Lucrezia turned ashen and shot up to look at Ariadne.
“What a horrifying nonsense!”
“I’ve been doing some investigating. You came to the Cardinal de Mare while you were quite pregnant, didn’t you?”
After hearing Maletta’s story, Ariadne had questioned the old servants who came up from Taranto.
She couldn’t hear the inside story, but she could hear some of the situation when Madam Lucrezia first moved in with Cardinal de Mare.
“Hippolytus was premature? The first child of a young woman being premature?”
Ariadne laughed out loud.
“Is the probability higher that a child born after seven months to a firsttime mother would be as healthy as Hippolytus, or that a mother of ten lied about being two months pregnant?”
“No!”
Lucrezia screamed with all her might.
“What you’re saying is all guesswork. ‘It must have been like this.’ Where is the evidence! There is no evidence!”
“Maletta was the evidence! But you killed her and got rid of it!”
“She just picked up some rumors too! How could that be evidence!”
Ignoring Lucrezia’s piercing scream, Ariadne walked over to her and grabbed her shoulders.
“Give up on your pointless resistance. Your son abandoned you. Are you going to die alone? Shouldn’t we go to hell together?”
Ariadne shook Lucrezia’s shoulders violently.
“Why! Why did you treat Arabella like that! When did I ever ask for you to be good to me?! Why were you such a terrible parent even to your own child!”
“…She, ruined my life.”
“What did you say?”
“I could have left San Carlo. I could have left with Epolito as my father. It was all ruined because of Arabella…. If it weren’t for that wench!”
Thwack!
Ariadne slapped Lucrezia across the face.
“You call yourself a mother?”
“You don’t know anything, you brat!”
Lucrezia fell to the ground, tears streaming down her face, cursing.
“When a woman gives birth, she thinks, ‘Oh, I’m a mother now. My life as a woman is over.’ Do you think you can give up that easily?!”
Lucrezia wailed, lying on the stone floor.
“I just made the choices that seemed necessary in the life given to me. But that tightened the noose around my neck!”
Lucrezia was a mess of tears, her words slurred and barely understandable. Now, she was swallowing her words in between her sobbing.
“I had to live with Simon because I had to feed Epolito and my relatives. I had another child because I lived with Simon. But because of that, I couldn’t leave with my love! Why! Why did I do wrong?!”
Ariadne looked down at Lucrezia with cold eyes.
“Usually, people live without committing sins. Who asked you to lay eggs in another bird’s nest like a cuckoo? If you had raised Epolito by yourself, you could have proudly followed Epolito’s father!”
Lucrezia looked up at Ariadne, her face wet with tears.
“You think you’re better than me! Do you think life goes as planned?!”
“If you hadn’t killed someone else’s precious daughter to protect your son, you wouldn’t have been poisoned in this underground prison today!”
“Someone else’s precious daughter? What’s the big deal about killing a common servant, a commoner, for my precious son? It’s just bad luck that a couple of commoners can’t make a difference!”
“That’s why your life ends like this because you live like this!”
Lucrezia gritted her teeth.
“I hope you have a daughter like you and hear the same words!”
She yelled at Ariadne.
“Do you think life goes as planned because you’re young? You have to do dirty things as you live, and life just goes on!”
The age difference between Lucrezia and Ariadne when she died was only about ten years.
“I’ve seen and experienced more than you think, Lucrezia.”
Ariadne looked at her stepmother with disgust.
“I’ve done a lot of dirty things. I admit. I’ve made many mistakes. I admit. But I didn’t live recklessly like you.”
Lucrezia looked at Ariadne approaching with fearful eyes. Ariadne whispered softly.
“Your son abandoned you. Ingratefully. Looking for his own way. Even though you risked your life for him. Take revenge while dying.”
Ariadne asked Lucrezia.
“Who is Epolito’s father?”
Lucrezia slowly opened her mouth, then closed her lips.
The Male lead Always Seduces Her with His Beauty (Matriarchy)
Xin Jiao Zhou is the leader of the world’s premier sect. She has just experienced betrayal from all sides, was poisoned in an assassination attempt, and faced death squad attacks while the poison was taking effect. After finally clearing out the scum from her sect, she was drugged again while trying to detoxify.
After waking up from a night of unconsciousness, she gained a “beautiful and kind-hearted” husband.
Xin Jiao Zhou: “???”
He fell ill.
She came to see him, bringing breakfast.
As she put down the breakfast and was about to leave, his hand slipped while holding the spoon. “Clank!”
She turned around upon hearing the noise.
He looked up at her, his eyebrows drooping: “My hand… has no strength.”
“Shall I… feed you?” she asked tentatively.
He opened his mouth cheerfully: “Ah—”
Thinking she was drowning, he jumped in without hesitation to save her, but nearly drowned himself. In the end, it was she who swam over to rescue him, giving him air underwater.
After emerging from the water, his ear tips turned red. He lightly brushed his cheek, tucking his sideburns behind his ear, revealing delicate, pink-tinged ear tips. He lowered his gaze, too embarrassed to look at her.
Xin Jiao Zhou: He’s truly beautiful, kind-hearted, and adorable.
A certain someone when disciplining subordinates behind the scenes: “If they don’t obey, just kill them.”
What’s that? She might already have someone she cares about in her heart? A certain someone: Find out who it is, kill them, and then there won’t be anyone.
What? She met a man by the riverside? What? That man even hurt her? A certain someone: Whichever hand hurt her, chop off his entire arm.
Love at first sight without realizing it, gradually falling in love, slowly getting closer…
Family and national grudges, schemes and desires, good and evil, crime and punishment, she and he face the future together, seeking justice with passion!
A naturally dark female lead who could accidentally destroy the world but is actually an honest person VS a weak, pitiful, and helpless but skilled fighter, beautiful white-cut black male lead
My heart is not of stone, how steadfast is your love? — Tao Yuanming “Imitating the Ancients (No. 3)”
— Reading Guide —
Cold female lead & dramatic black lotus with hidden yandere traits male lead