The word 'catastrophe' left him aghast. His lord dancing amongst the other nobles… it was something he couldn't possibly imagine.
The temperature of the capital would've dropped just because Noah entered it.
He was that much of a monster, so something like this would've never happened.
But maybe her excellency, who was as pure as the hydrangea flower he'd once seen in a book and probably as bright as the sun on a fine spring, didn't know the lord's true nature. She must've mustered up her courage to ask him for a dance just to ease their surroundings.
But even before the threat that was Derrick went away, she caught the eye of their lord.
"S-such a thing. How can such a cruel thing..."
David shed tears for the pitiful grand duchess, who had to suffer from two encounters with the Winter family.
"Her excellency is pitiable. A beautiful flower who somehow got involved with the Winter family! Kuhuk! Wouldn't it have been better for her to marry the second young master?"
"However, the second young master is still only eight years old."
"The lord and her excellency were born in different centuries."
"Ah, that is right."
The two's idle chatter seemed to have no end.
David continued to praise Judith, even though he had never met her. Derrick cursed under his breath.
But that sound didn't go unheard by the grand duke's elite knights.
"Stay quiet, would you? You think swearing will bring you something?"
David bluntly retorted at Derrick before redirecting his attention to Jacob .
"I'm worried about the grand duchess. Are you sure she won't get hurt?"
"Don't know, we should get ready to leave."
"Already?"
"I'm only here to pick up her excellency, not like I was gonna stay along anyways. Besides, the capital is too hot."
Jacob drank all of his tea at once. Before he left, David gestured over to Derrick .
"What about the first young master?"
"Do whatever. Wrap him so that he won't be a bother to the lord and her excellency's eyes."
"Alright."
He nodded gently.
As David pulled out a rope from the inside of his cloak, Derrick furrowed his brows and said,
"…..Wait."
"What is it?"
"I'd like to say goodbye to my friend first."
Derrick's eyes widened.
"You have friends?"
This was the reason why Derrick hated the dogs his adoptive father had trained.
He endured it because he was a patient man. But, since he had no intentions of being wrapped up or removed from the vicinity, Derrick called for his sword without hesitation.
They were elite soldiers, but a little bit of bloodshed was the natural cost of victory.
The sword didn't betray the whims of its master. It revealed itself as it sliced through the air.
But a strange odour was present.
"Uwek."
David gagged and covered his nose, and the stink made Jacob change expressions.
"What's this? Suddenly there's this rotten smell...."
Their attention moved over to the sword. The rumoured sword put its fame to shame with its dirtiness.
"Did you fall in a ditch or something?"
"Ughhhh, I'm gonna vomit."
Not being able to stand it, David opened the door.
Haa haa, you could hear him gulping in the fresh air.
"Come with me. But before that, lock the door."
Derrick grinded his teeth as he attempted to leave through the door with Jacob .
"I said I have someone I need to meet."
David turned his head around to see Derrick , who was emitting an aura of bloodlust, and immediately regretted it.
"Who, um, who is it? Tell me his name, ergh."
"Bring Michael ", Derrick muttered as he lifted his sword that seemed to have been at the bottom of some ditch and stared at it.
If he couldn't touch Judith Heart , he'd just have to vent his anger on the people surrounding her.
I wasn't sure if bringing Noah to a cafe was a good idea. And so, I rented the whole cafe. The owner and their staff trembled as they hid beneath the counter.
That was because of the pressure coming from Noah .
"Mr. Noah ."
"Hm?"
"Follow me."
I smiled at him.
He stared back at me compliantly and followed with a smile on his face.
"Eek!"
One of the personnel fell back.
"That backfired."
I thought they wouldn't be scared because of his handsome face. Though, it seemed like I was the only one capable of staring at his face without turning blue.
"H-h-here's y-your c-coffee."
Because Noah didn't order anything, only I received the coffee from the employees.
But it was just coffee. No cream nor any milk.
A slight ominous feeling swept over me as I took a sip, a frown following afterwards.
Bitter...
"What's wrong?"
Before answering his question, I glanced over to the staff member.
They seemed to have used the wrong recipe, but I had a hunch that if I were to ask them to make it again but sweeter, they'd hang themselves right away.
When I looked at Noah , the image of Emily's shoulders quivering came into mind and made me weak.
"It's nothing."
"It's truly regrettable that my wife has already started lying on our first day of marriage."
I couldn't stop thinking about how nice his voice was. He wasn't too loud, but his pronunciation was clear so it was easy to understand him. Plus, no matter what he said, he still sounded hot. My ears felt like they were in heaven.
"Wait a minute."
The coffee in my hand was taken away.
Noah stood up. I thought he was going to beat up the staff, but after they exchanged a few words he entered the kitchen.
