In response to Cassion’s somewhat shy reaction, Rosetta chuckled silently and asked.
“By the way, you’re late.”
“I changed my clothes and took the secret passage from the back alleys to make a roundabout return.”
Around the time the carriage with Rosetta arrived in front of the café, Cassion, who had been disguised as a coachman the entire time, received the pre-arranged signal and headed towards the cafeteria. As he entered the deepest part of the café, he found Melvin, who had been waiting leisurely while sipping tea.
As soon as Melvin spotted Cassion, who was dressed similarly, the coachman bowed deeply and promptly gathered the cakes and cookies that had been prepared beforehand.
With this, the roles of the coachmen were perfectly switched.
Cassion changed his clothes inside and exited through the secret passage arranged by Blanca.
As he moved inconspicuously, avoiding drawing any attention, he navigated the narrow alleys, taking more time than he had anticipated.
“Here you go.”
After Cassion sipped his tea and set down the cup, Logan handed him the jacket that had been placed over the chair.
Cassion naturally accepted it and put it on.
“Thanks for handling the carriage.”
“It’s alright. You had it worse.”
Logan replied to Rosetta’s words. The reason she had disguised Cassion as a coachman was the same as why she had sought Blanca’s help.
To prepare for anything unexpected, just in case.
So, when the incident occurred, she had deliberately sent Alicia towards the carriage. Coachmen typically wore hats and remained inconspicuous, making them suitable for covert operations.
From Logan to Blanca, and now to Cassion.
Some might say that such excessive precaution was overkill, but knowing that it was a trap, Rosetta knew that it was better to be overprepared than underprepared.
Overflowing was better than lacking. If you had too much, you could always scale back, but if you were lacking, there was no way to remedy it.
“So, now that we’re all here…”
As Rosetta opened a rather meaningful discussion, the gaze of the three individuals turned towards her simultaneously.
She looked back at them calmly without a hint of discomfort and began speaking slowly.
“By the way, did Daniel do anything to Alicia?”
Despite her casual tone, her eyes were chilling.
Feeling a renewed sense of delight, Blanca chuckled and raised her head.
“To say he did something… he just tried to comfort her, I suppose? There was nothing unusual. He seemed quite ordinary on the surface.”
As Blanca said that, Cassion added,
“I couldn’t find anything suspicious either. Well, I didn’t get as close as the Madam did, but…”
Despite hearing their reassurances that nothing untoward had occurred, the same coldness still lingered in Rosetta’s eyes.
“Right… I see.”
Rosetta mumbled her response and leaned back against the chair, her silvery hair cascading over her shoulders.
“You didn’t have any trouble, did you? Earlier, you and Leo were alone together.”
With these muttered words, Cassion posed a question to Rosetta.
In an instant, Cassion’s face stiffened.
It was because of what had happened earlier that the memory resurfaced.
Shortly after the commotion, Logan had returned to the carriage alone.
The moment he realized that Leo and Rosetta were alone together, his heart thudded wildly.
The image of Rosetta, her face drained of color and unconscious during the hunting festival, flashed before his eyes. He wanted to leap out of his seat and rush to her side at once.
As he replayed those unpleasant memories, Rosetta finally spoke up.
“I did have some trouble.”
“…What?”
The person who spoke did so casually, but the one who heard the reply couldn’t remain calm.
He clenched his fists tightly, causing the veins on his hands to bulge.
“What happened?”
Trying to contain his anger as much as possible, he inquired, but in his mind, he tore through the specter of Leo.
Sensing this, Rosetta leaned her chin on the table, her pitch-black eyes meeting his gaze with a sly smile.
“Well, you see, among the attackers, there were some blue monsters.”
The mention of the ‘blue monsters’ caused everyone to momentarily fall silent.
Wasn’t that one of the most influential phrases in the empire at the moment?
Blue monsters, Rosetta, Ducal Lady Valentine.
These three buzzwords were the hottest topics in the empire these days.
“…So it’s just as you expected—the culprit is likely either Young Duke Freesia or the second son of House Carter. They not only attacked you, Ducal Lady, but also falsely accused you as the owner of those monstrous creatures.”
