Duke, Please Fail! - Chapter 93

Episode 93

“They didn’t really do anything, it was like they slowly became citizens of Attenu, and if there hadn’t been a war, no one would have known they were brainwashed spies.”

They stayed dead as a doornail and then sold military intelligence when the time was ripe for war with Desatell. But,

“Why is that Leonel’s fault?”

“Because I informed Leonel of this fact.”

“……”

“If that guy considered us real friends, he would have pulled Tatiasun out of the battlefield before he betrayed us!”

Leonel wouldn’t have done that. A person who hesitated even to kill a wolf would not have killed a friend. If he were ambitious, he would have at least considered suspicion, but Leonel had no desire for power. 

All he wanted was to survive.

“There must be a misunderstanding. He may have received the news late…”

“No. I sent the letter at the beginning of the war.”

“Then, maybe he didn’t receive the letter?”

Adelhardt let out a bitter laugh.

“When you return, make sure to visit the capital, Nelly. I still have his reply in a drawer in my room.”

“……”

“He told me not to worry about Tatiasun’s affairs. I believed only that. The three of us were like brothers. But…”

Leonel had killed him. If he had sent Tatiasun to the capital, military information wouldn’t have fallen into enemy hands. Then Tatiasun would be alive, and military secrets would have been safe, significantly reducing casualties. 

Leonel had neglected something he could have stopped. 

If the prince’s words were true, that’s what it meant.

“But Leonel has no reason to do such a thing.”

“He was acknowledged by the king for capturing the spy. He gained support from the nobles. Everyone is going crazy saying that he should be the next in line for the throne.”

“He killed a friend because he wanted to become king? Leonel?”

Does he believe that?

The prince affirmed with silence.

“It’s absurd. He has no interest in the throne.”

“If he had no interest, he wouldn’t have tried to kill me. He probably wouldn’t have stayed on the battlefield right after establishing his position, as if he was waiting.”

“It sounds like you’re suggesting that Leonel went to the battlefield to set a precedent as if he wanted the throne.”

My tone involuntarily turned sharp.

“You hit the nail on the head.”

“No, I didn’t.”

The prince looked down at me with an irritated expression. I didn’t avert my gaze.

“Leonel left the battlefield because he wanted to escape the nightmare. I told you. He killed a friend and suffered.”

“……”

“If he really aimed for the throne, he wouldn’t have tried to avoid the war even if it meant defying the king.”

“Who said such things?”

His face was full of mockery. It seemed as if he thought I would unquestionably believe whatever Leonel or his cronies said.

“I heard it directly from Her Majesty and Leonel himself.”

“Her Majesty?”

“Yes. Her Majesty said she would impose the crime of rebellion and execute Leonel unless he proves his usefulness within five years, other than killing people.”

Expression vanished from his face.

“So, his journey to the battlefield… wasn’t to vie for the throne?”

With a gaze clouded by confusion, the prince looked at me. I roughly understood how misunderstandings had piled up.

Even now, Leonel hesitated to speak about the memory of his betrayal.

When he was pushed to the battlefield, it was shortly after losing his parents due to betrayal, so he probably couldn’t trust others as much as he does now.

He would have been more guarded against those close to him. Even now, he warns me not to trust friends, but it would have been even more so back then.

Leonel remained silent, and the prince misunderstood.

With emotions already deeply entrenched, Tatiasun had died, and their relationship had become irreparable.

‘If only the misunderstanding could be cleared up…’

Both Leonel and the prince seemed to long for the time they had spent together.

It felt like there was something more to say. 

I was about to ask if he had tried talking to Leonel, but the prince muttered quietly.

“But the fact that Leonel killed Tatiasun remains unchanged.”

It was a cold and empty voice. He turned abruptly without giving me a chance to hold onto him.

“The walk is over. Let’s go inside.”

The knights approached and shielded my view. They lightly bound my hands and lifted me.

I was moved to the room. As soon as my wrists and blindfold were loosened, I looked for the prince. However, there were only armed people around me.

“Please rest for a while. We will bring you dinner when it’s time.”

One person spoke politely and led the others out of the room.

I was left alone. The prince seemed to have a lot on his mind, so he wouldn’t be coming in for a while.

‘This is an opportunity.’

I opened the window wide. It was still high, and my body trembled at the thought of descending, but I couldn’t think of any other way.

‘But tearing the bedsheet would be too conspicuous.’

