Chapter 31
Ray quickly adapted to life at the Duke’s mansion.
As promised, Kent approved her entry as a maid.
Blick was a little more difficult, but thanks to the small bribes she had discreetly spread beforehand, he didn’t oppose it too much.
However, he sent someone over childishly to suggest,
“If you have that much money, you should give me more bribes.”
Ray, who moved freely around the mansion, almost got kicked out by Julius and Lucilla, but with her amazing quick thinking, she convinced them that she was on their side.
As a result, they believed Ray was their spy and were using her to gather information about my movements.
Now that she had more freedom, Ray gradually became my right-hand instead of Mari, who was slowly losing favor with the Penton couple.
In the meantime, she was winning the favor of everyone in the mansion, from the knights and maids to the chefs.
“Today, when I was asked about the young lady’s well-being, I reported that she’s been feeling weak lately and has been staying in her room, doing nothing. I thought that would be better.”
“What about the wedding preparations? There’s only two weeks left, right?”
“It’s been delayed a few days. The preparations are a bit stuck.”
Ray, sitting with me and Mari, answered while taking a bite of the cookies Demeyra had sent.
Coincidentally, those cookies were from Mama Dain’s, so they were the perfect snack for Ray, who was feeling nostalgic.
“As you predicted, rumors have spread. They say Young Master Bartol is close to Prince Balthazar and is trying to stop an unwanted marriage by spreading those rumors.”
“Suddenly?”
I tilted my head.
“It was a bit noisy at first, but then when Balthazar had a scandal with a maid, the rumors were covered up. But now, they’ve resurfaced?”
“Yes. Someone planned it and used the palace maids to manipulate public opinion.”
“Who?”
“Me.”
Ray answered while sucking her finger, which was covered with sweet crumbs.
“Despite what I seem like, I’ve gotten along quite well with the palace servants.”
Mari and I stared at her, stunned. It was such a bold plan and execution that it was almost unbelievable.
“Now that the wedding has been postponed, which solved one problem, I’ll handle the issue you mentioned earlier.”
Ray wrapped the remaining two cookies in a handkerchief and stood up.
“It’s about Ron.”
“Deputy Butler Ronald Kent? You’ve been on a first-name basis already?”
“We’ve been that way since the first day.”
Ray smiled as though it was nothing, as if it wasn’t a big deal.
“We’ve become closer now. We share hobbies, family matters, and his ambiguous, cowardly yet kind-hearted nature… The preparations are complete.”
She grabbed her coat and winked at me as she left the room.
“I’ll make him completely yours before today ends.”
Without a moment’s hesitation, Ray exited the room and disappeared down the hallway.
Deputy Butler Ron Kent of the Aphellemion family rubbed his darkened eyes and descended the back steps of the mansion.
“Stable inspection, kitchen inventory check, fire one servant, hire two maids, check the jewelry vault, manage weapons…”
There was a mountain of work to do. He hadn’t been able to sleep for several days.
“Ugh, I can’t take it anymore!”
With a grim expression, he tugged at his thinning hair. Despite his young age, he felt like he was about to go bald.
He had trusted the housekeeper, Blick, who had promised that the work would be easy, but after joining the mansion five years ago, Kent hadn’t had a single day of rest.
The reason? The head of the house, Blick, spent his time traveling and attending banquets with the Penton couple, leaving all the duties of the mansion to Kent.
If Blick wanted Kent to handle everything, he should have just let him do it. But instead, Blick constantly criticized Kent’s policies whenever he had free time.
“Why did you hire this person? Why is the salary for the knights so high?”
Blick kept pushing the decisions he should have been making onto Kent while getting angry if something didn’t go his way.
“Ugh, just focus on the salary,” Kent muttered, trying to calm himself down, though frustration bubbled up inside him.
In fact, the problem wasn’t just the workload.
The larger issue was that Blick and the Penton couple were embezzling large sums from the Aphellemion family.
Kent had previous experience working in other noble households, so he had some flexibility when it came to his standards.