Blanca’s voice, tinged with a mixture of amusement and disgust, made Rosetta nod in agreement.
“Yes, and I found out who it actually is.”
“You did?”
Taken aback by the unexpected revelation, Cassion asked with wide eyes.
Following his question, the madam’s whistling echoed.
Logan remained silent but had his gaze firmly fixed on Rosetta.
She raised her lips in a smile, tapping her teacup with her fingertips.
Plik.
Accompanied by that small sound, ripples spread across the surface of the tea.
Rosetta looked into the distorted reflection of herself in the tea and spoke.
“Daniel.”
Daniel Freesia.
That man was none other than Urien.
* * *
Starting from some point on during my third transmigration as Rita,
I often observed Urien deceiving people from a distance.
I had to watch, even though I didn’t want to.
He always wanted to keep me close.
There were occasionally those who doubted Urien’s intentions.
They suspected his kindness at first, but gradually they succumbed to him, and in the end, they clung to his ankles, shedding tears of repentance.
There were even those who clung to his feet and wept, causing Urien to put on a difficult expression and urge them to stop.
Of course, his attitude was nothing more than a disgusting act.
Watching from a distance, I saw exactly how he deceived people.
His lies were subtle.
His deception was silent, and his voice was gentle.
It was all just part of the daily routine.
He merely threw small pebbles at those people dozens of times.
At first, only faint ripples formed.
However, if those faint ripples repeated endlessly, they would eventually swell like waves.
You wouldn’t even know when you’d been ensnared in his web, but if you ever come to your senses, it’s by the time that you’re already on the verge of being devoured.
He had deceived people with such trivial things, and through repetition of these trivialities, he created confidence and trust.
Just like today.
Just as Urien often did in the past, when Leo grabbed my wrist and lingered in a certain way.
It was a very trivial action.
However, because it was also Urien’s habit, I couldn’t help but be suspicious.
I wondered if Leo might be Urien.
But when the same action repeated a second time,
It became a different kind of ‘certainty’.
This was all Urien’s orchestrated deception.
The fact that Urien had hidden his true identity from me all this time was to make me lower my guard.
Lulling me into a false sense of security was his specialty.
So, if Leo were really Urien, he would have noticed his mistake by the strange look I showed the moment he grabbed my wrist.
And then, he wouldn’t have made the same mistake twice.
Considering his personality, he wouldn’t repeat the same mistake consecutively.
However, Leo repeated the same action twice.
It was extremely trivial, but it was enough to unconsciously remind me of Urien.
Could it be that this was one of Urien’s frequent tricks?
So, there was only one conclusion.
All of this was planned. He deliberately tried to instill in me the conviction that Leo was Urien.
As always.
Subtly, silently.
‘It’s the same even with the broken beads.’
Urien didn’t notice what I found by chance while walking, didn’t he?
He had enough time for that.
For instance, the time I briefly chatted with Logan disguised as Maxwell.
That should have been enough time to look around and find one bead.
It was more than enough time to discover it and deal with it.
But he didn’t.
He pretended not to notice until I found it, then acted surprised, raising an eyebrow and discreetly licking his dry lips.
Everything was incredibly silent. To the point where I could be swept away in a flash if I let my guard down.
Furthermore, everything pointed to only one conclusion.
‘Leo is Urien.’
This is quite arbitrary, isn’t it?
He hid it all this time, but now he’s revealing the answer so clearly?
Nothing was that easy in this world.
Sometimes, a problem with an obvious answer would be hidden in a twist.
Leo is Urien?
No.
‘Urien is Daniel.’
He must have planned this because he knew me well.
Knowing how cautious I was, he would try to subtly leak a false answer so that I would continue to weigh and doubt the two of them, making it difficult for me to discern the truth.
However, his plan was fundamentally flawed from the start.
He may have known me well and crafted his plan accordingly, but it ended up being his undoing.
Overconfidence often arises from incomplete certainty.
He knows me.
But the time he spent with me was ultimately the time I spent with him.
The magnitude of love and hatred was always the same. So, as much as he boasted about knowing me, I also knew him.
Right now, he might be blinded by his irrational love, making him overlook this fact.
He was so, so sure that his love was greater than my hatred.
And that is your downfall.
Urien.
