However, even such knowledge would become useless if it could not be properly utilized. Therefore, Charlotte had to make a wise choice.
The person who would want this information the most, the person who needed it the most. And the person who would become her strength.
That person was…
“My Lady. We have arrived.”
At that moment, she felt the carriage stop and heard an unfamiliar voice. Smoothing out her wrinkled dress, Charlotte stepped outside through the open door.
The place Charlotte headed to was none other than the plaza. Specifically, the plaza where the victory celebration of Grand Duke Vermier, who had sounded the drums of victory in the Asral War, was taking place.
As countless people were coming and going, the coachman and knight entrusted with her escort approached Charlotte with a scowl.
“Look at that. The crowd is considerable, is it not? Did I not tell you so?”
Said the knight, approaching with a swaggering attitude.
“How about turning back even now? If something unfortunate were to happen in such a crowded place, it would become troublesome for me.”
A reek of alcohol emanated from his flushed face. To think that someone regarded as an escort knight in society felt no hesitation in drinking and treating his master this way. Charlotte could feel her miserable situation so vividly that she ended up letting out a dry chuckle.
“Would it not be fine as long as the incident does not happen right before your eyes?”
“…Pardon?”
“It means you will stay here, and I will go alone.”
The knight hesitated for a moment before shaking his head.
“That will not do. It is dangerous.”
“Since when did you care about my danger?”
Spitting out a sneer, Charlotte lifted her chin straight up and met the knight’s gaze.
“If any harm comes to me, you can just say that you tried to follow me but I insisted on going alone. Then, they will interrogate you instead of me. It is I who will take the scolding, after all.”
She then gestured with her chin toward a shop behind the knight.
“Go into the pub. I will head there once I am finished.”
The knight still hesitated.
He was weighing whether to stop escorting her here and go gulp down alcohol, or to resist the temptation of alcohol and continue escorting a worthless duchess’s daughter who offered no real benefit. But naturally, the scale tipped toward the former option. The reward for choosing between immediate pleasure and the abused, lowly girl of the ducal estate was far too obvious.
“…You must not hold me responsible for this.”
“As if I would.”
Casually replying, Charlotte turned right around and stepped into the crowd. She had awkwardly draped an old robe she brought over her body and pulled the hood up.
In the street, there was a throng of children roaming around with intensely excited expressions, adults managing those children, and merchants soliciting those adults.
Moreover, because it was the victory celebration of Grand Duke Vermier, everyone was in a high-spirited mood.
“Kassel Vermier…”
Grand Duke Kassel Vermier. He is a man much more often called by his epithets than by his official title.
Those who expressed any mild favor toward him called him a “murderous fiend” to acknowledge the blood he had buried so many times, but most people labeled him a “womanizer,” a “good-for-nothing,” and a “playboy.” These nicknames carried the implication of a stray dog that went wild and chased after any woman’s skirt it caught sight of.
In truth, the Grand Duke of Vermier was precisely like that. Whenever he went out to the battlefield, he lost his mind, swinging his sword, firing guns, and wallowing in blood without distinguishing friend from foe, acting the part of a murderous fiend. Then, upon returning to the capital, he would host banquets every single night, summoning all sorts of women and frequently drowning himself in the scent of perfume as if trying to wash away the stench of blood.
Recalling all of this information, Charlotte slowly stopped walking. She looked out at the shabby scenery of the old plaza and the run-down fountain spread out before her eyes. At the same time, she gazed at the hooded man sitting perched on the rim of the fountain.
That man will die one year from now. Unless Charlotte reaches out her hand.
Charlotte knows the future up to two years from now. Therefore, within that future, the Grand Duke of Vermier is not alive. He meets his death approximately one year from today.
The reason is simple. He was pushed out of the struggle for imperial power.
Before long, Charlotte’s family, the Duke of Aubry’s household, and Richard’s family, the Count Cosmo’s household, will announce to mark the coming-of-age ceremony of the Second Prince that they intend to support him. The nobles who had been acting neutral because they lacked power and subtly looking down on the First Prince, the child of the former Empress rather than the current one, would gladly seize the opportunity and take the ducal household’s hand.
However, the Second Prince possessed such a ferocious and brutal disposition that he was utterly unsuited to be emperor. Thus, the trust of the common people was directed toward the First Prince, and since the Grand Duke of Vermier, a cousin of the former Empress, was supporting him, the scales hung evenly balanced.
Yet, one year later, the Second Prince seizes the imperial throne. How did such a thing happen?