A bit of bribery, tax evasion, and petty embezzlement that had no real significance, he could turn a blind eye to.
The problem was that the Aphellemion family was special. Or more accurately, Blick and the Penton couple were special.
Their embezzlement was beyond anything Kent had ever imagined.
Not only did they use Aphellemion’s funds for their own expenses, but they even openly smuggled money and jewels to the Penton estate.
They didn’t even try to hide it. Julius even referred to himself as “Duke Aphellemion” at times.
Because they weren’t even trying to conceal it, the evidence of embezzlement was overwhelming.
Kent had started to gather all the evidence and, despite his somewhat naive and warm nature, he’d been tempted to report it to the royal family a year ago. But every time, his plans had failed.
After five years as deputy butler, Kent hesitated because he knew exposing the corruption would put him in danger. But the biggest reason for his hesitation wasn’t just that.
‘If I do this, our family, our servants, will all be ruined! Doesn’t the deputy butler have a heart?’
‘Are you planning to take everything from my son and daughter’s future? What will happen if we lose our lives?’
It was Lucilla, who would cry hysterically at the slightest suspicion.
Kent had been from a conservative knight’s family, so it wasn’t easy to ignore a woman pleading with tears.
What had shaken him the most were the words about Iris.
‘Not for her, no report! She’s going to marry our Bartol and inherit the mansion. How could I ruin her future happiness when she’s already lost her parents and can’t even manage the family?’
Kent wasn’t particularly close to Iris.
After witnessing the Penton couple’s embezzlement, he had avoided her because of the strange guilt he felt.
He rarely had the opportunity to meet her face-to-face.
Sometimes, he heard rumors that Iris was locked in her room under the Penton family’s orders, but Iris didn’t resist much.
Above all, Iris had never shown tears in front of the servants.
What did it mean that a young lady, raised delicately, didn’t cry in difficult situations?
Iris had accepted the situation.
As Lucilla had said, she had no other option but to accept it since she hadn’t been trained to manage the family.
After all, how could an eighteen-year-old girl take on such a responsibility?
If she had given the family to someone else, it might have led to a greater crisis.
Kent rationalized the situation, though somewhat cowardly.
The guilt still remained, but after Bartol and Iris married, he planned to treat her as the lady of the house, as that would be more emotionally comfortable for him.
Fortunately, Lucilla didn’t fire or try to kill Kent, likely because she believed she could control him and feared provoking him or hiring an assassin.
All this created a delicate balance, and Kent convinced himself that this was peace.
‘Just focus on the tasks at hand and read the novel I’ve been reading after work.’
With that thought, Kent quickly walked on.
“Ron, over here!”
“Ah, Ray.”
His face brightened as he recognized the familiar maid.
“Here’s the last volume of the novel I promised.”
Sitting on the stairs, Ray turned her face briefly to greet him, then extended her hand with something in it.
“How did you…?”
Kent was surprised to see the title of the novel. It was the one he had been reading recently, but had struggled to find the last volume.
“I told you, my younger brother is reading the same one. He cried for three nights after finishing the last chapter…”
“Aaah! I can’t hear it!”
Kent quickly covered his ears. His only comfort amidst the grueling work had been those melodramatic novels, and he couldn’t bear to know the ending ahead of time.
“You were crying through every page, though. Alright, fine, here you go.”
Ray clicked her tongue and handed him a handkerchief with Mama Dain’s cookies inside.
“I specially prepared this for you.”
Kent’s eyes lit up. Until recently, novels had been his only joy, but after meeting Ray, he had found another joy—Mama Dain’s desserts.
“Thanks!”
He quickly took the cookies and stuffed them in his pocket.
The thought of eating them while reading his book after work made him feel happy already.
Kent’s thoughts were a whirlwind as he made his way through the mansion, burdened with tasks that seemed never-ending.
The recent developments with Ray had added another layer of complexity to his already complicated life.
He had received the cookies and the novel, small distractions from the exhausting world he inhabited.
