Kneel Before The Villain - Chapter 113

‘I heard that the princess broke off the marriage with the crown prince… but does he still have feelings for her and want to hold on to her?’

 

Claire clenched her fists and trembled.

 

As her pupils became red, a malevolent expression appeared in her beautiful eyes, which had only looked good.

 

“Really to the end.”

 

“Yes?”

 

As Claire muttered, the maid involuntarily raised her head, then immediately lowered her head when she saw her angry face.

 

She had never seen such a face before because Claire always had a kind and gentle face.

 

But now, the beautiful lady’s face was full of malice.

 

It was a completely different atmosphere than usual.

 

For a moment, the maid felt as if her heart sank.

 

After belatedly remembering that the maid was still in the room, Claire spat out coldly.

 

“Fine. I don’t need your help anymore, so just do your job.”

 

The maid, fortunate that Claire did not take out her anger on her, took her rag and began to dust the top of the drawers.

 

It was a low, cold voice that seemed to upset her.

 

Claire sat in front of her dressing table and brushed her hair.

 

Her gaze was full of melancholy, and her expression was sultry and sunken.

 

It was the empress, and she always disapproved of Claire being by the Crown prince’s side.

 

She was his lover, and she herself was a stumbling block.

 

Claire resented the empress for doing this to keep her away from the crown prince, and more than that, she cursed Roxana.

 

Although she had never done her own harm to the princess, she constantly tried to frame and harm her.

 

She (Roxana) recently had a sudden change of person, separating herself and the crown prince but now, even after the marriage was canceled, he was holding on to her ankles.

 

Still, there was hope.

 

If the crown prince knew she was in a situation like this, he certainly wouldn’t pretend he didn’t know.

 

Didn’t he stop Baron Dana from forcibly marrying her off last time?

 

But one problem she had was that she didn’t have much time.

 

She felt as though her heart was burning because she was nervous because she did not know when Baron Dana would force her to marry again.

 

Claire stood up looking at her beautiful self in the mirror.

 

The slender back of the maid caught her eye.

 

The maid’s hair was her dazzling blonde, and with her slender figure she was roughly the same height as hers.

 

Claire watched the maid with pensive eyes.

 

Suddenly, her eyes brightened.

 

Finally, she had just thought of a way to make the maid serve her ‘use’.

 

“The window frame there is dirty, so pay special attention to cleaning it..”

 

Claire ordered coldly.

 

The maid nodded her head gracefully, then silently picked up the mop and headed for the window.

 

As she concentrated on wiping the dusty window sill with her rough hands, Claire picked up a vase and slowly moved behind the maid.

 

The carpet on the floor was old and worn, but it was so thick that footsteps could hardly be heard.

 

Finally Claire stood right behind the maid.

 

The back of the maid’s head was in front of her eyes.

 

The maid seemed engrossed in her work, as she hadn’t yet noticed her approach.

 

A complex expression appeared in Claire’s gaze.

 

It was because she was hesitant.

 

Her father, Baron Dana, was never a good father, but he certainly would never do anything to harm her.

 

Perhaps hurting the maid was fine.

 

It’s not like anyone would care what happened to a lowly maid with a commoner’s status anyway.

 

In the first place, weren’t the servants there for the owner to use?

 

Serving her usefulness even in this way was the reason and duty of her existence in the mansion.

 

So… there was nothing to worry about.

 

Claire, who had finished her thoughts and made up her mind, held up the vase.

 

Then, she slammed it straight into the back of the head of the young maid who was cleaning the window frame. With the heavy hit, the maid couldn’t even scream and she fell to the floor.

 

Red blood flowed from her head.

 

“Lady…?”

 

The maid looked towards Claire with her blurry eyes.

 

Claire trembled and took a few steps back.

 

With a blank face, she looked at the maid who had done her last ‘use’.

 

She had seen Baron Dana treat his servants harshly many times since she was a child, but this was the first time she had touched them herself.

 

She was terrified when I saw the maid flinching on the floor.

 

“Why…….”

 

The maid’s face was just a puzzled expression.

 

Her voice, which leaked out as if it were cut off, was so small.

 

Claire swallowed her dry saliva.

 

Soon the maid closed her eyes.

 

She seemed to have fainted.

 

Claire hesitated for a moment before reaching out her hand before the blood from the maid’s head stained her clothes.

 

The maid outfit was much simpler to put on and take off than a fancy dress, so it was easy for her to change it herself.

 

However, it took much longer than expected.

 

It took a lot of courage to dare to approach the fallen maid, but unlike the urgency, even the simple task of unbuttoning and locking the buttons was not easy because her hands were shaking.

 

After twists and turns, Claire exchanged her clothes with the maid and looked at herself in the mirror.

 

The maid was a few years younger than Claire, but she was not tall, so it fit.

 

Claire put her hair in a plait, just like the maid, and powdered her face a little darker than her natural skin.

 

She covered her white skin and lively cheeks and lips, and she appeared to be a pale, glazed maid.

