The Villainess Duke Lady Hides Her Identity - Chapter 51

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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 51

The Orphanage stood unchanged. A fresh coat of paint had daubed it in garish colors, but its distinctive gloom remained untouched.
On the surface, it looked like any ordinary orphanage without a trace of trouble.
‘The Director’s son, then.’
Reponya dredged up her memories. In those early years, when the Director had sold children off, this man had stood at his side—snickering into cheap cookies, his face unmistakable.
He bore the Director’s revolting features too closely, and the contact dredged up a flood of things she’d rather forget.
“This one.”
The man tightened his grip on Reponya’s shoulder—light but firm, as her learned terror stiffened her limbs—and presented her to the Director.
Everything that followed moved with mechanical swiftness. As she’d overheard, the man handed money to the Director and instructed him: tell no one who came asking; hand her over to no one.
The Director, who’d worn the mask of a good man, transformed the moment the bills appeared. He pocketed the money and assured the man not to worry—just get through a month or two and there’d be no problem.
He even volunteered that selling a child too quickly might draw attention, so he’d keep her here at least five years before moving her on.
The man left without a backward glance, as though Reponya’s fate thereafter meant nothing to him at all.
“Hmm. Thirsty?”
The Director read her condition at once. Most children brought to the Orphanage arrived starved, injured, or parched.
“It’s fine. Let’s go inside.”
Indifferent to her response, the Director seized the limp child and hauled her into the Orphanage.
“Welcome. How old are you? No, wait. Don’t tell me. Your age won’t matter here anyway. Mm… you’re small and scrawny. You’ll pass easily for three or four years older than you are.”
“Let go of me!”
“You’re lucky. The younger they look, the higher the price. Older children have no market value—they don’t even sell well as slaves.”
Once inside, a long hallway stretched before her. A hallway she knew far too well.
Faded frames on the walls, bloodstains on the floor dried into changing colors.
Children’s eyes peering through narrow door gaps, brimming with terror.
‘How did I ever escape this place?’
Of all places, she was brought back here. What persistence fate showed in tormenting her.
Reponya had thrashed at first, but quickly realized it was pointless. To escape, she’d need to conserve strength and wait for opportunity.
“Perfect timing, actually. My gambling debts have been tight, and I was wondering whether to sell all the children here at once and skip town. Now that I’ve got this, I can finally make real money, clear the debts, and start fresh.”
The Director descended to the Basement, whistling contentedly. In the storage area below lay a Solitary Cell.
Children who’d misbehaved were dragged there to sit for a day or two, or worse.
“Just to be safe, you’ll spend a month or two down here.”
Young Reponya had been brought to this cell before and knew it well. No light entered; only one candle burned. Once the basement door closed, sight failed entirely.
At night, the wind made a woman’s keening sound—eerie, unsettling—and she’d jolt awake to the patter of rats fleeing in the dark.
The children dreaded being dragged to the Solitary Cell. Reponya had felt that same dread then.
The Director shoved Reponya inside.
“Stay here, and no one who comes looking will find you. Oh, you said you were thirsty.”
The Director smiled and handed her water.
“Don’t die. Don’t get sick. You become worthless then. Understand?”
Ironically, what these people feared most in such a place was the children’s death. To them, children were inventory.
Reponya bit her lip and drank the offered water in one gulp.
“You’re strange, though. Normally when kids are dragged in like this, they whine and cry—let me go, save me, blah blah blah. But you’re quiet. That’s nice.”
“If you don’t send me back, there will be consequences.”
The Director, who had been moving to close the door with a smile, turned back.
“This was done without the Head of House’s permission—an independent act. Release me now, and I’ll forget it ever happened.”
“So that’s why you weren’t crying… Are you insane? Did you go mad? Dammit. Mad ones don’t fetch as much—I should’ve asked for more.”
“I belong to House of Craitan.”
Reponya met the Director’s gaze with an expressionless face.
“Can you handle the consequences?”
There was no reason to hide.
If the Director ran to House of Craitan and tried to leverage Reponya as a hostage for ransom, the Duke would rescue her. She’d escape safely.
If the Director spread word, he’d be announcing he held her. The rumor would spread; Reponya would be found.
It pained her to invoke the House of Craitan’s name for this sordid business, but Reponya had to survive first.
To live. To want to live.
That had been her only goal from the moment she’d fled this Orphanage.
“Ha. You really are mad.”
The Director looked down at her with contempt, sighing.
“If you belong to House of Craitan, then I’m royalty. What? Now everyone wants to be nobility? Huh?”
“If you don’t believe me, tell House of Craitan you’re holding me and demand ransom.”
The moment Reponya mentioned money, the Orphanage Director’s eyes flickered. His earlier complaint about gambling debts suggested his funds were stretched thin.
But he quickly collected himself.
“So you’re planning to have me executed for lèse-majesty.”
That wasn’t it at all.
“Look, if you’re going to lie, at least do it convincingly. Children these days—they’re all hopeless. Why didn’t you just say you were the Duke’s daughter instead?”
……
“Every brat who walks through that door tells me the same story. ‘Don’t you know who I am? Let me go and I’ll bring you money.’ I’m sick of it. Why don’t you try saying you’re on close terms with Duke Billemen, the man everyone’s been talking about lately?”
……
“It’s better for both of us if you stay quiet. Understood?”
The Director smiled and shut the door behind him.
‘…It’s all actually true, though.’
The misaligned door creaked shut with a heavy thud. She heard the Director’s footsteps ascending eagerly, and then the basement door slammed closed with a dull bang.
She’d worried that he might recognize five-year-old Reponya as resembling some child from years past, but the Director seemed to have no memory of those old days at all.
‘It’ll be dinner time soon, and the Director and teachers will be occupied. Better to stay quiet for now.’
…Teacher.
The word conjured Havelian unbidden.
That face she’d watched avoiding her gaze so desperately, and then—in the end—that face stained with guilt and regret, despair and confusion.
If he’d decided to abandon her, he shouldn’t have worn such an expression. He should have felt relief instead.
“…Stupid Havelian.”
He was the one who’d cast her aside, so why couldn’t she stop thinking about him?
Reponya curled into herself and closed her eyes.
Her body shivered in the cold, having grown too accustomed to the warmth of the fireplace.

