Chapter 86: A Distorted Deal

“Now that everything’s tangled up, I find I can’t trust anything.”

Knowing the original story didn’t mean knowing everything. This was even more shocking than learning about Caelan’s aversion to poison.

Bliss, barely able to stand and leaning against the wall, wanted to just go home. She wanted to reflect on what had happened to her in a quiet place.

“Bliss.”

An urgent voice caught her attention. Turning around, she saw Count Bonita striding toward her.

“Ah.”

Come to think of it, he would be the one most pleased about Caelan becoming a duke. That’s why he had pushed aside Latte and maneuvered his daughter into the Adrian marquis family. How happy he must be that his son-in-law would become a duke. Perhaps because of this, his approaching speed didn’t slow but rather increased.

“Please slow down, ugh.”

Even if he was happy, as Bliss was about to tell him to calm down, the count suddenly grabbed her arm. Wasn’t he too excited?

“Come this way.”

Count Bonita didn’t lessen his grip even seeing Bliss’s pained expression. Instead, he pulled her as if telling her to hurry and opened a nearby door.

After checking if anyone else was inside, he closed the door, instantly cutting them off from the outside.

“What are you doing?”

Having been practically thrown into the room and with her arm still aching, Bliss looked strangely at Count Bonita. Thinking about it, he had called her by name rather than as Marchioness in such a public place where others might hear.

Just as she noticed that Count Bonita was different from usual, he finished checking outside by pressing his ear to the door. When he turned from the door to face Bliss, his face was like fire.

“Why don’t you ever listen?”

When Bliss didn’t respond to his low roar, Count Bonita strode over and grabbed her arm again.

“Viscount Jimilta, I told you not to associate with that man.”

“…There was nothing for father to worry about.”

“Hmph. Nothing happened, yet that man enters the knight tournament and circles around you?”

Count Bonita just snorted derisively, refusing to believe her.

“That man, though he might not match Marquis Adrian, you saw in this tournament that he possesses quite sharp skills.”

Having won second place, Leonard’s skills were worthy of everyone’s recognition, separate from his cruelty. But what was the problem with that?

As Bliss looked at him uncomprehendingly, Count Bonita returned a look of exasperation.

“It means that man, who had lived without revealing himself until now, moved because of you.”

“I… don’t know about that, but he probably entered because he was confident in his skills.”

Since Leonard had come bearing the Blast ducal family’s emblem, Count Bonita’s words seemed correct. However, Bliss denied it for now. At this moment, getting information from Count Bonita was more important than asserting her opinion was right.

“Hmph, what intentions could that sinister man have had in entering such a tournament.”

“Then are you saying there was another reason?”

She subtly probed, wondering if he was referring to the rumors circulating about some kind of deal with Duke Blast.

“It’s because of you.”

At Count Bonita’s direct statement, Bliss kept her mouth shut.

“It was always like that. He was only gentle and kind to you. He couldn’t properly hide his feelings for you and showed his favor. That’s why I was so wary of that man, tsk.”

What started as an explanation to Bliss had turned into muttering to himself.

“Especially now when we can’t afford to fall out of the Marquis’s favor, that man is ruining everything…”

“Ruining?”

Listening to Count Bonita’s muttering, Bliss pointed out the strange part. At this, Count Bonita’s mouth snapped shut, unable to take back his words and revealing his distress.

After waiting for a while with no further words forthcoming, Bliss unpacked some of what she had just heard.

“There’s nothing particularly strange about Viscount Jimilta having feelings for me.”

“…”

“I understand telling me to keep my distance from Viscount Jimilta, but what’s this about not falling out of the Marquis’s favor? Are you talking about Caelan?”

As she spoke, things started falling into place, and Bliss recalled past memories. He had told Caelan about the business she would start. Could it be because of that?

“Please tell me.”

If it was about the business, he could just say so. Bliss waited for Count Bonita’s answer. However, as if determined not to make a second mistake, he kept his mouth shut.

“If you won’t tell me… may I ask Caelan if he has any idea about this?”

“Bliss.”

“So tell me.”

Bliss said while pulling her arm free from his grip. If he really wouldn’t tell her now, she planned to leave. No, she showed her resolve to do so.

