After My Dead Ending - Chapter 61

61.

Philip, caught between here and there without knowing where to go, had never felt happier to see Petra. His foolish mind momentarily forgot that, depending on the situation, she was someone he needed to eliminate.

Like a salmon swimming upstream, Philip floundered his way toward the ballroom entrance. But as light as a paper doll, he was easily swept aside by the surging crowd.

In the brief moment he staggered, she vanished before his eyes.

Huh? Where did she go? I’m sure she was just ahead—

Guests spilling out from the entrance glared at him as he lingered awkwardly near the door. Bumped and jostled from all sides, Philip’s dazed eyes darted about in confusion.

There were too many people, and the frustration of losing Petra so quickly after finally finding her made him restless. He was never patient; even the slightest mishap left him helpless.

Just as he was about to bite his nails out of nervous habit, someone suddenly grabbed his shoulder. Startled and flustered, Philip shook his shoulder and turned around.

A short-sleeved, purple dress came into view—its neckline and chest boldly exposed as though the wearer had forgotten the season.

McFoy’s color.

Guilty as he was, Philip briefly panicked, mistaking her for the head of House McFoy.

“Oh my, did I startle you?”

The woman before him waved her hand lightly in front of his face, as if to snap him out of it. Her pale violet gloves shimmered faintly against her skin.

“Hello, my love.”

“Ah… ah.”

Beneath the white half-mask, the gentle curve of smiling lips finally came into focus. Philip let out a sigh of relief.

“P-Petra. You scared me.”

The one holding him was Petra Landry. After being cornered and uneasy for so long, the sight of her made all his recent grievances against her vanish from his mind.

“What were you looking at so intently? Were you searching for me?”

“Of course I was! Why were you so late? I almost died waiting. There are so many people here today…”

Philip whined as he wrapped his arm around Petra’s waist.

“Oh my. Does it seem more crowded than usual? I wouldn’t have noticed. My love always knows everything.”

Her tone had the rhythm of a stage performance, as if she were already acting, but to Philip, her voice simply sounded sweeter than usual.

“I wish I could stay in your arms forever, but sadly, I have to go prepare for the stage. It’s been so long since I’ve been the main character tonight.”

“Why didn’t you tell me beforehand? I would’ve prepared a gift.”

“The play changed suddenly, so I didn’t have time to tell you.”

“Really? If you’re the lead… is it that founding myth story from before?”

“No, Philip.”

Petra shook her head and embraced him more tightly, whispering softly.

“A love story.”

Then, with graceful detachment, she slipped out of his arms and smiled brightly.

Philip felt his heart flutter for the first time in a while. The woman before him was once again the gentle, beautiful Petra he had fallen in love with.

“So, stay somewhere I can see you best, all right? Before the play starts, one of my attendants will show you to your seat.”

Feeling as though he were being treated with special affection, Philip nodded without hesitation.

The curtain rose without delay after the red-masked woman, who appeared to be Lady Tibey, gave her welcoming remarks. Petra, in her purple dress, climbed the stage and took her place.

Those who recognized her cheered. Some even booed at her for daring to take the stage wearing McFoy’s color.

Tonight she played the only daughter of a wealthy merchant, “Annemarie.” She had a kind fiancé arranged by her parents.

Another actor appeared as the fiancé. He wore an amethyst brooch on his left breast. Philip, watching the play with Petra at its center, didn’t notice that at first.

Because Petra had said it was a love story, Philip assumed it would be about Annemarie and her fiancé’s romance.

But the play turned into a melodrama from the very start.

Whenever Annemarie turned her back, the fiancé carried on a shameless affair with a beautiful mistress.

The fun of a masked-ball performance was that people could watch noisily, scrubbing etiquette aside. The masked audience shouted every time the fiancé and his mistress made bold moves.

“Stupid Annemarie, look behind you!”

“Poor Annemarie, what a dog of a fiancé!”

Half the people at the masked ball were probably committing affairs themselves, but they leaned into the drama, hurling insults at the actor playing the fiancé. Of course, some took it as clever satire and laughed it off.

Philip’s face began to harden accordingly. Amid the crowd’s heated reaction, he didn’t even notice that someone had stood beside him.

When the story reached the point where, two months before the wedding, the fiancé’s mistress became pregnant, the hall erupted in rough curses, boos, and shouts.

“This is insane! Who wrote such trash?”

“Are they mad? How dreadful! If it were me I’d strangle him myself!”

Someone screamed in outrage. Philip’s face went completely white. His hands began to tremble.

It was only a play, just a fabricated story…. Philip shook his head as if denying reality.

The fiancé and the mistress met and whispered secretly. The fiancé sang that, in truth, he coveted Annemarie’s fortune and had sworn an oath to win her heart; if his betrayal were discovered, he wailed, he would lose his life.

Sighs and cheers burst from the audience at once. The spectators wanted the fiancé to be punished thoroughly.

