My Contract Husband Demands a Divorce - Chapter 63

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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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Princess Lucretia stopped in her tracks, likely having caught the sound of my approaching footsteps.
Whirling her head around with a menacing glare, her face twisted with pure venom the moment she spotted me.
“Why did you follow me? Here to mock me?”
“Of course not.”
Even as I closed the distance, she refused to back down.
Instead, she tilted her chin higher, glaring as if she wanted nothing more than to strike me dead on the spot.
“You think you’ve won, don’t you?”
“This wasn’t a contest, so how could there be a winner or a loser? I already told you—I only wanted to clear my name.”
“Don’t make me laugh!”
Her shrill, screeching voice echoed sharply down the empty corridor.
“You intended to ruin me publicly, didn’t you? But what a pity. Only my maid was dragged away, wasn’t she?”
“…….”
“You might be riding high on the Rootsild name, but I am Prince Kildian’s fiancée. I am a princess of Carosel, our nation’s ally.”
“I have never once denied that you are a princess, have I?”
“Then you should have known your place and crawled before me on your own! Do you truly think your precious family will shield you?”
She marched forward, jabbing her index finger forcefully into my shoulder over and over.
“The Rootsild Family would never cross the royal house of Carosel for a mere branch-line relative like you! Even when those nasty rumors spread at the university, your family chose to warn you instead of defending you!”
“That much is true.”
When I calmly agreed, Princess Lucretia grew even more infuriated, tearing at her hair and stamping her feet in sheer rage.
“Then why do you still hold your head so high in front of me! When I strike, you should take it, and when I trample you, you should stay down! Why do you keep looking up at me, why!!”
“Because this time, it wasn’t something so trivial.”
Princess Lucretia froze instantly, her breath coming in ragged, harsh gasps.
“Princess, it seems you truly don’t comprehend what you’ve actually done.”
“What do you mean, what I’ve done? I simply tried to bring you down.”
“No. This time, you weren’t trying to bring me down—you were trying to drag my family under.”
“What nonsense is that? Are you claiming that you are the Rootsild Family itself?”
I offered a sweet, placid smile to her scoffing, dismissive face.
“Tarnishing my reputation is a personal insult. However, framing a member of the Rootsild Family is entirely different. That enters legal territory. You have actively attempted to defile the honor of the Rootsild Family.”
Princess Lucretia’s aggressive demeanor faltered slightly.
“S-so what? What are you going to do about it? Your name has been cleared anyway. And do you have any proof that I did it? My maid already confessed that she acted entirely alone!”
“Proof? I have none. At least, not right now.”
Princess Lucretia’s face began to brighten, only to darken instantly once more. She bit her lower lip hard.
“What do you mean by ‘not right now’?”
“You are aware that my rose sapling won the grand prize, yes?”
“So?”
“I intend to request that the sapling be planted at the very back of the abandoned Rose Garden behind the West Annex.”
“Why… why are you telling me this?”
“Just so you can prepare yourself mentally. I can afford to show that much mercy to a fellow alumnus.”
“…….”
All color drained from Princess Lucretia’s face.
Her lips parted and closed, but not a single sound managed to escape them.
I stepped forward slowly, narrowing the space between us.
For the very first time, Princess Lucretia began to take a step back.
Cornered against the wall, she began to tremble violently, though whether from uncontainable fury or sheer terror remained unclear.
“You should not have crossed the line. When someone threatens my family, I cannot afford to react graciously either.”
“Do you honestly think the Carosel royal family will sit idly by if you touch me?”
“Are you certain of that? Personally, I highly doubt they would turn their backs on the entire Rootsild Family just to save a single princess.”
I carefully observed Princess Lucretia’s condition.
Her wide, trembling eyes, her parted lips, and the visible swallow down her dry throat.
Her chest heaved dramatically before settling as she finally let out a shuddering, terrified breath.
Lucretia tightly gripped the fabric of her dress with both hands.
Seeing her instinctively shrink back even when I didn’t advance any further, I felt entirely certain.
‘That does it.’
I took a step back myself and flashed a bright, refreshing smile.
“Well then, I shall see you at the banquet shortly.”
Leaving the frozen Princess Lucretia behind, I turned and walked away.
It was time to meet Princess Isoldra.
* * *
Lucretia paced the confines of her room, gnawing viciously on her fingernails.
She circled the exact same spot repeatedly, resembling a rat suddenly trapped in a narrow cage.
Did she know what was buried in the Rose Garden?
Judging by her words alone, she absolutely did.
‘How could she possibly know?’
She had taken absolute care to handle the matter in total secrecy.
Snap, snap, snap.
