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Chapter 6
The Aftermath of the Passing Shower
‘Was that just an insult aimed at me?’
Leopold, who had suddenly been compared to a dog, deeply furrowed his brow.
Even considering she was half-asleep, the situation was still absurd. She had never even properly met him before, yet she was cursing at him. What exactly had he done?
“Hah!”
Letting out a low scoff, Leopold abruptly tossed the coat he had been holding to the side.
Fine then. She could freeze to death for all he cared.
This was exactly why one shouldn’t start doing things that weren’t in their nature. What nonsense had possessed him to suddenly develop even the slightest shred of humanity when he didn’t even bother raising any?
The pride of Leopold Otero had nearly been wounded.
And yet, despite himself, his lingering gaze still drifted toward Violetta.
“She really won’t wake up even once.”
Should he call it sleeping peacefully?
With that ambiguous thought lingering in his mind, Leopold leaned back deeper into the darkness once more.
Not long after, the rattling carriage gradually came to a stop.
Leopold slightly lifted the curtain.
Just as expected, the red-roofed house on 10th Street in Terdo District stood before him.
The aftermath of the passing shower lasted four whole days.
Naturally, only for Violetta.
“Oh honestly! Why were you standing out there getting soaked in the rain?! Your body’s weak enough already!”
Reina—Violetta’s milk sibling and former personal maid—pressed a cold towel firmly against Violetta’s pale forehead while scolding her angrily.
When it rains, shouldn’t people think about taking shelter first?
Reina shot a resentful glare at the young lady who clearly didn’t appreciate how worried she was.
Since childhood, Violetta had always been frail and sickly. Once she fell ill, she would usually remain bedridden for at least a week. Even the late baroness had rarely taken her into high society because of it.
Even though her daughter was so beautiful she must have wanted to show her off everywhere.
“I swear, this is unbearable.”
Reina’s grumbling filled the quiet room.
Lying helplessly in bed, Violetta only gave a faint smile.
“Reina, I made some porridge, so feed the young lady later. Don’t forget her medicine either.”
Mrs. Marie, already dressed for work at the textile factory, poked her head through the doorway.
A plain work scarf neatly covered her graying hair, which was tied back properly.
Already exhausted from repeating the same instructions several times, Reina weakly nodded in agreement. Yet Mrs. Marie still glanced back at Violetta worriedly.
“Miss, take care of yourself, alright? I’ll be back later.”
“…Yes. Don’t worry about me.”
Even with her throat hoarse from the severe fever and cold, Violetta answered with a smile.
After Mrs. Marie left, Reina returned from the kitchen carrying porridge and sat beside the bed, carefully helping Violetta sit up.
Her already pale skin looked even whiter than usual.
Remembering the culprit behind all this made Reina clench her fists tightly.
“That damn bastard Dante Lopez. That crazy princess. And that lunatic duke too!”
Four days earlier, she had nearly fainted from shock upon seeing Violetta completely drenched from the rain.
The moment she entered the house, she had collapsed unconscious.
And the first thing Violetta said after waking the next day was—
“I got hurt again.”
With just those few words, both Reina and Mrs. Marie immediately understood what had happened.
How many times had it been now?
The men who kept hurting Violetta infuriated them, but even more hateful was the princess who had tormented her for years.
What had their young lady ever done wrong?
Yet somehow, an even worse person had now entered the picture.
‘Duke Otero… told him to break up with me.’
According to what Violetta had explained after regaining some strength, that idiot Dante Lopez claimed the duke had pressured him to leave her.
Apparently the excuse was simply that their “status levels” didn’t match.
“What kind of nonsense is that?!”
No matter how much she thought about it, Reina couldn’t calm her anger.
Violetta only smiled bitterly at the outburst.
“…Forget it. I’ve already forgotten everything.”
“No, but did the duke really say something like that? Why? There’s no reason!”
“Maybe Dante was lying. And even if it’s true, there’s nothing I can do about it.”
Reina beat her chest dramatically as she argued.
“What do you mean there’s nothing you can do?! You should at least figure out who’s right and wrong! If Dante lied, then he tarnished the duke’s reputation and deserves punishment. And if it’s true, then you have every right to ask why!”
Violetta fidgeted with her fingers.
Though reluctant, she clearly seemed to have considered the same thing herself.
Reina immediately seized the opportunity.
“Think about it. Please? Don’t just bottle it all up. At least get revenge.”
“Reina, revenge leaves nothing behind. It’s pointless.”
But Violetta, who preferred clean and straightforward solutions, rejected the idea firmly.
Frustrated, Reina smacked her own forehead and sighed deeply.
As though comforting her, Violetta gently rubbed the reddened spot on Reina’s forehead and asked softly—
“By the way… has there been any letter from Lucas?”
Lucas Hernandez was Violetta’s younger brother and the young master of the house.