They fabricated the Emperor’s will.
And then, they murdered the Emperor.
Learning of this fact, the First Prince joins hands with the Grand Duke of Vermier and raises a rebellion. However, the rebellion fails miserably. Consequently, the Grand Duke of Vermier dies, the First Prince is exiled, and the families who supported him are completely destroyed.
Conversely, the Duke of Aubry’s household and the Count Cosmo’s household, which supported the Second Prince, ride the coattails of peerless influence and prosper without limit.
This is the extent of the future Charlotte saw while she was alive.
However, Charlotte had no intention of letting this future pass by peacefully just as it was. If things went that way, Charlotte’s revenge would become infinitely more difficult, and furthermore, she might not even be able to attempt it.
If Charlotte were to fail in her revenge, the reason would be precisely because she lacked the power to wield. Moreover, being an adopted child of commoner origin, no one would listen to her words, and she had even less of things like power or money that she could leverage.
Then what should she do?
If she could not do it with her own strength, could she not borrow the power of someone else?
That someone else whom she had in mind was none other than the Grand Duke of Vermier.
Since Charlotte, who needed power, and the Grand Duke of Vermier, who needed information, were beings who could offer each other help and secure victory.
However, she did not know whether or not he would accept her proposal. This was no different from a gamble.
That was why Charlotte had purposely ventured all the way here. Wishing to face the Grand Duke’s face, a place no one sought out and where he wished for no one to find him, Charlotte deliberately made her footsteps audible as she approached the person sitting on the fountain’s rim.
Wearing an old, pulled-down hood, he looked up indifferently at Charlotte, who was blocking the beating sunlight.
“No one will know.”
Charlotte stared at him inside the hood and slowly approached.
“The protagonist of the victory ceremony is killing time in such a secluded place like this.”
His fingers, which had been resting on his thigh, twitched and curled inward. Immediately afterward, a deep and distinct line was drawn across his brow.
“Daring to disturb my time even while knowing who I am.”
It was a voice cold and chilling enough to freeze one’s ears. Charlotte barely managed to catch her abruptly quickening breath and tightened her grip on both of her legs.
“Are you a madwoman?”
The Grand Duke pulled back his hood. As soon as he did, his somewhat messily tangled hair poked out into view. However, the tangled hair was not messy enough to detract from the appearance he possessed. It was so black and dark that, when reflected in the sunlight, it even looked like a subtle green.
Reaching the end of his forehead as it curved downward, his protruding brow bone and the eye sockets deep enough to cast shadows beneath them possessed thick lines. However, the sleek corners of his eyes and his sharp inner eye corners were oddly keen, giving off a refreshing feel as well.
Yet, in contrast, his cloudy gray eyes, the shadows dark beneath his eyes, and his pale complexion also gave off a gloomy vibe. Looking at him somehow gave one the feeling that their chest was sinking right down.
He was clearly a creature cobbled together from beautiful things, but words like dark, heavy, sharp, rough, and deep naturally came to mind. However, such contradictory feelings were sufficiently charming, leading Charlotte to briefly think she could understand why countless women had suffered from heartaches over him.
Charlotte tightly clenched her hand hidden beneath the robe. “How about treating me as crazy and listening to a bit more of my story?” “Well. I have never mingled words with a madwoman.” Charlotte’s features were reflected in his gray eyes, which gave off an eerie sensation.
It was a gaze as cruel and chilling as a dense sea fog. He felt like a lion looking at a small rat right before its eyes. However, she did not back down. If she were a rat that would tuck its tail in fear of merely a lion, she would not have even thought of gnawing away at the mansion from the very beginning.
Charlotte stroked the edge of the hood the Grand Duke was looking at and bit her lip. “My reaction will probably change depending on what a madwoman’s face looks like. Why don’t you lower your hood as well? Or perhaps strip off that coat completely.”
Although Charlotte already knew that the Grand Duke was a promiscuous man, she had not expected to hear such filthy words right in front of her nose. He truly was a messy person, just as rumors said. Charlotte felt her flushed cheeks and clenched her teeth hard. “Are you purposely choosing to say things like that?”
“Things like that? What things? The thing about wanting to touch you once because you are wearing such a shabby robe yet your body lines look alluringly full?”
“…”
“It was a joke. I do not have the hobby of sleeping with street prostitutes.”
The Grand Duke chuckled and gently curved his eyes. It was a truly innocent and truly mischievous, pure smile. Had it not been for those dirty words he had just spat out, one could have thought he was an innocent young man. “Hah.”