In response to Cassion’s somewhat shy reaction, Rosetta chuckled silently and asked.
“By the way, you’re late.”
“I changed my clothes and took the secret passage from the back alleys to make a roundabout return.”
Around the time the carriage with Rosetta arrived in front of the café, Cassion, who had been disguised as a coachman the entire time, received the pre-arranged signal and headed towards the cafeteria. As he entered the deepest part of the café, he found Melvin, who had been waiting leisurely while sipping tea.
As soon as Melvin spotted Cassion, who was dressed similarly, the coachman bowed deeply and promptly gathered the cakes and cookies that had been prepared beforehand.
With this, the roles of the coachmen were perfectly switched.
Cassion changed his clothes inside and exited through the secret passage arranged by Blanca.
As he moved inconspicuously, avoiding drawing any attention, he navigated the narrow alleys, taking more time than he had anticipated.
“Here you go.”
After Cassion sipped his tea and set down the cup, Logan handed him the jacket that had been placed over the chair.
Cassion naturally accepted it and put it on.
“Thanks for handling the carriage.”
“It’s alright. You had it worse.”
Logan replied to Rosetta’s words. The reason she had disguised Cassion as a coachman was the same as why she had sought Blanca’s help.
To prepare for anything unexpected, just in case.
So, when the incident occurred, she had deliberately sent Alicia towards the carriage. Coachmen typically wore hats and remained inconspicuous, making them suitable for covert operations.
From Logan to Blanca, and now to Cassion.
Some might say that such excessive precaution was overkill, but knowing that it was a trap, Rosetta knew that it was better to be overprepared than underprepared.
Overflowing was better than lacking. If you had too much, you could always scale back, but if you were lacking, there was no way to remedy it.
“So, now that we’re all here…”
As Rosetta opened a rather meaningful discussion, the gaze of the three individuals turned towards her simultaneously.
She looked back at them calmly without a hint of discomfort and began speaking slowly.
“By the way, did Daniel do anything to Alicia?”
Despite her casual tone, her eyes were chilling.
Feeling a renewed sense of delight, Blanca chuckled and raised her head.
“To say he did something… he just tried to comfort her, I suppose? There was nothing unusual. He seemed quite ordinary on the surface.”
As Blanca said that, Cassion added,
“I couldn’t find anything suspicious either. Well, I didn’t get as close as the Madam did, but…”
Despite hearing their reassurances that nothing untoward had occurred, the same coldness still lingered in Rosetta’s eyes.
“Right… I see.”
Rosetta mumbled her response and leaned back against the chair, her silvery hair cascading over her shoulders.
“You didn’t have any trouble, did you? Earlier, you and Leo were alone together.”
With these muttered words, Cassion posed a question to Rosetta.
In an instant, Cassion’s face stiffened.
It was because of what had happened earlier that the memory resurfaced.
Shortly after the commotion, Logan had returned to the carriage alone.
The moment he realized that Leo and Rosetta were alone together, his heart thudded wildly.
The image of Rosetta, her face drained of color and unconscious during the hunting festival, flashed before his eyes. He wanted to leap out of his seat and rush to her side at once.
As he replayed those unpleasant memories, Rosetta finally spoke up.
“I did have some trouble.”
“…What?”
The person who spoke did so casually, but the one who heard the reply couldn’t remain calm.
He clenched his fists tightly, causing the veins on his hands to bulge.
“What happened?”
Trying to contain his anger as much as possible, he inquired, but in his mind, he tore through the specter of Leo.
Sensing this, Rosetta leaned her chin on the table, her pitch-black eyes meeting his gaze with a sly smile.
“Well, you see, among the attackers, there were some blue monsters.”
The mention of the ‘blue monsters’ caused everyone to momentarily fall silent.
Wasn’t that one of the most influential phrases in the empire at the moment?
Blue monsters, Rosetta, Ducal Lady Valentine.
These three buzzwords were the hottest topics in the empire these days.
“…So it’s just as you expected—the culprit is likely either Young Duke Freesia or the second son of House Carter. They not only attacked you, Ducal Lady, but also falsely accused you as the owner of those monstrous creatures.”
