Chapter 34: CH 34

(3rd’s Person POV)

“Ahhh….”

Anastasia ran for a long time to chase after Duke Barantes, but it was impossible for her to catch up with him.

Anastasia struggled and then stopped on the spot. She inhaled deeply and tried to catch her breath.

“No way…how could he run so fast at his age?”

Anastasia looked at the Duke of Barantes, who now resembled a small dot with a troubled expression on her face.

“Didn’t you know? Duke of Barantes has always won first place in running when he was still at the academy.”

Anastasia was surprised to hear that from Madame Rochester’s belated explanation.

“Really? Why am I hearing this for the first time?”

“Well I do not know but he was very famous. If he wasn’t born into the Duke’s family, he might have probably won the title of the world’s fastest runner.”

“But how come I get tired so easily? How come I am not the same as my father?”

Anastasia’s stamina wasn’t very good, to begin with.

‘Even before my regression, I didn’t have much muscle strength in my body. I was always running in place by using the treadmill by myself in an empty place, but I would always feel exhausted in less than 10 minutes.’

‘In addition, it is not easy to exercise while avoiding the eyes of others. In the end, I settled on increasing my walking time instead. Of course, even now I still do.’

“You look very much like your mother, Your Highness.”

Madame Rochester gave me the answer as if it was not that difficult to do.

“Your mother wasn’t very talented when it came to anything that involved physical activities.  Instead, she had great dexterity and often made puppets the size of a finger for me.”

“…I’m not very good with my hands.”

It seems that only the two’s shortcomings were excluded.

Again, this was a very unrealistic and unnecessarily fictional novel.

“You know my parents better than me, Madame Rochester.”

“That’s because I attended the same academy with your parents, Your Majesty.”

Please do not repost our translation. Read only at Pink Muffin Translations.

Madame Rochester shrugged back.

“By the way, the child’s name was Selene, the one you brought in. They were so badly hurt that I was thinking that she should not start any time soon. She insisted that she could work right away, but it would be a big deal if her wounds got infected.”

“Please do that. That kid’s been through a lot, so she’ll need to heal not only her wounds but her emotions as well.”

“Yes and…Lady Melina hastily returned to the Marquis’ mansion this morning.”

“Really? She didn’t even show her face before she left…..”

“Well…it looks like something urgent has happened.”

After saying those words, Madame Rochester paused for a moment.

“Your Majesty, please don’t get too close to Lady Melina.”

At the sudden remark, Anastasia opened her eyes wide and looked at Madame Rochester.

“What do you mean?”

“Didn’t you propose for her to become Her Majesty’s handmaiden? What was her response then?”

“She declined my request.”

“…….”

Upon hearing Anastasia’s reply, the Duchess of Rochester remained silent.

“In my humble opinion, Your Majesty, the Young Lady of Lutent is not a good person.”

Upon hearing this, Anastasia was perplexed.

Before her regression, Madame Rochester had never said such a thing to her.

Melina got along well with her and Madame Rochester until the very end before she returned in time.

‘So, what’s going on?’

This was the first time that a new situation has happened that differs from her past life. Anastasia was instinctively frightened by the unexpected twist.

“What do you mean by that? Did something happen?”

“…….”

Madame Rochester paused for a moment before speaking again.

“No, I think I made a mistake, Your Majesty.”

“What?”

“I don’t know more about the reason why she would refuse becoming your handmaid, so I may have been harsh with my words. I apologize, Your Majesty.”

Please do not repost our translation. Read only at Pink Muffin Translations.

“No, wait a moment Madame Rochester……”

“Then I’ll get going now.”

Madame Rochester left immediately, leaving Anastasia in a bewildered state.

‘What happened without my knowledge?’

[pr/n: I have the same question…]

-ˏˋ ━━━━━━ ʚɞ ━━━━━━ ˊˎ-

(3rd’s Person POV)

The answer to her question came sooner than expected.

“…Oh my, Julia?”

Later that day, when Anastasia saw the face of the maid who brought her tea, she was very surprised and asked.

“What’s happened to your face?”

“Yes, Your Majesty? …..Oh.”

Julia hastily covered her left cheek with her hand but Anastasia did not allow her to do so.

“Remove your hands off it. It looks like you have been slapped in the face.”

“No, it’s nothing like that, Your Majesty!”

“Huh!”

When Anastasia saw Julia pretending to be fine she lifted her head as if to look at it closer.

Now she could see her slightly scratched cheek better.

“Did someone hit you?”

Anastasia asked seriously, but Julia shook her head.

Anastasia spoke in a voice that had now begun to fill with anger.

“How dare anyone do this to you! You’re the Empress handmaiden. It’s the same as disgracing me. Who did this to you?!”

“Well, about that….”

“Your Majesty, it was the Young Lady of Lutent.”

Another maid appeared from behind and answered in Julia’s place.

Upon hearing the unexpected name, Anastasia asked with a shocked expression.

“……What?”

“Well, yesterday, while we were talking, the Young Lady of Lutent came to us and slapped Julia on the face.”

“Her Majesty will misunderstand you if you say it like that.”

Julia spoke to Anastasia with a troubled look on her face.

“It was my fault, Your Majesty. Last night when Her Majesty went to the Central Palace, I was caught gossiping about Lady Melina with the other maids…. That was what happened.”