The unsettling sound of her hard nails being torn away alternated with the erratic, anxious clicking of her heels against the floor.
‘It must have been that wretched girl who spoke.’
That maid with the filthy, curly hair.
The one who had been abruptly dismissed by Princess Isoldra and left the Palace without warning.
She had tried to have the girl hunted down and eliminated, but she was only told that tracking her was nearly impossible since she had left Melbern long ago.
That had been a relief, at least.
It meant that even if something were discovered in the Rose Garden tomorrow, that maid could never be brought in to stand as a witness.
Even if they set out to capture her this very instant, they couldn’t possibly bring her back by tomorrow.
“Then why on earth is she acting so damn confident!!”
There was definitely something else.
She must possess some undeniable, irrefutable physical evidence.
Princess Isoldra had once ordered a thorough search of the Palace under the pretext of looking for a missing item.
Had they discovered something back then?
Anxiety clawed at her, making it utterly impossible to sit still.
From afar, the faint strains of a waltz and the muffled chatter of the crowd drifted into the room.
That peaceful atmosphere only served to grate on her nerves.
The mere thought of Amarynthis Huniswald smiling inside that room, basking in everyone’s attention and goodwill, was enough to drive her mad.
“Aaagh!!”
Lucretia stamped her foot hysterically, tearing wildly at her crimson hair.
Then, gasping for air, she peered out the window.
Once total darkness fell after the banquet, the fireworks display would begin immediately.
In that instant, a chilling, gruesome smile bloomed across Lucretia’s face.
‘I can just remove it before it ever gets discovered.’
She rang the bell violently, but no one came to answer.
Every single maid who possessed knowledge of Lucretia’s cruel and filthy secrets had already been disposed of.
She had eliminated them out of sheer paranoia that her past deeds might come to light.
The last maid who had functioned as her hands and feet had just been dragged away by the Palace Guard.
Since the Flower Show banquet was currently in full swing, they wouldn’t be able to assign her a new maid immediately.
There was no one left to perform the heavy labor for her, and no one left to take the blame if things went awry.
‘Then I shall simply do it myself.’
During the fireworks, every single light inside the Palace would be extinguished.
The security forces would also be heavily concentrated around the Main Palace and the event venue, meaning absolutely no one would pay attention to a place like the backyard of the South Wing.
The booming explosions of the fireworks would easily drown out the sound of digging earth.
Smiling brightly, Lucretia made her way back toward the ballroom.
She mingled and smiled with the guests as though she hadn’t been trembling in terror just moments prior.
Amarynthis was currently dancing alongside Scheit Huniswald.
The sight made her stomach twist in jealousy yet again.
Kildian was entirely occupied with tending to his political foundations, leaving his own fiancée, Lucretia, completely ignored.
Yet Amarynthis was receiving an abundance of affection from her husband.
‘Look at her, looking so blissfully happy she could die. Just you wait. Once I get through this safely, I will speak to Kildian and have Scheit Huniswald slaughtered. Let’s see how much despair that bitch feels then.’
As the lights began to dim, Princess Lucretia slipped away quietly.
When the Palace was plunged into a rare, absolute darkness, Princess Lucretia grabbed a shovel.
Steering a small cart, she pushed her way through the dense roses.
Sharp thorns tore through her silk dress and left shallow scratches across her skin, but she couldn’t care less.
She arrived at the deepest, most secluded area.
The ground at the very back was concealed by thick brambles, but it bore the distinct markings of having been excavated multiple times before.
Because it was a garden left entirely abandoned, even the gardeners never ventured this far inside. From outside the bushes, the spot was completely invisible.
Forgetting all royal decorum, she dropped to the dirt floor and began franticly digging up the soil with a trowel.
Before long, a dull thud echoed as the metal struck something hard.
It was fabric, wrapped tightly around a corpse.
Suppressing the violent surge of nausea, she cast the trowel aside and began clawing away the dirt with both hands.
She had to throw all of this into the storehouse incinerator before the fireworks concluded.
“Pant, pant, pant.”
Her fingertips were raw from the rough earth and small stones wedged themselves beneath her nails, but she refused to stop.
Dragging the first corpse with all her might, she shoved it into the cart.
Beneath it lay two other corpses, piled atop ancient, weathered skeletons.
She paused briefly to catch her breath before returning to the pit to haul up the next body.
Flash! Bang! Flash, boom, bang!
Suddenly, the vibrant light generated by the fireworks flashed brilliantly before her eyes.
The world should have plunged right back into darkness afterward, but strangely, she felt as though her surroundings remained illuminated.
Lucretia froze in her tracks, turning her head to stare back toward the South Wing.
Across the entire building, one by one, the windows were lighting up.

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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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