If someone entered while I was in the middle of it, I would surely be caught. After some thought, I removed the inner sheet. The bed was quite large, and a decent-sized piece of fabric came off.

If I gathered all the inner curtains, they seemed long enough when connected.

‘But I’m not sure if lace curtains can support my weight.’

Even if I tore them to make them longer, they didn’t seem sharp even after rubbing my eyes. There was no mirror either, so that was all there was to it.

‘Break the glass?’

No, if I did that and got caught, it would be over before I even attempted to escape. I pressed my ear to the door and listened to the sounds outside. Once I was sure it was quiet, I removed all the curtains.

Since there were six of them, when connected, it would be about six stories high.

‘With the sheet, I can make it down!’

With furtive glances, I firmly tied the curtains together. They were so heavy that I couldn’t lift them all at once.

I tied the fabric to the pole and pulled it several times. It didn’t seem like it would come undone.

I opened the window and slowly lowered the curtain outside the window on the opposite side, checking the sounds outside the door once more before looking out.

‘Okay. I can do it. You can do it, Nelly Pepper! Be brave.’

I took a deep breath and jumped in place. I removed the belt, put the curtain-made rope inside, and tightened it again. This way, even if I lost my grip, the rope wouldn’t slip through my hands and fall.

Since I wouldn’t have the strength to hold on, I wound the rope around my forearms.

By pushing the sagging rope up, I figured I could safely reach the ground.

‘I have to do this. Can I do it?’

I tightly closed my eyes, opened them, and cautiously climbed over the window railing.

The rope tightened around my forearms, and I had to be careful not to break it. It felt like it might snap if I made a mistake. I wrapped the rope around my legs as well to distribute the weight carefully as I descended.

Though my belt snagged on the knot occasionally, it was relatively smooth.

‘Alright, just a bit more…’

I could almost reach the ground, but for some reason, I didn’t think the distance was decreasing.

What’s going on? Why does it feel like I’m getting farther away?

Panicking, I picked up the pace. The remaining rope below was getting shorter, but the height seemed almost unchanged.

“No way…”

As I gazed upward, I could see a large hand pulling the curtain rope.

No, this can’t be happening. I was so close to succeeding!

I can’t be caught like this. I don’t know what they’ll do to me after attempting an escape. They might have been kind so far because I behaved myself.

I looked down again. The rope was just barely touching the ground. It felt like it might slip away in a moment, but for now, it was okay.

I desperately untied the curtain wrapped around my forearms. Once the cloth wrapped around my legs was also released, I relied on my strength and the belt to hang onto the building.

‘I feel like I might faint out of fear.’

Still, with my eyes tightly closed, I exerted my strength. The rope hanging by the belt began to slide. I clenched the rope whenever the speed seemed too fast.

After a few repetitions, I was getting closer to the ground. However, the pulling from above was accelerating, so the rope was already quite far from the ground.

When I reached the second-floor height, I closed my eyes tightly and jumped down.

“Ah!”

I felt like my body was plummeting, but then I suddenly collided with something. When I opened my eyes, I saw the prince lying beneath me. I had intended to get up right away, but the prince’s hands were faster.

He turned his body and took over above me, then got up and extended his hand.

“Are you okay?”

“How did you know?”

“My room is right below. I saw something crawling down outside the window.”

He grabbed my arm and helped me up. There were already guards around us. It was only then that I truly realized my escape had failed.

‘He told me not to try to escape…’

I tried to hide my fear as I looked at the prince.

He chuckled as he looked at the curtain-made rope.

“Even though you’re so afraid…”

He sighed, and whether it was admiration or exasperation, I couldn’t tell. He turned to me, his brows furrowing.

I involuntarily took a step back, but he caught my hand.

“You’re bleeding.”

“Let me go.”

“Okay, I understand. But let’s start with treatment. Are you hurt anywhere else?”

The prince asked with concern. Given that armed men were surrounding us, his face didn’t seem very princely as he advised against attempting to escape.

I didn’t particularly appreciate his attitude. After all, if he hadn’t kidnapped me in the first place, I wouldn’t be in this desperate situation trying to escape.

However, I didn’t want to harbor outright animosity either. My emotions were a bit conflicted.

“I’m not.”

As soon as he released my hand, my vision was obstructed again. The prince initially attempted to tie my wrist but sighed and left it be. Then, he removed the blindfold.

Perhaps he’s letting me go? I looked at him with a hopeful expression, but he shouted from above.

