The Prince’s Nanny, Her Specialty Is Assassination - Chapter 286
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This chapter was translated by Lunox Team. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Chapter 286. Interrogation (1)
“This is truly absurd.”
Jerome let out a groan while crossing his arms.
He glared at me sitting in the chair across from him with my hands and feet bound.
“So what you’re saying is, you are indeed Kayla Angel, but it’s also true that you died and have now been resurrected in Rachel Brown’s body?”
“Yes.”
“No, how exactly did you come back to life?”
I couldn’t tell him that the young boy I saved had grown up and brought me back to life. If I did, Kaiden would become terribly troubled.
“I don’t know either.”
“Ha.”
Jerome sighed at my answer and muttered.
“A dead person coming back to life…”
“I know you won’t believe it. I couldn’t believe it at first either.”
“Good grief.”
Jerome swept his bangs back as if he had a headache.
Then he kept tilting his head and asked again.
“The ‘Kayl Angella’ who was assigned to guard Prince Edwin during the subjugation campaign was also you?”
“Yes, I was in disguise.”
“Ha, really…”
Jerome read over the writing on the documents several times before shaking his head.
“Whether this is truly possible in reality…”
I quietly watched Jerome as he muttered to himself.
He seemed to be reciting something under his breath before opening his mouth again.
“Well, anyway, the reason I arranged this meeting is to interrogate you on His Majesty the Emperor’s orders.”
He who came to interrogate me on the Emperor’s orders looked extremely tired.
“We’ve obtained information that the Breath of Angels is involved in this rebellion. Also the fact that the deceased Viscount Ian Miller was actually the same person as ‘Ian Angel’ who secretly led that organization.”
They found out quite quickly.
I waited for Jerome’s next words with an indifferent expression.
“And ‘Kayla Angel’ is someone who was very close not only to the Breath of Angels but also to Ian Angel. Therefore, His Majesty suspects that you are not unrelated to the rebels.”
“I have no connection to them. If I were connected, why would I have killed them with my own hands?”
The fact that I eliminated the assassins was directly witnessed not only by the children but also by the maids including Catherine.
Even Philip, the vice-captain of the Gloria Knights, saw it clearly with his own eyes, so there were plenty of witnesses.
“Then, did you also kill Ian Angel?”
Yes, I did. With my own hands.
As his cold corpse came to mind, I felt my fingertips and the inside of my chest grow cold.
“…Yes.”
I quietly steadied my breathing before answering.
“I killed him.”
Jerome narrowed his eyes at my answer.
Then he raised one eyebrow and brought up something unexpected.
“What’s your relationship with the King of Adamant?”
“Why are you asking about that?”
“Because the King of Adamant is claiming that he killed Ian Angel.”
Kaiden? Why?
I tried to maintain a nonchalant expression.
Then Jerome rattled off things I hadn’t even asked about.
“Ian Angel was the heir of an Empire noble family that was wiped out before he became an assassin. If that’s the case, then a foreign king murdered an Empire noble, but does that brat know how much damage such a statement will cause his country…”
“The one who killed Ian.”
Jerome’s eyes widened as soon as I interrupted him, and he stared at me.
“It wasn’t His Majesty the King of Adamant, but me.”
I clenched my fists as I added.
“If you examined the corpse, you would know. That bastard died from poison. It was poison I made myself, so I can prove it to you.”
“I know.”
Jerome looked annoyed.
“I also think you killed him. But what can I do when the King of Adamant insists he killed him?”
As expected, I’ll need to discuss that matter with the Adamant side again.
Jerome muttered to himself again, then grumbled in a sighing voice.
“Brown, or should I call you Kayla.”
“Call me whatever is comfortable for you.”
“…Then I’ll just call you Brown Lordling. That rolls off the tongue better.”
Jerome took a deep breath and lowered his gaze.
He turned a page of the documents he was holding and continued speaking.
“Brown Lordling, when did you decide to become The 3rd Prince’s caretaker?”
“I believe I told you that when I came back to life, I was already in the position of caretaker.”
“What I mean is, why didn’t you immediately quit being a caretaker? Just because you were resurrected in someone else’s body doesn’t mean you had to take on that person’s job as well.”
It was a dilemma I had countless times in the not-so-distant past.
I too had only thought about how to escape somehow as soon as I realized that Rachel Brown’s job was being a caretaker.
‘At first, I planned to quit after just one month.’
