she had been continuously biting.
“I understand.”
For Miernelle, it was all the same whether she returned to the capital and died or died here.
To keep breathing and enjoy wealth, she must absolutely embrace the Grand Duke in her skirt. There were no other options.
‘I will never go back to the old days.’
Miernelle repeated the vow she had made countless times on her way here.
But what she had overlooked here was that she had believed the Marquis’s words unconditionally. And that she lacked the head to apply his words.
That was Miernelle’s naivety. And usually, that kind of naivety always brought disaster.
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“Aaaargh-!”
In the middle of the dark night, a woman’s scream echoed through the lantern-lit corridor.
Servants who had been keeping their positions near the Grand Duke’s room ran out into the corridor with startled eyes and were horrified by the sight they witnessed.
The Grand Duke had grabbed the young lady by the hair and dragged her into the corridor. Without hesitation, he threw the young lady like a piece of luggage.
