TVIOWHFW 39

Suddenly, the situation spiraled, and Countess Hettel restrained her daughter.

“Wait. Lotte. We’re in the middle of Obblente—”

A vow to a family name, Obliente.

This wasn’t merely a matter of a bet with honor at stake.

“Because it involves the imperial family’s name, as part of the vow!”

If you lose the bet, not only would the family’s honor be utterly ruined, but the winner could demand three things from the opponent according to the vow.

“I can’t demand the family’s titles, but…”

Everything else was fair game: the lordship, the fief, absolutely everything.

“If things go wrong, we’d owe more than 100,000 gold.”

Even, this very meeting included the imperial prime minister Ortega as arbiter. If something went wrong, there’d be no changing the terms.

“Better to drag this out—perhaps listen to the Viscountess Blanchet’s words later—”

In the moment Countess Hettel hesitated, Estelle tilted her head slightly and asked:

“Countess Hettel. Is something wrong?”

“Obbliente is something that must be decided carefully.”

“I understand your feelings, Countess. In fact, I think both sides could still be true.”

Estelle clasped her hands and smiled.

“But even if that were the case, the truth must come out. So I think we should proceed with Obliente. Don’t you agree?”

The Countess Hettel didn’t answer right away.

Then, with boldness, the Count spoke.

“Madam, what could you possibly not do? Very well! I, under the name of the Hettel estate, vow this!”

Startled by her husband’s sudden move, the Countess Hettel nodded.

“Very well. But can the Duchess of Blanchet also agree to Obliente? It would require the Duchess’s consent.”

“That needn’t concern you.”

At that moment, John placed a hand on Estelle’s shoulder and replied languidly.

“Estelle’s Obliente I’ll guarantee. Even if it costs Blanchet’s downfall.”

With a sly twist of his lips, John’s gaze grew icy.

“And once I take the lead, there will be no mercy.”

A sharp malice filled his voice, and Countess Hettel involuntarily drew back.

But she had no way to escape.

“Good! Prime minister, verify quickly. Determine which side’s words are true.”

“Understood. Since both houses seem to have reached an agreement, I will proceed with careful verification as well.”

Ortega the Prime Minister gathered the documents, sealed them in a pouch, and activated the contract spell ring.

Light from the ring swirled over the envelope. The ring’s blue gem turned opaque.

An absolute stillness—no one breathed.

All eyes fixed on Ortega’s ring.

After a moment, he opened his eyes.

The gem’s color became distinct.

Red.

That meant manipulation.

People turned their gaze toward Countess Hettel in silence.

‘So confident…’

‘What kind of confidence is this, to pull a clearly detected con on the Blanchet Duke?’

Countess Hettel’s face went pale.

“This is impossible! I- this must be a mistake!”

Her cold hands trembled.

‘The prime minister’s magic isn’t something that can be set up for a con…’

At that moment, Countess Hettel’s eyes met Estelle’s.

Estelle, standing slightly behind John, seemed to lean her frail body as if relieved by the sight of Estelle.

“You were the one! It was you all along. You—”

“Madam Countess Hettel. What on earth are you saying?”

“That—”

Her words were cut off by the ring’s magic, and Estelle smiled for those who could see her.

‘Yes, it’s me.’

The Countess Hettel collapsed to the floor, dazed. Estelle bowed her head in sorrow and leaned on John’s shoulder.

‘But Countess, no one will believe your words.’

The contract and the guarantee were all Countess Hettel’s, and all the evidence pointed to her. In short, she had done it all herself. The only difference was that Estelle hadn’t simply allowed herself to be the victim.

‘Who told you to do such a bad thing, you fool.’

Of course Estelle knew better why the Countess attacked her. The Blanchet Duchess held a formidable position. But Estelle found her to be ludicrous and naive.

‘All because of rumors.’

Estelle quietly recalled the titles she’d once heard hurled at her.

‘A fool adopted by Libertan without knowing her roots.’

‘A pretty but wicked woman.’

‘A dirty fake.’

People forgot that even the pretty fakes were living beings with thoughts.

‘But even a fake, as a human, must think and act.’

Still, it was a relief that things had turned out easier in the end.

Now the Countess, deprived of reason, would step on her own landmines.

~·~·*· . ·*· . ·*· . ·*·~·~

Countess Hettel, in denial of reality, raised her voice.

“Prime minister! We are wronged. There must be some problem. The Artefact of our family’s magic tool! We must try again with our family’s own tool.”

I simply watched the Countess as she spoke.

‘But it wouldn’t matter what magic tool you bring.’

Because the document I had tampered with was…

‘If Betty hadn’t been there, we would have had to use another method.’

But Betty was a loyal subordinate of the true puppeteers.

‘I have infiltrated other houses, stealing information and manipulating things.’

‘I can slip into anywhere and smuggle out whatever I want.’

Betty clapped her hands as she brought the sealed envelope from Countess Hettel and her husband into view.

Betty, red in embarrassment, brushed her cheeks and spoke.

‘The servants have their eyes elsewhere, so it wasn’t too hard. Replacing the same document with a similar one is my specialty. Anyway, my Lady, should we destroy this envelope as is?’

Truthfully, destroying it would have made things easier.

