-----------------------------------------------------------------
Translator: Vine
Chapter: 15
Chapter Title: My Enemy Sister Cares for Me
-----------------------------------------------------------------
“I've heard the story, but please calm down, Madam.”
Osen tried his best to calmly admonish her, but Clarissa scoffed as if she'd been waiting for that.
“If I calm down, I'll be the one sinking. You've heard what that girl Callista did to my nephew, haven't you?”
The quiet lasted only a moment. She quickly pressed Osen even faster than before. He stammered in response.
“Well... the Elder Council Chairman is also very concerned.”
“Of course. That old fox is useless without Evans' errand boy.”
Osen wiped away his cold sweat, looking embarrassed.
He was originally the head of a vassal family managing the Luperne Ducal Family's maritime business.
Since handing the business over to his son and becoming the Vice-Chairman of the Elder Council, it had become his daily routine to be harangued, caught between the ill-tempered Clarissa and the even more ill-tempered Chairman.
“No, well, the Chairman said he'd even send a doctor for young Louis...”
“Who asked for treatment? What good is a doctor when my own hands and feet are being cut off?”
“Pardon?”
“It means I'm losing all my people in the Luperne family. Especially Leroy, you know how crucial he was for securing funds, don't you? Half of the gold bars I had hidden away were originally mine! That wretched brat, I could chew him up and it wouldn't be enough...!”
As Clarissa pounded the table and shouted, Osen's eyes widened further.
“And they say they're going to exclude the Evans family from food suppliers and staff recruitment now! That damned Theon...!”
In other words, the Duchess of Luperne wasn't worried about the well-being of her subordinates, but rather about her own precarious position. Especially the financial pipeline she had been secretly embezzling through Leroy.
“Madam, if we just look into a few more people...”
“There's no time for 'looking into people'! With no one left, that girl Callista has returned, so...”
Clarissa gritted her teeth and glared at the innocent Osen. She picked up the cup on the table, gulped down a cup of tea, and then spoke again in a slightly calmer voice.
“So, about that plan the Chairman mentioned before, I think we need to move it forward a little earlier.”
“Pardon?”
Osen asked again, his face turning ashen.
“It means I can't keep getting my hands and feet from only the Evans family forever. If she's to be the Luperne Ducal Family's future physician, wouldn't she make a perfectly fine maid for me?”
“A, a maid? That child is from the Mueller Count Family...”
“That's precisely why it would be even more amusing to crush her and make her serve as a subordinate. I've been wanting to humble that stiff neck of hers, especially since she attends the Academy of Medicine.”
Clarissa wore a twisted smile.
“Didn't the Chairman propose this plan first? To capture that girl first, draw in the Mueller family, and then bring down that Callista girl to install another successor.”
“That's right.”
Osen wiped his cold sweat again and nodded.
It had been several years since Clarissa and the Chairman secretly joined hands.
At the time, the Chairman had found enjoyment in wielding immense power by suppressing the incompetent and listless Duke of Luperne, and he had no desire to ever relinquish that position.
Meanwhile, Clarissa needed people who could help her bring her own allies into the family.
Both sides exchanged various forms of help, but they primarily agreed on one thing: if Callista became the official successor to Luperne, they would all be ruined.
Therefore, the Chairman and Clarissa did their best, first, to sow discord between Callista and the Duke, and second, to undermine Callista's position.
The problem was that the latter wasn't going very well, and the key to solving this was Vittori Mueller.
“But that plan still needs some time...”
“How frustrating. Did you think I'd just sit idly by?”
As Osen tried to explain, Clarissa glared at him again, her eyes wide.
“After the Leroy incident, I instructed Danny. To give Vittori a drug along with a stimulant to accelerate addiction. She'll be used to strong tea aromas, so even a genius doctor wouldn't know.”
“Oh! Is that true?”
“She's probably already addicted to Kori Berries without even knowing it. To the point where if she suddenly stopped taking them, she couldn't possibly survive.”
Clarissa smiled coldly at Osen, whose eyes were wide like a rabbit's in surprise.
She and the Chairman had prepared for quite a long time to attach someone to Vittori.
From the moment they succeeded in placing Danny, a distant relative of Evans, as a maid by faking her as an orphan, they began feeding Vittori berries with narcotic properties.
The original goal was to administer it little by little over a long period, but Clarissa, made anxious by the Leroy incident, recently found an accelerant that would double the drug's effect.
And through this, she confirmed that there would be no problem accelerating the point of full addiction.
“How fortunate. The fact that Kori Berries are one of the few things that grow in the desolate Evans territory.”
“Heaven must have intervened!”
Osen, who had been flustered moments ago, now chimed in with a brightened face.
“I already suspected she was addicted, but with the accelerant, there's no need to wait any longer.”
