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Chapter : 07
Cutting Out the Rotten Root
Her body slowly stiffened. On the day death arrived, Charlophe was completely forgotten.
“They say your father won’t be coming.”
It was what her husband told her as he looked at Charlophe, who was dying. Her fingertips had gone numb as they weakly fumbled over the bed, and her gaze clung foolishly to him.
“The family’s disgrace will die here.”
Why me.
Why do I have to end up like this?
“That disgrace’s death will be buried as well.”
“Ah… don’t do this to me. Ah… ahhh!”
“Conceal her illness thoroughly. Don’t let this story leak outside.”
Did they hide my death?
Ah.
That’s right. They did. Mogens. That was you. After losing half the skin on her body to burns, and finally ending her life with Luperatic disease. Even when her lungs hardened and her life reached its final moments, no one came to look back at her.
“Eat whatever you want, and just rest comfortably while you’re out.”
Leandro patted Charlophe on the shoulder.
“By the time you come back, everything will be over, so don’t worry and go.”
They had begun the procedures to bring Charlophe out of her maternal family. Today was the day they would carry them out. To minimize any trouble, Charlophe was scheduled to step away for a while.
“Your Highness, please take good care of Charlophe.”
“Is it enough if we return by evening?”
“Yes. By then the adoption procedures should be finished as well, so please rest comfortably with the child.”
She stepped outside with Benjamin, saying they would be away for a bit.
Although her uncle had warned her to be wary of him, this time he readily pushed Charlophe forward.
So really…
Is it all over? Is it ending just like this?
“Charle.”
Benjamin called her.
“Charlophe!”
Charlophe slowly turned her head.
“I’m listening.”
“I can see you zoning out.”
“I think I got tense without realizing it, hearing that people from the main house are coming.”
They were already outside. Looking around, it was a familiar shopping district. Ah, had they said they’d eat first here?
So she’d been walking absentmindedly without even knowing where she was.
Charlophe stopped short, and Benjamin casually reached out.
“Your complexion’s pretty red.”
He touched her cheek.
“Are you the type who shows stress physically?”
Ever since she was young, when she lacked sleep or got stressed, her body would heat up with a slight fever.
“Who did you take that after?”
“My mother, when she was alive.”
They started by eating at a restaurant. Aside from her tangled feelings, the food itself was fine.
It was a restaurant in a busy shopping area, apparently well-known by word of mouth—the flavors were all clean and decent.
Still, she quickly lost her appetite.
“Doesn’t the food suit your taste?”
“I don’t really enjoy meals to begin with.”
“And who’s that like?”
“That too, my mother.”
The two of them were alike in many ways. They resembled each other.
“Which part of Windsor did she hate so much?”
“That’s sudden. What are you talking about?”
“My father. I wonder what he hated so much that he despised her like that. When I was little, I thought it was my fault.”
It was around the time her mother had died in her previous life.
There was something her father had said when Charlophe was dragged into a forced marriage.
“I’ve done all I could. Now go your own way.”
You’ve done all you could? What exactly did you do?
You never gave me any choice. You talk as if I ever had one, but I didn’t.
Charlophe poked at her salad with her fork.
“You don’t look good.”
“A little. I just remembered something unpleasant.”
It felt like past memories were clinging to her ankles. In the end, Charlophe put down her utensils.
Benjamin, who had been fiddling with his glass, also finished his meal. Wiping his mouth with a napkin, he began:
“…I’ll tell you this in advance.”
“Yes?”
“The Windsor family will bleed a lot to pull you out. They’ll permanently give up your birth mother’s personal assets and tear off the rest of the businesses entirely to hand them over to Tutyer. It’ll be like offering up an arm—maybe even ripping off a whole leg. In return, Windsor will demand your disownment.”
Charlophe’s fingers trembled slightly.
Just one year. They were willing to suffer that much loss just to secure custody until she turned twenty.
“If your biological father doesn’t pull you out, you can’t leave that family. It means he’s claiming ownership of you.”
This wasn’t about custody. It was about ownership of property.
“Remember that feeling well.”
Charlophe slowly steadied her breathing. At his words, the trembling stopped. With stiff motions, she brushed the back of her neck.
“It was something I expected.”
“Yeah.”
“If it were that easy to take you out, things wouldn’t have come to this. Not for your mother, not for you, not for that household.”
Charlophe fidgeted with her fingertips. She already knew that resentment. She had etched that injustice into herself again and again.
“That’s why I kept quiet in the first place.”
Now was the time to be pushed out. Getting out of that family came first.
She chose to be abandoned instead. And so she cut out the rotten root.
Just then, a few more people entered the restaurant. Charlophe’s expression twisted along with them.
Ah.
So that’s why those memories came back.
It seems it was to make me run into you.
Benjamin also noticed her change and turned his head toward the entrance.
“Someone you know?”
“Huh?”
“You look gloomy.”
“Well… I used to, but not anymore.”
A familiar man looked around and took a seat by the window. After him, several others from his group arrived.