Blanca’s voice, tinged with a mixture of amusement and disgust, made Rosetta nod in agreement.
“Yes, and I found out who it actually is.”
“You did?”
Taken aback by the unexpected revelation, Cassion asked with wide eyes.
Following his question, the madam’s whistling echoed.
Logan remained silent but had his gaze firmly fixed on Rosetta.
She raised her lips in a smile, tapping her teacup with her fingertips.
Plik.
Accompanied by that small sound, ripples spread across the surface of the tea.
Rosetta looked into the distorted reflection of herself in the tea and spoke.
“Daniel.”
Daniel Freesia.
That man was none other than Urien.
* * *
Starting from some point on during my third transmigration as Rita,
I often observed Urien deceiving people from a distance.
I had to watch, even though I didn’t want to.
He always wanted to keep me close.
There were occasionally those who doubted Urien’s intentions.
They suspected his kindness at first, but gradually they succumbed to him, and in the end, they clung to his ankles, shedding tears of repentance.
There were even those who clung to his feet and wept, causing Urien to put on a difficult expression and urge them to stop.
Of course, his attitude was nothing more than a disgusting act.
Watching from a distance, I saw exactly how he deceived people.
His lies were subtle.
His deception was silent, and his voice was gentle.
It was all just part of the daily routine.
He merely threw small pebbles at those people dozens of times.
At first, only faint ripples formed.
However, if those faint ripples repeated endlessly, they would eventually swell like waves.
You wouldn’t even know when you’d been ensnared in his web, but if you ever come to your senses, it’s by the time that you’re already on the verge of being devoured.
He had deceived people with such trivial things, and through repetition of these trivialities, he created confidence and trust.
Just like today.
Just as Urien often did in the past, when Leo grabbed my wrist and lingered in a certain way.
It was a very trivial action.
However, because it was also Urien’s habit, I couldn’t help but be suspicious.
I wondered if Leo might be Urien.
But when the same action repeated a second time,
It became a different kind of ‘certainty’.
This was all Urien’s orchestrated deception.
The fact that Urien had hidden his true identity from me all this time was to make me lower my guard.
Lulling me into a false sense of security was his specialty.
So, if Leo were really Urien, he would have noticed his mistake by the strange look I showed the moment he grabbed my wrist.
And then, he wouldn’t have made the same mistake twice.
Considering his personality, he wouldn’t repeat the same mistake consecutively.
However, Leo repeated the same action twice.
It was extremely trivial, but it was enough to unconsciously remind me of Urien.
Could it be that this was one of Urien’s frequent tricks?
So, there was only one conclusion.
All of this was planned. He deliberately tried to instill in me the conviction that Leo was Urien.
As always.
Subtly, silently.
‘It’s the same even with the broken beads.’
Urien didn’t notice what I found by chance while walking, didn’t he?
He had enough time for that.
For instance, the time I briefly chatted with Logan disguised as Maxwell.
That should have been enough time to look around and find one bead.
It was more than enough time to discover it and deal with it.
But he didn’t.
He pretended not to notice until I found it, then acted surprised, raising an eyebrow and discreetly licking his dry lips.
Everything was incredibly silent. To the point where I could be swept away in a flash if I let my guard down.
Furthermore, everything pointed to only one conclusion.
‘Leo is Urien.’
This is quite arbitrary, isn’t it?
He hid it all this time, but now he’s revealing the answer so clearly?
Nothing was that easy in this world.
Sometimes, a problem with an obvious answer would be hidden in a twist.
Leo is Urien?
No.
‘Urien is Daniel.’
He must have planned this because he knew me well.
Knowing how cautious I was, he would try to subtly leak a false answer so that I would continue to weigh and doubt the two of them, making it difficult for me to discern the truth.
However, his plan was fundamentally flawed from the start.
He may have known me well and crafted his plan accordingly, but it ended up being his undoing.
Overconfidence often arises from incomplete certainty.
He knows me.
But the time he spent with me was ultimately the time I spent with him.
The magnitude of love and hatred was always the same. So, as much as he boasted about knowing me, I also knew him.
Right now, he might be blinded by his irrational love, making him overlook this fact.
He was so, so sure that his love was greater than my hatred.
And that is your downfall.
Urien.
