‘What is the Duke doing over there?’

The person standing in the hallway was the Duke.

He entered the room without turning his head towards me.

‘That must be the room where the Duke stays.’

Since the first day I arrived at the ducal residence, I had never encountered the Duke.

The Duke didn’t come to see me first, and I didn’t go to see the Duke first either.

Moreover, the mansion was so large that even if I wandered around, I rarely encountered him.

‘I need to pass by….’

The place I was heading to was the back staircase leading to the end of the second floor.

Each floor had a back staircase that servants could use, and there were many things to pick up there, especially since many servants passed by.

‘Should I just take another path?’

I pondered for a moment. Then I quickly changed my mind.

‘I can’t avoid seeing him forever anyway.’

As long as I had to stay here for another 4 years, I couldn’t keep avoiding the Duke.

It was also good to be in the Duke’s good graces for the sake of my goal of independence in 4 years.

‘Since he’s the owner of this house.’

If I make a good impression, it might be easier to collect emergency funds.

I made up my mind and started moving one step at a time. I thought about what I would do after encountering the Duke.

When I accidentally meet the Duke while passing the hallway, I will politely greet him and pass by!

‘If I act courteously, the Duke might look favorably upon me.’

Maybe even if I were to be bullied by the young masters later, he might protect me a little.

I stopped in front of the door to the room the Duke had entered. Since the door was wide open, I could immediately look inside the room.

And I encountered a scene I never could have imagined. My whole body stiffened.

The first thing that caught my eye was a broken teacup scattered on the floor. The expensive rug laid right in front of the door was dyed red.

On the rug, a person was lying face down, not showing any movement.

The Duke was standing in the middle of the room, casually dusting off his sleeve.

I unconsciously tried to scream, and at the same time, the Duke turned his head.

‘Gasp.’

I quickly hid my body to the side. Silence flowed around me.

My mind was a mess. Still, only one thought came to mind.

‘I must not get caught.’

No one should find out that I saw the scene just now. I tried my best to suppress my breathing.

‘Let’s go to the room.’

I went straight up to the room.

* * *

Light footsteps could be heard coming from the hallway. Just as suspicion arose as to who it was, Philen appeared in front of the door.

“Your Grace! Oh my, what happened here!”

Although the footsteps were a bit light to be those of a grown adult, Cailius didn’t dwell on it deeply.

After all, there weren’t many people who would aimlessly wander the second floor hallway at this hour.

Seeing the situation inside the room, Philen hastily brought a few servants and instructed them to clean up the room.

The servants Philen brought were also relatively accustomed to this kind of situation.

Having worked in the ducal residence all their lives, they clicked their tongues familiarly but silently cleaned up the room.

“Are you alright?”

Cailius indifferently nodded his head towards the corpse.

“Check it out.”

Philen briefly examined the tea in the pot. He took out a pen he was carrying and dipped it in the tea.

The pen was coated with sheepskin. The dye on the sheepskin stained by the tea quickly turned white.

“Hydra?”

Hydra was a colorless poison with a sweet scent. So when using hydra, it was usually mixed with strongly scented tea.

Since it was a poison discovered only recently, even they would not have obtained the information if not for Grand Duke Consta.

Hydra was a poison that did not discolor even silver tableware. The only thing that could identify hydra mixed in a strongly scented tea was dyed animal skin.

If dyed skin was dipped in a liquid containing hydra, the color would fade and the skin would turn white.

Having heard such information from Grand Duke Consta, Philen immediately had all the carpets in the house replaced with sheepskin for that reason.

A very small part of the carpet laid on the floor appeared to have turned white.

Perhaps it was because Cailius had spilled the tea to check if there was poison.

“It seems so.”

“What happened to this person?”

“Check inside his mouth, there should be poison.”

Upon checking inside the mouth, a burst pill was found. It seemed he had chosen to take his own life so as not to be caught when his identity was discovered.

After examining the state of the corpse, Philen soon got up from his spot.

Although a more thorough investigation was needed, there was only one place in the entire empire where people would risk their lives for a request like this.

“If he received this level of training, it must be that place.”

“They must have put in a request.”

Unlike Cailius who seemed indifferent, Philen gritted his teeth.

It wasn’t difficult to deduce which affiliation the assassin belonged to.

That’s why it was even more problematic.

If it was that affiliation, there was a limit to catching the culprit even with his own information network.

“For now, I will infiltrate people into the suspected families.”

In the meantime, the corpse of the dead servant was moved outside. Cailius’s gaze turned to the red stain deeply dyeing the rug, then returned to the front.

“No, just leave it for now.”

Philen was startled by those words.

“Leave it? Since they tried once, they will keep trying unless the request is canceled.”

