Chapter 10

Adeline quietly lowered the hand she had placed on the door handle and walked toward the chair where she was sitting, then turned around.

Slowly, she lifted the hem of her suit trousers.

Then — one strike, two strikes.

Adeline’s whip, filled with powerful energy, slammed down onto Osphier’s calves.

“Ah! Aah!”

‘What’s this? Only two hits?’

And what pain could there be from hitting such a thin, withered child’s wrist anyway?

Adeline glanced up at Osphier again with a disinterested expression.

“You said you hate noisy children, teacher, if I remember correctly…”

“……”

In a heavy, crushed mood, Osphier brought both hands to cover his mouth.

He felt like he was going insane from humiliation, but he couldn’t leave this place right now.

Facing Adeline at this moment was as difficult as flattering a seasoned noble.

‘How dare I be threatened by something so ridiculous! Damn it!’

Even if he cursed endlessly inside, what came out of his mouth was…

“Ah!”

Only an embarrassing scream.

Thack, thack.

The sound of the whip filled the quiet space.

“I think I learned somewhere once. That opportunities should be equal.”

Thud.

Throwing the whip in front of Osphier like that, Adeline leaned back against the chair’s backrest, which was much larger than herself.

“So now it’s teacher’s turn to ask a question. Ah, of course, the next turn will be mine.”

“……”

“Ah, you keep making me talk too much, my throat hurts.”

The cute complaint came from Adeline as she casually watched the view beyond the curtain she had personally opened.

And she enjoyed the numerous gazes sneaking toward her, pretending not to notice.

‘Setting an example is important.’

She hadn’t reached the crown princess position just by luck or bloodline.

She knew very well what people like this feared the most.

For a moment, the thought crossed her mind that she might have revealed her nature too early at their first meeting, but it didn’t matter.

‘Rather, this is better.’

Hiding her claws was something necessary when making the opponent let their guard down, not when dealing with such small fry.

Besides, fortunately or unfortunately, the current mansion without its master was extremely lax in many ways.

“What are you doing? Aren’t you going to ask a question?”

Observing the people glancing at this place with various emotions—surprise, curiosity, and displeasure—Adeline made up her mind.

‘This house also needs some cleaning. There are too many inconvenient things.’

Living in a state where even a small action seemed restricted by twenty different rules was troublesome.

Even the home tutor she had brought was this incompetent.

At the same time, Osphier also made a decision.

He would use this incident as an excuse to collect a large compensation and never, ever approach this house again.

But he didn’t know.

That he was already a fly caught in Adeline’s massive spider web.

“Hey, did you hear that story?”

“Hear it? I saw it myself!”

After finishing the chaotic morning duties and changing into uniforms, the servants gathered and started talking about the same story.

“I was really shocked. Honestly, I thought Amy would be bathing in honey alone again.”

“Exactly! Some people were cleaning the furnace ashes every morning, but Amy acted like she was the noble young lady herself.”

Acting all refined, talking about drinking tea leisurely in the morning like she was the lady of the house.

Serves her right.

Although no one said it out loud, their eyes were all the same.

And how many men had fallen for her shallow pride?

“But, that young lady who woke up — she won’t be easy to serve, right?”

The topic had already shifted from Amy to Adeline.

“Of course not. She beat her teacher like that. Do you think she would just leave a maid alone?”

“Ugh, scary. I liked it better when we were told not to go near the annex.”

The story quickly inflated, and soon there were even rumors that Adeline had beaten her home tutor with a club.

At that moment, a maid quietly changing clothes in the corner and just putting on her apron raised a question.

“…But why did that tutor just get beaten? And why did the young lady hit the teacher?”

Yeah?

A question flashed through everyone’s mind but disappeared in three seconds.

Because the reason didn’t matter to them, nor was it interesting.

“You, Lucy, are going to imagine unnecessary things again, aren’t you? Even if we feel sorry or something, the young lady is still a noble.”

“That’s right. Worrying about nobles is just meddling.”

Anna, who was nearby, scolded her, as if understanding, but Lucy still felt puzzled.

“But she was brought here as a teacher, wasn’t she?”

“So what?”

What kind of teacher would just stand there and let their student hit them?

‘These idiots.’

Even after working in a noble household for so long, they couldn’t even notice something like this.

Even the household’s de facto young master, Charles Claudius, who had constantly made servants scream around him, had never personally struck a home tutor.

