The Price of Silence
You shouldn't have killed him.
"……Carix. Your brother, Deolis… he is dead."
"Pardon?"
The year I turned nineteen, my twenty-three-year-old brother, the confirmed heir to the house, passed away. They called it an accidental death. They said he had been drinking, returned to his academy dormitory, and fell off a stone bridge, drowning in the water below.
"Ah, aah…!! Why, why on earth…!! He was a child who didn't even drink much normally, how could this happen!!"
My mother, who had always been sharp and venomous, wailed. My father, who had always pressured me by saying I lacked talent and needed to try harder, shed tears. The entire household was plunged into deep sorrow. I stared at the scene, dazed.
'Why did he die?'
My brother wasn't a man of extraordinary talent, but he didn't like alcohol. He was simply a man who was more diligent and felt more responsible for his position than anyone else. A man like that, struggling with the burden of noble duty, got drunk and fell to his death? 'That's ridiculous.'
I had known since the moment I was born. What kind of person I was. What this world was. And I even knew about the deaths of my brother and my family.
Black hair and eyes as red as blood. The second son of the Valentia Duchy. The most heinous, psychopathic villain who would later frame his brother's death as an accident, kill his parents when he came of age to inherit the title, and finally enjoy tormenting the player by using his own death.
Duke Carix Valentia.
'And yet, I haven't done anything?'
When I realized my role, I didn't want to live a life written by someone else, so I did nothing. It wasn't about being a villain or a protagonist; I just didn't want to lose my own agency. So, I acted incompetent.
"Swordsmanship?"
"I have no talent."
"Magic?"
"None."
"Academics?"
"I don't have any."
"No, what about… do you have any talent for dance or music?"
"I have nothing."
"……"
A lack of talent that surpassed mere mediocrity. The only thing I was better at than others was speaking a little earlier. But because of that, it was a shocking reality for my parents who had held expectations. Realizing I had no talent, my parents pinned all their hopes on my brother. I just had to live quietly like that.
"Carix… Carix…! Now, now you are all I have left! Please, please just live healthily!!"
My mother cried, clutching me. My father, his voice trembling, said as if squeezing the words out due to his duties as the head of the house, that I had to start heir training even now. And I, feeling that not a single tear fell even after hearing of my brother's death, thought:
'Could it be?'
Is it some kind of compulsion? It would be much later, after my brother's funeral, that I would fully realize the reality—that the world was forcing me to become a villain.
My brother had passed away, but I did not let the monster's talent within me bloom.
"Young Master. It's not a sword, it's a pistol. I asked you to put at least one shot into the target. How could you miss every single one?"
"My wrist hurts."
Because it had already fully blossomed.
"……It's as if you missed on purpose."
Correct. I missed on purpose. To be precise, I was hitting and killing the bees and flies buzzing behind the target.
"Young Master… please, I beg you, try a little harder. The Duke and the Duchess are very worried."
"More importantly. What about my brother's case?"
"Pardon?"
"Re-investigation."
"……There is nothing particular yet."
A lie. When this middle-aged tutor lies, he always scratches his philtrum with his left hand and looks up to the right. He was doing it now.
'It seems it's already progressed to some extent.'
It must have been conveyed to the key figures of the family. And that content surely included instructions not to let me know.
"Young Master Carix. Young Master Deolis was not a person of great talent either. But he always tried his best and……"
"My brother had the entire family investing in him since he was five."
I set the empty pistol down on the table a bit roughly.
"I only picked up a gun for the first time when I turned nineteen."
"……"
"Isn't it too much to ask me to be at his level right away?"
Two months since my brother died. The Valentia Duchy was still trapped within the funeral. My mother and father no longer sat at the same table. I hadn't seen their faces for two weeks.
"But Young Master, now you are the heir……"
"And."
I cut off the tutor.
"I am just as devastated by my brother's death as anyone else."
"……"
"Is it your teaching method to compare the deceased in front of the bereaved family?"
"……I apologize."
The middle-aged tutor bowed his head. 'It's annoying.'
My brother was murdered. It's not a suspicion; it's a certainty. My brother didn't like alcohol. He knew better than anyone that he lacked talent, and that was why he was the most diligent person I knew. A man like that, with the magical beast subjugation front approaching, suddenly drinks himself into a stupor and falls off a railing to drown? Even on a bridge with waist-high railings? It makes no sense.
Above all, my brother was the heir to the Duchy. He had power, money, and people. Why would a man like that walk home from a bar instead of taking a carriage? The more I think about it, the more suspicious it becomes.
"Young Master?"
"I'm going to the Capital Central Prison."
"……Pardon?"
"Since I, the brother and heir, haven't heard a word about the investigation."
I straightened my clothes and started walking.
"I have to hear it myself."
The tutor looked surprised. It must have been quite shocking for someone who had lived his whole life moving only during hours when no one was around to suddenly want to go out—all to ensure I didn't bring shame to the family as my father had instructed, or to ensure the lacking second son didn't wander outside and tarnish my brother's honor.