“We need to observe the situation for now, and we won’t get any more information from the perpetrator anyway.”

Philen, who was about to object, closed his mouth. As he said, searching the assassin’s body would yield no information.

As the Duke said, it might be better to observe the situation a bit more before making a move.

“Aren’t you curious to see how far they will struggle?”

At those words, Philen felt a chill down his spine for a moment.

For some reason, the life of the other party seemed more precarious than Cailius who almost got poisoned today.

As a minimal human courtesy, Philen quietly thought to himself.

‘If you want to die peacefully, it would be best to stop here.’

In fact, this wasn’t the first or second time he had experienced something like this.

Philen also agreed with Cailius’s judgment that it was better to leave it as is rather than expose this incident right away.

After all, from Cailius’s perspective, the current threat was no more than a worm wriggling.

Still, Philen, who had a duty to safely attend to Cailius, thought that Cailius needed to be a little more careful.

“But I must say. You are not alone anymore, Your Grace. If something were to happen to you, the young masters could be in danger.”

Despite his well-thought-out words, a light smile hung on Cailius’s lips.

“Those kids?”

“Yes. Of course, that’s…”

Philen suddenly stopped speaking. Come to think of it, even if Cailius was in danger, the young masters were not the type to be easily scared and succumb.

‘They would rather cause a riot.’

Rather, the other party should hope that Cailius wouldn’t be easily defeated. So as not to offend those young masters.

Philen cleared his throat and continued.

“Anyway, the young masters are also at an age where they need to grow. Now is the time for them to grow up preciously under the protection of their caregiver.”

“Yes, I’ll have to make sure the kids don’t cause any accidents.”

“Yes, yes. Anything.”

Although he gave a warning, Philen knew well that Cailius was not someone who would be easily defeated.

Philen sighed and tidied up the surroundings. Then, he suddenly thought of the child who had recently entered the mansion.

“Come to think of it, the little one could really be in danger, couldn’t she?”

Philen muttered to himself. At that moment, Cailius’s eyebrows twitched.

“The rumors haven’t spread outside yet, but I told the servants, so the rumors will spread in an instant. What if they find out about the little one’s existence?”

“Well, I don’t think they’ll pay that much attention to that child.”

“Why do you think so?”

“Because I don’t intend to pay much attention to her either.”

Cailius coldly continued.

“Keeping that child is only temporary. I’ll send her to the Rosen monastery soon.”

“Ah, so you weren’t planning on keeping her?”

Cailius’s indifferent gaze turned to Philen. It was an expression asking about something obvious. Philen asked in a reluctant tone.

“But doesn’t the little one need to stay at the mansion to help Young Master Clemens? You brought her for the issue of the young master’s succession.”

At Philen’s words, Cailius simply nodded.

“I’m going to show her face to the vassals and send her away. The kids are coming home soon anyway. I need to send her out before then.”

“Indeed, the vassals won’t sit still once they hear the news either.”

“Yes, so it’s better to show her first. It’ll be a headache if they get suspicious.”

Philen recalled the little one again, whose skin had turned fair and whose flesh had plumped up from Sophia’s devoted care these past few days.

The black hair, which had been a mess on the first day, as if it were a broomstick, had also turned into soft and shiny black hair from daily applications of oil.

If such a child were brought in front of the vassals, none of them would easily doubt the blood relationship between the two.

Then suddenly, Philen’s gaze turned to Cailius’s black hair.

‘…Is it really not?’

The lightly risen question quickly dissipated. Because Cailius immediately followed up with a warning.

“Until then, we need to keep her from doing anything rash.”

* * *

‘Someone died.’

Only after entering the room did I slowly exhale my rough breath. The earlier scene kept coming to mind blankly.

Someone died. The Duke killed someone.

‘Why?’

I asked myself, but in fact, there wasn’t much to think deeply about. He was Duke Crustel. He felt no guilt in killing people.

Even in the original work, how many lives of those who were loyal to him did he take in vain, saying that useless pieces were unnecessary?

‘It must be the same this time too.’

Come to think of it, the Duke’s reason for taking in three adoptive sons was the same. Because their abilities were useful.

The eldest, Clemens, knew how to interpret ancient languages, and the twins, Michael and Daiban, had outstanding talent in using mana. And I realized the terrible reality.

‘I have nothing.’

Unlike the young masters, I had no talent.

The Duke brought me because he needed me for now, but like them, I would be discarded if I became useless.

The young masters had their talents, so he couldn’t easily discard them, but I was just a child who wouldn’t be missed even if discarded.

Suddenly, a terrible imagination came to mind. The imagination of my figure overlapping with the servant lying on the floor just now.

I had no choice but to completely revise the plans I had made so far.

‘Let’s get out.’

I don’t think I can last 4 years here.