🔊 TTS Settings
Chapter – 05
On Molly’s face, which openly showed worry, Brielle quickly added,
“Molly, you know how strong and thorough I am. If anything happens, I can run immediately.”
After defending herself with such zeal, Brielle dashed to the storage room and soon returned with something in hand. What she held were clothes that would fit a teenage boy.
“That outfit is…”
“Remember? It’s what Austin used to wear a few years ago. I’m going to disguise myself as a man with this.”
“…….”
Molly silently stared at Brielle, who was cheerfully holding up the men’s clothing. Then, as if having made a decision, she slowly spoke.
“Change into the clothes and come out. I’ll adjust them so you won’t have any discomfort while moving.”
“Wow, Molly’s the best!”
While Molly mended the clothes with her needlework, Brielle gave a brief explanation of the first person she intended to punish.
“Baron Sutton. He’s in his late forties.”
“He’s just a nobility title with nothing special. He married a wealthy commoner woman and gradually siphoned off her fortune. When his sickly wife couldn’t produce an heir, he demanded a divorce—a despicable man.”
The wife refused firmly, but he even bribed the judge to finalize the divorce. Now, he kicked his wife out of the mansion he bought with her money and moved in his mistress.
“…So, he’s the first one I decided to punish.”
“Ugh… I guess he really does need to be punished. But I still don’t get why you have to do it.”
That was because Baron Sutton was one of the people listed in those documents.
Instead of explaining the reason honestly, Brielle just smiled faintly.
“All done, miss. Try it on.”
By then, Molly’s hands had perfected Brielle’s work clothes. She left enough room to hide Brielle’s body curves, removed unnecessary decorations, and increased mobility.
“Maybe you should run a tailor shop instead of a café. Molly, there’s nothing you can’t do. You even chop firewood well.”
“You’re too kind. Honestly, thanks to you, this first robbery will go smoothly.”
Brielle’s flurry of praise made Molly blush briefly, but her expression hardened at the next words.
After glancing at Brielle, who laughed at her change, Molly added a warning.
“Don’t get hurt.”
“Of course. There’s no one in the world who cherishes their body more than me.”
Brielle then lifted her hair, put on a wig, applied quick stage makeup, and pointed to her face with a smile.
“Ta-da! Even you wouldn’t recognize me, right? I’ll be back soon!”
She cheerfully declared her departure and headed out through the backyard—but Molly’s urgent shout stopped her.
“Wait! You’re not going out unarmed!”
“Don’t worry. I have a gun.”
“What if it misfires or runs out of bullets? The sound alone could be dangerous. So just wait a moment!”
“Even so, a few punches should be enough to knock them down…”
While Brielle scratched her wig awkwardly, Molly hurried to the café kitchen.
“This is too sharp… this is too small… and this is too big…”
After examining several items, Molly returned to Brielle with something in her hands.
“Is this… a weapon?”
“It may look shabby, but it’s actually pretty good. When I was a teenager, I used this to knock out a guy who tried to harass me. Here—hit the vital spot here.”
Molly handed Brielle a wooden club called a rolling pin, normally used for kneading dough, pointing to the spot near the neck.
‘It really fits nicely in the hand,’ Brielle thought. The male clothes had deep pockets, perfect for storing it.
“Then let’s go for real!”
As darkness fully descended, Brielle’s second career officially began. Her heart pounded even more than during the day.
Disguised as a newspaper delivery boy, Brielle walked along the alley dimly lit by gas lamps, murmuring her goal quietly.
“Since the punishment is late, I’ll make them pay interest too.”
Following the path, she soon reached a dead-end street devoid of people. Brielle lightly leapt onto a roof, landing steadily.
Tap, tap, tap.
She ran across rooftops, leapt to the next, and ran again—her movements fluid, a result of her experience escaping from the underground of the Taylor Baron estate.
Her destination was the mansion of Baron Mark Sutton, where he lived with his mistress, Gloria, after taking it from his ex-wife.
Before marriage, he had nothing, yet here he was living lavishly in a mansion with a large garden in the city’s wealthy district.
The fact that he fattened himself with his ex-wife’s fortune was infuriating, but what made Brielle even angrier was that his fellow nobles covered for him.
His ex-wife, Diane, had done her best to defend herself, and several household staff provided favorable testimony.
Yet in court, Diane’s witnesses were dismissed as bribed. Even her plea that she had no money to bribe anyone fell on deaf ears.
The jury, composed of nobles listed in the documents, instead scrutinized her humble origins. They claimed that the “allegiance of ordinary folk to their master is a lie,” effectively discrediting the witnesses. It was absurd.
“What a rotten group.”
Suppressing her anger, Brielle moved quickly. Soon, she reached Baron Sutton’s mansion.
The mansion was isolated; no neighboring houses were nearby. Brielle observed the entrance and garden from the nearest roof, then safely landed on the ground. She already knew the layout of the house from prior reconnaissance.
Recently, Baron Sutton had been busy thanking the nobles who helped him, so the mistress Gloria was effectively running the household in his absence.
Brielle had learned from a servant that Gloria lived luxuriously in the room formerly used by the Baron’s wife.
This was not good news; it made reaching her target—a diamond ring—more difficult.
‘No choice. I’ll just have to take it right in front of her.’
Brielle approached the rear of the mansion, climbing along the wall to a tree. Moving across trees and branches, she drew closer to the house. Occasionally, servants appeared in the garden, but she entered the mansion without incident.
‘Gloria’s room is at the very back of the second floor.’
Brielle visualized the interior, noting that there were almost no sounds. She planned to enter through a window next to Gloria’s room.
The room was dark. Brielle blinked quickly, letting her eyes adjust, and then made a surprising discovery:
A large hole in the wall connected to Gloria’s room.
‘This wasn’t in the blueprint…’
Curious, Brielle approached the hole. Pressing her ear against it, she heard a woman’s voice—Gloria’s—and a young man’s voice.
“Do you have the jewels I gave you?”
“Yes. I’ll sell them in another city to avoid suspicion. I’ll also check out a place for us to live.”
“Ha… Almost done, Fletcher. Just a bit more from the Baron.”
‘So the mistress has a lover hidden in here.’
Brielle realized the purpose of the hole: the moment the Baron returned, Gloria could hide her lover here.
‘You stole someone else’s life for your own benefit… and yet, you complain about it.’
Quickly thinking, Brielle revised her plan.
Originally, she intended to steal the ring and punish the Baron outside. But since it had come to this, it would be better to handle everything inside the mansion.
She decided to wait for Baron Sutton to return, prompting his lover Fletcher to hide in this room.
