The Villainess Duke Lady Hides Her Identity - Chapter 60

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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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Chapter 60

Reponya held both brothers’ hands firmly and fairly as she led them toward the Conference Room.
Of course they bickered several times along the way, but their quarrel never escalated into a full argument.
Whenever the dispute threatened to intensify, Reponya would squeeze the hands she held and let out a sharp “Psst!”—and remarkably, both brothers would settle down each time.
‘…How strange.’
It was startling how the firstborn, infamous for his coldness, and the second son, notorious for his wildness, would become docile at a single sound.
Reponya had to keep holding both brothers’ hands firmly all the way until they arrived at the Conference Room.
As they entered, she could see the retainers standing with lowered heads, glancing nervously about, and Duke Craitan sitting with his chin propped on his hand, his expression rigid.
She remembered seeing that face before.
Back when Reponya was still her true self, before she had become so small—when she was carrying out the Pope’s orders.
It resembled the face she’d glimpsed then, when she was being hunted by him, the guardian of the empire.
She’d been so terrified that night that even in her dreams she’d been chased and chased by Duke Craitan.
As that memory surfaced, Reponya flinched and took a step backward.
At that instant, both her hands were gripped firmly.
“What’s wrong? Cottontail, are you scared? Did we startle you?”
“We’re right here, so you don’t have to worry.”
“Father. Cottontail is frightened. Soften your expression. If you keep looking that scary when you’re the one who called her here, what are you trying to accomplish?”
“Father. Ponya is still only five years old. Children are sensitive to the mood around them, so I would appreciate it if you could be more considerate.”
Whether chastened by his sons’ rebukes or not, Duke Craitan, who had been tapping the table with a rigid expression to exert pressure, instantly softened as if he’d never been stern at all.
“Ponya.”
Duke Craitan rose and approached Reponya readily.
Thanks to the warmth of the hands holding hers, Reponya quickly came to her senses and nodded. Duke Craitan reached out, lifted Reponya into his arms, and returned to his seat.
Once he settled her on his lap and sat back down, all the retainers bowed their heads in unison.
‘It’s like back then.’
She remembered the day she first met the retainers.
Not long after Reponya had been adopted, the retainers had all come to pay their respects, and on that day too she had sat on Duke Craitan’s lap and greeted them.
The difference was that back then the retainers had been glaring at Reponya with disapproving expressions, whereas now they were fidgeting and bowing their heads in shame.
“Are these uncles being punished?”
Reponya asked in the innocent tone of a five-year-old who knew nothing of the world.
Though Duke Craitan noticed her behaving in a way she normally wouldn’t, he didn’t find it odd and went along with it.
“These uncles dared to disobey my orders and made you suffer and hurt, so yes, they must be punished.”
“I see.”
Reponya nodded as if she understood.
“What kind of punishment will they receive?”
“I’ll confiscate their wealth and ban all of their children’s marriages.”
The moment the Duke finished speaking, the retainers’ faces went deathly pale. Confiscation of wealth was one thing, but banning all their children’s marriages was a catastrophe.
Their family lines would be cut off entirely.
Moreover, even if their children found someone they loved, they would not be able to marry, and even if they had children, those children could not be registered to the family register.
“Your Grace, Your Grace!”
“I’m quite certain I warned you at the beginning.”
Duke Craitan, chin tilted at an angle, fixed his piercing gaze on the retainers.
“I told you that those who dared to slander the princess would pay a price, and that if you so much as laid a hand on my daughter, ignorant of your place, I would stake my entire honor on making you regret it.”
The retainers trembled violently.
“There is no reconsidering. Your loyalty has been corrupted, and I have no choice but to mete out a punishment commensurate with that corruption.”
“We were wrong, wrong. Your Grace. Please, please reconsider—”
“Please forgive us! We were wrong! We were all wrong!”
“We thought it was the way to protect House of Craitan. Our loyalty has not wavered. So please, might you not reconsider your judgment regarding only my daughter and my son?”
