The following day marked the first gathering of the entire inner household, maids and the two sisters included. Arabell had acquiesced without any resistance but bringing out Meisie, who had been particularly adamant about staying cooped up in the room, had been particularly harsh. As far as the heir of the manor and other maid promotions were concerned, everyone had dropped their hopes and burned them inside their hearts. The step-sisters knew they were better off marrying outsiders as one had become a murderer, and the other had a disfigured face. Well, it was a scar hardly as large as my lady’s, but to noblewomen, it was equivalent to having their hands chopped off.

Of course, the ones to blame were none other than spiteful men of the era and their deranged political maneuvers. And their craze for collecting beauties.

I wasn’t concerned about the fate of noblewomen either way. My lady was unlikely to welcome any men to the family, so the maids had to vanquish their hopes of earning a male heir.

A few guards were also stationed close to the foyer, and my lady stood at the top of the stairway leading to the first floor, her two sisters beside her. One undead and Igan standing slightly away from her. Maids were gathered around the entire entryway, more than thirty in number, their gazes strapped with the uneasiness of their fate. Even those with higher ranks, one who wore white kirtles, were worried out of their minds since they had disregarded my lady all this while.

“The demise of the lady of the household must have hit you hard,” my lady spoke, her voice harsh enough to make everyone flinch at her address, “and I am the least bothered to offer solace. After all, one among you bitches murdered her. I wouldn’t call out the name of the person. Neither do I know who, and I am not interested in investigating. If the culprit doesn’t come forth, then I will personally see to it that the guards will behead all of you right now. I hated her, but it wasn’t your place to carry out the sentence. You are ragged commoners beneath the soles of my shoes, and you dare act up in my absence? Just because I ignored everyone doesn’t mean I don’t remember the snickers.”

She paused, running her eyes over the crowd. “You both can move aside. Thank Rudolf for his grace, or you would have been the first ones to face the brunt of my ire.”

No one moved until two brunettes stepped out of the crowd and prostrated before my lady gratefully and scurried to the side.

“Now, I will ask one more time,” she took a deep breath, moving her cold gaze across each one of them. “Who killed lady Marlica?”

“Kiarne did it, lady Letitia,” a shout came from the center with no hesitance. Life for mortals was bread for me. “I saw her pour the poison into the cup of lady Marlica’s tea personally.”

Mortals would do anything to save their skin. It wouldn’t matter whether the person they pushed to the gallows would be a friend, family, lover, or undead. All the exceptions get watered away through many epochs.

“Guards,” Letitia said after brief deliberation. They had never obeyed her before, but after the death of Arabell’s fiancé, there was no heir to the mansion. She was the highest-ranked person in the household, so not listening to her was a crime worthy of getting buried alive. “Kill this maid. I don’t need loose mouths in the manor.”

Everyone gasped in surprise, and I smiled brightly from the sidelines. Igan moved away from me, albeit slightly.

“Lady Letitia!” the woman shouted. She was old enough to be her mother, but alas, I had never taught her to respect the elderly. If anything, the elderly should die first because their values are deep-rooted and unchangeable. “I just did as you said, right?! How come I am the one getting beheaded? What kind of absurdity is this?!”

“Didn’t you hear me?!” she bellowed, and the guards dragged the maid away, and her wails filled the room. She even blatantly cursed my lady, and I cast [Quanmire] on her before she disappeared behind the ostentatious doors.

“Kiarne,” my lady called out again, and the crowd parted, letting a maid close to my lady’s age into her sight. “Who ordered you to kill the lady of the house? Oh,” my lady paused and smiled, “former lady of the house.”

That must have felt great because Marlica often referred to lady Chantelle using the same address.

Kiarne’s wails were loud and miserable enough for a few older servants to shed some tears, and my lady clicked her tongue. “Will you talk?”

“I-I d-don’t know, l-lady Le-Letitia,” she prostrated on the ground. “A masked… masked silhouette asked me to p-pour some poison in lady’s wine, threatening t-to k-kill my f-family b-back in the village.”

My lady paused to stare at me impeccably, and I just shrugged. We could always use people who have killed once before because they wouldn’t hesitate to do it twice.

“Lock her in the guard quarters for a fortnight,” my lady said. “Feed her enough so that she wouldn’t starve to death.”

That earned my lady stares of displeasure and hatred from around the room. No one refuted her words, and the punishment was carried out amidst shouts of gratitude, unlike before. Alas, she would wish she had died if she knew about our plans for her. Not that we had any at the moment, but having an extra murderer roaming around didn’t do much harm to the manor in general.

“Henceforth, all are demoted to basic rank for maids. Those who shall serve well will be promoted, and those who don’t will be kicked out of the manor. If you find this discourteous, leave now. If you have complaints, you will be flogged. I’ve heard enough of your snickers and seen enough disrespect in the manor. Everyone will report to Igal for duty,” my lady pointed at the woman beside me, who didn’t flinch under the hateful gazes. “She’s the new head maid. I will appoint two more based on your performance in the next few days. If you try to flatter your way up the ranks, you are better off not staying in the manor anymore.”