Around the beginning of every new school term, he always sent a letter without fail, proudly reporting that he had once again secured a scholarship to ease his sister’s burden even slightly.
But perhaps because it was his final year, the letter was arriving later than usual.
“Young master Lucas’s letter… still hasn’t come yet.”
“…Still?”
“No. But some other letters arrived. Do you want to see them?”
“Mm. Alright.”
Soon Reina returned carrying a stack of letters.
After receiving them, Violetta carefully opened the envelope labeled Ecla Sierra first.
But—
The more she read, the more confusion and shock filled her previously calm face.
After finishing the letter, Violetta spoke in a trembling voice.
“Then… whose carriage did I ride home in?”
She reread the letter again and again in disbelief, but the contents remained the same.
[You returned home safely that day, right?
I was so flustered that I ended up taking the carriage first and leaving before realizing it. I cried all day, and then suddenly remembered that I had left Miss Hernandez behind, so I became worried and decided to write.
—Ecla Sierra]
Rental carriages couldn’t simply be boarded because they happened to be empty by the roadside.
The fare had to be paid in advance through the carriage guild before one was assigned a carriage.
Then why…?
As far as Violetta could remember, the coachman had let her aboard without complaint.
That was why she had safely returned home without sensing anything strange.
“Reina… I definitely came home by carriage, right?”
“Uh… yes. The carriage was still outside until you entered the house.”
“And they never asked for payment afterward?”
“They just left. Why? What happened?”
Violetta stared blankly at the increasingly worried Reina before murmuring—
“Did I… get possessed by a ghost?”
Otherwise, none of this made sense.
Like someone dazed, Violetta hurriedly opened the remaining letters as well.
Perhaps a carriage bill had arrived afterward.
But her trembling hands only dropped emptily onto the blanket.
Scattered beneath them were nothing but debt notices from victims of the old investment fraud case and various unpaid bills.
Biting her lip, Violetta tried piecing together her fragmented memories of that day.
It rained.
She boarded a carriage.
She came home.
Was there something she missed?
It rained.
She met the coachman and told him her destination.
She boarded the carriage.
She came home.
There was no problem.
No… wait.
Her tapping finger suddenly stopped atop the letter envelope.
What about inside the carriage? Was someone else already there?
All she remembered was the dim darkness caused by the gloomy weather.
And with the fever clouding her mind, her memories inside the carriage were smeared and blurry, like water spilled over a painting.
Honestly, even those fragmented memories hardly felt real.
The only thing that remained clearly in her head was—
“Duke… Otero?”
“The duke? What about the duke? What happened?”
“No, no. That can’t be right.”
Violetta violently shook her head.
Beneath dark black hair—
cold silver eyes.
Surely that had only been a dream.
A dream where she openly cursed at the duke right to his face.
‘That bastard Duke Otero.’
The vivid sound of her own voice suddenly resurfaced, and the hazy memory sharpened as though fog had cleared away.
In the dream, the duke had said nothing.
He only looked down at her coldly, as though she were insignificant.
As though silently agreeing with Dante’s words:
“You’re not a woman suited to your status.”
And that must have been the moment—
‘That bastard Duke Otero.’
—when she had spat out the curse she had kept buried inside.
In a way, it was merely the aftermath of the breakup.
A dream born from resentment she hadn’t been able to release in reality.
Though she never expected the target of that resentment to be the duke instead of Erika or Dante.
Haha, yes.
Which only proved even more that it wasn’t real.
It couldn’t possibly be real.
And yet—
“Why do I feel so uneasy?”
Sudden anxiety washed over her, and Violetta clutched her head with both hands.
This was all because Dante Lopez had mentioned the duke while making excuses—and because of the illustration of the duke she had seen in the newspaper.
That was why she had such a dream.
Yes. That had to be it.
And if she still couldn’t settle her mind…
Then she should simply confirm it herself.
Violetta grabbed Reina’s hand tightly.
“I need to ask the carriage guild.”
This had to be a dream.
At least, for Rodrigo—the emperor of the Garcia Empire—it absolutely had to be.
[If the Garcia Empire does not compensate us
for the broken engagement your side unilaterally caused,
the Kingdom of Kutan is prepared to go to war.]
A telegram resembling a declaration sat openly before him.
It demanded payment for the sins of his foolish son, who had recklessly shattered a marriage alliance.
And honestly, it was a reasonable demand.
If their rival kingdom had voluntarily handed them such an opportunity, he wouldn’t have ignored it either.
Seated upon the imperial throne, Rodrigo pressed his aching temples.
“How do you intend to deal with this?”
His anger-filled voice echoed through the cold audience chamber.
Kneeling before the platform, his son Ian remained silent for an entire hour.
Despite being the empire’s sole heir!
Rodrigo gripped the golden armrest so tightly the veins stood out across his hand.
“If you don’t want this armrest to become your neck, then answer me! How do you plan to resolve this disaster?!”
