Reincarnated As My Husband's Mistress-Chapter 70: [] Dear Countess Pireta

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The confrontation with the frozen Annie didn't last long. Having already learned her lesson once, Annie couldn't utter a word and just gaped. When my gaze lingered on her, she couldn't bear it and lowered her head without a word.

"I don't have time to waste, Annie. I'll overlook your past mistakes, but I'm also in a hurry to tell you what you'll gain by becoming my person."

"Overlook... you'll overlook them?"

Her voice creaked like an unlubricated door. I nodded with a deep sigh. Annie glanced at my eyes, which were looking down coldly at her, and shivered. I knew what my eyes looked like. Doris's voice, so easily trying to drag Roardnes into this dogfight, was buzzing in my head, and there was no way my eyes could look normal.

"I, I..."

"Don't make excuses. Just give it to me. Or run back to the Western Province and send a letter to Castanya."

Her chest, which had been heaving roughly, stopped moving, and Annie tore at the hem of her apron. Even so, one hand was still pressed against her chest, so I reached out.

"Is it here?"

I could feel her flinch beneath my hand. She was good at lying, but she was clumsy at it. After all, she must have grown up quite delicately as a noble girl, so she wouldn't have much experience crawling on the floor. Just like I did. After a long pause, Annie seemed to make a big decision and reached into her bosom before looking up at me with urgency.

"If I become your person... if I work for you, what can I get?"

"Is there anything you want?"

Annie hesitated for a long time. Her dull purple eyes fluttered aimlessly before stopping. Then, she took the seal from her bosom and replied.

"Please let me be by the Grand Duke's side, even if it's just as a servant. If not a servant, even just as a dedicated maid."

"..."

I stared at Annie without answering. She looked quite pitiful, her eyes tightly closed as if she were prepared to be hit. I put my cold hand on her cheek. Annie flinched and looked up at me.

"It's presumptuous... I don't want to be the Grand Duchess. I can't have it either. I just... please let me be by his side. Let me serve him... If I give you this seal, it's like I'm cutting ties with the West. Please..."

Instead of hitting her, I stroked her cheek affectionately.

"As much as you want."

I lightly pinched her cheek as if she were cute and took the seal from her weakened hand. The seal, which I had never stamped before, felt foreign to me. As I turned to go back to my desk, Annie grabbed my sleeve. It was a weak force.

"Really, really, the Grand Duke..."

I patted her shoulder gently.

"Yes, you have it. As long as you can have the position of Grand Duchess, I don't care who he meets."

While you fall into the abyss, Noebian Trovica, you'll fall with me too. Annie, who didn't know my true intentions, bowed her head deeply, looking sincerely grateful. It might have been the most polite expression I'd ever seen from her. It was ridiculous that she had harassed me, relying on the Duke of Castanya, just for that insignificant position. I didn't even feel like mocking her. I looked slowly around the empty office. The memories of the past, when I had struggled to become a proud wife to Noebian Trovica, flashed before my eyes. Unlike the Grand Duchess's bedroom, which was always clean and tidy, this place was covered in dust. It must have been this way since I was no longer able to sit in this office, when I was so ill. As I wiped away the dust with my finger and blew on it absentmindedly, I continued thinking about what I had been thinking about before Annie was called in. There was a stack of high-quality letter paper on the desk. It was the same shape as the one in Noebian's office, but the pale color separated the work of the Grand Duke and the Grand Duchess. Just like Doris had recognized Noebian's letter paper and rushed to me, there was someone who would rush to me upon recognizing this letter paper. 'Dear Countess Bianca Pireta.' As soon as I wrote the first sentence, tears welled up in my eyes. I could still hear Bianca's voice as she cried with Gregory on the day of the funeral. I wanted to resolve everything without being noticed by them, but I couldn't. [Do you know that Duke Trovica has already chosen his next Grand Duchess before the funeral is even over?]

****

In front of the tent of the city guard stationed in front of the Grand Duke's residence, I came here telling Gaspal that I would go and tell him to dismantle the tent right away. In reality, I came here to borrow the post office. All correspondence coming in and out of the Grand Duke's residence had to be inspected. The reason Noebian had confined me to the Grand Duke's residence was to cut off my ties with the Crown Princess or the Duke of Castanya. Fortunately, Neil or Vincent was guarding this place, so I could occasionally come here under the pretext of protesting and secretly borrow the post office like this. I blankly watched the letter, now out of my hands, fly away. The letter, stamped with the Grand Duchess's seal, was finally flying to my hometown, eastern Pireta. I knew my family would be devastated upon receiving this letter, and the cold reality of having to drive a nail into their hearts with my own hands hit me hard. It would be best if I could avoid meeting them, but it would be difficult. If I were to face them as Noebian's mistress and the next Grand Duchess, looking exactly like Adrienne, one of us would surely go mad. I could feel the tears that had already started rolling down my cheeks gradually freezing in the winter wind. I barely managed to compose myself and was about to turn back when Roardnes appeared, having seen everything.

"Ro... Your Highness."

"Why are you crying?"

He didn't even acknowledge my greeting. Roardnes, who was startled by my crying face, sent Neil away and hurriedly took me into the small tent. He gently grabbed my shoulders and scanned my body as if looking for wounds.