He came back a moment later with a coffee full of milk decorated with a heart shaped straw, a wafer stick, whipped cream and sweet syrup to finish it all off.
"Is this what you wanted to eat?"
"Wow, it looks exactly like the one shown on the menu."
I couldn't help but admire it.
He accepted the compliment as if it were only natural.
"I'm a bit quick when it comes to visual learning."
Because of the bitter taste still present in my mouth, I quickly gulped down the drink. It was sweet.
Yup yup. I like my husband.
"It's delicious, thank you."
When I smiled widely, Noah smiled with his eyes.
"There's something I'm curious about my beloved wife."
"Ask away", I said as I stirred the drink with my straw.
His eyes were fixed on my face.
"You said you'll only take your most trusted maid. Is she the one who brought you that letter?"
"That's correct."
"And her name is Emily ?"
"Yes."
"Is she very precious to you?"
"She's both precious and cute."
"Do you want me to kill them?"
Huh?
He asked the same question as before, but this time its meaning differed. I felt like he had a deeper, hidden motive.
I ate the whipped cream with my teaspoon and asked,
"Is there something wrong with Emily ?"
"It seems like she'll be taken away soon."
I put down my teaspoon and laughed coldly.
"Will it be dealt with violently?"
"Since my wife's maid is quite cooperative, there's most likely no need to. Since they're planning on finding your weakness, she won't be killed."
Instead of getting up, I continued drinking my coffee. Then, I continued with the conversation, unperturbed.
"And how come Mr. Noah knows about this?"
"I've already told you, I'm quite quick when it comes to learning things."
"Ah, is that so."
When I stared at him because of his lousy explanation, Noah laughed like a villain.
"Do you have good hearing too?"
As the most powerful man in the North, it was only logical that he was quick to learn things and had excellent hearing.
I drank my coffee and murmured in a subtle tone,
"I had a hunch this would happen, but it still upsets me."
"Well, the kidnapper isn't exactly Derrick . He's playing the role of the mastermind instead", Noah said, his smile never disappearing.
"That look on your face tells me you want to know how I educated my kids."
"..."
"Though, the fact that I was forced to take them in concerns me quite a bit. I assumed he'd get along with his teachers, but he turned them into disabled people instead."
Oh.
Oh?
"So you're telling me you adopted them against your will?"
It'd be a lie to say I wasn't surprised. The novel never mentioned any kind of explanation like this.
So I ignored it like it was nothing, but it was certainly strange.
The story behind the Noah adoption of the main characters… It was almost like his character was breaking apart.
Why did he travel all the way to the desert to fetch the two dying brothers?
Why did he choose to pick them up himself, and why were they in that desert in the first place?
The secret behind Derrick and Eckles's birth – that was the part I hadn't read about yet. They were abandoned by their parents; that was the only explanation provided.
Ughh, I should've read till the end and not just to the scene where Derrick died.
If I had known I'd reincarnate as one of the characters in this novel, I wouldn't have missed out a single part.
I, as well as many other readers, found the novel rather simple. The brothers' biological parents were human trash that didn't deserve to have light shed on them; that was all.
When they were abandoned, Derrick was already twelve, but Eckles was still a baby whose umbilical cord had only just been removed.
Normal parents wouldn't have abandoned their children in the middle of some desert.
But even in such circumstances, Eckles was able to resist death before Noah came and rescued him.
It's indeed amazing, but that might stem from the fact that he's naturally amazing because he's the male lead.
"Hmm."
"..."
"Uum."
How many secrets were hidden from me?
I stared at Noah face and thought about the contents of the novel.
The title of the novel I entered was 〈Luna〉.
Luna, the heroine of the story.
Luna was the daughter of a small, commoner lord from the frontier. Her childhood consisted of her being raised normally and with love, therefore it was barely mentioned in comparison to Eckles's childhood story.
This is just a brief summary of 〈Luna〉 to describe the Winter family's current situation.
After Derrick and Eckles were abandoned in the desert at the respective ages of twelve and a newborn fresh from the womb, Grand Duke Winter seemed like their saviour when he appeared.
He adopted them as his sons and made them nobles of the Navenna Empire.
How Eckles survived as an abandoned newborn was incomprehensible, but there were no special explanations provided.
At any rate, as time went on, their brotherly relationship deteriorated.
Derrick felt annoyed by Eckles , who followed him everywhere. The fact that Eckles missed his biological parents – that he'd never even known – was hilarious to Derrick .
He also knew that his younger brother was born with the qualifications to become an archmage. And so, hoping to ruin him before his awakening, Derrick never shared any information about their parents with him.
After Eckles started seeing the Grand Duke as his biological father, Derrick started displaying violent behaviour towards Eckles . It started off as light beatings, but over time the intensity grew and grew.
