Inside Rose Blanche's Matronne's room, the matronne sat in her chair behind her desk, with her daughter, Emma, also known as Lady Orchid, standing beside her; facing them were Shania and Aryan.

"So, did you get what you came here to get?"Lady Orchid inquired on the matronne's behalf.

"Yes, we did, and for that, the mother extends to you her gratitude for your cooperation on this specific matter," Shania answered in a monotone voice.

"Child, may I ask what exactly you came here to look for—for you to even put your life on the line as bait to get your hands on it?" The Lady Orchid asked.

The answer to that particular reason had every reason to spark the Lady Orchid's curiousity, as two months ago, roughly a couple of weeks after rumors about the Holy Paladin Gunther’s fate began to spread, she and the Matronne had been reached out to by the Aristocracy, the same Aristocracy responsible for Gunther Freshet’s rumored death, the Matronne’s son, and the Lady Orchid's brother.

With Mael, their only true noble ally, still imprisoned and Arte, who had only recently taken over the duty his Master had assigned him, making him inexperienced to deal with such serious matters, they had no choice but to accept the aristocracy's assistance.

The said assistance came in the form of one girl, Shania, who was there to, from within the establishment, investigate the rat’s identity.

Though the Matronne and Lady Orchid were perplexed as to why the aristocracy would send merely a girl instead of anyone else, they voiced no complaint.

In their efforts to seamlessly integrate the girl as a flower of the establishment, they mistakenly permitted a third party, which they initially assumed to be among the people sent by the aristocracy, to integrate the rose blanche's rank. It was only later that it was revealed to them that the third party was a bona-fide noble, a friend of Arte, who was there to offer up her assistance on the case of the flower abduction.

Stuck between a rock and a hard place, the aristocracy, who had already infiltrated their flower rank and a clueless noble there on behalf of the Rose Blanche’s clueless protector, the matronne, came to take the decision to have both proceed as they wished to, to observe how things would unfold.

The matter eventually evolved, or should one say devolved; this time four girls were abducted, including both noble girls, the aristocracy envoy, and the girl who the matronne and Lady Orchid knew were Mael's ears and eyes. From his detention cell, Mael made a point of not getting involved in this particular matter because the church's involvement could be smelled from miles away.

In the end, the girls’ abduction triggered a reaction from the three parties: the aristocracy, Arte, and Mael, and the final outcomes became what they are today. While the reasons for Mael and Arte's involvement were clear, the reasons for the aristocracy's involvement remained a mystery to the Matronne and Lady Orchid; they knew from the start that they were after something, but neither of them knew what it was.

A guess that made them look in a positive light at the aristocracy after what they'd done to the Holy Paladin Freshet was that they could be after the Archbishop, whom the Matronne and the Lady Orchid consider a threat to their business and family.

Unfortunately for Lady Orchid, the only answer she got was, "I’m sorry, but I don’t think it is within my authority to reveal what we came here to seize. Besides, it is, in my opinion, in your best interest to be ignorant of what this whole thing was about."

"Is that so?"

"It is. You and this establishment are now free of the fear of having your flowers abducted and rats among your ranks."

At the mention of "rats," both Matronne and the Lady’s back straightened.

"Where is she?" The Matronne inquired.

"With us."

"With you… Can we see her?" Lady Orchid asked, sweat already beading her pale face.

"You really want to see her? Well, I figured you'd want to, so I brought her, but I must warn you all, she's been slightly... brutalized."

Lady Orchid's worst nightmare came true when she saw Shania approaching them and reaching for the bag she was carrying, instead of going to the door to let the woman she claimed was with her in. The girl retrieved something from the bag and placed it on the table, presenting it to Matronne and Lady Orchid.

It was a head—a severed one.

Though both of them averted their gaze from it, the moment the girl retrieved it from her bag, they knew that that head belonged to the woman working with the one abducting flowers from them, the woman that Mael went after during their speech. It seemed that she ultimately ended up in the hands of the aristocracy.

"I’m sorry for her state; it seems that while I had been abducted, some of my comrades took my abduction in a very wrong light and vented their anger onto her." Shania threw a discreet glance at the boy accompanying her. "I'm so sorry for this; I'm sure you would have preferred to personally pass judgment on her for what she'd done."

"No, that's fine; now, please put that away."

"Okay." With a casualness worthy of the coldest murderer, she stuffed the head back into her bag. "Anyway, you’re free of this burden now. Run this establishment as you always have. This might be a strange thing to say, but in the span of the few weeks I remained here, I managed to find warmth and kinship within these walls. The facts are that I would be lying to you if I were to tell you that I came here without any preconceived beliefs about this place or what you were doing here. Heck! Before coming, I even imagined that the Matronne was a horrible person who sold innocent girls for profits, which, in a sense, is quite true, but still, in my eyes, you turned out to be a far more decent person than I expected," the girl unfilteredly remarked.

Still not done, Shania went on, "Throughout these few weeks, I've come to understand that, while profits are a focus for you and this business, you're trying, to the best of your ability, to help these girls out; I can only but respect that."

"Thank you… I suppose."

"It was merely my thoughts on the matter, nothing to thank me for. Now then, we will look forward to working with you and the Rose Blanche again in the future, or not. Anyway, I will take my leave now." As the girl claimed, the boy reached out to her, and they teleported away.

With them gone, both Matronne and Lady Orchid let out a really loud sigh.

"Perhaps I am too old for this job."

"You are not the only one feeling so, Mother."

"Perhaps you and I should retire from this position in which we have crucified ourselves."

"Those are his words, aren’t they?"

The words the Matronne spoke were those of Holy Paladin Gunther Freshet. These words were spoken by the Paladin about seven months ago, shortly after he learned of the return of the person known as the Faceless One to the continent.

"They are."

Sighing at the memories of her departed little brother, she remarked, "That was an advice he should’ve kept for himself. Had he, perhaps he would’ve been at our sides, and all these deaths would’ve been avoided. "

There were few secrets between the Matronne, Lady Orchid, and the Holy Paladin Gunther, so naturally the two of them knew what Gunther had done nine years ago or so to the boy that would later be known as the Faceless.

From the moment Gunther learned of the Faceless One's return, he knew he would be coming for him, so he made all preparations for what he knew would be the end of the line for him, while appearing to go about his normal life as if he didn't know doom was coming.

Among the preparations he put in place were having Mael become much more personally involved in the Rose Blanche and having Arte take over his role as the Rose Blanche's protector before his death.

In both these initiatives, he was successful: Arte took over his master’s duty, and Mael went even to the length of involving himself and his name in manslaughter to protect the Rose Blanche from the ploy put in place by the Archbishop to usurp Matronne’s place at the head of the Rose Blanche, the greatest establishment of this kind in the holy city and most likely also on the continent, to have it fulfill whatever scheme he had for it.

"Perhaps, …. But here we are. That was the way he was; I could hardly see him running away from a fight, even though he knew it was a foreseeably lost one."

"Yep. Now look at us. It seems that stubbornness is a trait still running strong within the veins of those born in this family."

"It seems."