The Villainess turns the Hourglass

Editor Group: Liber Reverie

Mielle, who confirmed the words again which she had heard as she had been bathing, was surprised and covered her mouth.

“… My brother Cain too…”

“There is no reason to call you alone! I think she’ll have dinner with you two. She ordered two more meals. That’s ridiculous.”

Annie had a feigned smile as if it was ridiculous, and yet Mielle was relieved that Aria was for her and Cain.

Aria’s mother was divorced on paper, but they were still a family, and Mielle didn’t like the simple uniform and room that could be seen as a commoner’s, but she was satisfied with this arrangement.

Of course, she did not intend to remain still and keep living as a commoner even if it was so. She was going to ask for a change in something she didn’t like.

“Anyway, Miss Aria has a lot of work to do, so enjoy your time. You may not have spare time anymore.”

“… What is she doing?”

Mielle asked a question as Annie tried to turn around because she suddenly wondered. Aria had always been busy doing something without having anything. As a result, she had invested in promising young businessmen, enlarged wealth and power, and made all the servants of the mansion be on her side.

Mielle had thought of Aria as a trivial thing, and that everything she had been busy with was no good, but she didn’t think like that anymore. So Mielle asked, and Annie looked genuinely surprised and asked, “Although you were in jail, don’t you know that?”

“…”

Mielle had been told that she was the most intelligent of the noble ladies until recently, but she knew nothing as Annie said, so she had no other words to say. What Mielle had known was nothing more than manners.

So when there was no answer, Annie, who put her hand on her waist, began to talk as if she were proud of herself.

“Miss Aria is in touch with the people who will fill the post on behalf of the nobles who committed treason, and with the Imperial Castle. There are a lot of vacant lands and government jobs.”

“Why does my sister do that?”

She asked as it was an unexpected answer, and Annie answered as if it were natural,

“The nobles she invested in will be there! They will not be granted the estate because they have no special accomplishments, but they will be given similar power because they have to manage it. She’ll be filling the labor shortage of the Imperial Castle with capable men from the academy, and she will let them learn the lack of skills in the academy. In many ways, they need the help of our lady. No, the empire will be ruined without her now.”

Annie said with exaggeration but to some extent it was true. Because a lot of nobles of the empire had been executed. All of those who filled the vacancy were lower nobles who had a relationship with Aria. The most competent of the commoners were to be put into filling the vacancy where the Aristocratic Party had been kicked out.

It was already publicly spread, and there was no need to hide it. Some had already been appointed formally. It was easy to do so because Aria’s side was also on the side of the Crown Prince, and it was also easy to take strong power, similar to the previous Aristocratic Party trying to neutralize the imperial power by concentrating their forces on the power institution.

“So, is my sister doing it in the middle?”

Aria was doing something more than she thought, and she could not hide her surprise, and Annie, excited by this, boasted of Aria, pretending to know the details.

“There are many others and so many that you dare not imagine. So she has taken the Crown Prince’s heart, unlike you, who was abandoned by your fiancée.”

‘Despite the difference between the heavens and the earth between the origin and the learning…’

“Well, anyway, you have to thank her for your rest and wait quietly because it’s not too long before you’re so comfortable.”

She left Mielle’s room, leaving a meaningful word for whether this was all she had to say or whether there was nothing more to be scornful about.

“Is my sister… the center of power like Miss Isis in the past? She is a commoner… and the daughter of a prostitute. However, Miss Isis doesn’t even … exist in this world anymore.”

Unable to realize Annie’s mocking, Mielle was shocked by the new information about Aria and spoke to herself, keeping her eyes in the air for a long time.

* * *

Dinner was late. They didn’t know what the main reason was. Thanks to that, Cain, who had been taken to the mansion for dinner, had to have the eyes of servants in the front hall for a very long time. There were a lot of things about Cain that would interest them. But what really caught their attention was Cain wearing the uniform of a pageboy.

As he was older, he was not a pageboy, but now he just entered the Imperial Castle, so he had no choice. It was because all the servants entering the Imperial Castle were selected at a young age. There were a few that went there after adulthood, so there was no dress for him.

“… Oh, my God.”

“Is that really Mr. Cain?”

“I feel like I saw something I should not see.”

The one, who they had served as their master, appeared in a dress of a pageboy, not a commoner’s dress, so they could not believe what they were seeing and was speechless. Nevertheless, the reason why they could not move their eyes off of him was that it was quite funny and strange that an adult was dressed in a pageboy uniform.

If he wasn’t really a crazy person, a grown man wouldn’t wear a child’s clothes, and no matter how the uniform fitted him, the shape and the pattern were the pageboy’s. Cain knew it, too, so he tried to pretend not to know, but eventually, he warned them to stop staring at him as if he didn’t overcome his shame.

“… What are you looking at?”

But it wouldn’t work. No, some of them had really moved their eyes off as it was shortly after their master had changed, but most of them looked at Cain with wide-opened eyes. It was because there was a man behind him like a watcher and because they thought he might overpower him, in case. The role of the watcher was that.

The servants now seemed to be in touch with the fact that Cain and Mielle had rebelled and that the prestigious family of Count Roscent had been ruined. However, Aria had not come down for long, and their mockery and curiosity continued for Cain, and it was not until late at night that Aria came down from her room to the first floor.

“Oh, my God. When did you come, brother? I didn’t know I was busy.”

She approached Cain with a soft step, pretending not to know it even though Jessie reported it to her several times.

“You must have a hard time coming here. I think we should eat quickly. Unfortunately, my mother is out, so we should eat first. Jessie, can you get me Mielle?”

The expression of Cain, who was ashamed, was loosened by her soft tone.

‘You saved me from the execution, who had participated in the rebellion, and made a way for me to live in the future, so how can I not be happy?’

“Let’s go to the dining room, brother.”

Aria’s soft smile lightened his steps to the dining room as if he were a nobleman in the past. Shortly after Aria and Cain arrived at the dining room, Mielle appeared. As Aria saw her panting, Mielle seemed to have waited a long time for this.

“Brother! Sister!”

Mielle raised her voice with a flushed face, and all the attention of the servants was focused on her. Although there was no aristocrat in this place, it was a frivolous behavior. She had been a beautiful noblewoman in the past, but she was so excited that she could not care about it. She hugged her brother Cain once who glanced over her with his surprised eyes and turned around to Aria.

“My elder sister, I wanted to see you.”

“Is that so? I’m sorry, I’m so busy… Just sit down. Let’s have dinner.”

She had a lot to say, but suddenly, she could not talk about it, so she nodded and sat down after finding her place.

“It’s already too late, but we’ll talk about it while we eat,” said Aria, putting the salad in her mouth.