The blood drained from Lucas and Elise’s faces.

“Everyone here seems to have been dressed quite nicely. Like the people who once lived in this Ider Palace.”

Only then did people remember the incident that took place at this Ider Palace last year.

“Kyaaak!”

“Gasp!”

Screams and gasps could be heard here and there. Some ladies and young ladies fainted, unable to fully accept the tremendous truth. Some others vomited, shocked by the terrible treatment inflicted on those who once lived in Ider Palace.

“Huh… Huh, nonsense! Anyone could dress like that. Isn’t everyone here dressed similarly!”

Lucas decided to deny it.

There was no evidence anyway. The corpses were all too decomposed to guess their faces, and only a handful of people at the scene knew the original faces of the Franche family.

“They must have died somewhere else and flowed into this well.”

“Well. Are you trying to say that a dead family became undead, all gathered together, and accidentally entered the well? That sounds a bit strange.”

People thought it was really a strange thing to say.

“It seems to me that someone killed the Franche royal family and threw them into the well without even putting them in Adelia’s coffin.”

The crowd fell silent.

Who would do such an abominable thing? If someone did such a thing, that person is a beast that has strayed from the path of humanity. No, even worse than a beast.

Lucas clenched his fist and glared at Floyd. He pondered how to smoothly extricate himself from this situation.

At that moment, Elise, who had been quiet until now, opened her mouth.

“They are not the Franche royal family.”

People’s gazes gathered on Elise.

“I know well because I served them for a long time. Grand Duke, you are truly rude. How dare you say those living corpses are the Franche royal family, dragging the honor of the Franche royal family through the mud?”

Tears rolled down Elise’s cheeks.

“Why are you bringing in the Franche royal family, who have peacefully entered eternal rest, to establish your own merit? It’s too much, really…”

Elise, who had been desperate to win Floyd’s heart even at the party, realized that was no longer the important issue. For now, she had to get out of this situation.

“It’s too much.”

Floyd muttered.

“Yes, if I were trying to use the sleeping Franche royal family for such a thing, it would be too much. But if these people are really the Franche royal family, then which side becomes too much? Ah, then the phrase ‘too much’ alone wouldn’t be enough to express it.”

Floyd gritted his teeth.

“I should say they deserve to be torn to death without even smelling Adelia’s fragrance.”

People groaned at the curse that shouldn’t be uttered. Floyd sneered at them and turned to the left, asking.

“Isn’t that right, Princess?”

Princess.

No one understood the meaning of that title. They just stared at Floyd, dumbfounded by the sudden appearance of the title ‘princess’.

Because of this, people didn’t notice the woman in the black coat quietly standing among them slowly moving. She slowly slipped out from among the gathered people.

Only when she crossed the empty space after leaving them could people see the back of the woman wearing a coat with elaborate embroidery in gold thread.

Her jet-black hair swayed gently.

She passed by the undead and stood next to Floyd. With her head bowed deeply, no one could guess her identity.

“How about it, Princess? Are they the Franche royal family?”

People couldn’t understand why Floyd was asking her. Only Lucas and Elise had been staring at her with wide eyes since she appeared. Time seemed to have stopped flowing only around the two of them.

“Yes.”

At last, a small, thin voice flowed from her.

“They are.”

The voice that followed was a bit firmer and stronger.

Elise knew the owner of that voice. She knew it so well that she could recognize it instantly no matter when or where she heard it, so Elise’s legs gave out.

She staggered and grabbed Lucas’s arm, but Lucas didn’t even look at Elise. He seemed unaware that Elise was holding his arm.

“These people are.”

At that point, she raised her head.

Under the black hair, an exceptionally white face was revealed. The clear eyes under the slightly darker golden eyebrows and the forest-green eyes as clear as a clear day overwhelmed Elise.

The forest that she thought would no longer appear began to choke Elise’s neck.

“My.”

She pulled at the ends of her black hair. As she did so, the wig covering her head fell away, revealing light blonde hair.

Thus completely revealing her face, she said in a firm voice.

“family indeed.”

No one could open their mouth.

Now everyone guessed who she was.

