I Will Become the Ex-Wife of the Beast - Chapter 4

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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The gambling house dealers had meant to skim a few coins off a country noble who’d come up to the capital, but they ended up dealing him the worst bad luck in history. They piled on a debt no person could ever hope to bear, and I’d wager they were as stunned by it as anyone.

“Ah, now I’m completely broke. Ha, ha, ha. What am I going to do? What on earth am I going to do?”
“Not broke, old man. You’re in debt! So how are you going to pay it back? Huh?”
“P-please, save me!”

“…Girls, girls. I never wanted any of this, you understand.”
“…”
“Still, it’s not as though I’m out of options. I did borrow some money from a man sitting right beside me… only I’ve got no means of paying it back.”

“S-someone, please help me! I have four unmarried daughters!”
“…How much?”
“Hm?”
“I’ll help you. But in return…”

“How much did you borrow, Father!”
“…One million gold.”
“…”
For a moment, a deathly silence fell over the table.
While my older sisters glared at our father with resentment, I clenched my jaw and focused solely on what would come next.
…I can survive this. I have to survive.
I murmured the words under my breath and shut my eyes. Even as a sum I could never hope to bear swept across the table, I didn’t let a single breath falter. I concentrated only on my own future.
“One million gold? You lent that to Father? What kind of lunatic does that?”
“M-Melanie. Calm down for now.”
“Last month, the Northern Federal Bank’s base rate was three and a half percent. Even if you apply that as it is, the monthly interest alone would top three thousand gold. And if he borrowed it from a gambling den, they’d be squeezing ten times that out of him!”
Of course, Melanie, our most practical sister, immediately started clicking away at an imaginary abacus. But no matter how loudly she carried on, what was done was done. The truly head-clutching part was yet to come.
“…No, but he said we needn’t worry about the money. Don’t fret over that side of things at all.”
“Oh, for heaven’s sake! What fool would say something like that?”
“He said he was an advisor to the Grand Duke of Valencia.”
“Val… who?”
“Grand Duke Valencia. You don’t mean to tell me you two don’t know who he is?”
“…”
A chill settled over the room, even colder than when the words “one million gold” had come out. Our second sister let slip the book she always carried about like a lifeline, and it dropped to the floor with a soft thud.
“The embodiment of evil! The master of murder! The Blood-Soaked Duke!”
“…Don’t forget the other one. The Cursed Beast.”
When even our eldest, who had been holding her breath until now, joined in with whispers, our father’s face turned sour. Most likely the weight of having to say, “That man is your future husband,” had something to do with it.
“Everyone, just calm down for now…”
“B-but what did that advisor say to make him drag the Grand Duke’s name into it?”
“He said that if we couldn’t repay it, it didn’t have to be money. Anything would do.”
“…If not money, then what?”
“You all know what we have the most of in this house, don’t you? It would be…”
Our father’s gaze slowly swept over his four daughters, and finally came to rest on the face of our eldest, Eliya.
She had been scowling, not yet understanding what was happening, but a few seconds later she burst into a scream and sobs all at once.
“F-Father! You can’t be serious!”
“Eliya, think it over. It isn’t so terrible for you either. Why, you’d become a Grand Duchess, no less.”
“Waaah! Waaaaahhh!”
“Granted, the Grand Duke doesn’t enjoy a particularly good reputation in the world. But for a family like ours, becoming a Grand Duchess is something one could only dream of.”
“I don’t even want to dream about it! If you wanted that Grand Duchess title so badly, why didn’t you take it yourself? Waaah!”
Eliya finally collapsed onto the table, her shoulders shaking violently. No wonder. Only a few hours ago, she had been wrapped up in sweet trysts with a young lover who had been utterly besotted with her.
But there was one fact that weighed on her most of all.
“Don’t you know who he is? He’s been cursed! His face is all twisted and disfigured! How am I supposed to become the wife of a man like that, when I could have married a handsome beggar instead!”
For Eliya, her face was her talent, her wealth, and her future all in one. For a sister like her, being told to marry a beast-turned Grand Duke was more brutal than being sent off to a convent.
“No! I won’t! I don’t want to! I’d rather die than do it!”
“Eliya, will you keep quiet!”
“…Sob.”
“You’ve already made a promise, so what can we do? Besides, you can’t go on living like this forever. It’s time you settled down. It’s not as if marrying here was ever going to work out, and at the very least, you’ll be able to live in luxury over there. The entire North belongs to him, you know.”
Our father, who had started by bellowing like the typical hopeless head of a household, belatedly tried to soothe Eliya. But she had already been struck to the core, and his efforts were no match for turning her heart around.
