OCDRF 05

Chapter 5

It’s Always About Money

Meanwhile, at the Grand Duke’s residence.

The Grand Duke’s aide was utterly shocked when he heard about the contract with the Young Lady of House Serban.

Does the Young Lady of House Serban have two lives or something?

He had suspected something was wrong with her ever since she started following the Grand Duke around.

She was clearly not normal.

The aide glanced at the Grand Duke, who was busy dealing with a stack of overdue documents, before asking,

“Your Grace, I’m only asking just in case, but you aren’t actually planning to kill the Young Lady of House Serban, are you?”

The Grand Duke had removed political opponents simply because he disliked them.

It was hard to imagine him hesitating simply because his opponent happened to be a noble young lady.

But the timing isn’t good.

House Serban had existed since the early days of the Empire’s founding.

Even if their influence didn’t rival that of the Grand Duke’s family, turning them into enemies right now would inevitably attract unwanted attention.

Without taking his eyes off the documents, the Grand Duke replied indifferently,

“If she fails to fulfill the condition she put forward herself, then that’s what will happen.”

“You mean breaking off the engagement?”

“Yes. She certainly became quite the liar while I wasn’t looking.”

He remembered Liviat spouting nonsense about putting her feelings in order, and the corner of his mouth twisted.

Even if she blushes at my touch and offers breaking off the engagement as a condition…

Even though her face sometimes looked as indistinct as though it had been obscured by fog, he could still tell when her complexion changed.

He almost regretted not being able to see her expression properly.

If he could have seen the shameless expression she wore while telling such blatant lies, perhaps he would have been less annoyed.

It seemed she had devised a new strategy because he refused to return her feelings.

“I intend to use this opportunity to teach my fiancée a lesson about prudence.”

“If she wrote breaking off the engagement into the contract as a condition, she’ll have to keep her word. Why would she make such an offer?”

“I don’t need to understand everything that goes through the mind of an irritating fiancée.”

“Still, isn’t it strange? Considering she even staked her life, isn’t there a possibility that she’s actually serious?”

The Grand Duke still didn’t believe Liviat, despite his aide’s advice.

To be honest, he found it infuriating.

It was as though she had decided to leave before he could be the one to cast her aside.

After being the one who started this in the first place?

There was a reason he had tolerated Liviat’s persistent behavior all this time.

He had to constantly be wary of the eyes of those around him because he concealed the fact that he couldn’t distinguish people’s faces.

But whenever Liviat was around, he didn’t have to worry about his surroundings.

She attracts everyone’s attention on her own.

He had actually come to visit because he was beginning to think it was time to end their relationship.

But before he could even bring up breaking off the engagement, she had beaten him to it.

“I don’t know what made her suddenly change her attitude, but it irritates me.”

“I’m starting to feel sorry for the Young Lady. She made such a spectacle of her hopeless unrequited love.”

“If I’ve put up with a foolish and troublesome woman for this long, haven’t I done more than enough?”

How much did you actually put up with?

The aide remembered how the Grand Duke had ignored Liviat at every banquet and swallowed the truth before it could escape his lips.

Well, it’s true that Young Lady Liviat was troublesome.

After working as the Grand Duke’s aide, he had discarded his conscience long ago.

All he could do now was hope that the Young Lady wouldn’t provoke the Grand Duke so badly that she lost her life.

“If you can break off the engagement this time, it’s actually an opportunity for us.”

“Exactly. As it happens, I’ve recently become interested in the Saint.”

“I’ll increase our donations to the temple and create an opportunity for contact.”

“The Saint is fundamentally different from a Count’s daughter who does nothing but act spoiled.”

Of course, when she proposed her conditions, she had seemed like an entirely different person.

Instead of noisily clinging to him as usual, she had been calculating her desired compensation for breaking off the engagement with a terrified expression.

Even so, it’s just another attempt to attract my attention.

The Grand Duke pushed the strange feeling he had experienced around Liviat out of his mind.

If it hadn’t been for the gold mine offered by the Count and the Emperor’s pressure, there would have been absolutely no reason for him to become involved with that woman.

Breaking off the engagement would also make it easier to win the Saint’s favor.

He needed to determine whether the Saint’s power, which was said to heal any wound, could also cure the strange illness he suffered from.

The Saint was his only hope of treating the condition that prevented him from seeing people’s faces.

He was satisfied that he had finally been given an easy opportunity to demand the end of his engagement.

Several days passed after the contract was signed.

I handed every bit of money I had received from the Grand Duke over to the Count.

With that amount, we could avoid the bankruptcy crisis that was looming over us.

