How To Survive As a Villain on the Verge of Death

“Yes, they are all from the same family, so they arrived early.”

“Hmm, it’s surprising that they are relatives of the duchy.”

She looked at them and said in a calm voice.

“Looking at the host’s skills being evaluated in the hallway, it didn’t seem like they had learned the etiquette of aristocrats…”

Everyone shut their mouths with frightened expressions at her careless reprimand. She ignored them and walked towards the drawing room.

“I plan to wait in the parlor, would you like to join me?”

“Oh, no. Princess. How do we…”

“We will wait downstairs.”

Everyone jumped up and shook his hand. At this point, they would have known that the words they exchanged offended the princess. She wasn’t even the affectionate Princess Sorel, but Eve, who was famous for her dog-chasing class. So there is no way the would want to be together with her.

“Okay, then go downstairs. There is a waiting room downstairs as well.”

In the meantime, the relatives went downstairs and no more footsteps could be heard. She stopped in front of the drawing room and looked back to see Diane staring at her with her eyes wide open. She had a puzzled look on her face, but there was a faint sense of pleasure in her innocent face.

“Miss Diane. Thanks for showing me around the mansion. You must be tired, but go in and rest.”

“Ah, yes, Princess.”

Diane bowed her back to show her respect.

“I… Then I’ll see you at her wedding.”

Diane, who was about to turn around, looked at her for a moment and then she stopped. Then she hesitated, and she whispered quietly.

“And… Thank you for… a little while ago.”

It must have made her feel good inside that Eve had sent her relatives away. Her honest confession made Eve laugh.

“Don’t tell your mother. I said I would be quiet today if she invited me.”

Diane nodded her head with her mischievous smile.

“I won’t tell her.”

With that said, Diane turned around and walked down the hallway. Looking at Diane’s back, she remembered the question that lingered in her heart. Why did the relatives feel bad for the Duchess and Diane? The Duchess was clearly the daughter of an aristocratic family, and for a long time she had been the mistress of the family, so it was rather strange that she had a bad relationship with all of her relatives.

‘Is it because Miss Diane is the only daughter of the Duke of Rohan?’

Diane was the Duke’s only child. In other words, she was the heiress of this family. However, because she was ill, she couldn’t go out in social circles, and she had not yet decided on a marriage partner. Maybe that’s why her relatives whisper in a malicious tone. They were dissatisfied with the Duchess for failing to produce a proper heir. And without sickly Diane, the dukedom would go to the collateral relatives. Looking at them, they were disgustingly unpleasant people.

‘I have to protect Diane for the sake of the duchy.’

She commanded the maid that was passing by.

“Call the maid who came with me.”

Nell was downstairs waiting. Moments later, she came up the hallway on the second floor when Nell found her.

“Nell, will you do me a favor?”

“What do you need, Princess?”

“I’ll come out of the ball as soon as the third dance is over.”

The third dance at a regular ball is a waltz. The ball started with the minuet, then the cadreille. It was a difficult dance that neither of them dared to try. Since she couldn’t dance other than the waltz, she planned to enter the ballroom just in time for the waltz and run away as soon as the dance was over. By the time Diane took her last pill, she said, it was around the end of the prom. So she was going to spy inside the music room until her drugged maid showed up.

“While I’m at the ballroom, talk quietly to the Duchess and get the keys to the music room.”

“The keys to the music room?”

“That’s right.”

Normally, it might not be locked, but today was a day when the mansion was crowded with people. On days like this, all unused rooms were locked.

“I stopped by the music room in the evening and lost an important belonging and ordered it to be retrieved. It’s a personal thing, so I don’t want other people to know about it. He told me to secretly go quietly.”

And the mistress of the mansion would always have an emergency key.

“If you ask to borrow the key for a while, I will lend it to you.”

The Duchess was afraid that Eve would make a fuss, so even if she was afraid, she would get the key right away.

“With that, open the door to the music room and wait for me inside.”

Nell nodded her head with serious eyes, as if there was tension in her voice.

