It’s Time To Stop Looking For A New Family - Chapter 10

“S-s-spare me… Aah!”

Frightened, Gamal screamed as he wrapped his arms around his head.

Thrust! The next moment, Leticia thrust the dagger on her abdomen with her soft hands. Her red blood splattered on her old dress.

“Uhhhhhhhhh—!”

Hearing Gamal’s screams, she stepped back. He couldn’t stand up properly because she stabbed herself.

Clank!

Eventually, she slowly pulled out the sword that had stabbed her and it fell on the floor.

“I will completely ruin your life.”

Saying so, Leticia smirked with her blood-soaked lips and smiled. That was her best revenge and her way to comfort those dead children.

“Yo, you’re c-crazy! Y-you’re really c-crazy! I have to get out of here….”

Gamal muttered, half-crazy.

Leticia stretched her blood-stained hand behind her back and pulled out the tied ribbon. Her soft, blonde hair ran down her white, soft cheeks. There were splatters of red blood on her cheeks and head.

“Priest… said with your own tongue… that you’ll throw me to hell along with my mother….”

Gamal would be dismissed from the church two years later with his repeated tax evasion and illegal employment of his nephews she just mentioned about him out earlier.

“…M-my dagger!”

The Priest only found out after why Leticia let her escort go and be alone with him, and how she had stabbed his stomach with his own dagger. Understanding the situation, he picked up the dagger on the floor with shaking hands.

Even though there was blood on his wrinkled hands, he was so focused on talking that he didn’t even know it.

“I, I have to hide. I—I didn’t do it, I—r, really didn’t d-d-do it! This crazy b*tch was the one killing herself…!”

Gamal continued to scream with a blood-splattered face.

That moment, he turned his head when he felt a chilly gaze from behind—Bang! The Duke’s knights were standing through the gap of the open door.

“A mere priest was being disrespectful of the Princess…”

Standing among the knights was Faver, who was clenching his teeth. An accident happened with that d**n priest—just now.

Waiting outside the door for a long time already, he got tired after waiting for more than two hours. So, Faver had a light joke with his colleagues in the hallway where the parlor was and burned a cigar. It was possible since the Master of the Castle rarely visited the outer castle.

Then, a weak signal rang out as he was about to smoke this third cigar.

Click. Click. Click. Click. Click. Click. Click. Click. Click. Click.

It was a signal from the clock that he gave Leticia.

A signal would be sent out once the clock was turned. At that moment, Faver ran frantically into the hallway as he received the signal ten times.

“D**n! Young Lady!”

Faver shouted and ran frantically, and other knights who felt the seriousness of the situation followed him.

Cursing, he quickly opened the door, and he and the knights with him were greeted with the scene where Leticia had fallen on the floor, bleeding. Next to her was Gamal, who was standing still with a blood-stained dagger.

Faver ran right away and examined Leticia, who was on the floor.

“Call a healer! No, a bandage first! Bring the physician with you!”

The Duke’s knights approached Gamal while Faver anxiously screamed. All the circumstances pointed that Priest Gamal was the culprit. Leticia was still the Maner’s only Princess even though she was an illegitimate child.

However, the Princess fell on the floor and bleeding, and Priest Gamal was holding a dagger that appeared to be the tool used for the crime. Meanwhile, the Priest was in good shape in contrast to Leticia, with messy hair and bloodied.

Because of that, no one listened to Gamal’s truth of the situation.

“Catch that b*st*rd!”

The knights rushed to subdue Gamal as soon as one of them shouted to catch him. Gamal, who secretly ignored the knights of the Duke’s Family as a high priest, was caught without making a single sound.

“I, I d-didn’t do it. I-I really d-didn’t do it! That b*tch was the one…!”

“Shut up that b*st*rd!”

While Faver was sweating as he holds the bleeding Leticia, one of the knights elbowed Gamal’s mouth.

Peok!

Some of the priest’s teeth fell out due to the blow he received, but no one cared.

“Heuk. I said, heuk, i-it wa(s)n’t me.”

A gray-haired knight slapped Gamal ten times when he spoke in a clumsy pronunciation after losing some of his teeth.

Slap!

“Shut up, you b*st*rd! You can’t speak even if you’re to be executed!”

None of the knights dared to say it, though they all knew that they had failed to properly escort the Princess.