 

“This should be enough.”

 

Up close it seemed pretty plausible enough to fool other people’s eyes.

 

Who cared so much about a maid who did chores in the first place anyway?

 

If she could only get out of this room and avoid people, it was an easy task for her to escape the mansion using the dog hole she had been in since she was a child.

 

Claire looked behind her one last time before leaving the room.

 

The spilled blood did not show much because the carpet on the floor was red.

 

It was getting darker outside and the only light in the room was the dim lamp next to the sofa.

 

Not many people would immediately suspect her when they saw her back sitting quietly on the sofa in her pajamas.

 

“I didn’t want to do this either. You brought it all on yourself.”

 

Naturally, there was no answer from the maid.

 

The silence that filled the room made her feel chills, giving her arms goosebumps.

 

Claire stared at the maid’s back for a while with a complicated gaze, then turned her grip on the doorknob and stepped out.

 

“If you want to resent it, blame your parents who gave birth to you as a commoner and your fate.”

 

***

 

The lights in the mansion began to go out one by one.

 

A maid came out of the room with a tray of dinner.

 

Her steps were very cautious, and her shrunken shoulders and head bowed without confidence made her look more nervous than necessary.

 

Just in time, a knight who was on his watch walked through the corridors and bumped into the maid.

 

After a small nod of her head, she was about to leave when the knight stopped her.

 

“Wait. Where are you going?”

 

“I’m going to bring the leftover food and utensils to the kitchen after the lady has eaten. Why?”

 

She answered in a calm voice.

 

Her expression was calm, but if you looked closely, you could see that her hands were holding the tray in a very tight grip.

 

The knight looked back and forth between the maid and the tray in her hands, then nodded his head in agreement.

 

“Right. Just go.”

 

“Thank you.”

 

The maid nodded her head politely, then took her steps again.

 

The knight did not stop her this time.

 

But the only footsteps she could hear were hers.

 

A cold sweat broke out on her forehead. Looking back, she met his eyes.

 

She had an ominous feeling that the knight would call her and wake up all the people in the mansion.

 

But everything was still, until she slipped out of the front door and made her way to the corner of a wall, which was sparsely visited.

 

The maid, no, Claire, crawled through the bushes and found a hole in the wall.

 

It was a place she accidentally discovered when she was young, but fortunately, even after a few years, it was still unobstructed.

 

After passing through the narrow wall that felt a bit daunting now, she ran straight along the road.

 

When she finally came out on the main road, she found a carriage bearing a familiar emblem.

 

Claire spotted a man climbing into the carriage and hurried toward it.

 

She tried to grab his collar with her desperate hands, but she was soon intercepted by the knights.

 

Of course, their gaze at the maid, who suddenly ran up to them, was not friendly.

 

“Where did you come from? How dare you be rude to the young master?”

 

“I’ll hurt you if you don’t step back immediately.”

 

Claire gritted her teeth as she saw the knights exuding ferocious spirit as if they would draw their swords at any moment.

 

Soon the carriage was about to leave, leaving her behind.

 

She was still blocked by knights in front of her, and if she missed it now, the chance might never come again.

 

Claire exclaimed urgently.

 

“Young Master, it’s me!”

 

At that voice, the carriage that was about to start stopped, and a person walked out of it.

 

He had a decent appearance. Dressed in classy clothes, he frowned at Claire.

 

“Who are you…”

 

The young master of Prine, slurred his words.

 

Suspicion soon grew in his eyes, and then his pupils widened.

 

He muttered in disbelief with a puzzled face.

 

“Lady Dana?”

 

***

 

After dinner, I was walking in the garden when I heard a commotion coming from the front door.

 

Curious, I approached and saw that the duke’s knights and Noah were arguing. He looked at me and put on a happy face.

 

“Princess!”

 

“Noah?”

 

I frowned and looked up at the sky.

 

The sky was dark because the sun had already set, and a crescent moon was rising in the early evening sky.

 

In the past, there had been occasions when someone from the Hermes sent flowers or tea leaves without being invited.

 

This was not the first time Noah had visited in person, but he had never come at such a late hour without an appointment.

 

I couldn’t understand the situation at all, so I asked the knights.

 

“What’s going on?”

 

“We couldn’t help it because this person kept insisting on meeting the princess.”

 

“So you’re saying you didn’t want to tell me?”

 

The knight standing on the right added with a puzzled face.

 

“Recently, there was an order from His Excellency to strengthen the security of the mansion. Besides, I was suspicious because he insisted on coming and meeting you at this late hour without an appointment…”

 

At the word “stubbornness,” Noah made an unfair face.

 

However, he looked downcast as if he was aware that his actions were wrong.

 

Everything the knights said was right.

 

In their position to protect the mansion, Noah was just a merchant, and in this situation, he would look very suspicious.

 

After thinking about it, I opened my mouth.

 

“Come to think of it, I forgot that I ordered him something. Let him in.”

 

***