TLDWAE 16

Chapter 16

Karia hesitated for a moment, wondering if she should say something polite, but she was far too uneasy now to bother appeasing anyone.

“Even as empty words, I can’t say I feel comfortable. I imagine it must be the same for Your Grace, the Grand Duchess.”

“I do not hate you.”

“Nor do you like me, do you?”

She didn’t say it accusingly. In truth, there was no reason to accuse her. If anyone owed compensation for Karia’s wretched childhood, it was the Grand Duke, not his wife.

Just as Karia herself had found it hard to deal with Lady Lamia and Lord Christan, so too must the Grand Duchess have been even more unsettled by an illegitimate child her husband had never even consulted her about.

Karia understood well that the Grand Duchess had been quite merciful to her.

“You don’t need to force yourself on my account. Some things in this world simply don’t match. Isn’t that how you see it?”

“Karia—”

“I’ll take my leave now.”

The Grand Duchess reluctantly gave permission as Karia bowed politely. With a deep sigh, the Duchess pressed her brow, and Alcard quickly moved to support his mother.

Leaving the affectionate pair behind, Karia slowly made her way down the corridor toward the entrance hall.

“Ah—”

Suddenly, her legs gave out beneath her. Her heart pounded wildly, and heat spread through her body. She was undone.

“They kept me waiting too long.”

Karia bit down hard, stifling the scream threatening to burst out. Was it ‘the flames of hell will burn’? Yes, this pain was exactly like that curse.

“But still, it’s nothing compared to back then.”

Compared to losing her husband, her heart itself, and her child, her very soul—this pain was nothing.

“What’s wrong?”

A deep, low voice, unbearably resonant, pressed into her ears as she broke out in cold sweat. She lifted her head—and through the shadows, a pair of crimson eyes locked onto hers.

“—Karia?”

“Grenberik.”

Grenberik Luteberth. The Grand Duke’s eldest son and heir, the spitting image of his father in his younger days.

“—Why are you so startled? Have I come somewhere I shouldn’t?”

And he was the man she dreaded most among all the royals.

‘Your mother sold you for ten thousand gold. This candlestick costs thirteen thousand. That makes you worth less than a candlestick.’

The boy who had always been praised as dignified and thoughtful—why had he been so cruel to a younger sibling who had nothing?

Karia had been cut and scraped raw by the sharp stones of his words, left ragged and torn. To her, he was a calamity, a natural disaster. Whenever she met him, her heart grew cold, dark, and miserable.

“……”

When Karia glared at him with venom in her eyes, Grenberik grimaced sharply and said nothing for a long time.

After staring at her face in silence, he turned away and walked past her. A blatant dismissal.

“Steward! It’s far too late tonight. Prepare a room—I’ll be staying here!”

Karia shouted deliberately, making sure Grenberik would hear her. Truth be told, this mansion was uncomfortable for her.

But if there was anyone more unsettled by her presence than she was by theirs—she was willing to endure all discomfort.

She spent the whole night swallowing her pain and finally drifted into sleep at dawn. Perhaps it was a blessing she hadn’t fainted outright like last time. She thought someone might notice her unease and knock at her door, but no one disturbed her chamber until the late morning, when she rose on her own.

She had wanted to show her face at breakfast, if only to make Grenberik squirm, but when she came down to the dining hall, not only was he gone, the entire ducal family had already left the estate.

So Karia slipped out of the Grand Duke’s castle unnoticed and returned quietly to the forest. She tied her horse to a pillar of the main fortress—since the old stables had collapsed—and as she approached, she found Andeon and Alice quarreling through a second-story window.

<Lady Alice, you mustn’t touch things without permission! >

<I’m just cleaning! Cleaning! >

<Why the treasure vault, when there’s plenty of living space to tidy?! >

“You two seem to have grown close.”

At Karia’s voice, both Andeon and Alice turned toward her.

<Master! >
<Mama! >

For all their bickering, both golems beamed with joy at the sight of her.

Especially Alice, who leapt onto Andeon’s shoulder, slid down his arm like a slide, and landed before Karia.

