The Baddest Villainess Is Back - Chapter 99

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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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Episode 99
Rozelin shrugged and turned to face Devon.
“Grandfather.”
“Yes?”
“Usually when two houses conduct business, the contract explicitly forbids disclosing any details of the transaction to third parties, doesn’t it?”
Cherti Bellion’s eyes narrowed, and he nodded.
“That’s right, it does.”
He brought his Staff down against the floor with a sharp crack as he spoke.
“Yet today, most of the nobles you invited have broken that clause and met secretly to engage in collusion.”
“……What?”
“The Duchy faces a particularly severe food shortage. So they’re attempting to use it as leverage. If the Duchy ever tries to suppress even one house…….”
Rozelin drew a finger across her throat in a gesture of finality.
“They’ll all move together to boycott us.”
Devon Bellion’s gaze turned keen.
He scanned the room with a rigid expression.
“What grave accusations, my lady! How dare a girl who’s barely come of age meddle in such serious affairs between houses! And with nothing but fabrications at that!”
The Count ground his teeth and shoved his wife to the side, then took several strides toward Rozelin before stopping short.
“I’d prefer it if you didn’t come within ten paces of my daughter.”
A faint violet mist began to drift around Cherti Bellion.
Though Rozelin stood nearby, the poison posed no threat to her whatsoever.
‘So it’s true—the Abyss causes no harm to those the wielder does not wish it to.’
The rumors, it seemed, held truth.
Watching her father’s back as he commanded the Abyss with practiced ease, Rozelin smiled faintly.
“If they aren’t fabrications?”
“What……?”
“If they aren’t fabrications, then every transaction is void, and you’ll all pay the penalty. For breach of contract.”
Rozelin spoke with a brilliant smile.
“Look here, it seems your long illness has made your nature rather sharp. How presumptuous of you to speak so boldly when you don’t even understand the true situation of the Duchy!”
At the Count’s words, Rozelin laughed luminously.
Without a trace of shadow, her laughter was as beautiful as a rose in full bloom, yet her eyes held a keenness as though concealing poison.
“The House of Bellion has guarded the Monster Forest and its borders for centuries. At the front lines. Without retreat, not once.”
She lifted her head, drew herself up, and met their gaze.
“The calluses on my grandfather’s and eldest uncle’s hands, the scars covering their bodies—every one came from standing bare-handed at the forest’s threshold like a gate guardian, holding back the creatures that emerged from the Monster Forest.”
At Rozelin’s calm words, Devon Bellion’s eyes widened slightly.
He heard a truth spoken from the lips of a child so young he’d never imagined such words would reach his ears in his lifetime.
“Yet your conduct is laughable.”
Rozelin openly scorned them.
“Do you know why the Duchy is uniquely barren, even among the Northern Region?”
“Well, it’s because we’re farther north…….”
“Barren or not, you’re still the Northern Region.”
She spoke with finality.
“It’s the Miasma of the Monster Forest. The blood and Miasma of slaughtered beasts seep into the earth and kill it, so crops cannot grow.”
“…….”
“And with monster attacks frequent here, mining and weapons manufacture developed uniquely, but agriculture could never flourish.”
Rozelin regarded each of them who had come here driven by their own greed, and spoke with precision.
“Do you imagine what would happen if the Duchy closed its doors and ignored the creatures pouring from the forest?”
Then they would scramble to deploy their armies and struggle to dispose of the monsters.
The Imperial Capital would tell the Northern Region to handle it themselves.
“My grandfather is not a man to take credit for such things.”
But Rozelin was different.
She could take credit as much as she wished.
And quite ruthlessly at that.
“The House of Bellion has stood like a gate guardian before the Monster Forest for centuries, conducting periodic subjugations and, once or twice a year, collaborating with the Temple for purification rites.”
The assembly fell into profound silence at the words spilling from the young girl’s lips.
Devon, Cherti, and Batar alike stared at Rozelin with startled eyes.
Until now, Rozelin had been consistently indifferent to everything, rarely speaking at such length or expressing her opinions with such force.
“Have any of you ever sent even a single soldier to assist with subjugation? Yet you come here seeking to help the Duchy…….”
“…….”
“Gathering in a huddle, envious of your neighbor’s gains, and attempting to extort us with food as your excuse…… What’s the difference between you and thugs in some back alley?”
Rozelin gazed at them with a cold stare, then turned and smiled broadly, looking toward Cherti and Devon.
“So I’ve been thinking about it, Father. Grandfather.”
“……What is it?”
“Well, yes. Go ahead and tell us, granddaughter.”
Devon and Cherti looked utterly startled at Rozelin, then nodded vaguely in agreement.
“Should we cut off all our dealings with these insolent people?”
“Daughter, where did you pick up such harsh language…….”
As the bewildered Cherti spoke, Rozelin met his gaze in silence, and Cherti’s eyes narrowed fiercely at his own father.
At the same time, Devon let out a fit of rough coughing. “Ahem! Cough cough!!”
“Father…….”
“Yes! Cut them off, cut them off! If we have the evidence, there’s nothing stopping us! My granddaughter, do whatever you want!”
Devon waved his hand dismissively.
He had no hesitation, especially after hearing earlier in the day that Batar had agreed to provide a certain amount of provisions free of charge until they were no longer needed—a request Rozelin had made of him.
‘So that’s why she suddenly said such a thing…….’
It seemed his granddaughter had wanted to drop this bombshell.
“And from now on, we’re collecting Protection Fees.”
“Hmm……?”
Shrieeek!
A snowy white bird flew through an open window of the banquet hall with a piercing cry and approached Rozelin.
Rozelin unfolded the paper attached to the bird’s leg and finished her thought.
“No more free labor.”
Rozelin smiled brightly.
They were the evidence of collusion and underhanded dealings among the Northern territories—sent by Arma in response to the letter Rozelin had written not long before.
It was the moment the board Rozelin had laid out became perfectly complete.
* * *
The Moonlight Banquet came to a truly chaotic and miserable end.
Though lords grasped at the hem of the Bellion Duke’s robe from every direction, the evidence Arma sent was unmistakably clear, and Devon, the Bellion Duke, made no attempt to interfere with Rozelin’s scheme.
Instead, he simply sat as if watching a performance, drinking wine and nibbling at appetizers.
Of the seventeen territories that had dealings with the Bellion household, trade with fourteen of them was severed that day.
Though they apologized belatedly, nothing changed.
Following Rozelin’s plan, Devon locked the gates of the Duchy and allowed no one inside except for merchants and Kalutas with whom they maintained trade agreements.
He also ended the banquet with a notice that henceforth, they were on their own to survive against the monsters.
And just as the turbulent news reached the Imperial Capital and spread as a special edition, creating an uproar, Rozelin stood facing Devon at the entrance of the Bellion household.
Devon, who had been rubbing the bridge of his nose throughout the chaos, spoke first.
“Rozelin.”
“Yes, Grandfather.”
“No matter what, Cherti is still your father. You understand that, don’t you?”
“Yes, of course.”
Rozelin faced the serious expression of Devon Bellion and answered obediently, nodding her head.
How could she not know?
By now, everyone in the world must know that Rozelin Bellion was the daughter of Cherti Bellion.
“Good. I’m relieved you understand.”
Rozelin nodded without hesitation, as if it were obvious.
“……Then going forward, stop forcing him to sleep like that.”
Devon spoke while looking at his youngest son, who had once again been forcibly put to sleep and was now being carried away on a stretcher by servants.
‘As if he were some sickly girl.’
Devon clicked his tongue at Cherti’s pathetic state.

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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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