"I have something to tell you, Your Highness."

Roardnes's fierce expression immediately darkened. He must have had a hunch that what I was about to say wasn't good news. When the strength in his hands loosened, I grabbed his two arms tightly. His arms, clad in armor like a battlefield, were too thick for my small hands to wrap around, so it was almost like I was just touching them. The iron armor beneath my hands was as cold as ice. It was proof that he had been running around, taking on a case he didn't even want to take, at my request to make me a different empress. How long had he been outside in this cold weather? For the past two years, how had he endured the battlefield, facing rebels and monsters that made his blood run cold? How much had he suffered after being betrayed by his first love and his uncle? As I held his cold arms, and then his large, wounded hands, Roardnes flinched. He must have sensed something unusual.

"... Don't say you're giving up."

"Your Highness...?"

"Don't look at me like that, as if you're so pitiful. Don't look at me as if you're going to leave me."

In an instant, I was drawn into his wide and cold embrace. Startled by the coldness, I tried to pull away, but Roardnes held me tightly.

"I know you're having a hard time. I told you I'd be that friend you wanted. I told you I'd wait for you, whenever things were over. So why are you crying?"

His voice, which whispered in my ear, was somewhat harsh but also very low and plaintive.

"It's not like that, Your Highness. There's something you need to know."

I quickly looked around. There was no one guarding the tent entrance, and there were no shadows around.

"I'm not going anywhere."

"You looked like you wanted to run away."

"Did I?"

"You did. You looked like you wanted to give up everything and run away because you were so tired."

I was momentarily stunned and looked up at Roardnes's anxious face. It was heartbreaking to see him read my mind correctly and think that I wanted to leave him.

"I won't run away. Not until the truth is revealed. Not until you're happy."

I felt my heart sink when he so casually gave up his own happiness. Yet, I couldn't help but laugh bitterly. The few days I had spent worrying about playing the villain, telling him the truth, seemed insignificant. I reached out and touched Roardnes's disheveled hair. He lowered his head slightly, allowing me to do so. It wasn't so much a caress as it was an attempt to tidy his hair. But he closed his eyes as if he were being caressed. Just like when I had stroked Kowa's head, I felt my restless mind calming down. I had a strange feeling that even if he knew the truth, Roardnes wouldn't be as desperate or want to run away like me. Was it because he was so much taller than me? Or was it because his upper body, bent towards me, looked so much thicker than others? Or was it because of his reckless statement that he didn't care about his own happiness as long as I was in front of him? With a complicated expression, I finished tidying his hair. When he opened his eyes, his gaze was vacant.

"The monsters and rebels you've been fighting for the past two years... they didn't originally come from the West."

"..."

"They were all created by Noebian on purpose to keep you tied down. To prevent the Second Prince Roardnes from setting foot in the capital. I've found clear evidence of that. And that... probably..."

"It's not because of you."

"You pushed the person who was going to be Your Highness's greatest strength into a dangerous situation. How is that not because of me? Especially since Your Highness didn't even know about it."

"It's not because of you. It's because of that bastard, Noebian Trovica. Nothing changes."

His face, devoid of any pain, made me even more anxious. I expected him to be angry and say something unfair, but seeing him comfort me by saying it wasn't my fault, I felt frustrated.

"To whine about killing a few thousand monsters..."

His warm hand pulled mine, which was cold from suppressing my anger.

"Because the reality of marrying someone other than Adrienne Pireta was a bigger hell for me."

"...!"

"So, a few years without you, a few years that don't exist in my life, don't matter."

It wasn't a blaming tone at all. His words and expression were so nonchalant that I couldn't even feel guilty. His immense heart, which I had once thought would suffocate me, now cooled my overheated head.

"...Me too."

I stared at my hand, which he was holding tightly, and opened my mouth.

"Me too, in this situation... I have too much to do to be whining and wanting to run away."

I wanted to give Roardnes confidence.

"I just sent a letter to the East. I told them that Noebian Trovica brought another woman into his house even before my wife's funeral was over."

Roardnes, who had been indifferent to his own pain, grimaced at those words as if he himself was in pain. It was as if he had only then realized the meaning of my tears. He slowly wiped away my tears with his fingers.

"I won't run away. I expected this to happen someday. I'm going to let all the blame for this fall on Noebian. I want no one to be left by Noebian's side. Just as you were alone in the Grand Duke's residence, I was lonely on the battlefield with no one."

Roardnes was right when he said nothing would change knowing the truth. At this point, what was the point of dwelling on how much more of a bastard Noebian was? What scared me was my family getting hurt, and them hurting me because of my tainted image. It would be painful, but I had to accept it.

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"Even if the whole world insults and blames you, I'll protect you. So just do whatever you want. If you want to finish it with your own hands, then do it, Adrienne."

If I could end everything with my own hands, and if I could bring about the downfall of Noebian, who had dragged my family into this misery, then what did a few miserable months in my life matter?

"Ah..."

Roardnes embraced me like a mother bird. In his warm, firm, and large embrace, I couldn't help but think that if I could compensate for this man's time, if I could make this man happy, and if I could atone for my sins, I could do anything.

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