That afternoon, while reading a book in his room, Kieran lifted his head at the sound of a knock.
“My Lord, it’s Anton. The vice-captain says he has something to give you—may I come in for a moment?”
They had just met earlier in the morning. Curious, Kieran stood up.
“Come in.”
Before he could reach the door, as soon as the words left Kieran’s mouth, the door burst open. And something fell to the floor with a thud.
“Ugh… sob… huh-huhh…”
Seeing what had fallen to the floor, Kieran was horrified. It was a scrawny soldier, tightly bound with rope.
“It’s a bit unsightly, isn’t it? Maybe I should’ve put a sack over him,” Kanut remarked casually.
Kieran looked over at Kanut, hoping that this soldier wasn’t the “something” he had to present, but Kanut simply confirmed it with a carefree tone.
“Why is this man…?”
The soldier, trembling like a soaked rat, had a face swollen from a severe beating. Kieran’s question was met with Kanut giving the man a few taps on the back.
“Hey, confess.”
“I-I’m sorry! I conspired with the head maid and attempted to hand over the prison keys!”
“And?”
“I-I neglected my duties as a guard… a-and I drank alcohol during my shifts too!”
The soldier, after rattling off his confession, looked at Kanut with desperate eyes, a faint glimmer of hope shining in them. However, Kanut mercilessly smacked him on the head.
Thud!
“You little brat! You don’t even have the decency to apologize properly?” Kanut shouted, his voice thick with an accent from Elsha. The sound was so dull and heavy, it was hard to believe it came from a human head. The guard collapsed to the side with a faint groan.
Clicking his tongue, Kanut stood up, only to freeze when he locked eyes with Kieran.
“Uh, I apologize. I’m not well-educated, you see…” Kanut stammered awkwardly, his accent slipping back to normal. Kieran, a beat late, shook his head.
“No, it’s fine. There’s no need to be so formal.”
“No! Ahem, ahem. How could I do that? If you’re the husband of the commander, that makes you just like the commander too,” Kanut quickly corrected himself, softening his tone after nearly shouting again. Kieran, trying not to get swept up in Kanut’s fiery temper, spoke calmly.
“Alright, I understand. But first… could you explain this situation to me?”
Thinking the guard’s explanation had been lacking, Kanut made a move to wake the unconscious man, but Kieran stopped him and asked again.
“I understand who he is. What I’m asking is how you found out and caught him.”
There was no way the rumors from the castle could have reached the knights who lived beyond the walls. So how did Kanut manage to capture the traitor in just half a day?
“Well, that’s…”
Kanut scratched his head nonchalantly.
“When you released the food supplies to the townsfolk, and none of them received anything, it was pretty clear someone inside the castle was stealing it, right?”
Kieran could tell Kanut had understood that part correctly, as he nodded along while listening.
“Ah, those bastards must’ve been stuffing their faces while we were out breaking our backs to make money, so I went to deal with them,” Kanut muttered, clenching his fist. The veins on his thick hand bulged as his anger rose.
“Did you just happen to stop by the prison along the way?” Kieran asked.
“No, not really. Usually, guards are the ones taking bribes, so I figured the prison would be the most rotten place to check first,” Kanut explained, glancing at the unconscious guard and clicking his tongue in disgust.
“And sure enough, this scumbag was grinning, holding a ruby earring.”
Anton sighed, almost under his breath, “Still, you didn’t have to drag him in like this…”
Kanut, noticing the remark, awkwardly averted his gaze. Kieran, observing the scene, couldn’t help but chuckle quietly.
“No, you did well.”
While Kieran thought the method was a bit extreme, he was just relieved by their swift action.
‘If we’d been even a moment late, the maid would have escaped.’
The head maid wasn’t someone who had earned the trust of the castle’s people significantly, but she could still serve as a focal point. If public sentiment had rallied under her instigation, it would have been difficult to manage.
“Actually, I was going to call you to the castle about this issue, but what you brought up seemed more urgent, so I postponed it. I’m just grateful you took care of it on your own.”
“Feel free to ask us anything; there’s no need to worry about that,” Kanut said, shaking his head as if it were absurd.
“There might be some of your acquaintances among the castle’s servants.”
At those words, both Anton and Kanut exchanged strange looks. Anton awkwardly smiled and spoke up.