“You’ve gossiped about her?”

Please do not repost our translation. Read only at Pink Muffin Translations.

“Yes, Your Majesty. The maids within the Empress’s palace don’t like the Young Lady of Lutent. What happened yesterday only added to that statement.”

“I didn’t like her even at the beginning. Everyone knows that she is an illegitimate child of the Marquis of Lutent, and her strangely annoying attitude in believing Her Majesty’s favor towards her was also very arrogant.”

“Did Lady Melina hear those words?”

“…..Well, I think that may have been the reason. How terrifyingly it was for her to run up to us and then slapped me on the cheek.”

“…..”

Upon knowing the situation, Anastasia remained silent for a moment.

‘Is this what Madame Rochester was trying to say earlier?’

‘Of course, it is wrong to gossip behind other people’s backs. If those words had reached the person who was the focal point of the rumors, it would be more strange if they did not get angry after hearing it.’

‘But even so…slapping a person on the face? I couldn’t have imagined that Melina had that kind of personality?’

Anastasia was confused by Melina’s doings. She had never known she was capable of doing things like this before she returned in time.

“Lady Melina is somewhat gloomy and sneaky. She even pretends to be bright and cheerful as if she was wearing a mask…and maybe one day, it may come to a point where she might backstab Her Majesty.

“……Okay, stop it now. Does Madame Rochester know about this?”

“Yes, Your Majesty. Last night, we all apologized to Lady Melina and cleared the air.”

If that’s the case, then Madame Rochester may have already talked to them and given word to never do it again.

It was something she did quite well versus herself when it comes to disciplining the maids.

“You two must never do such a mean thing again to anyone. If this becomes known to others, everyone would laugh at us.”

Anastasia scolded them in a stern voice.

“You are the face of the Empress’s Palace. Don’t lose your dignity as my handmaidens. Do you understand?”

“Yes, Your Majesty. We’re very sorry.”

“Julia, please have your cheek treated right away and rest for a while. I’m worried that I’ll get scared.”

Please do not repost our translation. Read only at Pink Muffin Translations.

“The royal physician said there’s no need to worry too much. I apologize for all of the trouble, Your Majesty. I will make sure this never happens again.”

“Okay. You two can go out.”

After the maids went out, Anastasia also got up from her seat.

There’s a place that she needs to go to.

-ˏˋ ━━━━━━ ʚɞ ━━━━━━ ˊˎ-

(3rd’s Person POV)

Duke Barantes could not concentrate on his work all day.

‘Maybe, Her Majesty doesn’t love me anymore.’

Thinking like that, he became infinitely depressed and his complexion naturally darkened.

The defense officials working in the same office looked stressed all day. They were chatting among themselves about what was going on with Duke Barantes.

‘I didn’t expect that she thought that Madame Rochester was the only one who loved her…. I get that I’ve been a bit strict with her before, but is she that upset about it?’

As Duke Barantes continued to sighed in distress, the atmosphere in the office continued to drop in temperature.

It was a time when everyone was working nervously, as they were staring at Duke Barantes.

“Your Grace, you have a guest.”

“I’m sorry, but tell them to come back tomorrow.”

Duke Barantes responded with a heartbroken look on his face.

“I’m not in the mood to meet anyone today.”

“But…it’s Her Majesty the Empress?”

A Ministry of National Defense official who came to deliver the news asked with his eyes wide open.

“If that’s the case then I think that……What?!”

Before the servant could even finish speaking, Duke Barantes had gotten up and ran outside.

“Oh.”

Anastasia was standing at the entrance of the building. She was smiling brightly with a face that looked exactly like his deceased wife.

“Father!”

“Your Majesty……the Empress.”

Duke Barantes approached Anastasia with a voice full of emotion.

Please do not repost our translation. Read only at Pink Muffin Translations.

“Oh, how surprised I was that you had left the Palace just like that.”

“I’m so sorry, Your Majesty. It was because I was so shocked….”

“Oh my. Did I upset you?”

“I’m just a bit sad that’s all. But what are you doing here?”

Anastasia responded lovingly, locking her arms with the Duke of Barantes.

“Since I have some time today, I wanted to go for a walk with my father.”

-ˏˋ ━━━━━━ ʚɞ ━━━━━━ ˊˎ-

(3rd’s Person POV)

“…So what you said before wasn’t sincere, right?”

‘This is the 10th time that he asked me this question…’

‘My ears might begin to bleed due to his repetitive questioning.’

But Anastasia didn’t show any hint of the annoyance she was feeling and just nodded to answer him.

…I need to be more careful about what I say in the future.

“It’s funny to go around and say that the only people who cared about me are my father and Madame Rochester’.”

“Okay, I got it but I hope you know that I always thought of Her Majesty more than anyone else.”

“Of course. Who wouldn’t think of me other than my father? I always think of you.”

“Hmm…….”

Anastasia felt embarrassed when she heard the sniffling sound coming from the Duke of Barantes.

“Anyway, thank you for coming. It’s the happiest thing that happened to me today. I felt like I had been given a present.”

Please do not repost our translation. Read only at Pink Muffin Translations.

“In the future, I will often make surprise visits like this. Well…. I do have something else to ask of you.”

“Yes, go ahead.”

Anastasia hesitated for a moment and then asked.

“What do you think of Melina?”