Count Bonita, who had called her and pushed her into an empty room, was different from before.

Seeming to read Bliss’s firm attitude, Count Bonita clicked his tongue and turned to her.

“She disappeared.”

“Disappeared? Who?”

At such a brief answer, Bliss didn’t immediately understand and asked again.

“The person Marquis Adrian made a deal with has disappeared. It was the condition of the contract with the Marquis. To care for a woman for life and keep her from leaving a certain place. But that woman escaped from the tower.”

Despite Count Bonita’s agitated voice, Bliss remained still, not knowing how to react.

Her mind was blank.

“How did we manage to secure Marquis Adrian in the first place? Now that he’s becoming a duke, if he learns of this, do you think he’ll leave you be? He’ll discard you, who’s no longer needed, and bring in another woman. What will become of us then? Yet Viscount Jimilta is running wild with his sword, and you’re not even worried.”

This was why Count Bonita had been so agitated.

“So you’re saying Caelan will abandon me?”

“There’s no reason to keep you anymore. The reason he married you was because of the contract with me.”

Count Bonita clicked his tongue and gave her a look of contempt.

“You’re not prettier than Latte, that woman, and you don’t have any special talents either. With such qualities, while Viscount Jimilta is desperate to take you away, do you think Marquis Adrian will look kindly on you?”

“…Who is she?”

“What?”

“Who is this person who escaped from the tower, the subject of the deal?”

Though she understood why Count Bonita was agitated, her mind remained foggy and unclear.

The reason was simple: the subject of the deal.

“Who have you been keeping locked up all this time?”

As if the confusion about Latte wasn’t enough, new confusion was added.

***

“Why did she come looking for me anyway?”

Latte, unsettled by her conversation with Bliss, fidgeted with her fingernails. At the party, Bliss had approached her first and they had talked.

The conversation had been ordinary, not much different from their previous ones. Yet even after parting, it kept nagging at her mind.

“What am I missing?”

Why couldn’t she shake off the conversation with Bliss? It wasn’t particularly special that it bothered her because Bliss was Caelan’s wife – that had always been the case.

As Latte tilted her head in thought, she happened to notice a slightly open door. Though she could have passed by, seeing the figure glimpsed inside made it impossible to walk away.

After checking that no one was around, Latte opened the door slightly. Just enough to slip through, she entered quickly and closed it.

Once inside, Latte checked for anyone besides the person she had spotted before speaking.

“Planning to stay here forever, I see.”

This was their first meeting since she had said she would stop trying to kill Bliss.

Latte looked contemptuously at the man who sat with his head bowed, his back curved.

“You wanted Bliss so much you even stopped deceiving me, but now you’re acting like the world has ended just because you lost in the finals.”

Latte mocked Leonard. When she learned that his pretense of taking her side out of resentment toward Bliss had actually been to protect Bliss, she had wanted to kill him out of fury. Leonard seemed to have tried to win Bliss’s heart through this knight tournament but failed.

“Thinking you could beat Caelan was wrong from the start.”

Latte muttered, tilting her head. If anyone knew Caelan’s abilities well, it was Latte herself.

“Get out.”

At Leonard’s sunken voice, showing no joy despite his second-place finish, Latte snorted.

“I don’t understand what’s so great about Bliss that you’re like this. She’s not pretty, and she’s not even kind.”

Though from a count’s family, her background wasn’t particularly impressive. Above all, Bliss was the worst. She used to be a woman who tormented others and lived as she pleased, but now she acted kind as if she had forgotten all that – that didn’t make her attractive.

Yet from Caelan to Princess Jasmin to Leonard, she couldn’t understand why they all clustered around Bliss.

“She was better when she acted as she pleased before. At least then she stood out.”

“Is that why you tried to kill Bliss?”

Latte frowned.

“That was because she took Caelan. And you’re in no position to talk, after ruining all my plans.”

“You acted alone too.”

As Latte’s expression hardened, Leonard raised his head for the first time.

“You shot an arrow at Bliss.”

Latte had planted people to watch Leonard. Thus she had known about the ducal family’s ambush in advance, and she had set her own trap as well. She thought no one would discover it, but Leonard had brought it up.