Mad Rosetta - Chapter 43

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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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Rosetta Gone Mad

Chapter 43

The Villainess, the Rose, and the Ghost (9)

* * *

“P-please, Duke! Lady! I was wrong, just once more! Lady!”

“Tsk, drag them out! Next!”

So this was what they called a personnel purge.

Following the Duke’s command, I drew a line through the name of the Attendant being dragged away, striking it from the stack of documents before me.

Last winter. This was the one who had made my winter nightgown with short sleeves and never bothered to alter it.

‘Because of that, I caught a cold sleeping in front of a pathetic little fire, and my jaw nearly became permanently crooked. Well, good riddance.’

I laughed awkwardly at the sight of the Duke muttering about how there were so many unreasonable people.

In the end, Vicky was handed over to the courts.

No matter what tricks had been used to manipulate her, she had never breathed a word about receiving orders from Odette, and so I saw no reason to show her any mercy.

‘With Stilling implicated in the case as well… the sentence will likely be quite severe.’

After that, the Duke kept his word, seating me in his Study and summoning Attendants one by one.

Day after day, those dismissed by a single point of my finger accumulated, cast out without even severance pay.

Due to the scandal of having betrayed their master in a prestigious Household, they were effectively barred from ever working in another noble House again.

Moreover, for another Household to accept an Attendant expelled by the Duke of Benatra would be tantamount to declaring war against the Duke’s Estate.

– “I-I really didn’t know. Father! If I had known, would I have just stood by and watched?”

Meanwhile, as I weeded out those who had wronged me, the Servants belonging to Odette’s Lili Hall were also dismissed in great numbers.

Odette found herself hastily shielding herself before the Duke.

Watching her abject display, Rosetta could afford a quiet, contemptuous smile.

“You mean to tell me all of this came from those you investigated today?”

“…I didn’t even know I had these.”

The Duke turned to the Knights with pleading eyes, as if begging them to deny it, but they averted their gaze from their master.

Some among them even pitied Rosetta as she examined her recovered luxuries with apparent fascination.

The search of the Attendants’ rooms had yielded an endless cascade of Rosetta’s valuables.

“…It seems I have no choice but to expose everything, Coco.”

“But you did promise to exclude Marahan and our children from this.”

“Sigh…”

In the end, the Duke commanded a search of every Attendant’s room in the Household, and the results were nothing short of spectacle.

When jewels torn from Rosetta’s dresses, entire gowns, and even a parasol she had used in childhood were discovered.

The Duke, overwhelmed by rage and self-recrimination, ceased all other duties.

A merciless purge was executed.

* * *

“All this time… all this while… I have endured such humiliation, Coco?”

A heavy, oppressive silence settled over the room.

The Duke’s eyes grew hollow as his hands trembled, his voice breaking with emotion.

Across the pages listing Attendants’ names and positions, countless lines were struck through.

“How could such a thing occur? How could it…?”

Artemis’s voice trembled unfiltered with sorrow.

What I had dismissed as mere nervousness was a grave miscalculation.

After losing my beloved Duchess, my daughter had gradually transformed, and I assumed she suffered from her own anguish. That was my reasoning.

Yet as the truths behind the “misbehaving Princess” unraveled one by one, I found myself utterly unable to bear the weight of my own ignorance.

If I were to be precise, the poison of Panilnia—introduced when Lianna and Odette entered the household—was the primary culprit. But Artemis could never have known this.

Still, the contempt surrounding Rosette had undeniably kindled her nervousness, so my assumption was not entirely unfounded.

“…It is I who have failed. This father has driven you into despair.”

“I do not blame you, Father.”

The Duke, unable to lift his face before his daughter, had been staring only at his own pitiful reflection in the table’s surface. Now, at last, he raised his head.

Rosette kept her hands folded serenely upon her lap, her gaze unwavering and resolute.

“If I must assign blame… it is that you were ashamed of my ruin and abandoned me. The servants reasoned that a child fallen from the Duke’s favor need not be served. That is how this calamity came to pass.”

“…No, that cannot be. I bear responsibility. As your father, I neglected you, Coco.”

“Yet I have never resented you, Father.”

“…”

“Perhaps it is because I have always known that you love me more than anyone else.”

Having granted her child absolute trust, Rosette offered her forgiveness with a playful lilt to her voice.

While sorrow shadowed the corners of Artemis’s eyes, Rosette’s lips curved upward in a gentle arc.

Pride.

