It's Too Late for Regrets - Chapter 7.1

A sharp light flashed in the shaded green eyes.
“It’s a funeral, Your Majesty.”
To say that without swearing took bone-cutting patience.
The other was the Emperor of Lezan, the master of the noble Thousand-Year Empire protected by his own hands.

“Today is my wife’s funeral…”
“Who doesn’t know that?”
The Emperor of Lezan shrugged as if he had heard all kinds of nonsense.
“That’s a good thing. It’s almost like the symbol of Lezan and Eleanor Jenaire’s vassal has finally disappeared. And by her own feet, no less.”
It was as if he asked, You wanted that too, didn’t you? and the next words were no different.
“She was the woman you kept alive because you couldn’t kill her. The bastard of the Jenaire. Well… I didn’t expect you to have a child with her either.”

“Your Majesty.”

“But you won’t hand over the duchy, right? To secure the successor, you should accept a new partner quickly.”

“A new…”
While Rayan muttered absentmindedly, the Emperor glanced around, found someone, and waved happily.
“Count Irope is here too. His only daughter isn’t a bad match.”

Called by the Emperor, Count Irope and his daughter approached.

“Long time no see, Duke. You look pale. You’ve been through a lot.”
The Count greeted and gently pushed his daughter forward.
“This is my daughter. I sent you some letters before; do you remember?”
A woman with bright red, luscious hair shyly stepped forward.
Her golden eyes showed her hidden passionate love clearly.

“My name is Celia Irope, Your Majesty. We met a few months ago at the founding festival…”
Was that so? Rayan stared at the striking beauty and saw the tempting curve of her eyes.
It was a smile of clear intent from a woman in love.

Only then did he remember. Among the letters he had burned after Ines asked him not to accept proposals, the name Celia Irope appeared several times.

“How deeply you must be broken…”
Celia could not finish her sentence. Rayan’s expression, once blank, twisted fiercely in an instant.

“I’m, I’m sorry…”
He said nothing, but his sharp eyes and deadly presence were enough to make her step back.

The startled Emperor called him.
“Duke, what’s wrong?”

Rayan didn’t answer but looked around widely.
Among the dozens of mourners in the chapel, hardly anyone looked at Ines’s coffin. No one at all.
All who came to the funeral were looking only at him.
As if the real reason they visited the duchy was not to mourn but to see him.

They looked at him like he was the strange one for reacting sharply.
Like asking, What’s wrong with you?

The dozens of questioning eyes aimed at him took his breath away.
Rayan stepped back from the crowd with a confused expression.

But at that moment, a cold voice behind stopped his steps.
“A bastard of nobles and royalty… a being worse than vermin.”
It was Edgar’s voice.

“Something to be crushed before it even grows—a destroyer of the country and a stain on the family, isn’t it?”
Edgar came close from behind, smiling with only his mouth.

“Since that’s how it turned out, may the duchy’s future be full of blessings and prosperity.”
It was a congratulation closer to a curse.

Rayan bit his already cracked lips again and shook his head nervously.
“No.”
“What isn’t?”
“Ines is not that kind of woman…”

But before he could finish, Rayan realized where he had heard those words.
Suddenly, he felt a terrible chill, as if icy water ran from his head to toe.

What Edgar said was exactly the same as what he had once declared before the top nobles of Lezan, word for word.

That echo ringing in his ears was certainly Edgar’s voice, but the meaning inside felt strangely unfamiliar.

Am I the only one feeling this? Rayan desperately looked around for help.

Everyone in the chapel, including the Emperor, was asking him silently with their eyes.

What’s strange?
She was a dirty, lowborn bastard anyway.
You hated that, too, didn’t you?

“No, that’s not true.”
Rayan barely whispered through his tight throat.

“Ines is not a dirty woman, Your Majesty.”

“What?”
“Not a vermin-like person, no…”

Dirty. Low. Despicable. Worthless. Doomed.
None of the words that had always been attached to Ines’s name were true.
Ines was kind, pure, and so beautiful that no one could take their eyes off her.

