Translator: Nox

The Baddest Villainess Is Back

Chapter 4

As soon as she finished speaking, the other servants began dragging the three maids away.

“Wa-wait a moment! This is a misunderstanding! It’s a mistake!”

“Yes, Lady-to-be! My Lady! Lady Carmel!”

“Little Duchess!! It wasn’t us!”

Visible panic washed over Carmel. She gaped, looking first at the Duke and then back at the three maids, before speaking hurriedly.

“I’m so sorry, Father. I never ordered such a thing, but their loyalty to me must have been so strong that…”

“My Lady!!”

“Mercy, please, mercy…!”

The three maids, begging with screams, were dragged out by the other servants.

“How dare such pathetic, insect-like things play tricks at my table…”

The Duke muttered under his breath, his face etched with profound displeasure.

Roselyn watched them blankly for a moment before setting down her cutlery and continuing.

“By any chance, do you know of a place called ‘Makruksa’?”

As Roselyn asked softly, Aegis, who had been sitting with a sour expression while drinking water, arched an eyebrow.

“Makruksa? You mean that low-life trash pile? Those cell-based criminal bastards?”

Roselyn nodded, her eyes fixed on Lady Carmel, whose pupils were trembling despite her frozen expression.

“Yes. Lady Carmel is a ‘Bishop’ raised within Makruksa.”

At Roselyn’s words, a chilling silence fell over the dining table.

“And she intends to bring down the Bellion Ducal House.”

Following that succession of bombshells, bewildered gazes now turned toward her.

Roselyn turned her head to look at Lady Carmel, who could no longer hide her expression, and smiled beautifully.

“That’s why I told you not to bother me.”

At Roselyn’s nonchalant remark, Carmel’s eyes snapped wide.

“You… no matter how long you’ve stayed in this house, how can you frame me with such delusional lies! Just how much do you have to hate me to…”

Ignoring Carmel, who was shedding fat tears while pleading her innocence, Roselyn kept her gaze on Aegis as she spoke.

“If you need proof, you only need to look at the soles of her heels.”

As Roselyn said that, Lady Carmel’s lips clamped shut.

“Though it’s special ink, so her body temperature will need to rise above a certain point.”

Makruksa.

It was a criminal organization that peculiarly used chess pieces as ranks.

The hierarchy started from the lowest ‘Pawn,’ followed by ‘Knight,’ ‘Bishop,’ ‘Rook,’ ‘Queen,’ and ‘King.’

And there was one special rank: ‘Reaper.’ The assassins of Makruksa who carried out the most secretive and dangerous missions.

The current ‘Makruksa’ was a cell-based organization holding its breath underwater and waiting for its time; a group where the leader, the executives, and even fellow members did not know one another’s identities.

Because of this, they could cut off their tails at any time, and information was strictly limited.

And ten years from now, they were the bastards who would establish an outright guild and operate in the open.

Thus, Roselyn knew almost everything there was to know about Makruksa.

She had once used Makruksa to escape, and conversely, she had been stabbed in the back by them.

The turning point that allowed Makruksa to expand into a guild was when they intercepted the Ducal House’s businesses.

They leaked internal secrets, scouted away engineers, and eventually expanded their business by stealing clients.

And the greatest contributor to that was Carmel.

It wasn’t just the Bellion Ducal House that had its internal information leaked.

If it had been handled early like other families, it would have been resolved, but around that time, a series of disasters struck the Ducal House, and the situation was grim.

Aegis, who had never liked Lady Carmel from the start, left the Ducal House on the day of the wedding.

‘And I, unable to endure a stepmother who picked a fight over every little thing, flipped the table, packed my jewelry, and left home too.’

Three years later, the Duke contracted an incurable disease of unknown origin. Not long after, while traveling to visit the fief, he was ambushed and killed along with the butler.

The only remaining direct descendant was Roselyn’s father, the Little Duke Cherti, but he suffered from a disease similar to the Duke’s and was rarely in his right mind.