“Lower the rope!”

Why was the rope suddenly being lowered?

The rope that had been pulled up touched the ground once more. The prince wound the rope around my body several times and then pulled it twice, lifting me along with the rope.

“What are you doing!”

“I can’t tie you up because of the bruises on your wrists, and I don’t think you’d listen if I told you not to take off the blindfold.”

“That’s not how…….”

“See you upstairs.”

The prince and the guards moved farther away as they waved their hands. The prince had entered the tower, but the armed men remained where they were.

As I was being pulled upward, I made an effort to only look at the wall, so I didn’t realize the height until I was being hoisted back up to the sixth floor. 

With my eyes tightly shut, I waited, and in no time, I was back to the sixth floor. 

When I came back up, the prince was sitting on the couch with a vial of medicine. 

“The knot you made on the pillar was rather loose; if it had come undone, you’d have been in trouble. I told you I’d release you when the time came, so why go through all this trouble? Look at this, all bruised, bleeding, and battered.”

After delivering this grumbling with a sigh, he returned to his room.

Not much time passed before it was time to eat. I had intended to hide a knife, but all I had was a spoon. The meat had been precut into bite-sized pieces.

‘I wonder if there’s a secret passage? In novels, towers like this always have one.’

I waited for nightfall and moved discreetly. I inspected all suspicious decorations and knocked on the floor and walls, hoping to find an exit. However, what came out wasn’t a secret passage but Prince Adelhardt. He climbed up with a tired expression and sighed.

“Nelly. Please. Stop pounding the floor. I need to get some sleep too.”

“Are you sure there isn’t one?”

“Even if there was, it wouldn’t be here. Who would be foolish enough to lock a hostage in a room with a secret passage?”

He was right, so I nodded my agreement. The prince asked me to be quiet once more and turned away, but he wasn’t able to rest in peace.

“Your Highness, Duke Altwood has arrived.”

It was Leonel who had come.

“Now?”

The prince frowned with a tired look. It seemed he was weighing whether or not to take me with him.

“So he came earlier than expected. Is he alone?”

“He brought five knights and an extra hostage.”

I breathed a sigh of relief. Five knights might not be a large number, but it was better than being alone. Plus, they had a hostage too, which made the negotiation conditions quite fair. At the very least, I wouldn’t be forced into anything unfair to get me back.

“I’d like to go with you.”

“If you promise to behave.”

“I promise.”

As the knight holding my arm held me, the door opened. The brightly lit corridor was cleaner than I had expected.

“You mentioned there was a trap?”

“That was a lie.”

“I heard a sound like metal scraping against metal…”

The prince pointed to one side of the wall with his finger. A thick rope was connected to a wooden plank attached to an iron pulley.

He took me up on the plank. When one of the people near the pulley turned the handle, the plank descended slowly, making the same sound I had heard earlier.

“You’re quite good at lying, Your Highness.”

“If I didn’t say there was a trap, you might have tried to break the door. And please, call me Adel.”

The plank stopped at the second floor. Adelhardt took me and descended the short stairs, leading to the ground floor.

And then I saw Leonel surrounded by Adelhardt’s men.

“Leonel!”

Seeing that he was unharmed, I was about to cry with relief. But I stopped myself from actually crying since I didn’t want him to misunderstand that I was being mistreated.

“Nelly.”

He looked as if he might rush forward immediately. However, Adelhardt’s men blocked his path. Leonel, standing at a distance from me, seemed close to tears.

I took a bath and changed my clothes, so I should look fine, right? I smiled, trying to convey the message not to worry. But Leonel’s face crumpled. His gaze was focused on my hand.

I hurriedly concealed my hand, but Leonel drew his sword, looking desperate.

“Bring Nelly over here.”

“Wouldn’t it be better to put the sword away and talk? It’s getting rather grim here.”

“If you didn’t want it to get grim, you shouldn’t have hurt Nelly.”

I was the one trying to escape and ended up getting hurt. I expected some kind of explanation, but the prince remained silent.

I knew the look on his face well. I’d seen it on Leonel’s face once, too.

It was the face of deep-seated mistrust. Knowing that no matter what he said, he wouldn’t believe it, he gave up on trying to explain.

If they left it like this, their strained relationship would only worsen.

“Leonel, I got hurt trying to escape on my own. The prince even treated my injuries.”

Leonel’s eyes shifted between me and the prince. He seemed to ponder for a moment and then sheathed his sword.