Mad Rosetta - Chapter 125

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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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Rosette Gone Mad
Chapter 125
The Child of Confession (8)
“Since when…?”
“Theo.”
“What on earth…?”
The world tilted before my eyes, and I stumbled, yet I could not fall.
Jeremiah held fast to my trouser leg, refusing to let go.
“…Don’t mock me. How long do you think I have been watching over you, my brother?”
Those sorrowful blue eyes suffocated me with their intensity.
Fury surged through me once more, and I clenched my teeth.
“You knew all along that Fordicus Cessia was Carina’s illegitimate child? And knowing that truth, you have lived like this all this time?”
My voice trembled at the sight of my brother at my feet, so utterly wretched.
I tried to hide my contorted expression by covering my face with my palm.
Now came the sound of weeping.
‘What kind of man has he become?’
That was my thought.
No human could be this way.
At least the Jeremiah I have watched over all these years should rage against his mother’s infidelity.
He yearned desperately to be loved, yet the child she truly cherished existed elsewhere—how could he accept this?
I believed that if I told Jeremiah this truth, he would finally solidify his resentment toward Carina.
– “Investigation is my trade, older brother.”
– “…You. Don’t be evasive.”
And so in this moment, I felt I might go mad from my resentment of Jeremiah.
I had followed him for so long. I could never forgive him.
Yet how much torment had I endured to keep him alive?
He was pitifully wretched, base, and deserving of pity—the man who allowed assassins to pass and drove a blade into my back was my brother.
Whenever I found myself searching for reasons to keep Jeremiah alive rather than eliminate him for revenge, I felt countless times guilty.
It was natural to feel sorry toward my lover and younger sister who aided and supported me.
The word “mercy” was too grand; “pity” or “compassion” would be more fitting.
Yet because the greater cause could tolerate no deviation, I sought to use Fordicus Cessia to draw Jeremiah to our side.
If only that could be achieved, I believed without doubt that we would see the ending we desired.
“…There is no one who cherished you more than that woman.”
“…”
“I mean to say…”
The situation was so lamentable and unjust that tears spilled from my eyes.
How do you live?
That he—who had chased after his mother’s shadow his entire life—already knew of his betrayal was astounding.
Looking at it plainly, was Jeremiah not the strongest person of all? Even such a trivial thought crossed my mind.
‘…What am I to tell Rosette? I boasted so confidently that Jeremiah could not possibly know of the Empress Dowager’s infidelity…’
Sing could no longer discern how to persuade him further.
“It’s been a long time, Theo.”
“….”
“I learned of it ages ago…. I do wish you would stop crying.”
Looking down at Jeremiah with bitter eyes, I felt no inclination for my anger to subside.
Sing pretended not to hear and extracted his legs from the man’s embrace, then draped himself across the sofa in a languid sprawl.
“No matter what you say, if you remain as you are, your words will never reach him.”
“Ah….”
“Come and sit.”
Perhaps it was the somewhat presumptuous tone, so different from when he had been alive.
Jeremiah, who had remained motionless as though his knees were rooted to the floor, rose awkwardly and took the seat across from Sing.
Without even a single cup of tea offered between them, only a meaningless vase divided the two.
Seeing his elder brother’s dejected appearance, unable even to decide how to begin speaking, Sing exhaled a deep sigh.
“So tell me. How long ago did you learn of this, that you could face Montague so nonchalantly?”
“…It was the year Mother returned from the West.”
“…What?”
Perhaps it was the realization that this was far earlier than he had anticipated.
Meeting Sing’s pupils, which trembled violently, Jeremiah smiled with bitter resignation.
“That is why I said it had been a long time.”
The frequency was considerable.
When the Marquis Montague visited the Imperial Palace, eight-year-old Jeremiah perceived it thus.
It was only natural.
It was a time when he studied every gesture and movement to gain Mother’s approval, molding himself to suit her.
When the eyes that had been distant with anger whenever she looked at him seemed to lose even that intensity after her return from the West, becoming cold as if gazing upon something utterly worthless.