Rayan could not finish speaking and pressed the back of his hand to his eyelids. It felt as if fire was burning inside.

“What are you saying, Duke?”
The Emperor’s voice was filled with anger.
“That woman came from Jenaire. Are you defending her in front of the master of Lezan?”

Hearing that, Rayan’s breath caught. He grabbed his own neck with his hand, almost choking himself.
It felt as if a glass wall surrounded him.

No matter how loudly he shouted she wasn’t that kind of person, no one believed him.
No one…

Seeing Rayan’s strange behavior, Kyra quickly tried to calm the mood.

“Still, the child lived in the mansion for almost six years, so the Duke’s feelings must be uneasy under the same roof. The Duke is such a kind and Jenaireous person. We ask for your kind understanding, Your Majesty…”

Rayan laughed bitterly.
If he had to pick who was uglier between him and her, it was obviously him.
He was the one who crushed her like a worthless thing, took away her freedom, locked her up, and never granted even the smallest wish she had…

Ines was still the dirty, despicable person, and he had become the kind and Jenaireous man.

Edgar, gripping his shoulder tightly, whispered low.
“Congratulations on finally getting what you wanted, brother.”

“…”

“Well then.”
Edgar smirked at him who was breathing irregularly and passed by.

Rayan clenched his fist tightly, staring at his cousin’s leaving back.
His head was dizzy. At the same time, he felt something was very wrong.

“This isn’t right.”

What meaning did a funeral have if no one mourned?

“This is… something…”

Rayan could not let Ines’s end be marked like this.
After the funeral, he could not bear to order her to be buried.
The glass coffin buried in white flowers was placed on the altar inside the chapel.

After Ines’s funeral, the Duke’s residence returned to normal as if nothing had happened.
Kyra opened the windows wide and enjoyed the warm late summer morning sun. The air was very fresh.
The mansion regained its noble and dignified atmosphere after the thorn in Eleanor’s side who had dirtied her name for six years disappeared.

The same went for the master of Eleanor.
On the outside, he looked the same as before.
He worked as usual, met nobles visiting the duchy, and checked international affairs centered on Lezan and Eleanor.
He even personally interrogated a captured barbarian tribe from the 4th Torgen expedition.
At a glance, he looked obsessed with work.

Though still pale from overwork, and sometimes stopping to stare deeply at some place in the mansion for no reason, he no longer showed strange behavior.

Kyra nodded with satisfaction.
“It’s time for the duchy to return to normal. It’s been too chaotic inside and out for too long.”

Thus, the terrible disgrace that Ines, the bearer of misfortune from Jenaire, had cast over Eleanor completely disappeared.

She died well, that wicked one.

She smiled broadly and turned to order the maid.
“Since the sun is good, prepare lunch in the garden.”
“Yes, Lady Kyra.”

Now everything was perfect.

Through the open window came loud laughter.
The voices of Count Irope, his daughter, and the Marquess and Marchioness of Lowd talking with Kyra could be heard clearly even in the hallway outside the Duke’s office.

Rayan glanced through the window of the office seen between the open doors.
A week had passed since Ines’s funeral. The world could not have been more peaceful.

At warm noon, nobles chatted happily in the beautiful garden full of autumn flowers.
Maids cleaned the mansion while chatting playfully, and the steward and head maid talked about the master’s health without stopping day or night…
Everyone acted as if nothing was wrong.

As if only Rayan was the one who suffered Ines Eleanor’s death.
As if only he saw this illusion.

“…”
Rayan stood in the hallway and looked down quietly at the woman before him.

You’re here again.

Since Ines’s funeral and her placement in the chapel, Rayan often ran into her in the mansion.
Today, it was in front of the office.

The ghost was vivid and lifelike. His reflection stood in her blue eyes.
His mind knew it wasn’t real, but his body reacted first.

“Ines…”

For a moment, a brief joy filled him.
Rayan realized he had just smiled and was shocked as his lips fell open completely.

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