“The knight order allows anyone with a certain degree of skill to join. That’s why there are many of low status or those who are poor, but those who work in the castle are selected more rigorously…”
Kieran understood the implication without difficulty. It seemed that there were still social hierarchies, even in this small and barren territory.
‘It’s amusing that the head of the household, who should be at the top of the hierarchy, is treated poorly.’
A brief self-deprecating thought crossed his mind, but Kieran brushed it off. After all, it was a good thing not to have to worry about the Order.
“I’ll go meet the lord for a moment; please wait here.”
At Kieran’s sudden request to summon the Order again, Alyssa was taken aback, but she complied without any objections.
In less than a week, the Order, having left only a minimal force to guard the castle walls, arrived at the castle. Everything proceeded very smoothly and quickly.
“P-Please! I made a mistake! Duchess, if you could show mercy just this once…!”
“Look at this filthy animal talking back!”
Key figures among the servants, known for their high positions and severe corruption, were executed as examples.
The executions took place in front of all the castle’s servants, with each charge read out in full before their deaths.
Although the gathered servants had relatively lighter offenses, few were truly innocent.
As they witnessed the knights surrounding the execution site, fear and anxiety gripped them. The confidence they once held was gone, replaced by trembling at the thought of facing a similar fate.
Alyssa watched the entire scene unfold, relieved that Kieran’s plan was working as intended.
“Is it going to be alright?”
Unexpectedly, after the execution, Kieran asked her that question.
His gaze filled with concern was something that Alyssa couldn’t quite understand.
“I don’t want to rush you, but if you don’t speak up now, there may not be another chance.”
Seeing Alyssa’s puzzled expression, Kieran sighed softly.
“Everyone who confessed today mentioned the head maid. They all claimed it was her orders. While that may not be entirely true, it’s not completely false either.”
Alyssa listened absently to his words, but Kieran, sitting beside her, wore an expression that hinted at delaying the head maid’s punishment until the next day.
“I don’t know what you think of her, but you received something from her, didn’t you? Whether it was good or bad.”
Kieran struggled to continue, letting out a heavy sigh. He realized he was crossing a line himself. But…
“Sometimes, if you don’t shake certain things off, you end up tied to them for a lifetime.”
That was the sense of kinship. Kieran felt it himself. He had been devastated when he heard that his father had passed away.
The man had never regarded him as a son, except for the time Kieran had been officially registered as one.
He was the root cause of all the humiliation Kieran had endured since his birth, a bystander and, more than anyone else, the greatest perpetrator.
That death hit hard. It wasn’t the sorrow of losing a blood relative, but the pain stemming from what he had never received and the burdens he had been forced to bear.
Now, Kieran had no one to forgive, nor anyone from whom he needed to seek forgiveness. That reality still sometimes tightened around his throat.
“If you have the courage to face it, go and seek them out.”
Kieran didn’t know what kind of life Alyssa had lived, and he wouldn’t particularly care to find out in the future either.
So this was merely an act of kindness.
Alyssa quietly listened to Kieran’s words as they flowed on. After he finished speaking, she remained silent for a while before nodding slightly.
“Y-yes…”
Thud, thud.
The sound of her rough-soled shoes striking the stone steps echoed ominously. The noise sent chills down Alyssa’s spine, causing her to pause for a moment.
The prison for the worst criminals was located at the very bottom of the underground cells, and that was where Alyssa had often found herself locked up as a child.
With a pale face, she clenched her jaw and stepped forward once more.
Kieran had told her to go if she found the courage, but Alyssa believed that day would never come.
She had lived her whole life in fear. The underground prison, the sound of footsteps approaching her room, and the housekeeper’s shouts—everything terrified her to the point of madness.
Yet, rejecting Kieran’s suggestion frightened her more than confronting the housekeeper.
Things she had received, things she needed to let go.
As she descended the stairs, Alyssa mulled over his words.
In truth, she didn’t quite understand. She had received things from the housekeeper, but she didn’t see why she needed to let go of them.
Whether the housekeeper lived or died wouldn’t make her sad, nor would it bring her joy.
It was the same when her mother, who used to drag her in front of the mirror, died, and when her father, who shouted at her with terrifying rage, passed away.
Alyssa had no more questions to ask them, nor anything left to hear. She had heard the reasons for all the terrifying things they inflicted on her countless times.
“You deserve it.”
“…Who’s there?”
The seemingly endless descent down the stairs finally came to an end, and a cracked voice echoed from the end of the hallway.
