The Cardinal de Mare’s voice was slowly getting louder. The direction of the anger was a bit strange, but anger was anger nonetheless.

He, who managed the Holy Basilica of Hercules and handled all matters without ever raising his voice, had been frequently raising his voice at home lately.

“The second one is a child who always stays at home reading books, what kind of incredibly bad thing could she do!”

“Dad! She said to me, ‘You’re an Xlike XX, I’ll marinate you!'”

“What?”

Cardinal de Mare doubted his own ears.

“Where did you learn such vulgar language!”

“It’s what Ariadne said! Not me!”

Cardinal de Mare held his temples with his hand.

“Isabella. Are you now going to slander your sister with lies?”

This time, Isabella was really wronged, but the many lies she had told so far were tripping her up.

Cardinal de Mare thought Isabella would have first asked Janobi to ‘scold Ariadne’.

This was a reasonable suspicion because Isabella had previously tried to slander Ariadne at the debutante ball.

Cardinal de Mare internally reached a conclusion and pronounced his judgment on Isabella.

“I’ve never interfered with your actions outside until now. Because I thought you were a child who could distinguish what was important and what was not. No matter how disgusting and hateful, your sister is a member of our family, a comrade who has to struggle together!”

Isabella, who read Cardinal de Mare’s nuance, turned pale. Cardinal de Mare continued to speak without hesitation.

“Do not slander your biological sister outside, even if it’s to distant relatives! Your father has been watching you all this while. I gave you chances not once or twice. But today! You really disappointed me.”

He looked at Isabella sternly and pronounced his sentence.

“You will be confined at home for a while and refrain from going out. You cannot go out until you have read ‘The Story of the City Ladies’ and written a book report for me.”

Considering that Arabella was often confined in her room eating only stale bread and water and suffering from forced fasting, it was a very generous punishment.

However, this was the first disciplinary action Isabella had ever received from Cardinal de Mare since her birth.

“Dad!”

Despite Cardinal de Mare’s overly generous punishment, Isabella began to shed tears of injustice. But Cardinal de Mare seemed to have no intention of reversing his decision.

Turning his head away from the crying Isabella, he looked at Janobi and opened his mouth solemnly.

“And you. From the beginning, I considered you human trash.”

Janobi was shocked to hear such frank words from Cardinal de Mare, who he had only known as a generous uncle.

This couldn’t happen. Knighting was Janobi’s future, but the uncle’s generosity was Janobi’s, and his family’s, only current source of income.

“I thought it was a stupid thing to see Lucrezia investing in you, but if that makes her feel at ease, I didn’t care. But you’re not only unprofitable, but harmful.”

Cardinal de Mare scanned the serf with a look as if he was observing a bug. The serf shivered under that ruthless gaze.

The despising look from a person of high status who he thought was ‘equal to himself’ or ‘excellent enough to associate with’, hurt as much as the whip he had just received.

“You shot an arrow at my daughter’s back? I don’t believe you were aiming for the horse. At least you must have thought it wouldn’t matter if it hit Ariadne.”

The serf trembled in fear. No, how did he know? Did he look into my mind?

“A lazy, untalented fellow like you wouldn’t have shot the arrow with the confidence of hitting the horse.”

It was the sharp insight of Ariadne’s biological father. Cardinal de Mare, who had been shaking his head, soon delivered his punishment in an eerie voice.

“Take that bastard and sever the tendons of his arms. That’s the price for shooting a crossbow at my daughter. Sever all the tendons in his arms, and cut the tendons in his ankles too. It’s the price for shooting a crossbow at my daughter and shamelessly crawling into my house. Tell him not to utter a word until he vomits out all the living expenses and compensation for the Rossi family’s dissatisfaction!”

When the tendons of his limbs were severed, the serf would become a body that could never hold a crossbow again. He couldn’t walk properly and couldn’t work.

The household men rushed towards the serf, who was pale with fear, for their steward Nicolo.

Even then, the serf, who was stiff, thinking he had received the king’s punishment and had managed to avoid the harsh storm, changed miserably.

“Uncle! Uncle! Please save me!”

“Who is your uncle! You’re utterly reckless!”

At Cardinal de Mare’s shout, steward Nicolo brutally hit the serf with a club on behalf of his master.

“Ugh!”

With the serf curling up like a shrimp behind him, Cardinal de Mare gave one more instruction.

“Hold on before you take him away! Let him listen to this too.”

“Yes! Your Excellency!”

He turned his body to Lucrezia for the last time. His voice was affectionately low.

“Honey. You should know how much I’ve been indulging you.”

Upon hearing that the serf would have his limb tendons severed, Lucrezia, who was just shedding tears, lifted her head towards Cardinal de Mare.

She seemed to have no energy to object. However, Cardinal de Mare seemed to show no signs of pity.

“I am a clergyman. I cannot have a family. I can’t give you a rightful place as a legitimate wife. You don’t know how hard I tried to be good to you because I felt sorry for that.”

He was more frightening because he spoke gently and softly.

“You don’t know how grateful I am that you’ve led and built our family, even though you’re not the official wife. I thought you prioritized our family. Until today.”

Cardinal de Mare’s deep green eyes coldly stared at Lucrezia.