Chapter 100
Chapter 100
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Translator: penny
Chapter: 100
Chapter Title: No More Excuses
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*
“It seems like I was the one who was hit. Or is my memory wrong?”
Juliet, who had spotted him, blinked quietly without any surprise.
Lennox coldly scanned the group of people surrounding her.
Sly wolves. Humans not worth remembering by name or face.
But the moment these subhuman creatures, by his standards, encircled one woman and spewed all sorts of insults, it didn’t matter if they were human or beast.
A scoff escaped him.
It infuriated him to see them daring to speak of the woman he couldn’t even grip tightly for fear she might vanish from sight or turn away again, as if she were theirs to toy with.
“Since when did you start yapping about my family’s affairs as you pleased?”
The ones who had been like a pack of wolves, itching to tear into a single woman just moments ago, paled and bowed their heads before him.
“I-It’s a misunderstanding, Duke…!”
“We absolutely didn’t mean it that way…”
“Do you think you filthy three-inch tongues can compensate for my family’s honor?”
Talking was not his way.
“I’ll teach you the one way that worthless body of yours can atone.”
Clang!
Lennox snatched the sword from a standing guard and threw it to the floor.
“Draw.”
Eek.
The people, who had been dumbfoundedly staring at the scene for a moment, all turned white as a sheet.
But everyone present understood. There was only one way to restore sullied honor.
A duel staking one’s life. And this was him kindly offering to kill them legally.
Under imperial law, deaths from duels or territorial wars were not crimes.
The man standing before them was one who had earned infamy as a swordmaster before even turning twenty.
Desperate screams began erupting here and there.
“D-Du…!”
“What are you waiting for? Pick up the sword.”
His leisurely urging voice was low and even, just as always.
But the trembling ones couldn’t even find a place to flee, like livestock herded into a slaughterhouse.
Because he had entered the banquet hall last.
The duke stood with his back to the door.
“We’ve committed a mortal sin!”
In the end, the quickest to read the room knelt first, one after another, bowing their heads.
Sobs echoed from various spots. Yet Lennox Carlyle’s icy expression showed no change.
“That thing on your shoulders doesn’t seem capable of thought.”
“P-Pardon?”
“You don’t even know who to beg forgiveness from. Better to rip it off then.”
Shing.
The duke’s pitch-black blade reflected a cold gleam, as if ready to swing at any moment.
“W-What do you…”
The frozen people finally grasped his meaning moments later.
“Lady Monad!”
“Count!”
“We’ll do anything if you just spare our lives!”
The nobles scrambled on their knees, changing direction and bowing before Juliet.
It was quite a ridiculous sight, but no hint of amusement crossed Juliet’s face as she looked down at them.
They pleaded with tearful eyes, but no response came from Juliet’s lips. The sword-wielding man glanced at the crowd.
“You said you’d beg forgiveness, but it’s all talk?”
At his words, they startled, and the sobs rose a tone higher.
“N-No! Lady Monad, we’ll never presumptuously utter your name again!”
“Y-Yes! Forgive us just this once, and we absolutely won’t…!”
“Please, just let us live…”
“Enough. Stop it.”
The comedic spectacle ended only when Juliet spoke firmly.
The Duke of Carlyle still looked displeased, but Juliet wrapped up the situation with one word.
“Get out. Now.”
“Thank you. Thank you…”
“L-Lady Monad. No, Your Grace the Count. How can we ever repay this grace…”
“If you visit our territory next time…”
“Shut your mouths and get out. Now.”
As if scripted in advance, the guilty ones had no desire to linger in the banquet hall a moment longer.
Bang.
They fled in a herd, and after the door closed, only a handful remained in the empty hall.
Excluding the palace guards and a few attendants who had prepared the banquet, it was just the two of them.
The man sheathed his sword and slowly crossed the floor.
Approaching the woman rooted to the spot, Lennox could guess what she would say.
‘I’m fine.’
“You didn’t have to help. It would’ve been okay.”
Juliet said it without smiling. So softly and calmly that only he could hear. And Lennox recalled that this quiet voice usually made him angry.
“Were you just going to stand there and listen to that nonsense?”
This time was no exception.
“What a saint you are.”
He hadn’t meant to mock her from the start.
But fury surged the moment he saw her pale face.
How long had she been sitting there, enduring that drivel in his absence?
Precisely, he was angry at himself.
But before he could realize it, the sarcasm slipped out.
