Chapter 118: Chapter 118 Dahlia withered without blooming (3)
Francis freaked out when he asked that. Her eyes stopped rolling and her heartbeat seemed to stop as if she stopped breathing. The man stared at her coldly for a while.
“You don’t have to answer.”
Speaking as if he knew her response, he took back the document with her signature on it.
“I guarantee you one thing. If you violate any clause in it, namely if you appear before Wendy Waltz again, I will make sure that you get the maximum punishment you were supposed to receive originally. Oh, I will make sure that your last moments will be in Jacquelin prison before you serve out your terms. Keep in mind that this is not just a warning but a future that can come true,” the man said casually with a dry voice.
“I want you to know that all the words I’ve spoken to you were generous. I feel disgusted sitting in front of you and looking at your face. Today was the first time I have found it so difficult to hold back the urge to kill somebody.”
Although he spoke casually, there was an intense hostility in his words. Frightened, she strained her body and leaned back as if she wanted to move away from him. She was afraid that he would kill her right now.
“You… Who the hell are you? ”
She barely asked with a tense voice. Only then did he reply with a small smile on his face.
“I’m Lard Schroder, Captain of the 1st Imperial Knights. You’d better remember it because your life depends on me.”
He stood up without any hesitation. She trembled even at the small sound of the chair scratching across the floor when he stood up. She felt her hair stand on end with fear, but she wanted to ask him one thing. She had the guts to open her mouth before he left the room.
“Why are you so concerned about this case? Why are you being generous to me?”
It seemed that he would leave without replying, but he suddenly stopped at the door.
His gray eyes looked back at her with the kind of emotions he had never felt before.
“…Because Wendy Waltz’s pain is tormenting me,” he said with a quiet voice.
She looked at him in complete shock. There were mixed emotions on her lifeless face.
“… So, keep in mind that harassing her is nothing more than inviting a fight from me. I’m confident of winning the fight, and I’ll beat the opponent ruthlessly. I won’t show you mercy twice. Unless you are prepared to die, you and your family had better not provoke the fight.”
His calm warning alarmed her more powerfully than any other message.
After throwing a last glance at her as she held her breath, he turned and walked out of the room.
When the door closed, she lowered her head. In no time, her shoulders began to shake. Her miserable situation tormented her more than ever. Her punishment and fear of the future also plagued her mind, but that was not the only reason. The source of the teardrops falling on her cheeks was sadness foremost rather than fear.
His affection and constant support of Olivia, which she had not noticed at all, made her sad. More than any fearful words Lard threw at her, his love of Olivia Hazlet put her into irresistible sadness. Awareness of her own ignorance made her sadder than anything else.
‘Have I received that kind of love before?’
Lard’s words became a cruel dagger to her, who had not even received a little affection from Dylan though she had longed for it so much.
‘That man loves Olivia. Maybe Olivia loves him. She may be freed from her past life and perhaps she is already on the trajectory of life I don’t know. This commoner woman named Wendy Waltz may not be Olivia Hazlet.’
Her such assumptions made her hard to breathe.
She was confused. She suspected that the relationship between Dylan and Olivia was probably no more what she had imagined. She suddenly thought that her fury so far might have been meaningless. If she could, she wanted to erase all of these confused thoughts, but she kept thinking.
The fact that she alone was stuck in the past scared her.
‘If I lose something I have been hating so much, what should I do then?’
She was stricken with sorrow and fear, reflecting on her past for a while in the room left alone. There was nobody who could comfort her.
That evening the 1st Imperial Knights headquarters was disturbed by an unwelcome visitor.
There was screaming and shouting that rang through the building, and shortly afterwards, a knight entered Lard Schroder’s office. He spoke with a fatigued expression, “Captain, the visitor that you mentioned came. I’ve repeatedly refused her request to meet you… ”
“I heard the disturbance, too. I think her anger knows no limits. Let her in.”
There was contempt for her in his eyes. As the knight went out of the room, he turned the pages of the law book he had been reading. The book was thick and considerable and full of detailed clauses on the laws of the Benyahan empire. The pages of the book were worn out and discolored as if he had touched them several times.
A little later somebody knocked on the door, and when he gave permission, Mrs. Hazlet came into his office with the knight who had just left. Her face was burning with anger.
As if she was determined firmly, she was about to protest strongly. She opened her mouth as the knight nodded to him and left the room.
“My name is Anice Hazlet of the Hazlet family. I’m honored to see you, Duke Schroder, though it’s rude for me to come here. ”
The countess changed her expression and bent her knees. Her breathing showed her fatigue from a long day.
“If you knew it would be rude to come here, why did you want to see me?”
Seated in his chair, he asked calmly. The countess, who expected him to invite her to sit down out of courtesy, was annoyed when she was treated poorly.
“I know you’re busy, but my daughter is now in a precarious situation, so I came to see you with a sad heart as her mother,” she said, changing her expression once again.
Her pathetic voice trembled. She was doing her best not to annoy him to save her daughter’s life.
“I now know you are more patient than I thought… Can you get to the point? I have refused to see you to avoid this kind of war of nerves. You’re wasting my time now,” he said, turning a page of the law book. Her nose twitched when he said that. As she felt humiliated, she began to change her tone and asked sharply, “As you are so proud of your integrity, please tell me why you arrested my daughter so roughly. What crime did she commit?”
“There will be a trial tomorrow morning. It’s a private trial, so you won’t be able to observe it, but you’ll know when the verdict is delivered. You will see what crime your daughter committed and how generous punishment she will receive for her crime.”
“Why did you arrest my daughter by only hearing the ridiculous testimony from a back street bum? Is this the law of the empire?”
“Of course, I have other evidence. Your daughter has visited several detective agencies to cook up a scheme. I can present all the evidence I have. ”
“Who the heck is the woman who was injured? I want to meet her, so I can give her enough compensation. I’m willing to give her as much money as she wants, although I can’t admit that my daughter was involved in the crime. I’m going to give her enough compensation, so the injured woman would rather think of her wounds as a lucky occasion.” Mrs. Hazlet yelled, revealing her nasty attitude.
He frowned and glanced at her as if he was annoyed by her shrill voice.
“How vulgar you are! Why are you trying to save face and appease the wounded woman with money?”
“What… What did you say?”
“Olivia Hazlet. Is that name familiar to you? ”
When he mentioned her name, the countess stopped all of a sudden. Her shoulders moving up and down with anger stiffened. She swallowed while struggling to hide her embarrassed expression.
“She was expelled from my family… I don’t want to reveal the shame of my family… Why are you bringing up her name all of a sudden? ”
“Because Francis Hazlet ordered the man to kill her.”
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