Eluka looked around at the others, whose eyes were fiery with animosity, and let out a sigh. “So, now you see how it is.”
“All too clearly...” Allen heaved a deep sigh. He had to remind himself to keep breathing. And to restrain himself by focusing on planting his feet firmly on the ground—if he let himself go even a little, he would have stormed into the cottage. He scratched his head vigorously and glared at the mirror. “So the prince and the stepmother were linked... Things make sense now.”
The prince had persecuted Charlotte and smeared her name with false accusations. The stepmother had abused Charlotte over many years. Allen had assumed they were separate enemies, each acting on their own motives, but as it turned out, the whole scandal was a setup so they could be together, and the years of abuse were only the result of Cordelia’s jealousy.
Allen tried to calm his anger for a moment and pressed a hand to his forehead with a groan. “Actually, it’s a rather simple plot.”
“Oh yes, you’re exactly right!” Natalia raised her voice. Although the igloo was soundproofed by wind magic, her voice was so loud that it made the igloo shake, fissures running through the ice. Trembling, she spoke in a voice dripping with resentment. “Th-That horrible harpy! She abused my dear sister for a stupid reason like that?! I always thought it was because she didn’t like how her own daughter was the second one...!”
“That reminds me—she never showed much interest in you, did she?” Allen asked, staring thoughtfully at the woman in the mirror. Now that he was looking for it, he did see the resemblance between them, especially their willful, unyielding expression. But they looked more like sisters than mother and daughter. “How old is she anyway? She’s rather young to be Natalia’s mother.”
“She’s twenty-five now. The prince is twenty-two,” Eluka said.
“Ah, I get it. She must’ve gone along with the marriage that her parents arranged, but then she later met the ‘love of her life’—is that the story?”
“Bingo. Wow, bro, you’re starting to get how people’s feelings work,” she teased.
“Cut it out. That sort of thing happens all the time with noble families.”
Cordelia must have come from an impressive lineage to be chosen as the duke’s wife. She had accepted the arranged engagement and given birth to a baby according to others’ wishes, but she ended up falling for someone else. And the same went for Prince Cecil. They were still young and close to each other in age, so it was no wonder.
“If she was in love, she should’ve thrown away her status and honor and everything, and just gone off with him!” Natalia spat. “She only wanted to save herself—at my sister’s expense! That disgusting, dirty woman, I’m going to crush her for real! I’ll tear her into pieces along with the evil, rotten prince!!!”
“Um, Natalia... She’s still kind of your mother, so maybe you shouldn’t call her names like that...” Charlotte said timidly.
“My only family is you, my dear sister! So there!!!” Natalia shouted, red with trembling rage.
When Cordelia found her true love in Cecil, her own child—the daughter she’d had with a man she couldn’t care less about—must have turned into a mere nuisance. But for better or worse, she had treated Natalia with apathy, not aggression, because she already had Charlotte, her rival, as a target.
Sighing, Eluka shrugged. “When I went into hiding in Neils Kingdom to spy on them, I stumbled onto one of their secret meetings early on. I thought I better get some physical evidence, so I’ve been tracking them.”
“Well, they don’t look very cautious...” Allen said. “You got this cottage for them, didn’t you? That couldn’t have been easy—aren’t these places booked up years in advance?”
Eluka winked. “I got Papa to pull some strings for me, of course. What’s the use of having connections if you don’t use them, right?”
Meanwhile, Charlotte had been stroking Natalia’s head to calm her down a little. Now, Natalia tilted her head in confusion and said, “But I don’t get it... I would’ve thought they’d easily get caught in an affair like this. How did they keep their plot a secret all this time?”
“Simple,” Allen said, giving her shoulder a light pat. “If something stinks, you sweep it under the rug. For some, that’s one of the basics of getting along in life. If word got out that the prince and the wife of a duke conspired to stir up trouble in the kingdom, there’d be consequences for other authorities too. They’d rather sacrifice an innocent girl, if that means less trouble for them.”
“Ugh... Dirty grown-ups!” Natalia gnashed her teeth, her hatred flaring up even more.
“Mrr...I had no idea about them,” Lydie muttered. “Grown-ups are hard to figure out...”
“It’s not something children should understand...” Charlotte said with a sad smile, gently caressing Lydie’s head.
Despite her attempts to comfort Lydie and Natalia, Charlotte seemed to be reliving her painful past. Roo snuggled up to her and peered into her face anxiously. “Are you okay, Mommy? You look pale.”