Unable to bear it any longer, Philip spun around. He shoved past the woman in the yellow mask who was standing behind him and tried to push his way out, but his paper-thin body couldn’t force her aside. The brief scuffle drew everyone’s attention to him.

It felt like everyone was whispering about him. Driven by the thought that he had to get away from his seat, Philip tried again to wriggle free.

But someone grabbed the back of Philip’s neck. Weak as he was, he was pulled along helplessly. No sooner had he landed on his backside than a chilling voice whispered in his ear.

“Where do you think you’re going? Get up.”

“…….”

Philip Morfolk recognized that voice. But he couldn’t bring himself to turn his head and see who owned it.

“You’re not going to miss something this entertaining, are you? Get up. Now—this next part is the real fun, so keep your eyes wide open.”

Philip couldn’t bear to look at the person speaking to him. He couldn’t answer either. He only tried, with trembling legs, to stand up as ordered.

His already feeble mind felt as if a bomb had gone off in it and ceased functioning.

Philip, who had lived a comfortable life, felt like this moment must be a dream. He shook his head, refusing to believe such misfortune could happen to him.

Meanwhile, the play went on.

The fiancé and his mistress moved to break off the engagement before Annemarie discovered the pregnancy.

They fabricated a filthy scandal. The scandal was taken as fact.

The fiancé performed the role of a wounded, pitiable man so well that the audience’s hearts ached; then, returning to the mistress’s house, he laughed lewdly.

The rowdy audience, who had been tossing off comments, fell silent and solemn. Even the drunken ones slowly grasped the situation.

Even a fool could see this story was no longer merely a play.

Act One reached its climax. Annemarie, dressed in purple, was treated like a witch and driven from the castle. The scene was brutal, heartrending, and cruel.

Petra, as Annemarie, gave the performance of her life. But no one in the audience showed the usual emotional reactions to the play; instead, murmurs began to grow.

Some people pointed directly at Philip. They glanced from the gleaming brooch on Philip’s chest to the actor playing the fiancé and whispered among themselves.

At last, the betrayed Annemarie, expelled from the castle by her fiancé, collapses in the forest—and the first act ended.

“No, no…! I wouldn’t do that, I never meant for it to go that far. I didn’t start this. I was just dragged into the scandal everyone’s been talking about…!”

Philip panted and muttered. It was unclear to whom he was offering excuses.

Petra, who had poured her heart into the performance, slowly rose. Philip glared at her with reddened eyes, like someone who couldn’t believe what he saw. His look said he wanted to kill her at once.

Petra threw off her mask. When her face was fully revealed, gasps of “Oh my!” rippled through the hall.

“I dedicate this play to Lord McFoy.”

Petra knelt on one knee and bowed her head. Her clear voice echoed through the hall.

The stir grew louder, and a ripple of shock spread.

Philip’s head turned awkwardly to the side. He saw a woman wearing exactly the same dress as Petra. Because a white mask covered her entire face, it was impossible to tell what expression she wore or where she was looking.

Only then did Philip realize that the woman in the purple dress he’d seen at the entrance wasn’t Petra at all, but the woman now standing beside him. Tears of fear began to stream from his eyes.

At that moment the white-masked woman stepped one foot onto the stage. Silence fell over the crowd like a snap.

“You said you had something to say. So—is that all you wanted to say?”

The woman who spoke then ripped the mask from her face. The mask was thrown with such force that it shattered.

“L-L-Lord… Lord… My lord, my lord….”

Philip collapsed completely to the floor, clutching at the hem of my dress and panting like a dying man.

This is ridiculous—now I was made out to be the villain.

‘I should have known it would turn out like this if he picked a fight with me in the first place.’

Philip Morfolk’s head had always been full of flowers. Having led a life free of trouble, he surely never imagined his world could become miserable.

Tsk, what bad luck. I roughly brushed the hem of my dress and shook Philip off.

“L-Lord McFoy!”

Someone who had recognized my face shouted just then. Simultaneous cries of astonishment rose from all around.

‘Our lord is acting.’

Only Erika, standing behind Philip, bit down on her teeth and smiled from behind her yellow mask. As the commotion began to die down, I spoke again.

“Why are you confessing the crimes of you and Lord Morfolk with your own mouth?”

“Because Philip Morfolk is going to kill me—he’ll kill me who carries his child.”

“No!”

Another gasp of horror burst from the crowd, and Philip screamed in a seizure.

“Shut up, you damn wench! Who do you think you are, flapping that filthy mouth? Shut it, or I’ll tear that mouth off!”

“How can I believe you?”

I looked down at Philip’s grotesquely contorted face. My expression—clearly enjoying the moment—made him shut his mouth.

“I trust my fiancé. Who knows if this wasn’t some scheme to ruin him.”

The audience, more engrossed now in the exchange between Lord McFoy and Petra than they had been with the earlier play, held their breath.

“I will also swear an oath to you, my lord.”

My mouth stretched into a long smile.

“If the child in my womb is not Lord Morfolk’s, I will give my life to you, my lord.”