Tatlin glanced at Masa, who paid no attention to subtlety, and warned her with a look before turning his gaze back to me.

“If anyone should be rude to Miss, please tell me. I will deal with them immediately.”

At those words, all the servants except Masa made a ‘eek!’ sound, startled.

Turning toward the direction of the sound, the servants who caught my eye pulled up the corners of their mouths and smiled.

But their eyes were not smiling.

‘This is it. The capitalist smile.’

I felt a sudden sympathy as it was a smile I wore often. In pity, I encouraged them.

“Um, just do your assigned work well.”

“Yes, Miss!”

I didn’t particularly feel sorry about the previous servants who were dismissed, as they all seemed displeased with me.

I left them alone because, given my status, I couldn’t do anything about them.

I wasn’t their direct employer since I was merely living in the annex, not employing them myself.

All I could do was rant about their backtalk and rude behavior, ensuring they couldn’t behave like that in my presence.

The best method was to scare the servants with my actions so they wouldn’t be noticeable.

I was satisfied enough with them being out of sight.

Anyway, it was refreshing since the previous servants didn’t suit me, but I couldn’t understand it at all.

‘Why is she acting like this suddenly?’

I couldn’t figure out what the Duchess was thinking.

To cut the staff who had been in service for a long time just based on the words of my personal maid.

I never thought the Duchess would go this far.

‘I’ll have to leave this house before long anyway.’

So she didn’t need to worry about me. On the contrary, I was worried about how she would change her mind when my birth secret was revealed.

“Most importantly, she has commanded to take good care of Miss.”

Tatlin stared at me with fierce eyes.

In those determined eyes, I guessed the Duchess’s intent.

‘She must be monitoring me in case I poison myself.’

The Duchess was not pleased with the idea of poisoning myself to make the antidote.

Although she had no reason to be. Whether I drank the poison or not, it shouldn’t have mattered to her.

But if she prevents me from drinking the poison…

‘Does she worry about me? Me, who isn’t even her real daughter?’

It was an unprecedented contradiction that Temis Ferdia, of all people, worried about me.

We met and talked more frequently lately, but that was purely for business.

A mild friendship with a kind of partner, perhaps.

A business partner, not someone who would ever think of me as family.

‘So she must have looked at me with such cold eyes when I was a crying baby.’

People usually wouldn’t look so coldly at a crying stranger’s baby.

It made no sense that such a person would suddenly worry about me.

Unless it’s for poisoning surveillance, she may have planted her people because she doesn’t completely trust my claim of independence, fearing I might cause trouble before then.

If so, according to the Duchess’s wishes…

‘I must become independent as soon as possible…!’

Come on.

I secretly clenched my fist.

(This is a time marker.)

The day of the meeting at the Ishtar Temple had dawned.

Although it had nothing to do with me, I couldn’t ignore it. The Ferdia mansion was noisy since early morning.

The buzz reached even the annex, which was slightly away from the main mansion.

No wonder, as the invitation to the Ishtar Temple was not a day trip. They had to stay at the temple for at least one or two nights, so there was a lot to prepare.

I didn’t exactly know what they were doing in the temple.

‘I should have gone to find out.’

Sitting on the window bench, watching the busy servants outside, I was pretending to sleep as I turned back to the bed when I heard a knock.

Whoever it was, I didn’t want to deal with them.

Knock, knock.

After the sound of knocking again, the door gently opened.
Regular footsteps approached and stopped beside the bed.

One could tell who it was just by the somewhat obsessive footsteps. Yansida.

I pretended to be sleeping desperately. I didn’t want to exhaust myself talking to the inexplicable Yansida since morning.

In the silent stillness, Yansida’s voice was heard.

“……Liri. Are you asleep?”

“……. ”

“She must be asleep.”

“……. ”

“Sleep well.”

With those words, the sound of the door closing was heard. Only when I was sure that Yansida had completely left did I open my eyes and pull back the blanket.

“……Why is he like that?”

I thought he was my exboyfriend.

Yansida Ferdia’s antics continue today.

I was just stretching by the window, thinking about getting ready for today’s appointment with Reyan, when it happened.

“Sister!!”

Carlott, perched on a tree, called me with a bright smile. He seemed to wag an invisible tail, looking quite pleased.

‘Ugh, annoying.’

I barely got rid of Yansida, who was pretending to sleep like an exboyfriend, but now it’s Carlott.

“Carl. Don’t you need to get ready to go out?”

“It’s just that I can go, but there’s a bigger problem.”