She overflowed with pride in the affection her father had once bestowed upon her.

Given the severity of Rosette’s circumstances, it was perhaps beyond dismissal as mere ignorance—she was striving all the harder to shield her father.

Let others hurl their crude accusations—I’ve decided to extend some grace to my father, a man who sees nothing but me in this world.

“Besides, thanks to Father rolling up his sleeves and helping me so earnestly, I’ve managed to filter out those who treated me poorly, haven’t I? Those who witnessed this whole affair won’t dare demean me in my presence anymore.”

“…I’m grateful simply for you saying such things.”

“Ugh, I’m feeling melancholy. Let’s drop this gloomy talk. There’s a letter waiting for me from the Atelier, so I should be going.”

Rosetta gave an exaggerated shudder and rose from her seat.

Artemis, still weighed down by guilt, offered an awkward bow, and Rosetta departed from the Study.

Just then, Stilling arrived to see the Duke, and as he closed the doorway behind him, he came face to face with Rosetta—his shoulders stiffening visibly.

The charming smile she’d worn moments before had vanished entirely, replaced by a rather cool expression as she nodded curtly to Stilling and brushed past him.

“…Lady, wait!”

“Hmm?”

Stilling called out to stop her, then hesitated, clearly embarrassed by what he was about to say.

“…At the Feast.”

“…?”

“That is, well. At this Spring Stage, I mean.”

“Then speak. Out with it.”

“I heard you were absolutely radiant.”

“….”

“You were, you were the most magnificent….”

Well then, that’s all.

Embarrassed by his own awkwardness, Stilling fled back into the Study like a frightened rabbit, leaving only the soft, delighted laughter of Rosetta echoing through the Corridor.

* * *

“Does that satisfy you?”

“…What are you talking about, Bonita?”

The walk back to my room was proving quite treacherous.

I thought as much while offering a final retort to Odette before me.

I had encountered her in the Rose Manor corridor—whether she had come seeking me out or was returning from somewhere else.

‘…This isn’t the first time she’s dropped her formal speech.’

But it was the first time I’d seen Odette display such blatant displeasure and irritation.

“Don’t you think your actions went too far? Covering for a subordinate’s mistakes is also a virtue of nobility.”

Ah, so that’s why she looked so furious. She seemed indignant that her retinue had been nearly decimated.

‘How foolish. It was Father who ordered the attendants replaced.’

It was tantamount to criticizing the head of the household’s command as ungraceful.

Though her anger seemed to cloud her judgment entirely, I found her slip rather welcome and decided to accept it graciously.

“Aha! How fortunate for you, Bonita, that you said such things only before me.”

“What?”

“Father was the one who dismissed the attendants. Had he heard what you just said, how wounded he would be.”

“D-don’t twist my words! If my sister hadn’t exaggerated and reported me—”

“Odette Epsilon.”

At my words, Odette’s face turned cold and rigid.

Epsilon was the surname she had used when she was a baron’s daughter.

By dredging up the surname she had already discarded and calling her by it, I was essentially rejecting her—refusing to acknowledge her as a true member of this household.

Odette’s face flushed deeper still with shame and humiliation, as though I had struck at her most vulnerable point.

It was a truly satisfying sight.

“…It was merely a jest, Bonita. Do compose yourself.”

“…”

“However, you would do well to be cautious about speaking carelessly from personal emotion. Had someone unfamiliar with the closeness between us overheard, it would have been quite troublesome. For instance…yes.”

“…”

“Epsilon, how dare you.”

Odette’s pupils trembled violently.

That alone was enough for me to smile kindly and offer my one and only younger sister some heartfelt counsel.

“For Epsilon to presume to teach Benatra the virtues of nobility…why, even a stray dog passing by would laugh and mock such presumption.”

“What did you…?”

“I do not wish to see you suffer, Bonita. Though you may not share my blood, you have already become as precious to me as a true sister.”

I could not see what expression I wore, yet watching Odette’s pupils cloud with humiliation filled me with satisfaction.

As I gently patted her shoulder, the trembling that coursed through her body transmitted itself to me, and I felt a profound sense of accomplishment.

“So please, do not give your elder sister cause for disappointment.”

With those words, I departed the corridor.

Hearing no footsteps but my own, she seemed to remain standing motionless in that very spot.

‘Yes, you will continue to lose to me in every way.’

Whether I play the madwoman, whether you collapse in despair, whether you crawl upon the earth itself.

In any moment, I alone am enough for the Princess of Benatra.

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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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