Chapter 120
Translator: RaidenTL
Chapter 120
If you can’t see well, Lord Cat, I’ll explain. It’s dark, so it’s hard to tell, but I think Sister Nigella is eating something. Aha! The Great Detective Kiki has solved the case.
Sister Nigella must have been so hungry that she came to sneak a snack. She’d get in trouble if she got caught, so she has to be sneaky. Phew. Luckily, Uncle Marlowe isn’t in the kitchen right now.
Eating all by herself in secret… Sister Nigella is so mean. But since I’m a good girl, I won’t tell Mom or Uncle Marlowe.
Instead, I’ll just ask her to share some with me. But just in case she’s eating bell peppers, I should get a closer look at what it is first.
What Sister Nigella is eating is…
…a rat?
L-Lord Cat. Sister Nigella saw me.
* * *
I was wondering what on earth was taking him so long, but it turned out Pudding had brought back a child.
Suddenly, with a soft poof, a little girl appeared right before my eyes. What was this, a spirit? Since I still hadn’t given up on that dream, I thought for a split second that she might be, but then I saw the familiar cat cradled in her arms and realized Pudding had teleported.
The child, her face a mess of tears as she squeezed Pudding like a stuffed doll, looked at me and began to hiccup so hard it seemed she might pass out.
“Hic! D-Demon…”
What? Why is she looking at me and calling me a demon? I’m not a demon! I’m a villainess! A surge of irritation washed over me, but I knew I’d only lose if I got angry with a child, so I decided to be the adult and let it slide.
Pudding, who was being squeezed to death, sent me a desperate rescue signal. For once, however, I ignored his pitiful gaze. If I took the cat away from a crying child, she’d probably just cry even harder.
I’ve endured unfair treatment hundreds of times since setting foot in this duke’s estate. You’re the mature one here, Pudding, so bear with it. He let out a disgruntled “meow.”
“Pudding, who did you bring with you?”
“M-Mav… hic. I’m Mavka.”
The answer came from an unexpected source. It was quite admirable of her to respond while sobbing like that. The sight of a crying child holding a sulking cat was so ridiculously cute I wanted to gobble her up, and a laugh threatened to escape. But at this rate, the kid looked like she might actually hyperventilate, so I decided to soothe her first.
“Mavka. Do you want to stop crying and have some cookies?”
“Hic. C-Cookies…?”
“Yes.”
Mavka nodded vigorously, tears still streaming down her face. I sat her down on the sofa and popped a cookie into her mouth. With something sweet to focus on, she began to calm down, and her hiccups subsided.
Once she seemed to have settled, I asked her why she had been crying.
“Mavka, why were you crying? Did someone bully you?”
Mavka shook her head, her cheeks puffed out like a hamster’s from being stuffed with cookies. She tried to say something, but with her mouth full, only muffled noises came out. She chewed thoroughly and swallowed.
To prevent her from starting to hiccup again by eating too fast, I immediately handed her a cup of tea. Mavka took a few polite sips, swallowed, and opened her mouth again.
“I saw something scary…”
“What did you see?”
Perhaps the terrifying memory had resurfaced, because tears welled up in Mavka’s eyes again. She hung her head low and replied, “A d-demon…”
From the sounds of it, she wasn’t talking about me.
“Mavka. I know it’s scary, but could you try to calmly explain it to me?”
I coaxed her gently, trying my best to sound as kind as possible. Mavka nodded, mercilessly squeezing Pudding’s soft toe beans. As expected, Pudding’s power as the ultimate healing totem in a RoFan novel was enough to make a crying child stop instantly.
“Hello.”
Mavka folded her tiny body in half in a polite bow. Pudding, still cradled in her arms, was squashed in the middle and let out a squeak.
“I’m Mavka. My mom calls me Kiki.”
Kiki? The nickname suited her perfectly. It was an excellent choice, but if I used it, I felt like I’d look like I was smirking, so I decided to stick to her real name.
Since Mavka’s explanation was entirely from a child’s perspective, it was a bit tedious to follow, but grasping the situation wasn’t difficult. The news she brought was a goldmine.
I should probably preface this by saying: This story has been reconstructed from Mavka’s account.
First, Mavka was the daughter of Rico, the head butler. Rico had told Mavka that if she were ever kidnapped or ran into thugs, she should use her connection to the estate as a shield. Unfortunately, she ran into the priests under Bishop Marik instead.
It seemed the priests had been using the child to leak internal information about the ducal estate. Seriously, how shameless do you have to be to use a young child as a spy?
Bishop Marik was currently massacring those who rebelled against the Temple under the pretext of suppressing heresy, and she must have taken issue with Duke Hosaquin for pulling strings to get me pardoned. Telling Mavka to watch out for a “demon” was undoubtedly a setup to frame and oppress the Duke.
But that led to another problem: Duchess Agera.