* * *

Several days had passed since she was locked in the Solitary Cell.
On the first day, they’d stripped her of her clothes and jewels—everything of value was taken.
In their place, she was given worn garments and shoes so thin and frayed from washing that they were barely usable.
‘They steal expensive things and then give me this pittance in return.’
Reponya’s teeth ground together.
‘At least I managed to keep this one thing.’
Just one. The Green Jewel that Rudeuum had given her—they hadn’t taken that.
She’d fastened it around the back of her neck and wound her hair around it so it wouldn’t come loose.
It didn’t glow, but even so, Reponya would sometimes take it out in the Solitary Cell and look at it.
Then she could muster her courage.
‘Just eat well and rest, and wait for one chance to escape. One chance is all I need.’
With no daylight in this place, she had to judge time by the meals that arrived, tracking days through their intervals.
The Director showed her little interest, never even asking her name—he simply called her “Girl.” She’d worried he might recognize her, but fortunately that never happened.
He was too busy with gambling to waste words or blows on her.
Or perhaps he was simply frightened when he learned she was from House of Craitan.
Reponya’s eyes snapped open as a bitter chill cut through her.
‘They should at least repair the place.’
The Orphanage, already decaying with age, hadn’t been maintained properly—wind whistled through the gaps constantly.
She tried curling her body as tightly as possible to block the rushing air, but it did little good.
‘They could at least give me a blanket.’
She couldn’t fathom how her younger self had endured this cold so stoically. Reponya shivered, her brow furrowed.
‘This is why I shouldn’t have gotten used to comfort. Now that I’ve spent warm nights by a fireplace, I can’t sleep a wink when it’s cold.’
Everything circled back—in the end, this was where Reponya belonged.
She scrunched her face and squeezed her eyes shut.
Then she clenched the jewel tightly in both her hands.
He told her to live, so she would.
The anxiety that had flooded her suddenly drained away. Reponya opened her hands and looked at the jewel resting in her palm.
He said it would answer if she called. But it hasn’t answered.
“…Rudeuum, you liar.”
Reponya whispered his name faintly in a small voice, calling it again.
She shouldn’t have trusted it in the first place, yet here she was, a fool.
Reponya’s face twisted, her eyes clenched shut. She should never have bothered keeping this jewel—she should have carried a Return Stone instead, no matter how expensive.
Or she should have ridden the magical beast with all its safeguards built in.
If she had, by now she would’ve already escaped this place……
“Me?”
A voice cut through the darkness. Reponya’s eyes snapped open in shock. Light bloomed in the Solitary Cell—a Spirit’s radiance where no natural light could reach.
Reponya blinked, dazed.
“Ponya.”
As though summoned by her own voice, Rudeuum stood before her, answering her call.
“I found you at last.”
Was she dreaming? She had called and called, yet he never came—until now.
“I waited to hear you call my name.”
A dream? Was it a dream? Or a hallucination.
“I… called for you so many times, and you didn’t come until now.”
Reponya’s voice wavered, uncertain, as if murmuring to herself. Rudeuum laughed.
He saw her broken state and his jaw tightened for a moment before he released the tension and drew closer.
“I know.”
He removed his outer robe and sat facing her, meeting her eyes at level. Then he draped the robe around her shoulders. Warmth flooded through her as she wrapped herself in the garment—suddenly, a chill she hadn’t even realized she carried melted away.
His cool, familiar scent lingered at the edge of her breath, proof that this was no dream.
“I heard every word.”
Rudeuum opened his arms wide and pulled her small frame into an embrace, her body enveloped in his outer robe.

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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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