Translator: Nox

The Baddest Villainess Is Back

Chapter 6

“……What?”

Aegis blinked once, then burst into a booming laugh.

He laughed so hard it felt like the dining room might shake apart, slamming his fist onto the table over and over.

At that, a knife held by Duke Bellion flew through the air, aimed straight for Aegis’s head.

Aegis caught it between two fingers, flicked it back toward his father, and chuckled.

“Wow, I didn’t know our little niece had this kind of personality.”

“Lady Carmel came by yesterday and turned my stomach inside out. I simply reached the point where I couldn’t endure it anymore.”

“Hmm, is that so? Then she definitely needs to be taught a lesson.”

He murmured playfully, flashing a grin as he looked at Roselyn.

“But Chain…… I mean, your father. He’s not doing this because he particularly hates you. He’s been a socially stunted, dishonest bastard since way back when.”

Roselyn smiled brightly at Aegis.

“Yes.”

As Roselyn turned away with an expression that showed she didn’t believe a word of it, Duke Bellion finally spoke.

“Roselyn, let’s have tea together sometime soon.”

“Yes, then I shall take my leave.”

Letting the Duke’s words go in one ear and out the other, Roselyn gave a light bow and promptly exited the dining room.

“……Father, aren’t those two f-u-u-u-u-cking twisted?”

“Watch your language. Tsk, uncultured brat.”

“What are you talking about? Who do you think I learned it from? Think back to your younger days. You went around spitting every kind of creative insult imaginable.”

“That’s because I wasn’t raised right back then, because I wasn’t raised right! You insolent brats!”

“Oh boy, here we go again with the ‘I was an abandoned bastard until I was twenty, a thug wandering the back alleys’ story. I know, I know~ Where else would I have inherited this delinquent streak, Father?”

Snorting as he looked down at his father, Aegis stood up abruptly, glancing at the firmly closed door.

“In the first place, you raised the youngest so poorly that he turned into a gloomy bastard. Don’t let your only granddaughter leave the house; go fix this mess.”

“Then why didn’t you idiots act like proper heirs! Do you want to die?”

The old man growled, stubbing out his cigar.

“Please, you’re so old, could you even kill me? Anyway, I told you to kick that woman out because my gut feeling was bad.”

“What am I supposed to do when the kid says he likes her?”

“Bullshit. Just know that you’ve ruined this entire family, Father.”

Aegis waved his hand dismissively and strolled out of the dining room, his lips twisting one last time.

“Well, I suppose we were a bit indifferent too.”

With those low words, the dining room door finally shut tight.

---

“Hey, Chain. Are you moping in here?”

“……Get out.”

Inside a dark, empty warehouse where only moonlight spilled through the window, Cherti was nursing a bottle of strong liquor. He made no effort to hide his displeasure at the uninvited guest.

“So why did you say those things to your daughter?”

“…….”

Without waiting for permission, Aegis sat down across from him and shrugged.

He watched his youngest brother drain glass after glass in silence. Shrugging again, Aegis set down some jerky he’d brought and shoved a piece into the younger man’s mouth.

“I told you it was overprotection, didn’t I?”

“You dog of a bastard, I told you to get out.”

“Whew, you went through all that trouble pretending to be stoic just to hide that shitty temper, and what do you get for it? Your daughter jumping off the roof and announcing she’s leaving the house?”

Cherti scowled at his obnoxious eldest brother, who was snickering as if it were the funniest thing in the world.

“I’m the idiot for trying to talk to a beast.”

Cherti stood up abruptly, but Aegis didn’t let up, continuing to cackle.

“Hey, your daughter really looked like she was going to leave.”

“……Shut up. On whose authority?”

“Tsk, tsk. On whose authority? She’s an adult now, so it’s on her own authority.”

Cherti glared at the smirking Aegis with a murderous gaze.

Aegis shrugged his shoulders.

“Being a parent isn’t easy, is it? Children never do what you want, and they don’t know how you feel unless you tell them.”

The mocking Aegis snatched Cherti’s glass, downed the liquor, and tilted his head toward the man opposite him.

Every time Cherti moved, his long silver drop earrings swayed, and the many rings and bracelets on his hands clinked against each other.

“Fuck…….”

Cherti sat back down heavily across from Aegis.

“Why not just be honest?”

“About what.”

“That she’s actually properly registered in the family records. That you love her?”

Slam!

The moment Cherti struck the table with his fist, the wood stained purple and dissolved into ash in an instant.

“Dear me.”

Aegis rescued the bottle and glass from the melting table and clicked his tongue.

“Shit, it’s like this, so what am I supposed to do! Even I……!”

