Roxana
Chapter 27
Chapter 27
The Way to Protect the Female Lead’s Older Brother
Chapter 27
Watching him, Roxana felt a flicker of doubt.
How strange. There is no way he could have known this flower is poisonous.
In appearance, it seemed like an ordinary flower, and since it was a newly bred variety unique to Agriche, he could not have seen anything like it outside.
Furthermore, Yoan had snapped the stem halfway up, meaning the base where the poison concentrated was no longer there.
“If you don’t want it, I’ll just take it with me.”
“Leave it.”
Yet the reply came so firmly that Roxana blinked, a curious expression crossing her face.
What was stranger still was that Cassis flinched for a split second, looking taken aback by his own words.
He looked precisely like someone who had spoken entirely on impulse.
“You don’t have to force yourself to accept it.”
“No… Now that I think about it, having something here might be better than an empty room, just as you said.”
Even so, he showed no intention of taking it back.
With those words, Cassis took the bouquet directly from Roxana’s hands. His expression remained somewhat stiff.
Roxana could not fathom what in the world was going through his head to make him act this way.
She narrowed her eyes and studied Cassis, but she could glean nothing from him.
In the end, giving up on reading his inner thoughts, Roxana perched on the edge of the bed where he sat.
“Setting that aside, take a look at this.”
At Roxana’s words, Cassis furrowed his brow and pulled his gaze away from the flowers. Immediately afterward, he froze.
“What are you doing…”
For his eyes caught sight of Roxana slipping her hand between the parted fabric over her chest.
And so, against his will, his gaze fell right where her hand was resting.
Flustered, Cassis parted his lips to speak, only to trail off at once.
For a folded piece of paper of unknown origin was drawn out from Roxana’s hand.
Looking at the speechless Cassis, she tilted her head slightly and parted her lips.
“I didn’t have anywhere else to hide it.”
Feeling foolish for having panicked over nothing, Cassis remained silent for a moment before brushing a hand down his face and asking,
“What is that?”
“A complete blueprint of the Agriche estate.”
Right after, a silence with a slightly different weight settled between them.
Cassis’s eyes snapped up, fixing intently on Roxana’s face before him.
“Why are you staring like that? I told you I’d help you get out of here.”
Even under his piercing gaze, Roxana merely spoke in a calm, matter-of-fact tone.
“Look at it and memorize it right now. I’m going to burn it before I leave.”
Cassis looked down at the paper Roxana had spread out over the bed.
The blueprint drawn on it was remarkably detailed. It depicted not only the interior of the buildings but also the entire layout of the grounds surrounding the mansion.
“From your perspective, you must still have doubts, right? It’s difficult right now, but I’ll arrange for you to take a look around the estate grounds soon. You can see for yourself then whether I’m trying to trick you with a fake map.”
He had never imagined she would go so far as to prepare something like this and show it to him.
Roxana had even added that he should verify it with his own eyes later, as if it were only natural for him to suspect the blueprint might be a trap.
In truth, Cassis had not expected anyone to assist him in escaping Agriche.
That was why he had never asked anything of Roxana first and had focused solely on recovering his strength.
His plan had been to heal his injuries to a reasonable degree, assess the situation, break the chains himself, and make his escape.
Cassis studied Roxana’s face in silence for a brief moment.
Then, lowering his gaze, he examined the blueprint of Agriche.
“Where is this room located?”
“Here.”
It was just as Roxana had said before. Seeing it mapped out like this, the entire Agriche estate truly looked like one massive labyrinth.
Though there might not be zero ways out if one searched every nook and cranny, looking at the layout made it seem exceedingly difficult to find a path leading outside.
Of course, there remained the possibility that this blueprint was a fake designed to mislead him. But with no way to verify its authenticity for now, questioning it was meaningless.
“And the shortcut I know is this way. I’m probably the only one in Agriche who knows about it. I happened upon it by chance in the past.”
The place Roxana pointed to was inside the mansion, not outside.
“A secret passage connected to the manor?”
“Yes. There’s a minor catch to using that route… but it’s still the best option available.”
Cassis seemed to have memorized the entire blueprint after just a single sweep of his eyes.
It had taken her days to draft this, yet he needed only a few minutes to commit it to memory.
Roxana felt somewhat hollow, but that was naturally far better than staring at the paper until it wore through without remembering a thing.
A moment later, she caught the flame from the candlestick, burned the paper to ashes, and left the room.
After Roxana departed, Cassis traced the blueprint in his mind once more.
Then his eyes happened to fall upon the bouquet beside him.
A faint frown creased Cassis’s brow.
What Roxana had brought was undeniably a poisonous flower. Of course, Cassis did not even know its name.
Yet wafting faintly along with its floral fragrance was without a doubt the subtle presence of poison.
Because the amount was so minuscule, he could not tell how it might affect the human body, but he still felt uneasy letting Roxana carry it back with her. More than that, Roxana had clearly mentioned earlier that she often received gifts like this.
‘She said it was a gift from her father’s subordinate.’
From the look of things earlier, Roxana didn’t seem to realize what this flower truly was…
Could the faint scent of poison he detected from her be related to this as well?
Earlier, he had refrained from speaking up lest he seem meddlesome without cause, but he could not help feeling bothered by it.
With a lingering unease, Cassis looked down at the flowers, then reached his hand toward them.
A brittle crunch sounded.
The flowers, vibrant just moments ago, began to weep sap and wither. In no time, they dried up completely and crumbled to dust.
It was the backlash of his power. Cassis furrowed his brow as he looked at the brittle petals caught beneath his fingertips.
Though it was a top-secret matter, the power of purification and healing was inherited through the Pedelian bloodline.
Yet due to circumstances, the only power he could currently wield was a faint purification.
That was why Cassis had been so quick to detect the scent of poison radiating from the flower.
The reason he had been able to consume the food and mysterious medicines Roxana handed him was that he knew even if they contained poison, they would not severely harm his body.
Still, because the restraints were suppressing his power, even that purification ability did not activate at will.
Cassis glared with displeasure at the remnants of the flowers scattered over the bed, then swept them away.
* * *
“Roxana. Has your toy become a bit more obedient than before?”
What rotten luck today was. As if running into Maria during the day wasn’t enough, now it had to be Lant.
Roxana swallowed her irritation as she looked at Lant Agriche before her.
He was seated in a large chair with his legs crossed.
Holding a glass in one hand while propping his chin with the other, he appeared exceedingly indolent.
“More so than at first.”
She felt as though fortune was working against her today, but what choice did she have?
Roxana curved the corners of her lips into a smile for Lant Agriche.
“As expected of lowborn scum, there is still much to teach him.”
“Indeed. That gutter-rat blood of his wasn’t going anywhere.”
Lant Agriche snorted in amusement, as if he understood completely.
He was a despicable and cruel man, yet he had a simple side, and joining him in disparaging the Pedelians was often enough to soften his characteristically sharp demeanor.
“Still, breaking him makes it all the more entertaining. If he had been overly meek from the start, I would have been disappointed instead.”
What flowed from Roxana’s luscious red lips was a voice as clear and melodious as jade pearls, yet the content of her words was anything but.
“Perhaps because he is a toy Father gave me, I am especially fond of him. Once I patch up the broken parts a little more, I think I can truly begin playing with him in earnest.”
Upon the angelically beautiful girl’s face spread a smile tinged with an eerie cruelty.
Lant Agriche gazed silently at his daughter before suddenly curling one corner of his mouth upward.
“The more I look at you, the more you truly take after me.”
