Chapter 12
“If no one reported that I’m illiterate, then no one reported that I was adopted either, did they?”
“…What kind of bullshit is that?”
It went beyond bullshit—his brain just stopped.
Illiterate. Adopted. Those two things couldn’t possibly be true. They contradicted everything he had ever been told.
But when the woman activated the memory stone with the tip of her finger, Zion’s brow furrowed deeply.
In the stone, a very young platinum-haired child could be seen sobbing, begging not to be abandoned.
“……”
Even Zion Reinhardt von Kleist—infamous and cold—was left speechless.
Eventually, as if he finally grasped the situation, he muttered low and grim, “Damn it.”
“The birth certificate from Moerso Beach that was sent during the day… No, forget it. That’s probably fake too.”
Those bastards. They dared to make a fool out of him?
Zion chewed on his cigar irritably as he mentally discarded the hundreds of thousands of pages of reports.
This was the same intelligence department that once reported the number of parsley leaves on his dinner plate. Yet not once had they mentioned these two crucial facts.
That could only mean the information had been intentionally filtered. All nine of his elite intelligence agents had turned.
‘Ferdinand, that son of a bitch.’
That trash really did have a talent for filth. He should’ve been slaving away in intelligence, not the navy.
Grimacing with a deep sense of defeat, Zion pressed his fingers to his temples. Then, a sudden thought struck him, and he shot a sharp question at Odette.
“Then, are you telling me that you weren’t the one refusing purification over the mine issue all this time?”
Odette remained silent for a moment, then nodded.
A harsh, dry laugh escaped Zion’s lips.
He laughed again and again in disbelief, as if he’d been genuinely shocked.
‘Shit. The intelligence division’s a goddamn mess.’
What the hell was this?
The woman who had once been one of the Empire’s most crucial figures was now a complete unknown to him.
The Odette he knew was a beloved noble daughter, pampered to the point even her parents couldn’t stop her wrongdoings.
“Goddamn it.”
Within minutes, his cigar had been crushed flat like a piece of paper.
“Fine. Let’s assume what you’re saying is true.”
Her turquoise eyes met his.
“Then what’s the reason you requested a private meeting with me?”
“Because I want to make a deal with Your Excellency.”
“A deal only works if both parties have something to offer. The traitor’s identity is already known—what leverage do you think you still have?”
Calmly, Odette spread out the documents she had dumped earlier onto the table.
“You weren’t informed about my illiteracy. Or about my adoption. That means all nine agents were compromised.”
“I know. Are you mocking me now?”
“But can nine intelligence agents alone truly deceive you, Your Excellency?”
“……”
“The documents I sent earlier today—you’ve already verified them yourself. There’s a reason I sent them anyway.”
‘So this is what it feels like to lose a battle of information.’
It was his first real taste of defeat. He had no choice but to light a third cigar.
“I wanted to show you that these documents were forged so perfectly that even you couldn’t find a single flaw. You would know better than anyone—such perfection requires dozens of people.”
“……Damn it.”
“I’ll give you the names of the rats hiding within the intelligence bureau. That’s my condition for the deal.”
‘Obsessive, compulsive freak, that’s what he is.’
When Zion insisted the memory stone wasn’t enough proof of her disownment, Odette handed him a bundle of papers she had prepared.
She’d learned of those traitorous “rats” in her past life—because of Ferdinand. On the day he came to her prison cell to assault her.
As one of the Empire’s worst criminals, she had been locked away in the innermost triple-security level of the Imperial Palace prison. And yet Ferdinand had come to her alone.
To a shocked Odette, he had smugly shown the three keys required to enter her cell. Then he’d bragged shamelessly.
About how many people he had bribed in the Intelligence Bureau. Listing each of their names—nine in the count’s estate, thirty-five within the bureau itself.
All to justify, in his twisted logic, why he had every right to assault her.
Zion’s expression grew darker with each page he turned.
At first it was just a deep frown. By the end, his face looked like a demon’s. A monster worthy of being called a god’s beast.
‘The most monstrous thing is his reading speed.’
Back when she was still under him, that kind of speed-reading was something you’d only see when skipping through software license agreements.
“This is your proof of disownment? These are just a bunch of receipts. Looks like something you’d get when buying livestock.”
“It was an illegal disownment, so there was never any official certificate. That’s the only proof that exists.”
‘Sure, it looks pathetic. But what can I do? It’s the only real evidence I have.’
The receipt was proof of a transaction between her father and the orphanage director. Her father had paid the man to ensure the disowned Odette wouldn’t be adopted elsewhere.
Unlike the fake documents made of fancy paper, this ragged stack was the only thing that proved the real Odette.
The orphanage director had been killed by her father after she took on the false identity of a purifier.
“Out of all these receipts, which one is yours?”
“All of them. I was disowned thirty-eight times.”
At her calm reply, Zion’s face twisted from demon to something even worse—an evil spirit.
“Thirty-eight times?”
His violet eyes scanned her like she was a lunatic.
“Want me to show you the rest of the memory stone? All thirty-eight disownments were recorded.”
“You say that like it’s nothing? Why are you so detached?”
“After thirty-eight times, you become numb to most things.”
He fell silent, as if he couldn’t find the words. Then:
“…Fuck.”
With a sharp curse, he turned his eyes back to the stack of papers.
Silence returned to the drawing room. Odette gently touched the memory stone sitting on the table.
‘He loved erasing evidence, yet never threw these away. That bastard.’
He was the kind of snake who recorded all thirty-eight disownments on rare memory stones. A man who tossed away a child over and over just to break her—and feel omnipotent doing it.
“The handwriting matches Director Stiller’s. No signs of forgery. Damn it. I was wrong. Embarrassingly so.”
Zion dropped the receipts with irritation.
“Fine. I surrender. I need those names you’re offering. I accept your deal.”
“I’m relieved.”
“What you want must be related to revenge on your family.”
At Zion’s sharp deduction, Odette gave a bitter smile.
“How can you be so sure? It could be something else—like asking to be saved from them.”
She was testing him. But he just scoffed, as if he’d heard a joke.
“You always maintain perfect decorum, yet you showed me a shameful past without a shred of embarrassment. Only people consumed by revenge can be that detached.”
Was that… personal experience? Odette suddenly remembered the background information about Zion from the setting materials.
“So, what do you want in return? I get the names of the rats, and you get… what?”
Meeting his violet eyes directly, she answered firmly:
“Falsify my father’s financial records. While I’m stealing every last coin from the Albrecht family, make sure they never realize what’s happening.”