In this world, medicine had all but disappeared due to the existence of holy water, the ultimate cure-all. People who couldn’t be healed by holy water were branded as cursed or heretical, and dementia was no exception. Since holy water couldn’t cure it, those afflicted were shunned and said to be possessed by evil spirits. That was why only the Duke had attended the Crown Prince’s banquet.
While many people suffered from dementia, it was something everyone tended to keep quiet about. But if the Temple used Agera as leverage and framed her as a heretic, things would get complicated.
But… there was yet another problem. Seriously, the more you dig into this household, the more dirt you find.
The second problem was the “rats”—the very ones I had promised the Duke I would exterminate. Listening to what Mavka had heard from her mother, Rico, it became clear that these were no ordinary rats.
Apparently, the rat population in the mansion had surged one day, and no matter how many they killed, their breeding rate was too high to control. Then Gabriel came and suggested a temporary solution: submerging the rats in holy water.
To think Gabriel was the culprit behind that horrific sight I saw…
The fact that holy water was involved meant the rats were a product of sorcery. Whether Bishop Marik had spread them on purpose or someone in the duke’s estate was secretly practicing it, I couldn’t tell.
No wonder the Duke looked at me like I was crazy when I said I’d catch the rats. He could have at least told me they weren’t ordinary!
And now, Mavka had witnessed yet another shocking sight and shared it with me.
This was where the “demon” she mentioned came into play. I had wondered why the child was so terrified, and it turned out she had seen a maid named Nigella swallowing a rat. Mavka had been caught while secretly watching her swallow it whole. Honestly, I would have cried too.
It sounded incredibly suspicious. For the record, Nigella was the maid who had pulled back the canopy during my tea time with Agera in the greenhouse. She was practically advertising that she was the culprit. Seriously.
Anyway, Mavka had done a great job. As a thank you, I packed up all the snacks Hazel had left behind and gave them to her. In exchange, she promised to brush her teeth thoroughly.
If not for Mavka, I would have been stabbed in the back by Bishop Marik again without knowing a thing. I needed to resolve this quickly, before the Bishop targeted House Hosaquin.
If things went well, I could save the duke’s family, build up favorability points with Rico, solve the rat problem all at once, and take a giant step closer to my family regret story. Perfect.
* * *
“Bishop Marik, we have been informed that the child who brings news from Duke Hosaquin’s estate did not appear today.”
“It does not matter. I have already heard about the Duchess’s condition,” Saraka replied gently. Curious as to why the Duke, who had severed ties with his granddaughter, had suddenly taken Lady Rohanson’s side, she had placed several eyes around the estate.
The information obtained from those easily bought with money was trivial. Surprisingly, the most useful intelligence had been gathered from the butler’s young daughter.
Since Saraka was a merciful priest who did not lightly dismiss even the testimony of children, she had listened to everything the girl had to say. It turned out the reason Duke Hosaquin had suddenly stepped forward was entirely because of the Duchess. She was possessed by an evil spirit.
While not as grave a sin as others, it was enough to hold him accountable for heresy. With his entire family so wicked, the Duke was truly pitiful. If only he could abandon them and live as Saraka did, he might have found an honorable end to his life.
But since the Duke was choosing to turn his back on God, Saraka had no choice but to help him walk the righteous path. Now that she knew his secret, dealing with House Hosaquin would be a simple matter.
Pleased with this vision of the future, Saraka put the matter of House Hosaquin aside for a moment and focused on the task before her.
“Bishop, we have apprehended the sinners.”
At the knight’s words, Saraka looked down at the three children kneeling on the floor, their hands and feet bound. Though they were called sinners, their crime was not so severe.
With sorcery becoming more prevalent lately, the three had grown curious. Ignoring their parents’ warnings, they had conspired to secretly invite a self-proclaimed shaman to read their fortunes. Had the paladins not been tailing the shaman and raided the scene, it would have been overlooked as a momentary lapse in judgment.
“Aria…” Countess Regur, who was standing quietly in the corner, called her daughter’s name in despair.
The three had been incredibly bold, inviting a shaman to a tea party. They had taken advantage of the fact that no one would pay much attention to a small social gathering of young ladies. When the paladins barged into her estate, Countess Regur had shouted at them, demanding how they dared abuse their authority in God’s name. If not for Bishop Marik’s reputation, she would have never permitted their entry.
The Countess had repeatedly emphasized to Saraka that her family had nothing to do with pagans, but upon seeing her own daughter having her fortune told by a shaman, she was left utterly speechless.
“Mother! These people are threatening me! Please, save me!”
Aria had been holding her breath, guilty about bringing in the shaman, but when the sword-wielding knights raided the party and bound them, her fear took over. Now, seeing Countess Regur, her face brightened with hope.
Saraka let out a soft sigh. She looked at Aria, who had committed a wicked act yet failed to realize her wrongdoing, still believing her mother could save her.
“Countess Regur. It seems Lady Regur has been deeply bewitched by sorcery. She does not even realize what she has done wrong.”