Mistaken for a Wicked Woman!

“Was there no one next to her to help her?”

Since the Brights are quite famous in the capital, their offspring should have a companion or a chaperone to help her at all times. But where are they?

In response to my question, the crown prince gave a bitter smile.

“Unfortunately, Young Lady Bright had no friends. There were people who claimed to be but they were busy taking advantage of her, and the hard-bitten gentlemen of society viewed her as their prey.”

“Well… She was like a plant who grew up from a greenhouse, who finally got a chance to explore the world. She was hungry for affection, attention and affirmation from others. She could not distinguish between the good and the bad that was directed at her. She tried, but her inexperienced responses fostered the problem, and her clumsy handling made everything worse.”

‘Hmmm.’

“When the Young Lady Bright became embroiled in gossips, all of her friends turned against her, even her own chaperone condemned her behavior.”

‘It’s difficult.’

“I know it’s hard to understand, but the social world is like a battlefield without the swords. It’s a place where you can easily get swallowed if you show them a gap.”

When he realized that my expression was quite strange, he laughed bitterly.

“A battlefield huh… And Young Lady Bright is a loser in it?”

“In a way, yes. By the time I realized the problem, it was too late to do anything about it. There were all kinds of rumors about her, and people spent their time gossiping about it. No one believed her.”

“…Even the Duke and Marquis of Bright?” When I asked, the Crown Prince gave me a bitter smile instead of an answer. That alone tells me what the situation was like.

If even her own family couldn’t support her, then she must have been truly lonely.

“I can see why your highness would call her a victim, but what about the evil deeds she committed?” I asked, after having heard quite a few stories, the question still remained.

Even if she was witch-hunted by the social circles, it didn’t make sense that even commoners, not just nobles, would know about her. Something must have happened to imprint her as a Villainess in people’s minds.

“That’s…”

The crown prince opened his mouth to answer my question, but the aide who had given them tea and left the room, returned to report.

“Your Highness. There is an urgent messenger at the palace…” the aide said, carefully while handing a scroll over to the crown prince.

“Oh, no.”

The crown prince sighed softly as he read the message. He looked at me with an apologetic face. “What can I do? I’m afraid something urgent has come up and I won’t be able to talk to you anymore.”

“That’s okay.” It’s a pity, but it can’t be helped. I guess I should ask Sophie or the butler about it once I get back, maybe look for other information on my own.

But the crown prince suddenly stood up and asked me about my schedule, “Are you free in two days?”

“?”

“I’m sorry to send you away like this, but I’d like to talk to you if you’re free.”

“Oh, that’s…” I trailed off, unable to answer right away.

“Can’t I?”

I hesitated to answer, and he looked at me with the eyes of a hopelessly abandoned puppy.

“No, I can. I’m actually free.”

In the end, I lost the eye contact battle. Having accomplished his goal, the crown prince grinned and held up his pinky finger, snapping it lightly.

“Very well, then, I’ll send someone to arrange the details.”

So an appointment was made. All because of that pretty face. As I stared at it, admiringly, the crown prince in his overcoat approached me again.

“Do you know why I had a favorable impression of Young Lady Bright?”

“Ugh?”

“That’s because I’m a little sorry for her.”

“You’re sorry?”

“Yes. The Young Lady Bright used to be my half-brother’s fiancé, though they’ve since broken up.”

The crown prince’s half-brother? So a prince? My jaw dropped at the unexpectedness of it all.

I remember the receptionist saying something about the second prince before.

“His Highness the Second Prince?”

“Hmm? Didn’t you know?”

I blinked in surprise, and the Crown Prince smirked. “It was said that it was Young Lady Bright’s fault, that their engagement was broken, but… It was actually our fault. But… Ever since that incident, the Young Lady hasn’t been seen in the capital, and that’s why I felt a bit sorry for her.”

“Your Highness..!”

As the crown prince opened his mouth to say something again, a surprised aide interrupted him in a fidgety tone.

“There’s no time to delay, you must go.”

“Alright.” The crown prince sighed, he seemed tired of the aide’s urgings, and swept a hand through his hair. As I watched his emerald hair cascade down his back, he smiled wickedly at me.

“I’ll see you in two days, then.”

Stop smiling so beautifully!

⚘

“Wow.”

‘Is that me, or Young Lady Bright?’