He tried to convince himself it was because Theo had become Crown Prince, but only briefly—soon he came to find her deeply suspicious.
– “…You sent children’s garments to the Marquis?”
– “Yes, Your Majesty. They were all of the finest quality, and toys were included as well, it is said.”
When had the Marquis Montague become a supporter of Mother? The questions would not cease; they only multiplied.
The Marquis began appearing at annual events with dramatically increased frequency.
Carina was not one to change her conduct easily. This was something Jeremiah had learned through bitter struggle in his desperate attempts to earn her affection.
– “Last summer, someone witnessed a midwife secretly entering the Autran Marquis Residence.”
It was truly absurd.
She, consumed by revulsion and keeping her own son at a distance, knew nothing of Jeremiah, yet he knew her better than anyone.
It was he who wore away with longing, unable to abandon even a shred of attachment, not her.
No matter how he whimpered that she would not turn to look at him, how could he not look at her even once—in the end, it was only his own attachment that tormented the other, and Jeremiah was quick to blame himself.
“…And so I thought it best to bury it then. Had the Former Emperor learned of Mother’s infidelity…. It was obvious as fire what would become of my position.”
Rather than expose the rot that had festered within him to Sing, Jeremiah simply enumerated the facts he had uncovered in measured tones, then suddenly lifted his head.
“Yet he was so bright and red.”
“….”
“That shameless child was far too red.”
Until that moment, Jeremiah could have sworn he did not know.
The difference between what one sees and what remains unseen is vast.
– “I am Fordicus Cessia of the Montague Marquessate. I offer my sincerest congratulations on Your Majesty’s fourteenth birthday.”
As if boasting of the blood he inherited from his mother, the child’s hair blazed as red as flame.
It was only then that Jeremiah understood why he was wrong and Cessia was right.
Had he resembled his mother instead? Had he possessed those brilliantly luminous golden eyes, would something have been different?
A point of comparison had emerged from such a terrible hypothetical.
The seven-year-old Cessia whom Jeremiah first encountered was far too young to be called his peer.
There came a time when he could not, no matter how he examined it, comprehend the intention behind bringing such a child to the Imperial Palace Feast alongside the Marquis Montague at such an early age.
Clear deception.
This was how Jeremiah named Cessia’s existence.
“Theo, do you believe I have forgiven Mother’s infidelity? That I have accepted it, truly think so?”
“….”
“Yes. If Mother had truly regarded me as her rightful child as you say, would forgiveness alone suffice? I might have even shielded her while speaking ill of the Former Emperor for neglecting her. But I could not do so.”
“Brother.”
“I endured it. I bore it. Never once did I resist Mother, so that someday, when it became truly necessary—”
Crash!
Sing’s fist suddenly came down upon the table, cutting Jeremiah’s words short.
His disheveled bangs fell across his bright eyes, which seemed to burn with an inner flame.
“How grandiose your excuses are.”
“What…?”
“Endurance? When the time came to plot treason, what did you do? Ah, did you perhaps secretly view it as an opportunity to covet the throne?”
“…I, no. No, Theo. I—”
“And what of the fact that you have been conducting affairs of state beneath the Empress Dowager’s shadow all this time, as if to prove it? You are not a child emperor in need of a regent, are you?”
“Ah, ah….”
“You simply chose to be a puppet, consumed by fear!”
At the sight of Sing shouting with barely contained rage, Jeremiah shrank as if he might dissolve on the spot.
Sing thought, lost in despair, that the expression of one driven into a corner was truly pitiful.
“…You committed an act beyond your capability, then begged for death—was your only reason to escape responsibility?”
“…No, no! No, Theo! I repent! If I could return to that time, I would never allow you to suffer such a fate!”
“You speak of meaningless hypotheticals.”
“…What would you have me do? Hmm? I will do whatever you wish, so please, do not—”
“Think for yourself, Brother.”
“….”
“How much longer do you intend to place your leash in another’s hands?”
Weak and cowardly.
Sing finally uttered the words most poisonous to Jeremiah.
Even knowing it would be a difficult trial for Jeremiah, who had grown up denied the chance to move by his own will throughout his entire life.

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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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