Chapter 84: Not Even a Substitute

Damian got off the carriage and entered Roel Central Station with a grim expression. Without delay, he headed down to the basement of the station.

‘If Edelweiss hadn’t told me to send the knights, we might have missed Rosemary Widen.’

Since she could harm Edelweiss at any time, Rosemary Widen couldn’t be left alive.

The knight commander standing inside bowed his head as Damian approached.

“This is the ticket Rosemary Widen had. It seems she forged her identity as Lenia Ruwes, a relative of Countess Sandor.”

The commander handed the ticket to him.

Since Lenia Ruwes was a relative of Countess Sandor, this could serve as evidence that Count Sandor had tried to smuggle out Rosemary Widen.

He tucked the ticket into the inside of his jacket.

The damp air unique to the basement rushed in. Under the dim lighting, the shadow of someone crouched against the wall stretched long.

Around Rosemary Widen’s eyes, smeared makeup and signs of fatigue were tangled together.

Damian stared coldly through Rosemary Widen. Soon, she recognized him and lifted the corners of her mouth as if tearing them open.

“Your Highness, you’ve come to rescue me!”

Rosemary Widen spoke in a voice filled with delight. Her fingers fumbled across the floor as she tried to approach Damian’s legs.

“I knew Your Highness wouldn’t abandon me. You were just acting cold because that girl was there, right? I knew it all along. That’s why I never resented you… It’s okay.”

Damian found Rosemary Widen’s delusion just as pathetic as before.

“Rosemary Widen.”

“……Your Highness, please be kind to me. Don’t treat me like this. Can’t you call me ‘Rosie’ like before…?”

Rosie.

It seemed to have been a nickname once used for Rosemary Widen. At this point, he was genuinely curious.

“‘Call me Rosie like before?’”

Damian had never once offered Rosemary Widen any affection.

“You love me… don’t you…”

With trembling eyes and lips, Rosemary murmured as if in prayer, her hands clasped together desperately.

They had barely even spoken.

How she had come to such a conclusion baffled him.

If he could, Damian would’ve requested a psychiatric evaluation on her immediately.

“The day I went to propose to Edelweiss, I saw you for the first time at the Duke of Stern’s estate.”

“…Your Highness.”

“The way you couldn’t hide your emotions, like a child—it was fascinating. So I thought, here’s a girl pampered by the Duke, unaware of her place. That must be why she’s deluded herself into thinking I love her.”

That was all Damian remembered about Rosemary Widen.

An illegitimate daughter of Duke Stern.

A woman who should never be near Edelweiss.

In fact, her impression was so faint he wouldn’t even remember her face if not for this moment.

“You’re saying… it was a delusion? Your Highness, you never once gave your heart to me? You never… loved me? Why? What does she have that I don’t? There’s nothing—nothing she has that makes her better than me, yet you love her and cast me aside…?”

Rosemary bit her lip as sobs broke through.

Then she raised her eyes, glaring with betrayed fury.

“Edelweiss was just lucky to be born the Duke’s legitimate daughter!”

“Make no mistake. I never cast you aside.”

“……”

“I never once wanted you. So how could I cast you aside? It’s not because you’re illegitimate or because Edelweiss is legitimate.”

His cold voice cut like ice.

Rosemary drew in a sharp breath, momentarily speechless.

Then, suddenly, she burst into laughter—tilting her head, shoulders shaking uncontrollably, screams woven into her maniacal cackling that echoed through the dungeon.

Eventually, she stopped and looked straight at Damian.

“Then… why? Why did you treat me like that, Your Highness? Did I mean absolutely nothing to you? Is it because I wasn’t useful to you?”

Talking to someone as clearly unhinged as Rosemary Widen was exhausting.

“I can’t believe you share even a drop of blood with Edelweiss.”

“…If I had been the true daughter… if I had been the Duke’s legitimate heir instead of her… would you have proposed to me?”

But Damian hadn’t proposed to Edelweiss for her name.

He had only accepted Charlotte’s deal to give her the Blossomweaver Rose.

Even if Rosemary had been the legitimate daughter, he still wouldn’t have proposed.

And setting all that aside—

There was no world where Damian would ever choose Rosemary Widen.

“Even if you were a foreign princess.”

“…..”

Rosemary Widen was not Edelweiss.

“You’re not even worthy of being her substitute.”

“…You’re being deceived, Your Highness. That wretched woman Edelweiss—thinking she carries your child, of course you’d feel something for her.”

Rosemary muttered with her head bowed low.

“But… do you know? She’s been unfaithful all along.”

The air in the dungeon froze.

Damian’s brow twitched.

Not missing that reaction, Rosemary whispered:

“That child… isn’t yours. I saw her. She had an affair after marriage. Isn’t it strange? You left for the front right after the wedding, and yet she got pregnant right away?”

“……?”

“Prince Adolf told me to imitate Edelweiss. What if… he was the one she was secretly seeing? Or maybe… there’s someone else too.”

Damian recalled the look in Adolf’s eyes—how he always gazed at Edelweiss with emotion.

‘…That can’t be.’

He denied it. Edelweiss wasn’t that kind of woman. He should have dismissed it as Rosemary Widen spouting nonsense out of jealousy.

But the memory of receiving an anklet at the wedding reception lingered in his mind.

The sight of her reaching out with sincerity felt trampled under the malice in that voice.

“You’re truly out of your mind.”

The knight commander entered from outside.

“Your Highness. The executioner in charge has bitten his tongue and taken his own life.”

The knight commander whispered into Damian’s ear.

“……Damian!”

Rosemary Widen’s scream, drenched in madness, pierced through.

“Search around her! I’m sure there are letters exchanged with her secret lover!”

His fingertips tingled. The sound of his heartbeat ripped through his ears. His reason had already collapsed—he could no longer hold it together.

“If Your Highness cannot do it, then I’ll kill Edelweiss for you……”

Upon hearing that, Damian felt the dormant rage inside him stir violently.

He drew the sword from the knight commander’s waist and thr*st it into Rosemary Widen’s chest.

“…..Kgh…..!”

Thick blood poured from Rosemary Widen’s mouth.

“How… could Your Highness… do this… to me……”

Her grotesquely veined eyes widened in disbelief, slowly losing their focus.

Her body crumpled forward. Her fingertips scraped the floor. Her breath, which had been tightening, gradually faded.

“…..Your… Highness.”

She barely lifted her head, then collapsed completely after that final word.

The knight commander swallowed dryly and checked her wrist.

“…She has passed, Your Highness. What should we do with the body?”

Damian’s eyes remained frozen like a glacial lake. He slowly lowered the bloodied sword.

The dark red blood on his gloves felt like filth.

“Throw her corpse to the crows. She’s not even worth burying.”

With Rosemary Widen gone, Edelweiss would be safe.