Naturally, Carmel took over as the Duke’s proxy to handle affairs.

It was like leaving a fish shop to a cunning cat; one could only imagine the state of things.

By the time Aegis learned of the situation and returned to the Duke’s mansion, it was already such a mess that it was beyond saving.

All business partners had cut ties, the fief was on the verge of a riot due to exorbitant taxes, and the granaries were empty… The holes were too many and too large for Aegis, who hadn’t received heir training, to mend.

Despite this, he bowed his head everywhere and pleaded for sympathy to lead the family somehow, but eventually, those who found such a man a nuisance killed Aegis as well.

That was why, in the world Roselyn lived in ten years later, the Bellion Ducal House did not exist.

“I told you to stop talking nonsense! How dare you…! Even if you are uneducated, to have picked up nothing but the wicked habit of lying…!”

“That is enough.”

The silent Duke Bellion spoke, lightly dabbing the corner of his mouth with a napkin.

“Is there any need for a long tongue? If you are innocent, it is a simple matter of verification.”

The old man spoke leisurely as he took a wine glass in his hand.

“Father!”

Tilting the glass, Duke Bellion narrowed his eyes, took a sip of wine, pulled out a cigar, and placed it in his mouth, giving a half-hearted nod.

“Even you doubt me, Father? How could you…!”

Carmel shed fat tears. She whipped her head around to look at the Little Duke, Cherti.

“You, please say something too. Have I… have I ever done anything so wicked as to be suspected of belonging to such a cruel group? I only… I only loved you…”

At the falling tears, Cherti furrowed his brow.

He pressed his hand against his chest at the strange, throbbing sensation in his heart.

It felt as though he were facing a disagreeable yet obvious premise—that he must exclude everything hostile to her.

He turned his head in silence and froze when he saw Roselyn, whom he hadn’t had a proper conversation with in a long time.

It was because the child was staring blankly at him.

As their eyes met, Roselyn nonchalantly shifted her gaze and tilted her wine glass again.

“Father, let us stop there. I will handle the verification separately…”

“No, let the Butler do it personally. She is skilled in hidden weapons, so be careful.”

Cutting off Cherti, Roselyn stated flatly.

“Ah, she also knows how to use hypnosis, so it would be best to blindfold her before taking her away.”

At the additional remark, Carmel’s jaw dropped, as if she had now forgotten to even hide her expression.

The only people who knew she was skilled in hypnotism were her superiors above the Bishop rank in ‘Makruksa.’

To be precise, it was only a very small fraction of them.

Since Carmel was a fledgling member sold to and raised by Makruksa since childhood, only the long-standing members knew of her abilities.

It was information an outsider could never possibly know.

In the first place, Carmel could not understand how such a gloomy, stupid woman with zero self-esteem could know the rank structure of Makruksa.

“You, what exactly are you?”

“Oh dear, have you given up on the acting, Lady Carmel?”

“I asked how on earth you know!”

She’s given up.

Roselyn lowered her gaze and let out a faint laugh as she finished the rest of her wine.

She soon leisurely propped her elbows on the table, rested her chin in her palm, and tilted her head slightly.

“You ask how I know…”

Roselyn brought her lips close to the woman’s ear and spoke in a voice so small only she could hear.

“That’s because those bastards once tried to recruit me, too.”

“…What?”

“Asking if I wanted to become the ‘Queen.’”

Seeing Carmel’s expression, which bordered on horror, Roselyn’s eyes curved into a bright, innocent smile.

“That’s impossible. Such a story…!”

“You wouldn’t have heard it. Naturally, since you’re just a low-level grunt.”

A low-level grunt—considering that ‘Pawn’ was the bottom, ‘Bishop’ was not exactly a low rank.

“Do you think the position of Queen is even fitting for a girl like you!”

“Yeah, so I turned it down.”

Roselyn took her chin off her hand and leaned back deeply into her chair.

“Goodbye.”

With a beaming smile, she gave a little wave of her hand.