But Countess Hettel and her husband had tormented me enough, and I could not allow such a thing to stand.

‘Betty, is the contract magic inside this envelope now complete?’

‘The unaltered genuine one will appear. Madam, is this really the genuine one?’

‘We’ve written guarantees by force in Libertan before, but not by Hettel’s estate.’

‘Then this is…’

‘Yes. The contract magic has been manipulated to cause an error and thus altered.’

‘Usually contract magic reveals a lie when there is an error, but this is truly amazing.’

Indeed, nobles often kept important magical contracts like treasure.

‘But the fix is simple. Intentionally implant another manipulation on top of it to create a fault in the contract magic and leave it that way.’

Of course, Betty balked.

‘But Madam, won’t the Hetels notice before dinner? They’ll check again before the banquet.’

Indeed, if the Hetels checked before dinner and found the document fake, that would be a problem.

‘Then we’ll restore things as they were, and after they arrive at the banquet, bring the broken contract and lay it out?’

‘That’s a valuable artifact; they may bring it with them to the banquet themselves.’

‘No. Absolutely not.’

The Hetels’ personalities prohibited such an action. The Count was weak, and the Countess had the pride of a noble. They wouldn’t bring the document to court in front of so many guests; that would be undignified.

‘But honest to goodness, Betty, you could be caught. You’ll have to pull this off subtly.’

Betty nodded confidently.

‘Even a lady without a staff like this can infiltrate and smuggle things out.’

‘And one more favor.’

I handed back to Betty the document from Baron de Pennula that had been smuggled.

‘Hide this near the contract magic, just below it, where there are many secrets.’

Then, I staged things so the Hetels would not check the contract too closely. They would feel like innocent victims, unaware of what had happened.

‘Now there’s not much time left.’

Countess Hettel clung to Prime Minister Ortega and cried innocence.

“Prime Minister Ortega! Please verify with our family’s contract magic. Our family’s contract tool clearly showed it as genuine!”

“Even so, the fact that the Blanchet Duchess was falsely accused won’t go away, will it?”

“Yet doesn’t the fact that we weren’t acting with malice prove something? Please, I beg you.”

Ultimately, Ortega, respecting their plea, left to fetch the Hetel estate’s document.

‘Ortega will discover the Libertan document I placed there.’

Being clever, he would not assume the Hetels’ papers were the ones in question.

But Ortega wasn’t the type to be so rigid as to ignore an important piece of evidence.

“I’ve been to Countess Hettel’s office. The contract magic is quite deep; it took a little time.”

Ortega’s lips curved into a faint smile.

The Hetel couple looked at him with hopeful eyes.

“So, Your Excellency. How is it? Does our magic tool read true?”

“A truly unexpected turn of events has occurred.”

Nodding, Ortega handed the documents to the Hetels.

“You’ll find not only the fake signals from the magic tool, but also documents showing Countess Hettel bribed Libertan to trade. In fact, illegal goods banned by the Empire.”

‘This is the end.’

Just then, John patted my shoulder.

“Madam, are you alright?”

“What?”

“You’ve been under a lot of pressure.”

I, who had been focusing on the Hetels, turned in surprise at his quiet, unspoken presence.

Come to think of it, John usually acted first, but today he had stayed quiet.

‘What did John do when the lies were first exposed?’

John—

‘He only kept looking at me.’

As if there was nothing else to see.

A chill crawled up my spine.

Then John bent toward me and whispered softly in my ear.

“Anyway, from now on tell me everything. What your wife thinks, what she plans.”

“Excuse me, what are you saying now?”

“Ah, it might be difficult to say honestly just yet.”

John frowned, his elegant brow furrowed in thought.

“Then I’ll show you with my eyes from now on.”

My heart pounded.

“Talking will be fun.”

I gazed, entranced, at his red eyes. John held up ten fingers in front of me. He then began to fold them one by one.

10.

“Counting down?”

8.

As the numbers diminished, my nerves tautened.

“What on earth is he planning?”

The Hetel clan groaned and fell to their knees before the Ortega, while nobles gathered in the banquet hall began to murmur, trying to understand the situation.

Only John remained calm.

Finally, all ten fingers were folded. He whispered softly.

“Showtime.”

Bang!

The banquet hall door burst open.

Enter Raymond, the Blanchet Knights Commander.

Raymond hurled an aged man, his appearance disheveled, into the room. The man clung to the Prime Minister with blood on his hands, begging for help.

“Please… save me…”

I stared at the old man’s face in shock.

‘Is that Baron Pennula?’

Though scarred with blood, it was indeed Baron Pennula.

‘Since when did John know Baron Pennula was here? John hadn’t missed this, had he?’

Then John grabbed my jaw, met my eyes, and lightly kissed my cheek.

“Now I’ll step in, husband.”

~·~·*· . ·**##^^##**· . ·*·~·~

Hey there, It’s Green Rose 😉

Since I human I might have make some mistakes while translating so please if you find them let me know here in the comments or in the Discord group so I can correct them and be careful in the future so they do not repeat.

Thank you so much for reading, I hope you enjoyed this chapter.

~~~Next Chapter~~~

Next chapter will be released Tomorrow.

See you then!!