The Plan of the Terminally-Ill Wife's Divorce - Chapter 20

The cultured lady who had been cheering on Rose’s secret dream. But…

“I’m sorry, Miss Rose. Lady Egritte is busy right now checking documents to submit to the Madam.”

“Checking documents?”

“Yes, Lady Anette said she must personally review all the approval documents that the Lady has been handling until now.”

“Does that have to be done right now?”

Without Lady Egritte, who was Rose supposed to share her upset feelings with?

Rose’s lips pouted, unable to contain her anger.

“Miss, I’m afraid today… Please come another day.”

“Ah, if it isn’t Miss Rose who’s come.”

Lady Egritte, looking visibly tired, greeted Rose. Egritte had been unable to attend today’s event due to checking documents.

“It’s been a while. Come to think of it, this is the first time I’ve seen you since the order to copy the etiquette book. I feel terrible. As this child said, I’ve been busy with work.”

‘There was no need to bring up that story and hurt my feelings!’

Being punished by Anette, whom she had been ignoring, was a great blow to Rose’s pride.

Rose’s face turned bright red as she ignored Lady Egritte and disappeared.

“Miss Rose!”

“Leave her be. I don’t have the energy to worry about Rose right now.”

To treat me like this!

From the maids to even Lady Egritte. Rose’s face crumpled at this unfamiliar cold treatment.

‘What? Etiquette book? Who would…! If it weren’t for Father and Brother’s nagging!’

It absolutely wasn’t because she was afraid of that woman. It wasn’t that she had followed the order acknowledging that woman as Brother Darius’s rightful wife, but because her father and Brother Lucian had pestered her so much.

‘At first he said he didn’t like the Porche woman either, but after she repaired the training grounds once, he became completely smitten. That fool!’

Rose’s own brother, Lucian Temery, was also one of the people who liked Anette.

Rose clearly remembered how Lucian had first treated Anette.

The Temery family is the Grand Duke’s foremost shield, never objecting to what the Grand Duke does. They only support and carry out the master’s will.

If not for that principle, the proud Lucian would have been the first to object to Darius marrying someone from the Porche marquis family rather than royalty.

Until she heard the news that Lucian had clashed with Anette at the training grounds, Rose had been happily copying mountains of etiquette books.

‘Brother is showing the spirit of the Temery family. As expected, Brother is a model knight second only to Brother Darius!’

That proud model knight quickly crumbled at the two jars of gold coins Anette had discovered.

Whatever that woman did, Brother became completely smitten after meeting her just once.

Rose’s punishment was thus completed under strict supervision in an unexpected place.

So Rose, with a sour expression, came to visit the Grand Duchess’s room, carrying an armful of copied etiquette books. She planned to quickly put them down and disappear when Anette wasn’t there.

“Miss Rose. You can place what you’ve brought on the desk in Madam’s office. The Madam has been doing several things at once lately, so the desk is a bit messy.”

As the maid said, Anette’s desk was cluttered with various documents.

‘What kind of Grand Duchess has a desk like this? Really, there’s nothing about this woman that suits Brother Darius.’

Rose set down the seven volumes of etiquette books in an empty spot on one side of the desk.

Thud. With a heavy sound, the pile of documents teetered and collapsed.

“Really, is this a desk or a pigsty?”

Rose grumbled as she picked up the fallen books and papers.

‘Legends of the North and Their Interpretations’, ‘Fairy Tales’, ‘Geography of Forests and Rivers’…

“What is all this?”

As Rose looked into it with interest, most of the materials were about Northern legends and maps.

The ancestor’s treasure vault hidden in the forest. Said to appear in times of crisis for the Grand Duke’s family.

There was also a note that seemed to be written by Anette herself.

It doesn’t seem to be a lake. The place where the wind begins likely refers to a cliff. Candidates are two or three places in the Fairy Forest with oak trees.

“What, is she seriously believing in legends and searching for them now, when she’s not even a child?”

The legend-related materials Anette had gathered were well-known to Rose. Anyone who grew up in the North would have heard these stories as a child.

Long ago, the founder of the Inkhart family gathered the family fortune and created a treasure vault in preparation for a crisis in the world.

That treasure vault cannot be seen or touched by human eyes, and only those with a connection can open the vault.

A treasure sleeping until the day the world faces a crisis.

Children in the North used to play treasure hunting games in the forest, fantasizing about this treasure.

While it was an exciting story about hidden treasure to listen to as a child, now she knew it was a preposterous tale.

‘If such a thing existed, would the Grand Duke’s family be this poor now….’

Rose sneered at Anette as she tried to tidy up the desk.

‘But she’s the woman who found hidden treasures in this castle that we didn’t even know existed.’

Can it really be called a preposterous thing?

What if that woman accomplishes this preposterous feat again?

I can’t let that happen. While inwardly thinking she didn’t believe in such legends, Rose found herself unconsciously examining the materials Anette had organized in detail.

‘These are all places I visited as a child… Especially this place.’

Soon Rose covered her own mouth.

“I-if the map is correct…!”

She may have made an incredible discovery.

* * *

When the ceremony was all over, it was already late afternoon. The sunset was already turning orange.

“I’m so proud of you, Madam. The way the knights knelt before you one by one with such discipline!”

Honest Apple, unable to hide her emotions, showered me with praise, her face turning red.

‘The grand ceremony was impressive, but I have other things to do.’

“More importantly, Apple, you grew up in the North too, right? Do you know anything about the legendary treasure of the Inkhart family?”

“You mean the story about how long ago, an ancestor of the Inkhart Grand Duke’s family received a prophecy that his descendant would fight the Demon King, and believing in that prophecy, he sealed precious treasures somewhere in the North? Madam, really! Everyone in the North knows this story. But everyone knows the same thing. If others don’t know, I don’t know either.”

Apple laughed brightly. She didn’t seem to believe this story could be true at all.

“If you remember even a little more, tell me. It might be a hint, you know.”

“Yes, yes. Madam, who discovered the treasure sleeping in the castle.”

My discovery of the gold jars was a product of chance.

The legend of the treasure prepared by the ancestor Inkhart Grand Duke for his descendants.

When the original female lead first arrived in the North, she was at a loss for what to do about the sudden disaster that had befallen the North.

After searching desperately for a source of money, she finally looked for the legendary Inkhart Grand Duke’s treasure vault, and it really existed.

‘Originally, it’s a treasure that the female lead should find, but seeing the current situation in the North, I believe she would understand.’

We need to establish a foundation to fight the Demon King when we have nothing, right?

‘Female lead, I’ll prepare well for the money I’m using in advance! When you come later, the North will be a much more comfortable place to live!’

The problem is that while the treasure was easily discovered in the original story, it’s difficult for me to find it.

These days, I’ve been asking everyone I meet about the legend to find that legendary treasure.

‘I have a rough idea since I saw it being discovered in the original story. But I’m missing that decisive final piece.’

At that moment, Apple poked me in the back.

“Madam.”

When I turned around, Darius was waiting for me.