I’m not lying, it was really creepy. I got goosebumps. I couldn’t take my eyes off Young Lady Bright’s portrait, and I slowly clasped my arm in bewilderment.

“Wow.”

Sophie, next to me, exclaimed as well.

I turned her way. She seemed to have just come out of the room and had seen something new.

“Now that I look at it, you two are so identical. It’s like you had a mirror in front of you!”

I nodded with a dumbfounded look on my face.

“Yeah…”

I can now understand why People are so confused. I thought that we must have looked a little alike but it was more than I imagined.

Looking at her gentle smile in the portrait, it was like looking into a mirror.

“From here to there, it’s all portraits of Lady Archie. A painter would often come to paint her portrait every year.”

I followed Sophie’s lead and examined the paintings of Young Lady Bright hanging in the corridor, one by one. The long, winding corridor was ghostly with the traces of her life, from her infancy to her most recent appearance.

“Amazing.”

That was all I could say. I could have sworn that all the portraits here were of me, except for the hairstyle and clothing. It hadn’t occurred to me yet that the Bright family were my family, but after seeing the portrait of Young Lady Bright, I realized that we were indeed twins.

The butler and nanny must have known, too, and my mind raced as I thought of the two of them in the manor. In fact, when I told them I wanted to go to the capital to become an imperial knight, they raised their hands in opposition.

‘No way, not until this old man dies!’

‘Miss, now is not a good time… Why don’t you give up this time and wait for another time?’

At that time, I couldn’t figure out why they were so against it… But now I understand. The butler and the nanny probably expected this, but they couldn’t break my stubbornness. They were the two who knew my dream of becoming a knight better than anyone else. In the end, they agreed to let me go to the capital with somber faces, ‘If anyone follows you, run away.’

‘If anyone pretends to know you, ignore them.’

‘If anything happens, contact me.’

‘If it’s too hard, you can always give up and come back.’

‘I’m not a child.’

They were so worried about everything, and so I made a lot of promises, but now that this all happened, it all finally made sense. The butler and nanny had been serving the Sabrina family for generations. After my maternal grandfather and grandmother died in a tragic accident, they raised my mother, the only child, like she was their precious treasure.

Despite my mother’s lack of awareness as a lord, the Sabrina estate was still able to survive to this day thanks to the butler and nanny. They are truly fierce vassals.

It’s not hard to imagine what those two would have thought of the Bright family for hurting my mother so badly. The people of the Sabrina estate are infinitely tolerant of those within their borders, but they are brutal to those who are not.

To my mother they were such a sore thumb. But to them, the Bright family was their mortal enemy. But, yeah.

“That’s still too much…”

“?”

“No. Nothing.”

Oops, I must have let the words slip out of my mouth. I quickly shook my head as I watched Sophie blink in confusion.

“Sophie.”

“Yes, miss.”

“Young… No, no. You said Archie knew about me.”

“That’s right.”

“Do you know what she thought of me?”

“Ugh. I’m not sure about that.” Sophie’s eyes widened in embarrassment at the unexpected question. “All I know is that Lady Archie was greatly humiliated by the family for claiming to be lady Iris, and that the Duke went to great lengths to…”

“Wait, what are you talking about?”

“Didn’t you know? The Duke wanted to claim the rights to raise you, and there was a big fight.”

“I had no idea.”

What is going on? Every time there’s new information, I suddenly get a headache and press my temples together. I felt like my brain was overloaded with information. “Is there anyone else who knows what happened?”

“Well, maybe the butler and Mrs. Elena would know.”

“Mrs. Elena?”

“Yes, Lady Archie’s nanny ever since she was three years old. She’s not here right now, though.”

“Why, where did she go?”

Sophie’s face visibly darkened.

“That’s because… She went out to look for Lady Archie herself.”

Sophie said in a melancholic tone.

“Mrs. Elena knows Miss Archie well…. She’s been running away often, but it’s the first time that she hadn’t heard from her for this long, so she decided to leave to find her whereabouts.”

“I see.”

“His Excellency searched continuously, but there was not even a hair of her to be seen, so there were rumors circulating about this and that. You may not know it yet, but Miss Archie is quite famous in the capital.” Sophie smiled wryly and turned away. Whether or not the Young Lady Bright was a famous Villainess in the capital or not, no servants of the Mansion are allowed to speak ill of her as their Lady.