“Exactly. We must approach them now, taking advantage of the chaos caused by the recent return of both the Mueller siblings and Callista. Callista's upcoming graduation celebration would be the perfect timing.”
Clarissa's eyes gleamed sharply as she stared at Osen once more. Osen looked at her with an inwardly admiring gaze before nodding.
“If that's the case, then the Chairman will put his full effort into it this time.”
“There must be no mistakes.”
“Of course. It's a simple matter for someone addicted to Kori Berries, for which there's no antidote. Not taking it would be more agonizing than death itself, so why would they throw their life away?”
Osen leaned back on the sofa, as if all his tension had suddenly released. Clarissa, too, wore the same twisted smile as before.
“And remember. This must not leak out to anyone.”
She added in a low voice.
“Hahaha, you worry too much.”
Osen replied with a grin.
“Unless they're a prophet, who else could possibly know and prepare for our plan?”
They looked at each other and exchanged a satisfied handshake.
Of course, they didn't know. That prophets weren't the only ones who could predict the future.
***
“How about the one on the right?”
“Hmm.”
“Then the one in the middle?”
“Hmphhh...”
“Don't tell me, the one on the left?”
“Mmm.”
Jena furrowed her brow as much as possible, agonizing seriously for an hour.
“Can't I just wear anything?”
I, who was already exhausted from trying to accommodate her, pleaded, but she gravely shook her head.
“It's not your first time attending a banquet.”
“But it's the first time I've had more than three options. Lord Theon gave me more allowance than usual, so...”
That's right. Following the Leroy embezzlement incident, Theon began personally handling the minor household affairs that Clarissa used to manage. Thanks to this, I could receive my full allowance, which she used to siphon off about 80% of.
My living conditions improved thanks to this, and I even had three dress options, but why did Jena's worries increase?
“Which dress...”
She glared at the three dresses laid out on the bed, her expression showing maximum concentration. All of them were outfits prepared for Callista's graduation celebration.
“...will be the least noticeable?”
“Oh, for heaven's sake.”
I sighed.
Jena wasn't worrying about how to make her mistress stand out, like other maids. She was looking for what I could wear to avoid offending Callista.
Her cautiousness was remarkable, both in my previous life and this one. However, if Jena had used that caution for her own safety in my previous life, it seemed she was using it more for my sake in this life.
In this situation, being too cautious was the problem, though.
“If possible, something white or pink...”
I opened my mouth, looking from one to another of the three dresses on the bed.
One was as white as snow, another a light pink like a rose, and the last was a slightly dark yellow that might have been called gold if it shimmered.
The last one was unique for a dress. Its color was like ocher, or perhaps a yellowish ox, and what's more...
“I've decided. Let's go with the yellow one on the left.”
“Oh! That's the ugliest one!”
The design was also tacky and ugly. To the point where one couldn't tell what era it was made in.
“Exactly. The banquet hall and several other rooms are painted gold, so you won't be easily seen, Lady.”
She smiled contentedly and helped me change. Soon, I sat before the mirror, looking as if I'd been smeared with bright mud.
“I'll still comb your hair beautifully. No ornaments, though.”
“...Can't I just not go?”
I mumbled with a sulky face. The confidence that had recently risen after being called 'cute' seemed to drain away.
“You should still make an appearance. Besides, guests are coming from far-off remote areas today. It should be fine to stay away from the center and mingle with them.”
“Remote areas?”
I asked, puzzled. Callista's graduation celebration had been held in my previous life too, but guests had only flocked from the central parts of Luperne back then.
“Even without Father, guests are coming from remote areas?”
“Yes. Someone from the Naitra family is coming.”
Thump-
I put down the hand mirror I had picked up to see my back on the table.
“Naitra...?”
“Yes. I believe they were invited due to their acquaintance with Elder Council Chairman Igard... What's wrong?”
I know. Their acquaintance with the Elder Council Chairman. But that's not all.
The Naitra family was a family that, in the shadows, handled all sorts of immoral and illegal affairs for the Elder Council—specifically, for the Chairman—including assassinations.
In my previous life, Callista had killed them all and cultivated her own assassins, and the catalyst for that was...
“...Vittori will be at the banquet too, right?”
Jena nodded as I asked with a stiff expression. My hands, clenched without my knowledge, trembled slightly.
In my previous life, the Naitra family had only come to a Luperne banquet once. To corner Vittori and threaten her.
On that very day, after they had visited, Vittori took her own life.
But that was supposed to happen almost two years from now... Could something have changed?
“Jena.”
“Yes?”
Even though I didn't think it would be the case, I decided to make at least some preparations.
“I have something to tell Theon.”
I scribbled a short message on any paper I could find and handed it to Jena, who was blinking, completely bewildered.
“Make sure to deliver it before the banquet.”
Having finished speaking, I swept out of the room, the hem of my yellowish dress fluttering.