It was different from the fact that she had been slapped by her grandfather dozens of times, but the knights condoned it. This time, the Princess was seriously injured and as a result, the knights were responsible for it.

“…If the Duke learned of this, he would pluck out your eyeballs and make you chew them.”

The rest of the knights did not agree with the gray-haired knight’s threat.

It would be a merciful punishment if only his eyeballs were removed. The knights would cut off all his limbs and feed them to the wolves raised inside the Maner Mansion.

Barely finishing Leticia’s first aid, Faver got up, drenched in a cold sweat. He washed his hands several times already, although it was still covered with blood. He approached Gamal with staggering steps after he left her to the physician, who came running late.

“You’ll realize what you’ve done.”

The head of Maner, the Duke of Gaian, was a cruel man. Not being interested in her daughter and having problems with her life were two different things.

Attacking the Princess was equal to attacking the Duke himself, and it was a severe crime to a priest to try to harm even if she was a half-Princess.

They would once again see the never-before-seen interest and never-before-seen attention that would be given to the Princess. The Master of the Maner, couldn’t afford to have Gamal endanger the life or kill the Princess. Even the knights outside that weren’t able to properly protect the Princess wouldn’t be spared.

“Heuk, s-spare m-me…”

They heard a gloomy voice from the sobbing priest.

“You dared to touch the Master’s own blood and flesh. At this moment, you being a member of the Central Church and a high priest were meaningless.”

Faver swallowed his scorn, grabbed Gamal’s chin and made eye contact.

“You won’t be lonely. If you are eaten alive by wolves, then it will be our turn.”

None of the knights spoke to Faver though they tacitly agreed.

Duke Gaian, Maner’s Head, was a master who was clear with his rewards and punishments.

Even the knights with high standards knew that they were negligent in escorting Leticia, but the Duke didn’t even bother to point it out. The reason why the Duke never bothered was because there was nothing that could threaten him.

But, not today.

They looked at Leticia, who had fallen, with a grim expression.

Fortunately, they heard from the physician that it wasn’t life-threatening. Still, no one was relieved. It was because they had to take responsibility for not protecting the Princess properly.

Only now, the knights realize that Leticia was of Maner’s blood and that she was a Master they should also serve.

* * * 

“You need to rest for about a full week to recover.”

It had been two days since Leticia gained her consciousness.

She was on the bed when she opened her eyes, and the pungent smell of the medicine passed to her nose. Her wound was painful, but she endured the pain as usual instead of expressing it.

She then turned her head to the young man who was talking. Although Leticia didn’t immediately recognize him at first, but then her head hurt like it was cracking, and a fragment of her memory flashed through.

‘Glanz.’

He was a competent doctor in his mid-twenties from the commoners, and he was so talented that her father trusted him.

Glanz was the Duke Gaian’s physician, and he was now staying at the mansion in charge of the monitoring of the previous Duke (Leticia’s grandfather).

‘I wanted to see Glanz as a doctor even though he was looked down on by my grandfather because he was a commoner.’

Recalling her memories, this doctor also had a strong desire to be recognized.

He greeted her with one hand on his chest as he opened his mouth.

“From now on, the maids will serve Young Lady without any inconvenience.”

As she moved her gaze following his gesture, she could Kara with her hands folded and her head bowed. Beside Kara, there were other maids whom she could hardly see their faces.

“The knights are always waiting outside the door. So that Young Lady won’t encounter such inconveniences in the future…”

“Did you increase the number of escorts?”

“Yes, Young Lady. I added five since a single one wasn’t enough.”

“That many?”

She asked with a look of distaste. As an escort of the Princess, five wasn’t a large number, though Leticia didn’t even think about it since she had just woken up.

‘It wasn’t until I became the successor that he gave me five most elite escorts.’

Glanz, who thought Leticia was surprised, nodded and answered cautiously.

“The escort Faver and all the knights guarding the outer castle that day were cut off. Ah, Faver, the one escorting Young Lady…”

“I know. He was fired?”

“Yes, he is. They said that the escort was absent at the time of the attack. We are investigating whether he had a transaction with Priest Gamal.”

“What about Priest Gamal?”

“He was locked up in a dungeon. He spent much time asking to contact the Central Church, and he was now in the state of being beaten quite considerably…”

When he said that he was beaten into a pulp, Glanz rubbed his chest and hitched his breath.