Chapter 73

The investigation and interrogations moved forward without obstruction.

Once the floodgates opened, cracks appeared everywhere.

To the point that he could no longer understand how he had lived so long without noticing—everything the servants said was riddled with lies.

As Raul pressed them relentlessly, suspicion after suspicion, they finally began confessing the truth, each one self-destructing in turn.

The same went for the vassals who had long discussed the territory’s affairs at Raul’s side.

When the servants pinned blame on Muriel, they had turned a blind eye.

At times, they had even put their heads together and plotted, trapping Muriel without the slightest hesitation.

The greenhouse fire last September was a perfect example.

They scattered evidence everywhere to make it inevitable that Muriel would be deemed the culprit, lured her into the greenhouse—and then set it ablaze.

All of them in collusion.

The scheme had been a resounding success. From that incident onward, Raul had come to despise Muriel with a ferocity bordering on obsession.

…At least, until Raul discovered the truth.

“…….”

Standing before the vassals with their heads bowed low, Raul pressed a hand to his throbbing forehead.

A colossal wave of disappointment crashed over him, swallowing him whole.

How…

How could something like this happen in his own castle?

Because the daughter of Tierney was someone all of Winterberg ought to hate?

But thinking back… he himself had been no different.

“…….”

He had believed a woman like her deserved condemnation.

She was the detestable daughter of Tierney. Whatever was done to her would be nothing more than rightful revenge.

If she wished to resent someone, she should resent her family and parents—that was what he had thought.

“Your Grace, surely you remember….”

At that moment, one of the vassals stepped forward, as if mustering his courage.

“How your late parents, the former Duke and Duchess, met their deaths when they marched to war against Tierney….”

“…….”

“That cruel and greedy Willard Tierney committed such a horrific murder just to seize a single granary in the southeast!”

Raul’s parents had met a horrific end in the territorial war against the Tierney family—burned alive.

Willard Tierney’s mage had laid a ring of fire magic in advance and lured Raul’s parents into it. They had walked straight into the trap.

Even in the midst of war, it was condemned as a barbaric stratagem that abandoned all human decency. The public outrage had not ceased.

But that had been Willard Tierney’s crime.

Not something Muriel had done.

She was not even his biological daughter.

If anything, she had been a victim—just like Raul.

“Your Grace…!”

“…….”

And his retainers… did not know that.

Come to think of it, none of them—including Raul himself—had ever tried to truly know her.

They had only ignored her, turned away from her, cast her out.

And so, consumed by an unerasable hatred…

Believing their revenge to be justice, they had made a single scapegoat pay the price for everything.

Raul felt both pity and fury toward his foolish vassals. And toward himself.

How could he ever atone for this sin?

The one ensnared in their chain of hatred had not been the one who deserved retribution, but an entirely unrelated person.

“Your—”

“Enough.”

Letting out a heavy sigh, Raul slowly closed his eyes—then opened them again.

He feared the backlash that would follow once the truth about Muriel came to light, but he could not continue to conceal it.

So he said what needed to be said.

“…You—no, all of us….”

His throat stung as if caught on a thorn. He swallowed once, dryly.

“We have been hating… and falsely accusing the wrong person.”

“…Pardon? What do you mean…?”

Raul drew in a deep breath. Then he delivered the decisive words.

“Muriel… is not the Duke of Tierney’s biological child.”

The vassal standing closest to him stared, eyes blown wide.

From the two of them outward, a violent ripple spread through the entire banquet hall.

Back to the present.

It was only after running all the way to the contaminated zone that Raul regained his senses.

After learning the truth, he had once again been tormented by hallucinations. He could not fall into deep sleep; and even when he did drift off lightly, nightmares always followed.

He could not escape fear, self-loathing, guilt.

If he could, Raul would have freed himself from the nightmares and visions.

But he did not actively seek a way.

Because perhaps those nightmares and hallucinations… were the punishment God had seen fit to grant him.