Dark blond hair, a neatly worn uniform.
And a clean, polished appearance.
‘Mogens Weber.’
The eldest son of the Weber family—and once, her husband.
When Charlophe had been abandoned before death, it was the Weber family who had watched that death most closely.
That neat face turned this way. Mogens didn’t recognize her and soon looked away again.
The grave of her past life.
My grave.
The man who had stood trampling on that grave.
Charlophe withdrew her gaze and gave Benjamin a small smile.
“Shall we get up?”
“What about your meal?”
“If Your Highness is done, then let’s go.”
Benjamin readily tidied up. As he passed by, Mogens turned his head.
It was only for a moment, but their eyes met. Mogens recognized Benjamin at once and approached.
“My respects, Your Highness.”
“Don’t make such a fuss outside.”
Mogens looked exactly as she remembered. That neat face held not a trace of dissonance.
He was the same as ever. With a polished demeanor, he offered her a handshake.
“I am Mogens Weber.”
Charlophe tilted her head slightly and replied.
“I’m Charlophe.”
Mogens paused as if the name sounded familiar. His eyes swept over her.
After pondering why it rang a bell, he answered belatedly:
“Charlophe Tutyer.”
“What? You know Mogens?” his friends asked, looking at her.
‘Break her legs? Tsk, just get rid of her where we can’t see.’
Another filthy memory surfaced.
Her body had merely gone numb.
And they had treated her like scrap.
Charlophe smiled as she chewed over the memories.
Mogens introduced her.
“She is a young lady of the Tutyer family.”
“Tutyer? As in Marquis Tutyer? Was there a young lady of that age in that family…?”
“Be quiet. How rude of you… My apologies, my lady.”
It was only natural they didn’t recognize her.
One side effect of Charlophe being unable to socialize while nursing her mother was that she’d lost her presence.
“What about it?”
Charlophe shrugged.
“I didn’t know you thought of me so highly.”
That hypocrisy, that pretense—it was disgusting.
“Your Highness.”
There was nothing more to say.
Charlophe called Benjamin softly.
“Let’s go.”
“Which family was that guy from again?”
“The eldest son of the Weber family. One of the Empress’s faction, and also one of the families close to the Tutyers.”
If she’d stayed bound to the Tutyers, she might’ve been dragged off to the Webers again and forced into a wedding.
“So I’ll be disowned like this, right?”
Since Windsor was already proceeding with it, nothing special would happen. This was the end.
Who abandoned whom first? Did I abandon them? Or did they abandon me?
Charlophe was the only daughter of the Tutyer family, but after being disowned, it wasn’t her concern anymore.
Now they were strangers. She had truly let go. Charlophe crouched down, clutching her knees as she choked back sobs.
When she lowered her head, long red hair spilled down, hiding her bloodshot eyes in shadow.
How many years was it? How many decades had I been held by that man, losing my life?
One cheek had been nearly crushed in the fire.
Then her body was paralyzed by Luperatic disease, left abandoned on one side of the sickbed.
You told me then, didn’t you? That even that last breath was shameful.
That the stubborn breath, clinging on, had no sense of embarrassment as it flaunted its existence.
“Charle.”
Someone called her.
“Charlophe.”
Charlophe closed her eyes.
“Charlophe Windsor.”
A shadow fell. A large presence covered her.
“You should lift your head.”
Benjamin had come close. The distance between them shrank until he stopped in front of her small head.
Charlophe lifted her head and met his eyes. Even seeing her bloodshot eyes, he just looked down quietly.
“Are you crying?”
“No.”
“Biting your lips won’t stop tears.”
Smiling, Benjamin lightly flicked the bridge of her nose. Charlophe hid herself under his shadow.
She slowly steadied her breathing, forcing the quickening breaths to calm.
Benjamin patted her head and asked again,
“Are you okay?”
“Thanks to your concern.”
“That’s good, then. But we should get moving. By now, people from the Tutyer family should have come and gone.”
Benjamin smoothly took hold of her wrist. As he gently tugged her along, she was swept up again.
“My uncle is very wary of Your Highness.”
“He’s rather harsh on me.”
“But… these past few days, I think I understand why.”
She understood why Aster was wary of Benjamin.
He naturally wielded people.
The imperial palace was prey laid before a snake, and one day he would swallow it all.
She had no doubt about that.
In her past life, she had once seen him rule tyrannically, killing family and kin alike.
Back then, he had been alone. Sitting on the throne, reigning by himself.
In the end, he broke people with terror, suppressing them and holding them in his grasp.
“Even at this moment, Your Highness reigns alone.”
You are still standing alone.
“I think I know why the Tutyer family dislikes you.”
“The Tutyers dislike me? That’s refreshing news. I’d much rather be hated than fawned over by the Empress’s dogs.”
Benjamin looked down at people with the eyes of a ruler.
That crushing gaze was familiar.
How long will you keep standing alone?
In her past life, he had continued his tyranny until the day she died.
‘But after I died, there was no way for me to know, was there?’