The retainers vied with one another, begging and pleading. It was not merely parental affection for their children—the very survival of their families hung in the balance, and the urgency showed.
Observing the situation, Reponya cleared her throat with a soft hum and raised her short arm.
Seeing her hand shoot up as if she were making a proclamation, the Duke laughed.
“What is it, Ponya?”
“Well. But didn’t these uncles decide this among themselves?”
Reponya’s eyes turned toward Havelian, who stood behind her.
“Surely the firstborn planned it with them?”
Each time this topic came up, Havelian’s face would crumple like the petals of a flower wilted from long neglect, as if they might crumble to dust at any moment.
A single touch and he seemed as though he would scatter into the wind.
‘…that’s amusing.’
Wait, no—that won’t do. Just because I find their reaction funny doesn’t mean I should tease them about something this serious.
Reponya shook her head, collecting herself.
“My eldest brother is the heir to House of Craitan, so it would be hard to argue his loyalty was corrupted just because he listened to what he said and agreed with him, wouldn’t it?”
At Reponya’s words, Havelian’s face went ashen and he hurried to add more.
“I—”
Havelian opened his mouth.
“I did agree with it, but I wasn’t the one who initiated it. I’m not saying I did well, but those who came to me with the proposal and led the effort—they need to be punished—”
“But you accepted the proposal, didn’t you?”
Reponya asked matter-of-factly. Havelian had nothing to say; his lips pressed firmly shut.
“Ponya.”
The Duke, who had been listening to the situation, stroked the young girl’s hair and continued.
“I’ve already turned a blind eye more than enough to this, even when there was that fire incident last time. If you’re about to ask me to let this slide the same way—”
“No. That’s not it. They should be punished. But I think the severity should be different.”
“Different severity?”
Reponya nodded. Every eye in the room fixed on her.
They all understood now. Their entire fate rested on a single word from this five-year-old girl.
Reponya held up one finger.
“For the men who only voiced the opinion of sending me to the Orphanage, or merely agreed to it—confiscate their assets.”
Then she held up two fingers.
“For the man who actively participated in sending me to the Orphanage and planned to involve my eldest brother to mitigate his crime and then carried it out—confiscate his assets and restrict his children’s marriages.”
Reponya held up three fingers.
“And.”
And? What else? Even the Duke looked curious, as did all his retainers.
Reponya’s voice dropped lower.
“The man who switched carriages so I would be completely untraceable, who sent me to a different Orphanage instead of the original one, who didn’t care whether I lived or died. That man.”
Reponya looked around at the retainers. Which one of them was it? She hadn’t seen their faces, so she couldn’t tell by looking.
“That man will have his assets confiscated, his children’s marriages restricted—of course—and will be stripped of all Rights and Privileges he held as a Vassal Family of House of Craitan. He can no longer remain under the protection of House of Craitan.”
The Conference Room fell silent.
Everyone swallowed hard. The child who had just asked if those men should be punished seemed like a completely different person now.
Reponya swept her gaze lightly across the quiet room and then swung her feet back and forth with a cheerful expression, as if she hadn’t just done anything unusual.
“I was just thinking out loud! Of course, the final decision is yours, my lord!”
When punishments are differentiated based on the severity of the crime, in the future when a similar situation arises, no one will want to step forward or actively commit the deed.
Because they clearly know that the severity of punishment differs between merely participating and actively committing the crime.
If the punishment is the same regardless of the crime, then since mere participation brings the same punishment anyway, there’s a greater likelihood that people will act more aggressively.
‘The Pope used to be foolish about that.’
No matter who did wrong, it was always Joint Responsibility. Did that scare the children more because of it?
No. Since everyone would receive the same punishment anyway, it only encouraged them to act more aggressively instead. Reponya had been part of that too, of course.
That’s when she’d learned: to break unity, you first have to introduce differentiation.