The original purpose was to gather funds to track Ian’s whereabouts and then escape.
‘But…’
Small but numerous reasons accumulated and I ultimately couldn’t leave.
I thought for a moment and answered in a small voice.
“…I wanted to.”
“What?”
“I wanted to protect those children.”
Prince with Fur and the princess with no presence at all.
Though born with the most noble status, seeing those kids who were no different from my childhood self, I couldn’t bring myself to leave.
“Why?”
Jerome frowned as if he couldn’t understand.
“Why did you think you had to protect Their Highnesses?”
“Am I not allowed to think that way?”
“Well, aren’t you an assassin?”
The Duke said something similar to my lover whom I killed with my own hands.
“Someone like you who thinks human lives are worth less than gold coins surely didn’t volunteer for such troublesome work out of simple compassion, right?”
“…Is that strange?”
I couldn’t understand the reason.
Suddenly something surged up inside me.
“Do people who kill for money have no right to pity someone or protect them?”
A sneer escaped me without realizing it.
“Why is that? You also cherish your daughter dearly, yet you’re cruel enough to cut off the arm of an unknown young boy and kill him.”
Jerome’s fingertips holding the documents flinched.
He slowly raised his head to look at me.
“…You.”
“From your expression, it seems you do remember.”
I twisted up one corner of my mouth.
“That incident.”
Jerome’s jaw tensed.
He frowned and then slowly opened his mouth.
“…It seems you want to say I have no right to criticize you.”
“I never thought I had that right to begin with.”
We were both the same, weren’t we.
This time, I had no intention of hiding my hostility.
“You were also a mercenary, weren’t you.”
Taking money to kill people—mercenaries did the same thing.
“Knights are no different. Getting paid and having to kill unrelated strangers for the sake of protecting the emperor and citizens.”
And it’s not like they necessarily always protect the citizens anyway.
“Where is the honor in such work, where is the pride.”
“You speak quite well for someone sitting there as a criminal.”
“Are you deflecting?”
Jerome closed his mouth with a hardened expression.
A moment of silence passed before he spoke again.
“So you want to say that my swinging a sword at that boy that day was wrong?”
“That child was still a young kid who knew nothing.”
“But he was an assassin. A comrade who accompanied you to assassinate me.”
“Didn’t you promise? That if I told you who ordered your death, you would spare that child! I tried to be honest with you even while breaking the rules!”
My voice rose without me realizing it.
I could almost feel the body temperature of that child, growing cold as one arm was severed.
“And yet! Even so, can you call yourself a father to a child? How could you do that without a moment’s hesitation, so casually…”
“I.”
Jerome’s cold voice cut off my words.
“Simply don’t trust that kind of people in such situations.”
Those who crawled through the bottom, who couldn’t survive their entire lives without harming others.
From his cold gray eyes, I felt hotter contempt than ever before.
“Yes, as you said, I was also a mercenary. So I came to know better than anyone how assassins survive in those days, how they make deals.”
The people Jerome encountered wandering the back alleys acted like beasts who knew nothing of morality or faith.
As long as they could fill their own bellies, as long as they could preserve their lives, they didn’t care about others’ suffering. In the world they lived in, that was morality and faith.
“Yes, there might be unusual people like you among them.”
Jerome murmured in a low voice.
“…Abnormal people who don’t forget their sins, who rush to help others without caring about their own precious lives, trying somehow to remain human.”
Fearlessly barging into the knight order asking to let the prince participate in training, breaking through monsters to save an unrelated child, throwing yourself off a cliff to save the prince.
“But not everyone is like you, Brown Lordling.”
Jerome’s tone returned to normal.
His voice, which had seemed agitated, also calmed down considerably.
“What would have happened if the bastard I killed then had returned alive? Even if he went back alive, he would have continued living as the organization’s dog anyway.”
He slowly approached me and gripped the back of the chair.
“What if that bastard grew up and came to assassinate me again? Or if he tried to harm my daughter for revenge? If he threatened the safety of House of Crowner?”
The gray eyes that came close to my face showed no wavering.
“I only fought to protect what’s mine. Even if I went back to that time again, I would have acted the same way.”
Jerome looked at me with my head tilted back and murmured quietly.
“So I’d appreciate it if you didn’t judge me carelessly. If I have no right to condemn you, then you likewise have no right to condemn me.”
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This chapter was translated by Lunox Team. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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