The first person to notice his violent behaviour was Eckles's nanny. Soon after, the servants also found out. At first, no one dared to speak about it, but as it became more serious, everyone started avoiding Derrick .
Conscious of everyone, Derrick left the Grand Duke's territory, claiming everyone there only ever took Eckles side.
By the age of twenty, he made his way to the capital and paraded his abilities to his heart's content. Unlike the people in the North, the people of the capital favoured Derrick .
Obviously, it was because they didn't know of his true nature.
Then, Derrick married Judith Heart without problem under the pretense of a marriage contract written by their ancestors. Following that, Judith moved up to the North all by herself to greet the people there and get a feel of the weather. At that time, Derrick didn't go with Noah , saying he didn't want to see Eckles .
She stays there for a month and forms a close relationship with Eckles . Once in a while, he would even call her 'big sister'.
Those were the times she felt the most stable and happy after her marriage.
After her return to the capital, Derrick locked her up in her room saying that she was weak and vulnerable to illness, so she was unable to get in contact with Eckles .
It was only three years later that Eckles came to know that she was being abused.
And he learned through no one else but the Grand Duke.
Unlike now, Grand Duke Winter had no interest in external affairs, though he still had a guilty conscience.
At first, he tried to help her escape.
But Noah was anything but a normal person.
Judith seemed to have an extreme fear of him, so he attempted to get someone else to help. That was when Eckles overheard.
He rushed to the capital, but Derrick had already become Emperor. Everyone else stayed silent about Judith predicament.
Eckles visited Derrick and pleaded him to return Judith , however, Derrick didn't heed his request. Eckles proceeded to provoke him by saying he'd bring her back by force.
It was then that Derrick genuinely tried to kill Eckles for the first time.
Facing such different levels of bloodlust and violence, Eckles realized that their relationship would never recover again.
He decided that, even with his severe injuries, he needed to save Judith . Determined to stand against Derrick , he developed his strength.
And over the course of the years, he met Luna, who healed his wounds… and then they fell in love.
I didn't read that part properly since I just wanted to see Derrick get punished as soon as possible.
Yepp, I regret it.
Moving on, the role Judith played in 〈Luna〉 was the cause of his trauma and awakening.
Except for the time where Eckles nearly died and the time when he found out that Judith was locked away, Grand Duke winter was but a mere bystander.
No, well, there were many things to say when it came to how Judith was treated.
"I'll ask you one last time to check. Do you really not have any biological children?"
I looked at his face carefully, but unfortunately, I wasn't able to find any resemblance because I never took the time to observe Derrick's face.
Traits I remembered of him were black hair, used sneaky tricks, and other unfortunate features. That was all.
"Never happened."
Noah denied it right away. He looked insulted.
I had a gut feeling.
I knew it. There was an important secret I didn't know of.
Derrick was twelve years old when he was abandoned by his biological parents.
He was still young, and he wasn't old enough to know anything yet.
Even in the novel, he kept silent about his biological parents until his end.
"Did Mr. Noah kill their biological...."
"Leaving witnesses usually isn't in my interest."
He wore a cynical smile. Basically, if he was the one who killed their biological parents,Derrick and Eckles would've also been killed.
"You could've just given them away."
"Oh, I don't believe it's all that simple."
Humming lightly, I realized something.
Derrick wasn't abandoned.
Even though Derrick's personality became trash after he grew up, there must've been a reason why Noah didn't take further measures against him.
Was he threatened?
But who would do that to Noah ?
Seeing me think hard, he tapped the table with his fingers.
"Let's get back on track. How do you wish to deal with Derrick ?"
"...I'll do it myself, but I wonder if you can do me a favour."
"It'll be difficult to get rid of him. I'd much rather just kill him. But anything other than that, I am capable of doing."
So you can kill him but not cut ties with him... didn't know that.
What a vague remark.
What's the story behind that?
"Can I really?"
"You have the right to, my wife."
I nodded.
"Well, disciplining a grown-up will require a good beating. Cancel all other plans, we need to take shelter."
I wonder what state the Grand Duke's territory is in right now. The feeling of becoming the step-mother to a man one year older than you felt nice.
I hope Derrick vomits.
I really want him to vomit.
Meanwhile, Michael was in a dilemma.
Derrick ordered him to kill Judith's maid, but Michael was scared of the consequences.
He wished he could've just ignored Derrick . But then it'd lead to a grudge, and Derrick was the best swordsman in the Ravenna empire.
That's why he made himself Derrick pawn.
'Damn it. I should've stepped out of this earlier.'
As he spat out those curses, the face of the maid in front of him turned deathly pale. He heard her breath go uneven, and he saw her tears fall down, as if she knew what was going to happen to her.
To be continued…