My lady grew silent, and everyone dispersed to their duties without a single complaint. Some were relieved at having been given a chance to continue their term in the manor, while some were enraged at the demotion and my lady’s tyrannical rule. But if nothing worked, then we decided to replace the entire working staff of the manor. Money was our next problem, but that discussion had to wait.

She turned to the two sisters beside her. “And what did you do in my absence? Fight and lead the manor to ruin? I’m surprised there was no mutiny in the house. If this were a camp, then I would have been greeted with your heads and a charred mansion.”

“But she cut my face!” Meisie shouted at Letitia’s face, which earned her a sharp slap across her reddish scar.

“And what did you do, bitch?” my lady took a step forward, and Meisie retreated. “Feed her to horny vermins? Just because you wanted to become the heir of this shitty household?!”

Meisie’s hatred couldn’t be any more apparent. She gritted her teeth and shouted, “How dare you raise your hand at me?! Mother–“

Another slap, and now [Ice shards] shook before Meisie violently. “That vile bitch is dead. She’s becoming dog food somewhere in the gallows. Do you want to follow her in death?”

An aggrieved look, but Meisie bowed her head.

“Answer me, bitch!” my lady bellowed, her countenance the most ruthless I had ever seen. I hadn’t wiped off my grin since the morning. This was what I trained her to become. Her true self, beneath all her sweetness and playfulness.

“I don’t,” the answer was shallow.

“Then I want you to behave yourself this day on,” my lady said. “Stay quiet within your confines, and I don’t want to listen to your annoying voice. You were ready to destroy your sister for the sake of status; who knows what other schemes you would try underneath that harmless look? Ah, scarred looks.”

She almost clawed at my lady’s face, and I stood before her immediately, my gaze forcing her to retreat a few steps. There were visible tears on her face, and she ran away from the top of the stairs to her room in the left wing. She had changed her rooms, I noticed.

“Thank you, Letitia,” Arabell said, this time with proper etiquette that she had forgotten to use while in the bloodied room. “I never got a chance to do it with grace before.”

“I didn’t do it for you,” my lady rolled her eyes. “I hate scheming women. Your mother was one, and so is Meisie. You should have killed her instead of just going for her face.”

Arabell laughed at that and wiped the tears from her eyes. “I don’t understand why I hated you in the past, sister.”

My lady raised her eye at that and clicked her tongue. “Call me Letitia. I’m no one’s sister.”

“You are my sister,” Arabell said again, freeing herself from the shackles of the world. Guess a murder was all it took for her. “And you will be my sister for as long as I live. These past days had been dreadful for me, but my hope for your return never allowed me to take the poison rotting in my room. And I never will because I have something better than a fake family. A woman who lays herself bare in front of others. And I will do the same for you, sister.”

“I wear clothes,” my lady rolled her eyes. “And you will do that same. And,” she gave me a sly smile, “Rudolf is your in-law if I’m your sister.”

“W-what?” That made three of those, but my lady just shrugged and walked toward the door. “Aren’t you coming, mongrel?”

I shook my head in helplessness and smiled at Arabell. “I haven’t forgotten anything, lady Arabell. One wrong step and you are going to places worse than the gallows.”

That made her quiver because she had seen me revel in the bloodshed a few nights ago. “I will not disappoint you, brother-in-law.”

I coughed and shook my hand. “Rudolf, please. You don’t have to follow everything she tells you. Particularly if it’s about me.”

She smiled at me and bobbed her pony, her previous downcast mood nowhere in sight. Murder was justified in the victim’s eyes for self-defense, and that was how she got rid of the guilt.

Yes, the hypocrisy of mortals. They were just interested in finding loopholes to justify their wrong deeds. For me, a slaughter was a slaughter. There were no two kinds.

Arabell wasn’t just the villainess’s step-sister anymore. She would become her own person and make her own decisions from this day on. Whether for better or worse, I didn’t know. But I was looking forward to seeing if her new persona would become her new demise.

Our next destination for the day was Joane’s house. I would be lying if I said I wasn’t excited to see Yule again. Unless someone chopped its neck off, a sealed demon dog could live a long life. So, we could spend a few good thousand years hunting for bread, and then I could feed it more life force to continue on. Later I could summon it after I transmigrate to more worlds, and we could continue our quest for more bread.

I followed my lady, and her mood improved considerably after a short stroll. A smile was back on her face as she crossed the market plaza, and she was looking forward to her first baking lesson. Perhaps, I might taste the best bread ever today. Maybe she was a prodigy who could bake bread with her eyes closed.

Expectations were unwarranted.

I was reminded of the hard truth again.