14. Empress Siord
Dalia was still contemplating on how to persuade Her Majesty the Empress so she worked on the plan to make Meldon into the Duke of Artus.
Even if he does not receive the recognition of the Duke’s family, he can be incorporated into Artus if all the transcendents of other families recognize Meldon.
So she sent a letter to Mary Blueport, now the former Duchess of Blueport. The reply arrived quickly.
[Dalia, it’s been a while. How have you been?
I should have contacted you more often, but I haven’t been able to because I’ve been busy.
I was quite curious as to where the transcendent of the Artus Ducal family had gone, and as it happens, Dalia found it.
It’s Dalia’s request, so I’m going to help out unconditionally. Whether it’s me or my son or just sending the papers to the capital – We’re a little busy right now – Anyway I’ll help as much as I can.
From Your Dearest Mary Blueport]
Dalia was briefly lost in her memory. The time they spent together felt like a long time ago.
‘I have to go to the Duchess’s place next time to visit her.’
But as the memories faded, the weight of reality came to her mind again.
‘I also have to find a way to get along with the Empress.’
Dalia was absolutely discouraged to live with this misunderstanding for the rest of her life.
But they couldn’t meet. It was obvious that the Empress is avoiding her.
‘Is there anyone who can connect us properly?’
It seemed counterproductive to ask the Emperor or Cedric to connect them.
If possible, it would be nice if there was a young lady who could build a bridge in a completely different way.
However, Dalia’s network was smaller than expected. Adrisha had no connection with the Empress at all. She of course can’t go and find Miss Eridon now. (*t/n: the girl who was picking a fight with Dalia at the banquet before. I know you guys must have forgotten her name haha)
However, the lead to the solution always came from an unexpected place.
* * *
Shortly after Cedric’s birthday banquet.
An unexpected guest came to the Pesteros mansion. She had seen her a few times in the original, but had never met her in this world.
“Nice to meet you, Miss Dalia.”
Dalia was bewildered to see the unexpected figure sitting beautifully in the drawing room, wearing a large hat.
Merida Artus.
Also known as ‘The Viper’s Mouth’.
She was someone whose pride was high as the sky.
A supporting role that was famous for not only falling for the female lead but also the transcendent male leads, but quickly gives up her heart, and spews spiteful and sarcastic remarks until the end. (*t/n: I’m not sure if I translated this part properly..)
Not befitting the original’s myriad notoriety, she waited for Dalia with a very clear and bright smile.
She even showed very standard manners when she saw Dalia.
Dalia was scared.
This is because her actions and words in the original story still left a strong impression on her.
Merida’s words and actions can take down people’s composure.
「When I see Miss Adrisha trying to raise a family, it reminds me of a dung beetle.」
Because of this, Adrisha’s nickname among the fans became dung beetle for a while.
In the original story, she was caught plotting to assassinate Adrisha by Hikan once, and as soon as she was imprisoned, she told him this.
― The country is on the verge of ruin because of Miss Adrisha, how can I keep her alive as a human being?
The former Duchess abandoned Your Excellency the Duke earlier because she knew that you would act like such a madman.
Today I realize that the foresight of an older person is something that cannot be ignored.
She was then immediately killed by the angered Hikan, but she never backed down even until just before her death.
In this way, she seems like a person with a very cool conviction, but anyway, she was always the villain and a person who hated Adrisha.
Some of the things she did include an attempt to poison Adrisha, bullying her by instigating her peers, ridiculing her, and tripping over every little thing.
But suddenly, seeing this, she felt a cognitive dissonance.
Not knowing Dalia’s thoughts, Merida spoke softly.
“I’m here because I have a question for Miss Dalia personally.”
“Pl, please go ahead.”
“The person behind our family’s illegitimate child now is Miss Dalia, right?”
“What? What do you mean?”
Dalia covered her mouth with her hand and pretended not to know. However, her lips trembled behind the covered hand.
‘How, how did she know that?’
Merida didn’t even look at Dalia’s reaction, because she was already convinced.
The Second Prince’s birthday banquet a month ago.
When Beolde puts her hand on Dalia’s shoulder and Cedric calms the situation.
Only two people were aware of the real situation.
One was the Duke of Mershain and the other was Merida Artus, who was watching Beolde.
Beolde met Meldon before returning. And upon her return, Meldon began to step up in earnest.
Coincidentally, at the very same time, Beolde and Dalia are entangled in a strange relationship.
It was something in which the whole context was immediately visible once it began to get entangled.
It was such a ridiculously large scale of fight for someone as young as her, but Merida liked her guts.
But she wasn’t the one to move just because she liked it.
When Merida thinks of her father and brother these days, she has a headache.
“Merida, what would you do?”
Her father was alone in his troubles, sighing while looking in the air, and uttering meaningless words.
And he constantly talked to Merida about how miserable he was.
Merida doesn’t really care if he is or not!
People always make mistakes when they are in the corner. Considering her experience, her father was about to make a big mistake.
Even Merida roughly knew what it was.
She also has eyes, and there is no way she could not have seen man in robe who keeps going in and out of the mansion.
They wandered around the mansion without permission, but the butler and the employees pretended not to know.
Of course, it was possible with the consent of her father.
Considering his pride, they must be quite high-ranking officials, and they are neither the Imperial Family nor the other Dukes, so all that are left are foreigners.
The thought of them still gives her goosebumps.
She would often pretended not to know and viciously trip over their feet or flip their robes.
Everyone avoided it, except of one person. Rather, he calmly stared at Merida.
He was a very beautiful young man with emerald green eyes.
Merida shuddered. Those eyes, really, were like jewels. Instead of the vitality that a living human should have, there was only inorganic boredom.
“Is there a problem?”
Merida had a hunch the moment when she saw the look in his eyes.
‘If I let these unknown people eat Artus, it will be over.’
But the last hesitation was still stopping her father.
‘Please, let that idiot give up on his own.’
It was fortunate that her father was not someone of a high caliber.
It might have been a lot easier if she had found someone who was a little less stupid and had a bigger distribution.
She had no obligation to lead her father, and she had to find a way to escape.
It is less disgraceful to hand over Artus to an illegitimate child than to hand over Artus to foreigners.
“First, I’ll show you one of my cards.”
Merida took a small object from her purse and threw it lightly on the table.
Dalia saw what Merida threw had rolled over and stopped in the middle of the table.
As soon as she noticed what it was, Dalia covered her mouth.
It……it was the seal of the Artus Ducal family!
She knew the power of the seal from her experience in her previous life.
With this alone, the Artus family could have been sold abroad.
Dalia could not hide her surprise and looked at Merida. Merida grinned as if it were nothing.
“This is the real one. The one in the family vault is fake.”
“…….”
“This is enough to prove my worth, doesn’t it? And you know why I’m here. Let me know if you need anything else.”
Dalia was confused by the flow of conversation that she couldn’t keep up with.
Translator Note: Merida seems like a very cool character. +1 to Dalia’s harem I guess hahaha