“Yes, Princess.”

* * *

The sun was setting before he knew it when he went outside after roughly finishing his afternoon work. The sky, which had seemed clear blue just a moment ago, had turned gray. A light purple evening mist hung over the stone walls of the shaded mansion.

Terrence took out his pocket watch as he climbed into the waiting carriage. Before the ball started, he was trying to make it on time, but it seemed like it would be a little short before he reached the Duke’s mansion.

“Let’s go.”

The carriage passed through the front door of the mansion and down the hill along the sidewalk. Unlike other noble families, the Grand Duke’s mansion was located on the Isten Hill. It was a place overlooking Easten Street, where the mansions of aristocratic families were gathered.

It was evening, and the street below the hill was in shadow. On the far horizon, the red sunset cast a brilliant golden light across the gray sky. Looking at the golden color combined with the red color, he couldn’t help but think of the familiar red blonde hair. Her fiancée, Princess Eve.

‘I haven’t had any contact in the meantime.’

Instead, he gave her the name of the lady-in-waiting to her, when he secretly met Eve. The lady-in-waiting was one of the ladies-in-waiting at his palace and one of his spies. However, five days after that, she did not send a single message from the princess.

He asked to find out what she was doing and she said she had a cold and was sitting in the room. He wondered if she was faking her illness because she had some ulterior motive, but seeing that she hadn’t contacted him, it didn’t seem like that either. The day he last met her in her stead, he remembered taking the princess to the balcony by the waterfall. Was it too careless?

Terrence was well aware of his lack of consideration for women. He hadn’t even had a serious conversation with his fiancee, Eve, before.

“Kamion.”

Kamion, who was sitting across from him, had been watching him from before. Terrence asked without taking his eyes off the window.

“If the princess were murdered now, who do you think people would suspect?”

Kamion’s complexion slowly turned white as if he had accepted those words.

“Majesty. The princess… you want to kill her? No, no matter how much you want to kill her…”

Terrence looked back at him with a puzzled look.

“Who said I would kill the princess? I’m just asking.”

Kamion looked at him for a moment before replying.

“If the princess is killed, people will naturally become suspicious of Her Highness.”

“Okay. I guess so.”

His relationship with Eve was as bad as anyone could believe. To the extent that even Kamion in front of him would think he was trying to kill the princess in response to a simple question.

It wasn’t all his fault. Because Eve has been really selfish and stupid all this time. She chased after him whenever she had a chance, like a real stalker.

“But why do you suddenly say that…”

“…”

Kamion cautiously asked, but instead of answering, Terrence asked another question.

“Have those sent to the South returned?”

According to the original plan, Terrence was to set out for the South immediately after his wedding. It was because there were signs of a large-scale rebellion on the southern border. At first he accepted rather gladly, thinking that as soon as he got married he could get out of the marriage. At that time, he wanted to leave the marriage for a while even if he had to create a reason for not being there.

“It was as you would expect. Things seem far more exaggerated than they really are. There was turmoil around, but there was no danger of rebellion.”

“Right. It must have been the work of the Emperor.”

It was also as expected.

“Why did the Emperor want to send His Highness to the South?”

Kamion questioned again, but Terrence stared at the window in silence.

‘It must have been to divert my attention elsewhere.’

He was busy preparing for his match so he didn’t pay attention to Eve. As expected of the Emperor, Terence himself had been concentrating on preparing the army, avoiding his thoughts of the wedding. If Eve hadn’t told him directly, he wouldn’t have noticed anything suspicious. When he thought about Eve, the last conversation in the temple comes to mind. Whenever she pursued him to marry her, Eve stipulated that she would now want to divorce him.

It’s a divorce… In fact, he hadn’t thought of that. Shortly after the engagement, he only had such trouble once. Now, if the Emperor died or steps down, he wondered if he should divorce Eve. Although his marriage quickly dissuaded him from the thought that he could not do such an irresponsible thing to her married wife.

‘I never expected that she would want a divorce.’

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Translator Note:

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