<Alice, you must call her Master, not Mama. >

<But you said she was my mama. >

<I said she’s like a mother, not that she is your mother! >

<Hmm, so she’s Mama but not Mama? >

Alice tilted her round head quizzically.

<Then I don’t have to listen if I don’t want to? >

<Alice! >

“It’s fine. What’s in a title? Call me however you like.”

If she quibbled over every little thing, she’d never get a single errand done. When Karia waved it off, Alice smugly tilted up her chin—where she’d even picked up that posture, who knew?

Karia chuckled at the absurdity, then blinked in shock. Something gleamed far too brightly around Alice’s neck.

“And what’s that gaudy thing dangling around your throat?”

<Ah, this! >

“—That’s my necklace.”

Not just any necklace, but one set with a sapphire larger than a fist, barely cut at all—a treasure of the castle.

The great magician Asmoph had never been greedy for adornments, but sometimes rare jewels arrived as gifts, or he found them in the course of alchemy, and he had stored them away.

That necklace was among the most precious, bought at auction for a hundred kilos of gold. And now it swung around Alice’s neck, scraping against her stone body with every step.

<Andeon said it’s a necklace. You wear it around your neck. Alice found it while cleaning! >

“—Cleaning the treasure vault, of all places.”

Alice grinned, proud. She had actually found far more, and now she pulled out a heap of necklaces, bracelets, belts, and brooches from her waist.

Karia pressed her forehead with a heavy sigh. Priceless jewels, scuffed without care in Alice’s rough little hands.

<Mama, do you want one too? >

“Ah, I suppose you don’t realize—everything in there already belongs to me. That means what’s around your neck is mine as well. Hand it back.”

<Why? I want to keep this one. >

<Alice! >

Alice generously returned the rest, but clutched at the necklace with fierce determination—the most valuable piece of all.

<Mama already has plenty! And Mama’s neck is only one, so you only need one necklace! >

Alice screeched in protest, so loudly Karia had to cover her ears. She probably didn’t even know its worth, and yet children had such strange fixations.

Thinking back, even Edi, when he was two or three, had been mesmerized by jewels. If he saw her earrings sparkle in the sun while she held him, he would reach for them with his tiny leaf-like hands—strong enough that once, she nearly lost an ear.

Now, as Alice escalated from grating noise to full alarm-bell shrieks, Karia finally threw up her hands.

“Fine, fine! Keep it then.”

<Yay! I win! >

<Master, you shouldn’t indulge her like this. >

“She’s still a baby. She’ll grow out of it in time.”

Karia chose not to overthink it. Alice wouldn’t sell the necklace, and when she grew bored, she’d give it back.

Alice was her golem, and the jewels were hers as well—just shifting from one hand to another.

Still, she gathered the rest of the recovered treasures and went into the castle. On the second floor, she found the vault door broken, the wood splintered—surely Alice’s doing.

In her day, the vault had been sealed by magic. But the enchantments had since unraveled, leaving it pitiful.

The half-wiped glass cases and the dust rolled into balls on the carpet confirmed Alice’s handiwork.

“Can’t tell if she’s cleaning or wrecking.”

With another sigh, Karia went deeper into the vault and pushed aside a framed painting on the wall. Behind it lay a hidden handle. She turned it, and with a cracking sound, a seamless wall split open to reveal a door.

Inside the secret room lay a mountain of gold.

“A bit tarnished, but not bad. Alice, load a bag of this onto the horse I rode here.”

<Gold? This is gold? >

<Master, why gold, all of a sudden— >

Karia had realized something vital in yesterday’s conversation with the Grand Duke. No matter if she was his daughter, no matter if she was royalty—without power of her own, she could not do anything.

And when she saw poor Duke Pandeon, sold for two million gold, she felt it keenly: true power comes not from birth, but from wealth.

This castle might be hers, but she could never declare it. In this ignorant age, she could not even explain magic properly, nor would she want to—doing so would only bring misery.

Yet within the castle remained the vast fortune she had once amassed. Back then, she hadn’t needed to rely on gold, for nothing and no one could stand in her way.

But that was the past. Now, gold was a strength she would not dismiss.