‘Well, I have seen him have others beat people up.’

Then it happened.

“What is it? Why are you all gathered here?”

There was only one person stupid enough to ask such a question when everyone was naturally gathering.

“Ah! I was startled! What’s wrong, Amy, are you okay?”

It was Amy.

“…Okay? What do you mean?”

Amy seemed unaware of the incident that the many people who had returned to the annex had witnessed.

“Oh, were you worried I’d be tired taking care of the child alone? Good timing. I don’t know why I should be looking after that child anyway.”

Amy’s language when speaking about the young lady she served was blunt.

“Hey, listen…”

Lucy frowned at the blatant criticism that followed.

The expressions of those who had been listening, hoping for more interesting news, gradually turned strange.

“What are you talking about?”

Amy, who had been staying in the room and playing the “lady” role while Adeline was in class, had no way of knowing this news.

“What have you heard until now? So I was—”

“It’s not that. We’re talking about the young lady beating the new home tutor today… Hey! Amy! Where are you going!”

Amy ran outside like the wind without even waiting for the end of their words, shocked that she was the only one who didn’t know.

“Hey, that girl is really…”

Tell us even a little more before leaving, because we’re dying of curiosity!

The maids left behind clicked their tongues as she ran away like the wind before finishing her words.

After the morning class ended with no real gain and only a bad mood,

Adeline sat on the sofa holding a new book obtained by making Osphier bring it.

“Hm.”

The book in her hand was the chronicle of the Claudius family where she currently was.

In fact, it was closer to a bundle of documents than a book, but that didn’t matter.

What Adeline needed now was the latest information about this family.

“Everything About the Kingdom of Neria Nobility” was slow to update information about small families without territories.

In reality, even five years after the death of the previous Viscount Claudius, he was still listed as the current family head.

‘They probably planned to update it only after confirming I was definitely dead.’

Adeline swallowed her silent mockery and turned the first page.

But then—

“Huh?”

Ridiculously, something absurd was written in the very first line.

“I’m still the family head?”

After the deaths of this body’s parents, she naturally thought her uncle and aunt had taken the title.

All the unreasonable treatment probably came from that.

But they were merely acting as provisional stewards.

This was one of two possibilities.

Either they were completely ignorant about inheritance law, or someone was deliberately interfering.

Or maybe both.

“Whatever. They’re stupid.”

They couldn’t even see what was obvious from reading just one line in a book, yet they themselves didn’t know.

Adeline continued reading the pages arranged in chronological order starting from recent events.

But soon her hand stopped turning the page.

“…It was really that Lanche?”

A noble family she had lightly passed over without much thought before was written clearly in the notes.

And it was her maternal family — the Lanche Count family.

The name Lanche Count family sounded vaguely familiar.

‘Right, they were people from the Kingdom of Neria.’

In fact, what she was more familiar with wasn’t the name Lanche but the man who was the master of that family.

Arnold Lanche, a gray-haired noble who applied for asylum to the Tawnyport Empire, offering his fortune generously.

Since he had migrated, he had used a new surname, so she hadn’t remembered immediately.

It was surprising that she finally recalled that his original surname was Lanche.

‘If he is still remaining here…’

Adeline’s small brain began working furiously. Then suddenly, at one point, her thoughts stopped.

“So, what does this mean? That this man is my grandfather now?”

Brief memories of him quickly passed through her mind.

• Tch. What kind of crown princess is that, who can’t even stand properly and falls down? What are you looking at? If you’re angry at my words, then stand up and strike me.

The harshest words from when she had learned swordsmanship for less than a month—

• There is said to be someone climbing over the palace wall like a rat these days. Ah, of course it couldn’t be Her Highness the Princess.

Top-tier sarcasm.

As she recalled one by one, she realized she had clashed with him more than expected.

• Oh dear. No words for me this time, Count?

• Seeing you enjoy defeating an old man means there must be no one else you can defeat these days, right?

Whether he was friendly or hostile to the royal family was unclear — he always maintained a slightly arrogant, annoying attitude.

“…Let’s just live without interacting with my maternal family anyway.”

Adeline brushed her shoulders as if removing something dirty and quickly immersed herself back into the book.

After turning several more pages—

“Miss!”

Along with the sudden opening of the door, Amy’s sharp voice burst in.