139. Shattered Dream of Becoming Crown Princess (2)

“You…!”

Caitlyn pointed accusingly at Anette, but to others, she looked more frightened than threatening. Hesitantly, Caitlyn’s steps retreated.

“There’s no reason to be upset if I call you ‘you’ now. You’re not part of the Pochet family, and you have no relation to me, so there’s no specific title to address you by. Of course, it’s absurd for a commoner to address a Grand Duchess as ‘you,’ but just for you, I’ll gladly permit it.”

The broadly smiling expression and voice that never showed anger fueled Caitlyn’s fear. Simons also felt something off about the scene.

‘What harsh words did she whisper to make Caitlyn’s face turn even paler?’

Simons inadvertently glanced toward Darius, surprised by his wife’s unexpected side, wondering if even the Grand Duke of Inkheart might be appalled.

“What a pleasant evening. Isn’t it?”

The Grand Duke of Inkheart was smiling. As if he was genuinely enjoying himself.

“It reminds me of when I first met you, Anette.”

The smile on that flawlessly perfect handsome face struck Simons as unpleasant.

“You’re lovable because you’re so emotionally expressive. You have beautiful blue eyes, and when you’re angry, those lake-like pupils turn transparent, as if water is boiling—close to the color of the sky.”

Darius didn’t care whether Simons understood his feelings or not.

“I love that brief moment when those ice-blue eyes look at me and become round again.”

Darius whispered in rapture.

Margarita, who had appeared so suddenly, disappeared neatly after finishing the sacrament, as if her only purpose had been to conclude Caitlyn’s matter. And Caitlyn, finding no one willing to engage with her, stormed out.

Whew, Simons adjusted the cravat that was choking his neck in discomfort and spoke up. Although it had been an unavoidable choice, seeing his sister expelled like that didn’t make him feel particularly good.

“About that cotton, now that we’ve dealt with the incorrect contract issue, let’s seriously discuss a new contract.”

It was true that Simons had come to the capital in anger to personally catch his sister due to Caitlyn’s reckless extravagance, but that was also an excuse.

After Marquis Pochet disappeared, the Pochet family faced new problems every day, and people clung to Simons, the young marquis, demanding solutions.

He had hurriedly come to the capital to escape from these people, but when he saw the situation Caitlyn had created, Simons realized an unexpected solution was right here.

“Contract talk?”

“Yes, this time we should properly negotiate our mutual interests regarding the exclusive rights to cotton.”

Selling cotton to the North and receiving money and military support in return would solve most of the problems the South was currently facing!

“It’s ridiculous that Caitlyn casually mentioned the rights to cotton sales, but I’m the true owner of those rights. So now let’s properly talk…”

In response to Simons’s words, Anette laughed, “Ha,” and Darius gently pressed her shoulder. “I’ll handle this,” Darius whispered affectionately to Anette.

The eyes that curved and filled with smiles when looking at Anette rapidly cooled when turning to Simons.

“How much longer does the Pochet family intend to toy with Inkheart? There’s a limit to my leniency, even for my wife’s family.”

Tonight, he had no intention of letting Anette play the villain anymore.

* * *

“Sob…… hic! This makes no sense! It was clearly me, His Majesty was about to call my name!”

Whoosh, murky smoke billowed from the long pipe. Lilith lay on a long chair to the side, smoking her pipe. Inside Lilith’s chamber, dark day or night, Caitlyn was screaming with reddened eyes.

“Do it again, make me crown princess! Just speak well to His Majesty again!”

“I did promise to make you crown princess if you participated in the crown princess selection, but you couldn’t even manage that simple task, could you?”

“I did participate!”

“And you caused an unprecedented situation by having your qualification revoked before the selection ended.”

Even the great Lilith was taken aback when she heard that the young Marquis Pochet had burst into the crown princess selection ceremony and withdrawn Caitlyn’s participation in the name of the family head.

She had gone to the trouble of exerting control over the emperor to push for Caitlyn, only for that fool to fail to secure even her own position.

“His Majesty is currently sleeping in my chamber. He was greatly disappointed by your misconduct.”

“Sob, no…… it wasn’t my fault…… but why!”

Caitlyn trembled with despair. Lilith watched with cold eyes as Caitlyn’s knees buckled and she collapsed.

“I helped you, but you failed. We agreed to help each other, but you, you liar, broke your promise to me?”

Caitlyn wailed like a child at Lilith’s rebuke. The intangible pressure Lilith was emitting without restraint frightened Caitlyn. Her despair over the collapse of her carefully built future gradually transformed into inexplicable fear.

“How could I have known my brother would show up there…… sob. Something went wrong……”

Lilith laughed.