“I thought I was going to turn my life around in one shot, but I guess my life is still exactly the same.”

For the first time in my life, I had held an enormous sum of money in my hands.

And it had disappeared almost instantly, becoming part of the family’s funds.

I didn’t regret it.

If I thought of it as the price I had paid for possessing this body, it wasn’t such a waste.

The problem was my escape fund.

“I need at least 100 gold. If that’s absolutely impossible, I need to save at least 50.”

No matter how hard I tried to stay optimistic, reality was merciless.

I searched through every book I could find, looking for a way to make money.

I was actually trying to gather information about this world, but Betty interpreted my seclusion in an entirely different way.

“Young Lady, how long are you going to lie around like a flower blooming on your bed just because you’re depressed?”

“A flower? Isn’t mold more appropriate in this situation?”

“Whether it’s mold or a flower, it’s because you miss the Grand Duke, isn’t it?”

It wasn’t unreasonable for Betty to misunderstand.

Ever since the Grand Duke had left, I had started shutting myself inside my room.

But it irritated me.

Of all people, there was no way I could possibly miss that dangerous man.

“What do I have to do to make you believe I have no feelings for the Grand Duke?”

“If that’s really true, then go outside and meet a friend or something!”

I was too busy trying to find a way to make money. What did I need a friend for?

“I don’t have any friends.”

“Even if you say that, you’ll have to go out today.”

Betty gave me a meaningful smile when I looked at her in confusion.

A short while later, I was standing in front of the bathroom, being led along by Betty.

I had been thinking about taking a bath anyway, so I obediently went inside.

As I sank into the bathtub filled with warm water, the stress-induced headache that had plagued me all day began to fade.

“Let’s not be impatient.”

The Count had agreed to the engagement being broken off, as long as I paid him 1,000 gold.

I remembered the look of shock on the Count’s face when he learned where the enormous sum of money had come from.

I couldn’t tell him that I had received it in exchange for staking my life.

When I finished bathing and stepped outside, Betty was waiting with a dress in her hands.

“What exactly is going on?”

“Actually, Lady Clover came to visit at the Count’s invitation.”

“Who is that?”

“Your only friend, Young Lady.”

Seeing Betty’s beaming face, I couldn’t bring myself to say anything.

All right. Let’s look at this positively.

Meeting someone close to you and releasing the emotions you had been suppressing could be effective in reducing anxiety and stress.

Betty’s prescription was somewhat one-sided, but it wasn’t entirely unreasonable.

“My memories aren’t completely intact. Is it really okay for me to meet a friend?”

“You’ll get used to her right away.”

“We’ve never had a fight or anything, have we?”

“No. She even listens to you praising His Grace the Grand Duke.”

She sounds like an actual angel.

Just as Betty suggested, I decided to try enjoying the situation.

Perhaps there was at least one normal human relationship in Liviat’s life besides the Grand Duke and her debts.

However, a short while later.

As I sat face-to-face with my friend in the drawing room, I struggled through an endless silence.

Wait. She said she was my best friend!

She showed absolutely no interest in me, making the word friend feel almost meaningless.

I cautiously called her by the title Betty had told me.

“……Lady Clover?”

“Just call me Clover. Why are you being so formal all of a sudden?”

Clover grumbled softly as she twisted a strand of her golden hair around her finger.

Her green eyes narrowed as she looked at me, and she was rather cute.

And then—

Silence again.

I wasn’t exactly someone who had much experience talking with friends, so I was flustered.

Wasn’t this the part where we were supposed to exchange greetings and ask each other how we’d been?

“Clover. What did we usually talk about when we met?”

“Not much?”

“Hmm. Maybe your collection of things related to the Grand Duke.”

I let out an inward groan at the burden of Liviat’s obsessive stalking.

Did she actually brag to her friend about that criminal behavior?

Unable to find a suitable topic of conversation, I eventually just kept eating cookies.

Clover looked annoyed as she demanded,

“A contract is a contract, so if you have something you want to say, say it quickly.”

“A contract?”

“I always carry it around because I knew you might start talking nonsense like this.”

Clover pulled a rolled-up parchment from inside her clothes and held it out to me.

I accepted the parchment with a somewhat bewildered expression.

The striking title written across the very top immediately caught my attention.

Friendship Contract

……What on earth was this?

I read the title about three times.

The contract contained a clause stating that, for the sake of maintaining a smooth social life, the two of us would become friends with each other.

How few friends must someone have to actually write a contract to make one?

This was the saddest piece of paper I had ever seen in my life.