How to Hide the Emperor's Child - Chapter 13

There was still a light rain striking the window.

When will this rain be over?

When Astelle arrived at the emperor’s office, the knight who was guarding the door opened the door.

As soon as she entered inside, a screaming burst out.

“This is nonsense!”

Marianne, who was standing in the center of the office, shouted out loud as soon as she saw Astelle.

“She has ordered her own maid, and she is framed me! ”

Astelle, bending her knees in front of Kaizen and bowing politely to him.

Kaizen was sitting and Vellian was standing next to him.

Vellian was very excited to see as if this situation was interesting.

Kaizen looked at Lyndon.

Lyndon reported what he had found out to him.

“There was evidence that the maid who was caught as the culprit received money from Lady Marianne. She confessed that Lady Marianne’s maid also brought the money.”

At this point, Marianne couldn’t get past it.

Kaizen asked Marianne firmly, “Are you still going to deny it?”

“Well, I……that…… ugh……”

Marianne began to cry with a terrified expression.

Her delicate eyes moistened.

Marianne, with her tears up, was beautiful and lovely as a fairy.

But no one in this room expresses sympathy for her appearance.

When no one didn’t take care of her, the weeping Marianne glared at Astelle again, as if to kill her.

“She brought a suspicious vial and medicines in a box! Who carries so many medicines? How do you know what’s in it? It could be poison!”

When it became undeniable that she had searched Astelle’s box, Marianne seemed to have decided to turn the responsibility on Astelle.

However, when Kaizen heard it, he rebuked her, “So was it you who searched other people’s luggage? Since when did you become the safety officer of this castle?”

“Your Majesty, I was just worried……”

When that excuse didn’t work, Marianne blurred her words.

She shouted again, pointing at Astelle, with the tears hanging around her eyes.

“A woman who came to see Your Majesty has so many medicines. She is so suspicious in all respects! We have to interrogate her right away.”

Astelle never came to see the emperor.

It was only three or four days ago that she was forced with Theor to attend dinner with the emperor.

Marianne really didn’t know that, so she just said whatever was on her mind.

At Marianne’s words, other people’s eyes turned to Astelle.

As if asking her to explain why there she had so many medicines.

“Lady Marianne.”

Astelle looked at Marianne with cold eyes.

“Lady Marianne had younger sisters, right?”

“……huh?”

Marianne was bewildered at the unexpected question.

“What are you talking about suddenly?”

“Didn’t the nanny hired by the mansion always keep medicines in the drawer for Lady Marianne and your sisters? There must be some simple cold medicine, stomach-ache medicine, various ointments to apply depending on the type of wound, and stabilizers when the child is very surprised.”

Of course, the nanny taking care of the child works with the medicines ready.

Because children always get sick all the time.

Day and night always needed medicines.

Marianne couldn’t answer.

When she thought about it, it seemed that what Astelle said was true. The nanny always has a lot of medicine.

“Theor is only 5 years old now. He often catches a cold, so I need cold medicine, antipyretic, cough medicine, headache medicine, and stomach upset medicine. If the child gets hurt, I also need a kind of ointment to apply to the wound,” Astelle explained calmly.

“Theor had severe flu not long ago. The pharmacist said that his physical strength was weakened due to the aftereffect of the flu. The nutritional supplement alone is three bottles.”

Well, it wasn’t quite a lie.

Theor was very healthy, but he sometimes suffered colds.

In the first week Astelle ran away with her grandfather because of the rebellion in the south, Theor had a severe cold because he couldn’t adjust to an unfamiliar environment.

Astelle made nutritional supplements she had learned from Gretel and fed it to Theor.

It was because she was worried that Theor would get tired while moving from place to place.

‘Well, it doesn’t mean that there is no other medicine besides those ordinary medicines.’

In the medicine box Astelle carries, there weren’t just such ordinary medicines.

Even though they looked like ordinary medicines, there was a medicine that mixed with ingredients that changed the color of the eyes.

But Astelle’s claim that children need all sorts of medicines sounded plausible enough.

“I think my nanny did the same. Children are often sick.”

Vellian, who only listened quietly, sided with Astelle.

“By the way……”

Astelle, who stopped talking for a moment, made a cold expression.

Marianne was amazed momentarily by her cold light green eyes.

“Lady Marianne had already looked at my medicine box, so why did you keep asking me to check the medicine box again?”

Hearing those words, the inside of the office fell silent.

Marianne stuttered with a pale face, “What, what are you talking about?”

Astelle watched Marianne carefully.

There was no desire to become enemies of this Croychen young lady.

But now it was unavoidable.

She couldn’t let a person, who had put suspicions on her stay around her.

In the situation of hiding secrets that should never be caught, people who try to monitor people were the most dangerous.

“If you had opened the medicine box, you would have checked all my other luggage. You must have known enough that none of the items I brought were suspicious. Why did you keep the medicine box open? And why did you keep asking me to check the medicine box?”

“That, that’s……”

Marianne stuttered at Astelle’s question, and she bit her lip for an excuse.

Marianne proved that she had nothing suspicious of Astelle.

She didn’t seem to be able to think of it that far.

“Lady Marianne wasn’t trying to check my medicine box if there was anything suspicious in it, but weren’t you’re trying to mix the suspicious medicine into it?” Astelle asked calmly.

“That’s why you ordered the maid to carefully observe which medicines I use the most and the least.”

It was a common technique.

Putting poison or a fake secret letter in the least used item among the opponent’s items.

If you put it in an item you use often, the opponent will catch it quickly, so you use the belongings or drawers that the opponent barely touches.

You put a suspicious object that might be a problem in it and accuse the opponent, and it’s done.

Astelle was the empress who was abandoned by the emperor after a day.

It was difficult to avoid suspicion if poison comes out of the medicine box that she brought with the emperor.

Then, no one here would side with Astelle.

It seems that this lady didn’t know how common the trick was.

In the imperial palace, in order to prevent such tricks, when storing sensitive items such as medicine boxes, she attached her own marks to monitor who was secretly opening her stuff.

“I, no! It wasn’t like that!”

Marianne, who had been completely stabbed, stuttered and shouted in white face.

She shed tears and tried to cling to Kaizen.

“Your, Your Majesty……! Please trust me……”

Kaizen ignored Marianne and asked Vellian, who was next to him.

“Is there a prison on the west side of this castle?”

“Yeah, that’s right…… it’s an old prison.”

Since the castle itself was only managed by a few people unless the emperor came, the prison was hardly ever used.

It must be old and dirty because it’s been abandoned for so long.

But people can live there.

Kaizen ordered coldly, looking at Marianne, “Until the disposition is decided, Lady Marianne is imprisoned in the western prison.”

“Your Majesty!”

Marianne tried to beg, but Lyndon approached her.

“Lady, excuse me.”

Contrary to the polite apology, when he beckoned, the knights grabbed Marianne’s arms and pulled her out of the office.

As the door closed, Marianne still yelling and screaming, but her voice slowly faded away.

As the office became quiet, Kaizen spoke to Astelle, “I’m sorry for putting you through this.”

Kaizen was very guilty, but Astelle didn’t feel anything about this event.

She had a lot of these things in the past when she lived in the imperial palace.

There were countless nobles who were jealous of the Crown Princess.

The young ladies’ jealousy was nothing compared to the great nobles who seriously fought to take down Astelle into a trap and take over the place of the Crown Princess.

Overall, Marianne’s simple jealousy was rather cute.