“What a kind and fragile person you are.”

The negative emotions emanating from Caitlyn pleased Lilith. The events that befell Caitlyn this evening were absurd, but upon reflection, they weren’t much different from what Lilith had intended.

The plan to make Caitlyn crown princess and then use her had simply changed to using her without making her crown princess.

“Would you like me to speak favorably about you to His Majesty once more? Do you hope for another chance, Caitlyn?”

The eyes that had been soaked with fear moments ago now burned with foolish greed.

“Yes.”

Satisfied with that answer, Lilith handed something to Caitlyn.

“Now listen carefully to what I’m about to say. If you do exactly as I tell you, you can fulfill your wish.”

The Holy Grail of the South. The Demon King could be resurrected if she brought that corrupted sacred object.

* * *

Simons returned to the Pochet family townhouse without accomplishing anything and sighed deeply.

The Pochet family townhouse, greeting its master who had suddenly barged into the capital, was still cold and dusty, and that desolate scene made Simons feel even more irritated.

〈You just watched Caitlyn being removed from the Pochet family register. And now you’re saying there won’t be a new contract!〉

〈Simons, removing Caitlyn from the family register was your choice. Your choice as temporary family head. You seem unaware of how heavy the responsibility of authority is, having become family head so recently. Trying to blame others for the consequences of your own choices.〉

The Grand Duke mocked him mercilessly.

〈How disappointed would Marquis Pochet be when he returns and finds you in charge? Try to do better next time.〉

Next time? Would there even be a next time?

The situation in the South was so bad that Simons had used the excuse of catching Caitlyn, who was spending money recklessly in the capital, to escape.

Creditors, looking down on the young marquis, were practically camping at the marquis’s mansion demanding repayment, the city’s safety was in shambles due to suddenly appearing monster groups, and there were even rumors of potential uprisings due to poor harvests.

So when he heard that Caitlyn had sold next year’s exclusive cotton rights to the Inkheart family, he thought this was the solution.

“The North is definitely interested in cotton, right? Did they offer different conditions? If you’re hiding anything else, tell me now.”

Caitlyn’s maid swallowed hard at the young master’s fierce tone and squeezed her memory as much as possible. With Miss Caitlyn expelled from home, her own situation as Caitlyn’s maid was even worse.

“Well, that is…… um, when Miss Caitlyn first said she would give Inkheart the right to purchase next year’s cotton, Lady Anette suggested doing something else instead.”

“What?”

“She said she wasn’t interested in buying cotton, but wanted to try growing it, and asked if we knew anything about that.”

“Ha, trying to steal our family business? This is insane.”

Simons ran his hand through his hair.

Research all you want. As long as the Holy Grail is in our hands, cotton won’t grow in other lands. Cotton will never grow anywhere outside the South……

‘Seeds not yet placed in the Holy Grail might sprout, though.’

Having heard everything he needed to hear, the lingering maid became annoying. Simons waved his hand to dismiss her and sank into thought.

‘If I hide the truth about the Holy Grail and offer to help with cotton research in exchange for money and troops, would they agree?’

* * *

Simons made a proposal with changed conditions. He offered to help with cotton cultivation research.

“Sister, you know. The South is such a fertile land, but suddenly famine and monsters have appeared in this blessed land. It’s more confusing because we’ve never experienced anything like this before.”

After a noble story about how, as a lord, he couldn’t stand by and watch this tragedy of starving people facing monsters, he asked if they could provide financial and military support.

“Fine.”

Looking at the delighted Simons, I added.

“But only the military.”

One should listen to people all the way to the end.

I accepted Simons’s proposal because Northern troops were already in the South. Just counting the workers at the diamond mine and the forces guarding it, roughly 500 men had infiltrated without the territory’s owner knowing.

Moving troops wasn’t difficult at all, so I could agree to that.

“After what happened with Caitlyn, giving everything at once seems risky. If you actively cooperate with cotton research, I’ll consider money based on your sincerity. But I don’t want to give it now.”

“Tsk, whose family are you from, Sister? Even if you’re married, still. Did you live longer in the South or the North? They say raising a daughter is useless, and it’s really true!”

“Me?”

It was a ridiculous question. Simons was demonstrating the saying that people with nothing to say raise their voices unnecessarily.

“Of course I’m a person of Inkheart. Oh, come to think of it, I can be this confident thanks to Caitlyn? Without her, I would still be a Pochet.”

My gaze, joking with a humorless face, fixed on the Pochet family crest that Simons was wearing.

When I didn’t know, I hadn’t noticed it, but now I could see that the Pochet family’s crest was a Holy Grail.