‘Eek… insane!’
Beatrice, who had been standing behind Crowell listening to Valoa’s sarcasm and provocation, caught her breath involuntarily.
‘I thought she wasn’t in her right mind since she tried to lay a hand on me at a ball where so many nobles were gathered, but…’
Is something wrong with her danger-sensing center?
‘I mean, is Archduke Alec’s influence really great enough to protect her from even this?’
The words Valoa spewed as they came to her mind weren’t things that could be dismissed as mere disrespect.
Because the person she had just made the protagonist of a scandal was the Crown Prince of the Empire!
Of course, Beatrice had no intention of ever, even if she died, having that kind of relationship with Crowell. Not a chance!
Even if such a thing were actually happening, the normal flow of a person’s thoughts would be to pretend they hadn’t seen it and pretend they hadn’t heard it.
‘Unless you don’t value your life!’
But Valoa Edvane Crawford manages to pull off that grand revelation.
The people gathered by the sudden commotion also began to murmur with shocked expressions.
“What did I just hear?”
“Don’t tell me these burn marks… that woman set a fire here?”
“And she seems to be claiming that the Crown Prince and Lady Hartwell are in an inappropriate relationship… My goodness.”
Perhaps pleased by the audience’s reaction, Valoa pulled up the corners of her mouth and began to gleefully frame the two.
“Even the old tree where the two were—isn’t it like a sanctuary for lovers? And today, of all days, it’s a masquerade ball, not just any ball. Ha, I know you love each other to death, but isn’t this being too obvious?”
“…”
Beatrice, who had briefly lost her words in the feast of madness, quickly regained her composure.
It was because she felt that if she didn’t do something now, things would flow exactly as Valoa Crawford intended.
Squeezing her thoroughly convoluted brain, Beatrice instantly brought both of her hands together at her chest, pretending to be fragile.
Then, she spoke calmly with a trembling, hurt voice.
“…You’re too much.”
Beatrice’s quiet voice contrasted with Valoa’s tone and instead drew people’s attention.
Beatrice looked at Valoa with a look of disbelief, then carefully wrapped her arm around Clyde’s.
“I don’t know who you are, but how could you pin such a filthy, false charge on me and His Highness? How could you have such a misunderstanding……”
“…You…”
“I can recite every single wedding vow I shared with my love, Clyde, right here on the spot.”
Actually, she couldn’t. How could she remember such things? She was just bluffing, thinking that momentum was everything.
Fearing that Valoa might actually tell her to recite the vows, Beatrice quickly let out a sigh and continued.
“And you described it as if something were going on between me and His Highness, but it’s nothing like that! His Highness was merely……”
“Merely doing me a favor as a close friend. Darling, you don’t have to worry about me misunderstanding you because of such a framing.”
As if trying to quickly keep pace with Beatrice’s improvisational acting, Clyde naturally took over her words.
Holding Beatrice’s hand tightly like a romantic male lead in a novel, he added an explanation in a sweet voice.
“I was the one who called our Darling here, after all. You were surprised to see His Highness here instead of me, weren’t you?”
“Oh, Honey, don’t tell me!”
“Yes, that’s right.”
Pulling his arm away from Beatrice, he knelt on one knee and took a box out of his pocket.
Inside the box was a necklace embedded with a light green gem that was the exact same color as Beatrice’s eyes.
“I wanted to convey my heart to you once more. My gratitude to you for being with me.”
“My goodness, Clyde!”
Beatrice covered her mouth with both hands like someone who was deeply moved.
At the same time she let out her exclamation, similar sounds erupted from the surroundings. Along with the eyewitness accounts they had seen and heard for themselves.
“Yes, that’s right! It was obvious from a while ago that Sir Dalton was preparing something at the old tree.”
“He was. I even saw them looking so full of love that I knew it was them even at a masquerade ball. A secret tryst all of a sudden? That’s a bit…”
When public opinion seemed to turn instantly, Valoa screamed irritably.
“I said I saw it! I saw them alone! I saw them sticking together with my own eyes! You’re trying to shield your wife with such a flimsy lie? Clyde Dalton, you’ve truly lost your mind, haven’t you?”
“I don’t know who the one who has lost their mind is. For starters, I can testify to Clyde’s words. I wondered why he suddenly told me to go to the old tree instead of the ballroom…”
Crowell, who cut off Valoa’s words at the perfect moment, handed a bouquet of flowers—from heaven knows where—to Clyde and shook his head.
“Honestly, you’re probably the only person who would use the Crown Prince of the Empire as a flower delivery boy.”
Beatrice was actually a little taken aback inwardly by the two men’s perfectly synchronized performance.
‘No, what, what is this. I never heard about there being a backup plan like this….’
Well, whatever. Thinking it was all for the best, Beatrice decided she should use this momentum to reveal Valoa’s true identity.
Beatrice, making a pouting face again as if she were moved, approached Valoa with an “Oh, that’s right” look.
“Come to think of it, I still didn’t know who the person was who insulted me and His Highness Crowell.”
“Don’t touch me. If you lay a single finger on my body, know that one finger at a time will disappear from your hand next!”
Ignoring Valoa’s ominous threat, Beatrice took off her mask—which was hardly a mask—in front of her.
There was an interesting rule at the masquerade ball. As a sort of device to filter out problematic people, if one revealed their identity, the other had to reveal theirs as well.
“In accordance with the rules, I reveal my identity. My name is Beatrice Hartwell. And who might you be, My Lady?”
“Shut up. I said shut up! You, you…!”
“Oh, come to think of it, you won’t be able to take off your mask by yourself since you’re being held by the guards. I’ll help you!”
Tap.
The mask, which brushed against Beatrice’s fingertips, dropped straight to the floor.
People reacted quickly to the fully revealed face of Lady Valoa Crawford.
“I suspected it, but to think it really is……”
“Wait, then what happens? Is the Archduke’s house going to be swept up in treason because of Lady Crawford?”
“I wondered why she hated Lady Hartwell so much… so this is why……”
At the voices of the people adding their two cents, Valoa’s face instantly flushed red.
It wasn’t because of shame, but because of surging rage.
Glaring at Beatrice with eyes that seemed to burn, she screamed as if she had completely lost her reason.
“You… Youuuuu!”
“Eek.”
“I’m going to kill you! How dare you, how dare you make me into such a spectacle? You? I won’t leave you alone. I won’t leave you alone!”
Screaming like a madwoman, Valoa lunged at Beatrice with all her might.
However, before she could even reach her, Clyde, who had smoothly wrapped his arm around Beatrice’s shoulder and pulled her back, struck Valoa on the back of the neck.
Thwack!
“Clyde Dal… ton, you too……”
Along with a short, precise thud, Valoa’s body collapsed powerlessly.
He looked down coldly at her slumped form for a brief moment. Then, Clyde pointedly pressed his hand to his forehead and called for Crowell.
“Your Highness, this is……”
“Yes. It looks like justifiable self-defense, committed inevitably to protect your wife. We shall leave the matter unquestioned. Does anyone have an objection?”
At the Crown Prince’s words, people lightly shook their heads. Because from their perspective as well, the one who wasn’t in their right mind was Valoa.
The scorched garden and the fallen scoundrel of high society, Valoa Edvane Crawford; and Clyde Dalton, the man she had clung to so much, and his wife. Even the Crown Prince who had been swept up in it.
The nobles present all knew without exception. What they had just seen was a “hot issue” that would set high society ablaze for the time being!
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