Beside her, the already shabby house nearly shook with her wailing, and Melanie put a hand on her shoulder and gave it a shake.
“…That’s enough, Sister. There’s nothing we can do about it.”
“Huh? Are you seriously saying that? Are you saying you’re the one who’s not going, Melanie?”
“No, you’re still throwing a fit even after we try to calm you down? Honestly, if you’d lived properly, would Father have shipped you off so far away?”
“Only when you’re crushed under a pile of books will you come to your senses, is that it!”
“Quiet!”
Bang!
Only when I slammed both fists onto the table with all my strength did my sisters’ sobs and shouting abruptly stop. I had been silent, eyes shut, for a long while before stepping in, and my sisters parted their lips, looking dazed.
“…Can’t you see people are thinking? Keep it down.”
“Bella, you…”
At the voice that seethed through my clenched teeth, the strength slipped from my sisters’ hands, which had been clutching at each other. But that was only because they were surprised to see this side of me for the first time, not because they were frightened.
I looked up with grim resolve at my sisters, who looked ready to flip the table again. There was only one word that could fully resolve this utter disaster.
“…Then I’ll just go, all right?”
“….”
“I’ll go, so stop this already.”
“….”
The ripple effect of my single sentence was greater than I’d expected. The place that had been a mess just moments ago was now filled with nothing but silence. Not only my sisters, but even Father, who had been trying so hard to persuade us, could not find his words for a long while.
“B-Bella!”
“I’ll go. So all of you, just stop.”
“That won’t do. How could I send you? Yet our family is what it is. For you, the younger sister, to marry before your elder sister goes against the proper order of this family.”
“Ha…”
Well, aren’t you just a fine noble gentleman.
A hollow laugh rose from deep within my chest, and I could no longer hold it back. Ha ha ha, I let out an empty laugh without meaning to, and an uneasy current swept through those around me. The moment I stopped laughing and lifted my head, their agitation only grew.
“Father, if you’re going to talk about the proper order of the family, shouldn’t the head of the household first protect his daughters?”
“…Bella, how could you say such a thing.”
“Did you ever think about what would happen after you send off Eliya?”
I looked at my eldest sister, Eliya. Her hair was tangled from clawing at and fighting with our second sister, and she truly looked like the very future of this household.
Under my blatant stare, my eldest sister flushed and flared up.
“M-me? What about me?”
“Yes. What exactly is Eliya going to do…”
“Do you really think you’ll become a virtuous Grand Duchess Consort over there? Do you think you can live your whole life gazing at only one man, the Grand Duke who has become a beast?”
“…W-well, that’s…”
“I’ll be blunt. Can you swear you won’t stray over there?”
“….”
As expected, Father couldn’t answer. Even my eldest sister herself lowered her eyes, looking far from confident. Knowing yourself well is truly the highest virtue of our eldest sister.
“Still, Bella, isn’t that going a bit too far…”
“If you’re not the one getting married, Sister, then keep quiet.”
“….”
With that, I thoroughly silenced Eliya, and turned back to Father. His face looked pained somehow, but he still didn’t give up and searched for his next target, only for me to beat him to it once more.
“You surely aren’t thinking of Melanie, are you?”
“…After Eliya, it should be Melanie, the second daughter. As you know, Melanie is gentle and well-mannered, so in that regard…”
“Oh, sure. She’ll gently talk back to the Grand Duke at every turn, asking ‘Why me? Why should I have to do it?’ and end up with her head rolling off.”
When I made a slicing gesture across my throat with my fingertip, Melanie grabbed her own neck. Our second sister couldn’t deny it, as if she herself weren’t sure she could keep from doing exactly that.
“Even so…”
I thought there was no way left, but Father was still Father. From the first daughter to the second, and then to the one after that, he stared at Rose instead of me, and that finally set him off.
“Where are you looking! Surely you aren’t planning to send Rose!”
“N-no. How could I?”
“Don’t you dare even think it! Then why are you skipping over me, the third daughter?”
“…I only thought that you’d suffered so much all this time…”
“Oh, sure. So I should just keep suffering the way I always have. Because if I leave, there’ll be no one in this household to roll up their sleeves and work!”
“….”
Not only Father but my sisters, too, snapped their mouths shut. Only Rose trembled uneasily, and I swallowed my rage and lowered my voice.
“I’m going. That’s the only way for all of us to survive!”
“But I’ve already told the chief of staff that the first daughter would be going. If I suddenly say it’s changed now…”
“I don’t care whether it’s the first or the third daughter. It’s just a token match on their end anyway.”
“….”
“After all, we all look pretty much alike.”
Of course, I’m far prettier than any of them.

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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