Cherti, who had been acting all mature in front of his daughter, now gritted his teeth like a child. Aegis watched him for a moment before laughing softly and standing up.

Whoosh. The red flames flickering around him burned away the remnants of what had been a table emitting purple smoke, then died out.

“Hey, our niece has made up her mind. If you don’t have the confidence to hold onto her, let her go. Imagine how hard it must have been for her to reach that point.”

“…….”

“Don’t you know that what you’re doing is something a parent shouldn’t do, but also something a human being shouldn’t do?”

Aegis looked down at Cherti for a long moment before turning away.

It was just as he was about to leave the warehouse.

“……But.”

A faint voice drifted out, sounding as if it might fade away at any moment.

“I took her mother away from her. I’ve never even held her properly. And now, after all this time…….”

Cherti, face buried in his palms, slowly parted his lips.

“What am I supposed to say to her……?”

Aegis paused with his hand on the doorknob and let out a light chuckle.

How many people knew that the man who always acted tough and kept his mouth shut just to show his daughter his best side actually had this kind of personality?

“Isn’t it obvious what you should say?”

“What is it.”

“What is it? Good grief. Even a three-year-old knows those words.”

Snorting at Cherti’s question, Aegis opened the door and walked out.

“……Rose.”

The man, roughly rubbing his face under the moonlight, let out a deep sigh as the light in his red eyes faded.

---

“……Um, My Lady. Flowers have arrived.”

“Again?”

“Yes.”

Roselyn frowned at the bouquet of mysterious origin that had been arriving for several days now.

Ever since the formal dinner, bouquets had begun arriving daily around noon, each featuring a different variety of flowers and accompanied by a card with a short message.

[The flower language was good.]

[I picked this up on the way.]

[They happened to be selling them cheap while I was there.]

[These flowers are scattered everywhere.]

Of course, the notes were nonsensical.

‘Is he insulting me by saying they aren’t worth giving unless he just picked them up on the way?’

She always thought this, but the social language of the nobility was truly exhausting. Especially in the sense that one had to think so deeply about it.

The problem was that today, the sixth day of these flower deliveries, it had reached a point where she could no longer ignore it.

The room was so full of flowers she felt like she might suffocate from the scent.

‘I don’t know what kind of harassment this is supposed to be.’

Too lazy to think about it further, Roselyn waved her hand and spoke.

“That’s enough, throw them all away. From now on, if they come, you girls can split them among yourselves or just throw them all out.”

“O-oh…… I understand.”

The maids immediately bowed at her command.

Fortunately, the maids the butler had newly assigned were good. They weren’t talkative and did only the work they were given.

“Is the carriage ready?”

“Yes, the coachman is waiting.”

“Good.”

“Um…… but are you really planning to go like that?”

One of the maids, who seemed restless, finally spoke up cautiously as Roselyn was about to leave the room.

It was because the dress Roselyn was wearing was pitch black.

Originally, in the Empire, people tended not to wear black unless they were in mourning.

“Yes. As of now, I have no other clothes fit to wear.”

At Roselyn’s words, the maids’ mouths clamped shut.

In truth, Roselyn’s wardrobe consisted of nothing but faded clothes that were unworthy of a lady of a ducal house.

It was all because Lady Carmel had spewed nonsense about how a lady should be frugal.

Everyone in the service had been shocked to hear that the young lady, who had never said a word even when Lady Carmel ran rampant through the Ducal House, had finally kicked her out.

Even when rumors circulated that the young lady had changed somehow, they had been skeptical, but her atmosphere was indeed significantly different.

The servants hurried down the stairs after Roselyn.

Roselyn descended the stairs and boarded the carriage with her shoulders and back straight, revealing the red eyes she had always kept hidden.

The carriage door closed, and it began to move.

‘I didn’t think I’d be heading back to the Imperial Palace on my own two feet.’

Because the last time she was there, she had been captured by Gerran, handed over to the Imperial Knights, and thrown into a dungeon.

‘How long has it been…… since I last saw the 3rd Prince.’

At ten years old, a Roselyn who thought she was the most noble and exalted being in the world—immature, sickly, and even ill-tempered—had become engaged to the 3rd Prince.

Roselyn, the only lady of the Empire’s sole Ducal House, who believed she was no different from a bastard.

Arma Dianitas, the frail 3rd Prince who had no ambition and couldn’t even dream of succeeding to the throne.

Whether they were discarded pieces or not, the union between the Dianitas Imperial Family and the Bellion Ducal House had been the talk of high society.

Roselyn remained lost in thought for a long while after the carriage departed.

After some time, the carriage stopped and the door opened. Beyond the window, the magnificent Imperial Palace came into view.