“No wonder she is. To think that my Lady Charlotte was made to suffer for such a shameful, wicked plot... It makes my blood boil.” Gosetsu huffed through her nostrils as she sat by Charlotte’s side.
A heavy silence hung in the air. They were all deep in thought, their faces grim.
“So...what’s the duke doing right now, anyway?” Allen asked Eluka. “His clan is about to collapse.”
“Oh, for some reason, he’s roaming around all over the place. Looks like he’s spending tons of money collecting enchanted objects.”
“Hmm... It’s not an unusual hobby for the rich, but...” Allen had often heard of aristocrats with too much time and money on their hands getting hooked on collecting enchanted objects. Since there was a wide range of objects—from those that were useful in daily life to those with a broader mystical power—once one stepped in, such a hobby could be bottomless. But how can he be so uninterested in the crisis of his family...? That’s a weird story in itself.
In any case, it was pointless to wonder about the head of the house at present. Allen clapped his hands as if to dispel the tense, gloomy mood.
“All right, now we have all the info,” he said. He looked at Charlotte and asked gently, “What do you want to do? It’s your decision.”
“Y-Yes. The time has come, hasn’t it?” Charlotte let out a small breath, which seemed to reach the corners of the igloo. Everyone awaited her answer with bated breath. She glanced at the Mirror of Nostalgia, which still showed Cordelia and Cecil, then turned to Allen with a troubled smile. “Now I know how it feels to wish to be with the one you love—I can understand that feeling so much that it hurts. For that, at least...I can’t blame them.”
“Then...do you want to do the bare minimum to take revenge? Like prosecute them in court?” Allen asked. That was certainly one option. They could gather various pieces of evidence and charge them with crimes through official means. It would take time, but Charlotte would be able to clear her name. When he explained this to her, she knitted her brows in thought.
“That sounds like a good idea too...but can I ask you something?”
He crouched in front of Charlotte. “Of course. I’ll do my best to answer.”
With a determined nod, she asked a question he hadn’t even expected. “How do you have a fight with someone?”
“Huh...?” He blinked. The others looked at each other in silence.
“W-Well,” she added hastily, “when you’re in a situation like this, Allen, you can fight it out with your opponent yourself, and really let them have it.”
“Uh-huh, that’s right...” he replied, still confused.
“I’ve never done something like that before...so I think this is a good chance to try!” She clenched her fists and looked at him, unwavering. Determination colored her pure, shining eyes. “I want to settle things with my own hands. Like you do, Allen!”
“Charlotte...” Allen stared at her in admiration, forgetting how to speak. When they first met, she hadn’t even been able to voice her anger. Now, she had grown so much as an individual. It almost moved him to tears, but Natalia looked at him coldly.
“Dark Overlord...aren’t you too much of a bad influence on my sister?”
“Oh, I’d love it if you could teach me later too, Natalia. You’re good at fighting, aren’t you?” Charlotte said.
Natalia staggered back in shock. “Is that how you see me, dear sister...?!”
“I’d say it’s a reasonable view,” Allen said.
Charlotte giggled at that, then looked around at the group. “It’s thanks to Allen and you, everyone, that I can muster up my courage like this. I want to show those two how I’ve changed. So, um...” She turned back to Allen and smiled broadly. “Will you teach me? How you have a fight.”
“Hmph. That’s my area of expertise.” Allen smirked. He held out a hand to her and proclaimed, “That’s settled, then! Today’s naughty lesson is...how to have the fight of your life!”
“Yes please!” Charlotte took his hand with a big smile. And so, an allied army was formed between the Dark Overlord and the “wicked” noble lady.
But her face clouded over for a moment. “Oh, but I don’t want to do anything that would hurt them badly. I’d like to frighten them a little and hopefully make them regret what they did. Could you make it a fight like that?”
“Hm, in that case...Dorothea!”
“Who, me?” Dorothea said, wide-eyed. She had been sitting in the corner, scribbling down notes the whole time. She knew she was an outsider to their story, so she had stayed out of it completely. Now she was startled that Allen had turned to her.
“Lend us a hand!” Allen said, pointing straight at her. “If you help us...I’ll give you permission to write about us all you want!”
“Whoop whoop! You can count on me!”
Now that they’d easily recruited another member for their squad, they got to work whipping up an offensive strategy as fast as possible.