“What the hell were you thinking, putting up with that crap?”
“What else could I do?”
“What?”
“Your Highness.”
Juliet let out a small sigh and pushed his arm away. She looked up at him with eyes holding nothing.
“Why pretend to care now?”
Pretend to care?
But Juliet seemed genuinely curious.
“You never cared before anyway.”
“Juliet.”
“Whether people call me whatever, or what rumors I hear wherever I go. Or who I lock eyes with.”
Juliet took half a step closer to him.
“You never cared.”
“How could I not—”
He wanted to demand how he couldn’t care, especially hearing it right in front of him.
“You don’t need to pretend to care now.”
Juliet spoke softly, naturally passing the wine glass in her hand to his.
“Just like you always have.”
Then she reached out affectionately to straighten his collar.
Lennox could see her lowered lashes. But contrary to the intimate gesture, her following words were brutally cruel.
“Your Highness.”
Juliet looked up at him after adjusting his collar. So close it seemed he could kiss her any moment.
“You knew, didn’t you?”
But Juliet smirked.
It was a smile that felt strangely unfamiliar.
Lennox, unable to tear his gaze from her face as if entranced, suddenly realized that unfamiliar expression was mockery.
Yet he couldn’t quite comprehend it. Because Juliet had never shown it to him before.
“The real problem isn’t those people.”
Juliet glanced briefly at the door where they had vanished, then smiled again and gripped his arm.
Then, with those perfectly red lips, she whispered affectionately to him.
“For the past seven years, it was you who stood by and let them talk about me as they pleased.”
Lennox quietly clenched his teeth.
Crack.
The glass shattered helplessly in his grip. Red liquid—blood or wine, he couldn’t tell—dripped to the floor. Juliet gazed silently at his ruined hand, then spoke quietly.
“So don’t ever do this again.”
* * *
The House of Carlyle often circulated in unfavorable gossip.
Its history was dark and extreme enough to fill dozens of books and thrill gossips.
But Lennox Carlyle was innately indifferent and didn’t care about public opinion.
He was that way, so he naturally assumed Juliet was too.
Carlisle Castle had been without a lady of the house for twenty years.
‘When did that start again?’
The aides, who had unanimously begged him to marry, fell silent years after Juliet Monad began staying at the ducal castle.
“Your Highness, even just once, wouldn’t it be good to attend this gathering with the lady?”
Only when his loyal aide confessed that did he learn. The duke’s retainers had long since gradually shifted the lady’s duties to Juliet naturally.
It started with simple ledger checks, the kind a lord would verify.
Handling urgent matters in his absence, it gradually extended to events the lady of the North naturally had to attend and host.
“It was our request. The lady simply accepted.”
Anticipating his anger, the aide preemptively defended Juliet. Saying it was just acquiescing to their overstep, not intentional.
It wasn’t. Unable to refuse their pleas, Lennox listened calmly.
“And so…”
Watching him warily, the aide brought up the matter.
It concerned Juliet always attending banquets alone without a partner, stirring unpleasant rumors.
“So, just for today, couldn’t you attend together?”
That was the aide’s argument.
They saw Juliet as laughable because she seemed precariously positioned, liable to be chased out anytime. But was that true?
Around then, he was the one growing impatient over the woman who rarely smiled brightly no matter what he did.
Anxious at her lukewarm responses, yet replacing her with someone else was unthinkable.
Juliet had never once mentioned it.
Crash!
Yet when Lennox arrived late at the banquet hall, what he saw was Juliet smashing a teacup blatantly and storming out.
“Are you angry?”
Even as their eyes met outside, he didn’t immediately grasp her words.
“For acting like the lady of the house on my own?”
Her expression was so composed it was hard to believe she’d just overturned a teapot.
The question was misguided.
His face hardened coldly, but not because of Juliet’s fault.
He was angry because he’d first witnessed with his own eyes that she didn’t tell him about troublesome matters.
Before he could ask what happened, Juliet let out a small sigh.
“If you’re not angry, then I’ll be going.”
Far from crying and tattling, Juliet never once mentioned the rumors surrounding her afterward.
He wasn’t sure if he could ask, and she didn’t say.
So he handled it in his familiar way.
Without grilling Juliet, he ensured the clueless climbers could never set foot in the North again.
He was satisfied with that quiet, swift compromise, and Juliet stayed by his side without shedding a tear. He thought that was fine.
Until Juliet Monad abandoned him and fled.