Roxiana Franche. The only princess of the Franche royal family. Lucas’s fiancée. The ill-fated princess who lost her country and family, betrayed by her fiancé and died.

Such a person was standing alive before them.

Some people were shedding tears of emotion, some still couldn’t recognize who she was, and some were looking around in confusion.

But Roxiana stood straight, staring ahead without moving. At the end of her gaze were Lucas and Elise.

Only after some time passed did people notice where her gaze was directed. Lucas, receiving the people’s gazes, barely escaped from the shock of facing an unbelievable reality.

Unlike Elise, whose mind had gone blank with fear, Lucas thought he had to somehow avoid this situation. But in this embarrassing moment, his head wasn’t working properly.

“A slave…”

At Lucas’s words, barely uttered, Casar, who had been quietly observing the whole scene, inwardly sighed.

‘That’s not good…’

Lucas, unaware of his brother’s feelings, continued to speak.

“How dare a mere slave raise her head high and add words!”

A slave?

Everyone looked at Lucas in bewilderment, but Lucas didn’t realize it.

In most countries on the continent, if not in Torkan, slaves have no right to speak. No matter what their previous status was, once the slave’s brand is imprinted on their body, they cannot escape from the status of a slave.

Lucas thought he had made a pretty good attack, but Roxiana tilted her head slightly to the side and then smiled brightly. Her smile was so radiant and lovely that Lucas got goosebumps.

“A slave, what do you mean?”

“Don’t you know that the slave’s brand is imprinted on your shoulder! No matter how much you were a princess in the past, you must be a slave now. This is not a place for you to intervene.”

Roxiana’s eyes narrowed as if amused.

It was then that Elise came to her senses.

This is not right. Something is wrong. Lucas made the wrong attack. This shouldn’t happen.

But how to recover words already spoken, words everyone has already heard?

Elise’s head wasn’t working properly either.

She could tell something was wrong, but she wasn’t clear-headed enough to form a strategy.

“The slave’s brand, why do you think I would have a slave’s brand? Did you perhaps imprint a slave’s brand on me when you killed my family and threw them into the well? Did you imprint a slave’s brand and sell me off somewhere?”

Only when Roxiana said this did Lucas realize his mistake. The reason why Roxiana, who had been a princess of a country, had a slave’s brand imprinted, and the reason he knew about it, meant that he was the one who had imprinted that brand.

Regardless of whether the harsh treatment inflicted on Roxiana was true or not, the content was so miserable that some of those present exhaled dejected sighs.

“Surely not. Surely… How could such a thing…”

“To kill the family and throw them into the well, and even imprint a slave’s brand… Who would do such a thing?”

“If it’s really true, that would be a deed deserving of death without even smelling Adelia’s fragrance.”

“Surely… It can’t be.”

As Lucas and Elise’s faces turned pale, Roxiana’s smile deepened. Towards Lucas, who was racking his brain on how to get out of this situation, Roxiana said.

“But Lucas. Fortunately.”

As Roxiana took off her black coat, a snow-white dress hidden underneath appeared. The dress, deeply cut around the neck with shoulders completely exposed, made her white skin glow even whiter.

“I don’t have a slave’s brand.”

Lucas and Elise frantically examined the area around her collarbone. The jet-black brand that should have been there was not visible. It didn’t seem to have been covered with makeup either.

“It must be truly fortunate for you. Although you killed my family and threw them into the well, you can escape from the abominable crime of imprinting a slave’s brand on my shoulder.”

Each word, each phrase was engraved in people’s ears.

“Although you killed even those young children and threw them all into the well, you’re safe from the crime of trying to sell me to the lustful king of the Hobon system by imprinting a brand on me!”

Roxiana didn’t have a slave’s brand, but people thought that incident must have really happened. As proof, Lucas was pale and couldn’t rebut a single word of Roxiana’s statement.

“You laughed while showing me my parents’ heads! You called all the family members who didn’t need to be killed to the palace and killed them all! But you didn’t imprint a slave’s brand on me!”

Roxiana smiled faintly.

“How fortunate is that? Right, Lucas?”