She never thought she’d use that lesson here.
Duke Craitan let out a dry laugh and stroked Reponya’s hair.
“My daughter is a genius.”
“Father. Can this really be called mere genius? I’d say it’s too ambiguous a term. If I’m being honest, I suspect this is a divine intellect born only once every thousand years.”
Just as Havelian had been wilting like a dried petal, he suddenly sprang back to life, chattering away with a delighted expression.
“Didn’t I tell you to call a tutor immediately? I’ll conduct the tutor interviews myself. If they lack sufficient skill, they have no right to teach Ponya.”
The Duke nodded vaguely and turned to address his retainers again.
“We’ll do it. As the Princess said, we’ll differentiate the punishment severity. For those who only voiced the opinion of sending the Princess to the Orphanage, we’ll confiscate their assets.”
Some of the retainers’ faces brightened. They grasped each other’s hands, exclaiming, ‘We’re safe! We were right to hold back and not do it properly that time!’
“For those who actively participated in sending the Princess to the Orphanage and drew Havelian in, we’ll confiscate their assets and restrict their children’s marriages as planned. And.”
The Duke’s expression darkened desolately.
“The man who switched carriages to completely erase my daughter’s trace and changed even the Orphanage itself will have his assets confiscated, his children’s marriages restricted, and all Rights and Privileges he held as a Vassal Family of House of Craitan will be stripped from him.”
The Duke repeated Reponya’s words exactly as she had spoken them. It was an act of establishing her standing.
“He can no longer remain under the protection of House of Craitan.”
As the Duke finished speaking, the office fell silent.
No one dared speak hastily; they studied each other’s expressions. If anyone added another word now, it would be as good as a confession, so they seemed intent on feigning ignorance.
Fat chance.
“Your Grace. Everyone suddenly went quiet.”
Reponya laughed.
“It’s strange. The person who said they’d send me to the Orphanage seems to have all disappeared.”
“I—I’m really not one of them, Princess. I did agree, but—”
“Havelian.”
Reponya turned her head without so much as listening to the vassal’s words.
“You planned this together too, so you know exactly who raised their voice about sending me to the Orphanage, and how actively you drew them in, don’t you?”
Havelian flinched.
“When you summoned me back then. You know perfectly well who those people were—the ones who gagged my mouth, pinned my body, and forced me into the Carriage.”
He’d been manipulated by the vassals’ malice and swept along in their wake, but Havelian bore responsibility for his own choices as well.
“So you tell me directly who did it.”
Reponya smiled.
She spoke as if commanding him to pick out the vassals who had planned it alongside him and punish them with his own hand.
……
For Havelian, the Heir of House of Craitan, to stand before his vassals unable to protect those he had consulted with and instead cast them out himself—that was humiliation.
A harsh punishment for the heir who would one day shoulder the burden of House of Craitan.
‘A leader who cannot make the right choices has no strength to protect anything. That’s what he needs to learn.’
Duke Craitan did not stop Reponya’s words either. Havelian, who would become the head of this House and lead it into the future, needed to know how to take responsibility for his own choices.
Havelian lowered his gaze, then slowly pointed to a few of the vassals and called their names. Duke Craitan gestured to the knights to take them away.
“Please reconsider! Reconsider, I beg you!”
“Young Master! I implore you to render a wise judgment and embrace us with generous clemency!”
Reponya quietly watched the vassals being dragged away at Havelian’s call. She gently stroked the back of his hand.
A wordless warning not to be swayed again.
Havelian looked down at the back of his hand, tears glistening in his eyes, then set his expression firm.
“I will take responsibility at Reponya’s side from now on, so you will all answer for what you have done.”
A few more were dragged away.
The vassals who remained seated breathed sighs of relief as if it had nothing to do with them.
“But… how are we to know who sent the young mistress to a different Orphanage instead?”
The vassals murmured, each adding their own words.
Reponya’s ears perked 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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