'The family name I had to protect and my brother's honor were soaked in someone's spilled liquor and shoved under a stone bridge. There's no reason to decline now.'
Above all, in my judgment, we shouldn't drag this out any longer. Two months since my brother died. The academy, responsible for student management, wants to wrap up the case as quickly as possible. It's a dirty maneuver, as if they have something to hide.
"Prepare the carriage."
It's a sensation so familiar that it even makes me feel disgusted.
The Valentia Duchy mansion was located at the edge of the capital. They said it was because they wanted a much larger plot of land and a bigger mansion than other nobles, rather than living cramped in the noble district. While other nobles considered it an honor to build their mansions near the royal palace, the Duchy chose a size that rivaled the palace itself.
But to me, who knows this world, it just feels like an artificial setting inserted to make it easier for the villain, 'Carix Valentia,' to operate. Because our family had been neutral for generations, never interfering in politics, and the mansion's appearance was nothing more than a desperate attempt to directly clash with royal power.
Above all, with such a large mansion, it would be impossible for any evil deeds to be noticed, and even if they were, it would be easy to bury them.
"Stop. Who goes there?"
As soon as I arrived at the Capital Central Prison, the guards blocked my path. This is a bit unexpected. A big catch from the start?
"Asking even after seeing the crest on the carriage means you blocked me on purpose."
I looked down at him with a sneer.
"Who ordered you?"
"!"
There is no way the person in charge of the capital prison wouldn't know the crest of the Valentia Duchy. Furthermore, with my brother's recent case, the family's senior members must have visited this place several times. Even if it were someone working for the first time today, it makes no sense.
"If you don't want to die, move while I'm asking nicely."
"W-what are you talking about……"
"Otherwise, give me your name and bring your superior."
"Ugh."
My position, having become the heir following my brother, is different from before. Above all, I am not some righteous transmigrator who came here because I couldn't stand injustice. I am merely an avenger who felt the disgusting scent of my brother's death and started moving myself. And yet, a mere guard blocks my path under someone's orders?
"You're slow on the uptake."
I flicked my finger.
"Seize him."
""Yes.""
"Ugh!?"
The family knights slammed the guard onto the ground. Other guards who were rushing over with spears in surprise hesitated when I glared at them.
"A key witness."
This is why people go fishing. "I haven't been outside in a while, but the start is excellent."
"E-even if you are a young master of the Duchy, you can't do this in the Central Prison……!!"
"I can."
"E…?"
"I don't know who is behind you. But our family is stronger than the person who paid you to block our family's access. At the very least, if we protest to the royal family, there is no chance in hell that you and the person behind you will win."
I have lived my life rejecting the role of a villain. But I am not a moron who stays still when my family has been stabbed.
"Young Master Carix Valentia! What is the meaning of this!"
"Are you the administrator of this prison?"
"I-I am! What kind of tyranny is this, coming here so suddenly!"
I looked at him coldly and gestured with my chin.
"The tyranny is what this moron did. He stood there and didn't open the path even after seeing the clear crest of the Duchy, didn't even call his superior, and then questioned who I was."
A villain's brain works unnecessarily well. Moreover, I am the most heinous evil, with the setting that I never forget what I've read once.
"He just stood there saying he didn't know what I meant when I told him to call his superior. Does the Central Prison operate separately from the laws established by the royal family?"
I had read every book in the Duchy's library. Including the kingdom's legal code revised this year.
"If you have complaints, file a petition with the Duchy through the noble court. Aren't you looking forward to seeing whose words are proven right?"
"……Understood. I will hand over the guard. But, what brings you here without notice?"
At the administrator's words that he would hand over the guard, the guard's pupils wavered for a moment. His lips twitched as if he wanted to say something, but he looked like he was holding it in, unable to speak even if he wanted to.
"Since when did the law change so that the victim's family, even a direct descendant of a Duke, has to give notice to the Central Prison to move?"
"There is such a thing as custom."
"You would look for custom instead of the law to interrogate a criminal even if your own family were murdered? I will make sure to verify that myself when the time comes."
"……"
"If you're done with the bullshit, open the door."
The administrator eventually gritted his teeth and opened the way. "……Guide him."
'Was it the administrator's order?'
As soon as I came to the prison, big catches are being reeled in one after another. It seems there is much more entangled in my brother's death than I thought. Inside the prison, I was able to find the two people I was looking for quickly.
"Young Master Carix…?"
"Y-Young Master!! Please, please spare me!!"
The exclusive maid who served my brother. And the coachman who disappeared after leaving my brother at the bar on the day of the incident. I smiled at the two of them. Very gently.
"It's been a while. Dora. Bramble."
"Y-Young Master……"
"I'll get straight to the point."
I looked down at the two of them slowly.
"I will spare the family of the one who speaks first."
"……Eh?"
"Who is it."
My soft voice echoed through the prison.
"The bastard who ordered you not to serve my brother that day."
Since you killed my family, don't harbor the hope that your own family will be safe even if you stay silent and die here. "Unless you want your families to be found under a stone bridge, too."
"……"
I stared straight at them.
"Speak."
You awakened the evil, so swallow the consequences.