Chapter 126
Ever since Count Olivin Obel managed to escape the mansion with his life, there were many things he couldn’t understand.
On the day when a slaughter disguised as a banquet took place at the Wincastle Manor, countless people who had been invited to the false banquet died. However, outside, no one remembered those who had died that day.
The promising eldest son of Count Welton, known as a brilliant businessman, the Marquis Besso’s second daughter, once called the ice flower of high society, and even the legitimate son of Duke Porcal, who was a branch family member of the royal family. People who could never be forgotten had perished in this mansion, and yet, the world was silent.
Neither the king, nor the nobles, nor anyone else. No one remembered the dead. On the contrary, the few nobles, including Count Obel, who tried to make public what had happened that day, were treated as lunatics, scorned for spreading rumors about people who never existed.
There was something else strange as well. Though they had been trapped inside the mansion for days on end, when they stepped outside, only a few dozen minutes had passed. As if time itself had twisted inside the mansion.
Because of this, Count Obel began to suspect that he’d imagined it all. In fact, most of those few who survived that day and returned to the outside had long since gone back to their daily lives.
But Count Obel learned something unexpected. He still retained memories of his only daughter, Cynthia.
If the existence of those who died at the Wincastle Manor was erased outside, then Cynthia being remembered meant she was still alive.
Count Obel hesitated for a long time. Should he go to find her, or not?
The truth was, it wasn’t because of paternal affection or any fatherly love that he struggled with this decision. It was simply because his hand was too weak.
If he wanted to raise another child among his illegitimate offspring with the same perfect conditions, it would cost both money and time.
He’d spent both fortune and years to break her resistance and make her obedient, disciplining her with beatings, teaching her just enough coquetry and elegance, molding her into a beautiful, graceful doll to be sold off to a wealthy, high-ranking nobleman so that the household could rise again.
He was already old, and he couldn’t afford to miss another chance. Noble ladies these days weren’t as naive as before, and a decrepit man whose beauty had long faded couldn’t charm them with empty words as he might have in the past.
Even if he picked and kidnapped a suitable child as he’d done with Cynthia, the laws had changed since the new king’s coronation, and now he could be punished for it. It was no longer an era where a nobleman’s crimes could simply be swept under the rug.
And the fact that Cynthia was still alive in that dreadful place might be proof that the master of the mansion was treating her with some special care.
Otherwise, how could a frail young woman survive even a single day in such a madhouse?
Having made up his mind, the count returned of his own will to the hellish Wincastle Manor.
He was a gambler. He could stake his life on even the slimmest chance of winning, so this, too, was a gamble. If he was lucky, he’d gain a tremendous fortune and finally restore his family’s glory, reaping the rewards through the precious daughter he’d so carefully raised.
And his gamble succeeded, to a degree.
“My, it seems the two of you have already set up your bridal chamber. I’m ashamed to visit so late, as your father.”
Count Obel faced Duke Wincastle and his daughter in the duke’s drawing room.
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