For a moment, he had allowed himself to enjoy the small comforts Ray had provided, but the weight of his responsibilities came crashing back down almost immediately.
Kent knew he couldn’t allow himself to get too comfortable.
The Penton couple’s corruption, their manipulation of the Aphellemion family’s wealth, was not something he could ignore forever.
His moral compass screamed at him to do the right thing, to expose the wrongdoings that were poisoning the house from the inside.
But every time he came close to taking action, something—someone—stopped him.
Lucilla’s tearful pleas had always been enough to shake his resolve.
She was a master at emotional manipulation, and though Kent was a man of principles, he couldn’t easily disregard a woman in tears, especially when it was his own wife.
Her words echoed in his mind, driving him to question his every decision.
“Do you really want to destroy your children’s future?” she had asked him once, and those words had haunted him ever since.
And then there was Iris.
She was caught in the web of the Penton family’s machinations, a pawn in a game she never asked to play.
Kent knew she didn’t deserve any of this.
She was young, innocent, and yet she had been forced into a situation where she had no choice but to accept what was handed to her.
Kent couldn’t help but feel responsible. He wasn’t a father to Iris, but he felt a paternal sense of duty toward her, a duty to protect her from the people who were exploiting her.
But there was little he could do without risking his own life, or worse, the lives of his family.
When he had first come to the Aphellemion estate five years ago, he had been full of hope, eager to make a name for himself.
But now, after everything he had seen, he realized how naive he had been.
The mansion, the noble family, it was all a façade. Beneath it all, corruption ran deep, and Kent was no longer sure where his loyalties lay.
The tension had reached its boiling point when the Duke himself had begun to display his own form of arrogance and disregard for the rules.
Julius, who had once been a figure Kent admired, now seemed like another puppet in the Penton couple’s twisted game.
Kent had seen enough, but he knew any action he took could end in disaster.
But Ray… she was a different story.
She was clever, sharp, and seemingly unaffected by the drama and politics that consumed the mansion.
Kent found himself increasingly drawn to her, not just for her resourcefulness but for her willingness to stand up to the system that held everyone else in place.
He had to admit, she was unlike anyone he had ever met.
Despite her outwardly innocent appearance, Ray had shown a ruthlessness and cunning that was necessary in this world.
She played the game, and she played it well.
Kent had always prided himself on being a man of principle, but he couldn’t deny that Ray’s actions were beginning to sway him.
Perhaps he needed to be more like her—more willing to fight, more willing to take risks.
After all, the system was broken.
The only way to change things was to break the rules, just as the Penton couple had done for years.
“Ron, over here.”
Kent was pulled from his thoughts by the familiar voice calling his name.
He turned to find Ray standing near the staircase, a mischievous smile playing at the corners of her lips.
“Here,”
she said, holding out the last volume of the novel he had been reading.
The one he had been waiting for, the one that had eluded him for so long.
Kent’s heart skipped a beat.
“How did you…?”
“I told you,”
Ray replied with a wink.
“My younger brother has his ways. You were so desperate for this book, I thought I’d do you a little favor.”
Kent’s eyes widened.
He hadn’t expected Ray to go so far to track down the novel for him.
But then again, he shouldn’t have been surprised.
Ray was always one step ahead.
“Thank you,”
Kent said, his voice filled with gratitude.
Ray chuckled as she handed him the book.
“You’re welcome, but don’t get too comfortable. We’ve still got work to do.”
Kent raised an eyebrow.
“What do you mean?”
Ray’s smile turned sly.
“You’ll see. We’re going to make sure everything falls into place today.”
Kent’s heart raced.
He wasn’t sure what Ray was planning, but he knew it was going to be something big.
Something that could change everything.
With the book in hand, Kent walked to his room, his thoughts once again consumed by the weight of the decisions he had to make.
He was standing at a crossroads, unsure of which path to take.
But one thing was certain, he couldn’t stay in the shadows any longer.
He had to act, or everything would fall apart.
As he closed the door behind him, Kent knew that the next step would be the most important of his life.