What he had come here to do was clear.

To apologize to Muriel. To beg her forgiveness.

And… to compensate her for every moment of suffering she had endured in Winterberg Castle.

Still kneeling, Raul looked up at Muriel and spoke with sincerity.

“Muriel, I wish to apologize to you.”

“…….”

“I know there are no words that can earn your forgiveness…”

“…….”

“But I truly, from the depths of my heart, repent. For everything I… and my people did to you.”

Yet Muriel’s eyes, looking down at him, were as cold as an unmelted glacier.

---

‘Even after receiving an apology… I’m surprised by how absolutely nothing I feel.’

Once, I think I might have wanted an ending like this.

But now, not a single emotion stirred.

My heart was as still as a lake without a ripple. Cold enough to freeze solid.

Even if someone threw a stone into it—no, even if they hurled an entire boulder—

It wouldn’t cause the slightest disturbance.

Let alone an apology from someone who means nothing to me now.

…It stirred not even the faintest wave.

Raul was waiting for my answer. Looking at me desperately, as if he might crumble at any moment.

I began slowly, retracing the past.

“Long ago….”

“I wanted your understanding. Your attention.”

“…….”

“Do you remember the day we first met?”

At the question, Raul’s eyes shook as if struck by a violent gust.

“Back then… I was desperate for someone who would understand me.”

“…….”

“Someone who wouldn’t be swayed by rumors. Someone who would look at me without prejudice.”

“…….”

“I think… I hoped that person might be you.”

A faint sadness brushed past me.

If Raul had set aside his prejudice, even for a moment.

If he had spared just a little time to listen to my story…

Perhaps something might have been different.

But in the end, they were nothing more than futile what-ifs.

The past had already passed. No ordinary person could turn back time.

All that remained was to live the present without regret.

“I understand that you want to apologize. I understand how you must feel.”

“…….”

“But one apology doesn’t erase everything that happened.”

Raul bit his lip hard, then lowered his head weakly.

“I know….”

I cannot forgive Raul.

Not now.

Perhaps, after a long stretch of years, my mind might change.

But not now.

Just as I cannot forgive Duke Tierney, Kabil, or the Juliet siblings—Raul is no different.

Still, this man was not the worst of them, like those devils.

At the very least, he had acknowledged his wrongdoing and come to seek my forgiveness.

So the best mercy I can offer is—

“Let’s end it completely, here.”

“…!”

Raul’s head snapped up, his eyes trembling.

I drove the final nail in without hesitation.

“Never see me again.”

To erase him from my life as if he had never existed.

‘…After coming all this way, what do you think Raul wants? It’s obvious.’

He wants to apologize, to compensate me, perhaps even to endure my revenge if necessary.

But I will never grant him what he wants.

Revenge? If I felt like it, I could take it.

But that would be to ease the knot in my own chest—not to ease his conscience.

‘Did you think I’d just let you shake off your guilt and walk away at peace?’

I know your personality all too well.

If you cannot offer me sufficient apology and restitution, you’ll be tormented by guilt forever—until the day you die.

That vicious moral fastidiousness of yours.

‘So I hope you reproach yourself. Regret it. Until your last breath.’

A blue flame flared in my chest.

This must be what they call vengeance.

But I will not exact ‘physical’ revenge on Raul Winterberg or those who follow him.

Instead, I hope they live in hell for the rest of their lives. Clutching a guilt they can never cast off.

‘If Raul suffers his whole life, those who care about him will be wracked with guilt too.’

And if this form of revenge doesn’t satisfy me…

Well. I can think about that when the time comes.

“Don’t apologize or try to compensate me just so you can feel at ease.”

“Muriel, I—”

“I want you to disappear completely from my world.”

Raul’s lips, which had been moving, froze mid-motion.

His eyelids trembled.

Looking down at him coldly, I continued.

“That’s what I want.”