She is the Daughter of the Villainess in a Ridiculous Novel - Chapter 119
That was enough.
Now that she understood the Marchioness’s intentions, Idel closed her eyes for a moment before opening them again.
“I understand, Marchioness. You’ve shared a truth with me that I was unaware of… and besides, it’s a request for help that I’ve received after a long while.”
“Does that mean, My Lady, that you will help me?”
“If it is something within my power.”
Despite the clearly non-committal answer, the Marchioness looked delighted. It seemed she had been agonizing over this problem for a long time.
Reading the relief and a hint of excitement in the woman’s eyes, Idel took a short breath to steady herself.
‘I need to maintain a good relationship with the House of Grant anyway. I had already planned to establish a connection from the start. Besides, the things the Marchioness mentioned are weighing on my mind…’
She would need to hear the whole story to be certain, but “death” had already been mentioned twice.
The funeral of Marquis Grant and the letter arriving from the deceased daughter.
‘…Surely Nox hasn’t already made a move on the House of Grant, has it?’
Having seen Nox’s dirty tricks more times than she could count while running ‘Ask the Veil!’, suspicion arose naturally.
Idel consciously smoothed her furrowed brow and tucked a stray lock of hair behind her ear.
Straightening her posture, she spoke to the Marchioness.
“Then, Marchioness, would you care to continue the story you were telling earlier?”
“Ah! Of course, of course. Where was I…? ”
“You mentioned that a letter arrived from your late daughter.”
“Thank you for reminding me, My Lady. Let’s see…. Yes, one day, a letter from our deceased daughter was delivered to my husband and me.”
The Marchioness gave a faint smile, noting that the initial commotion of the letter’s arrival had already become a distant memory.
“There were only three sentences written in that letter… but those three sentences shook our hearts so deeply.”
Even now, the scene of that day remains vivid in her mind.
[Mom, Dad. It’s me, Cordelia. You’ve both been well, right? I miss you. – Cordelia]
Three sentences.
With an anonymous letter consisting of just three sentences, the House of Grant was turned upside down.
“Who is it?! What lunatic has the nerve to pull a stunt like this in front of me!”
“Honey! Wait, calm down…!”
“Tara, do I look like I can calm down right now? A prank letter with our daughter’s name boldly stamped on it? Everyone knows what that child meant to me…! Tara, I can only interpret this as a direct provocation!”
Tara Grant bit her lower lip as she watched her husband, whose rage showed no signs of subsiding despite her efforts.
Her heart had plummeted just as sharply as his at the sudden arrival of the letter, but cold reason was screaming that her husband’s assumption wasn’t the whole truth.
After all, it had already been three years since they lost Cordelia.
“Felix! Where was the return address on this letter?”
“Ah… well, it’s a mailbox in front of an old temple in the Geminine district.”
“A temple? You’re saying it’s the work of those temple bastards?”
“N-no, sir. That temple has already closed down. It was so small that I believe it merged with another temple in a neighboring district.”
“Then investigate every single noble who passed through that area! Catch whoever played this godforsaken prank!”
Tara tightly shut her eyes as she watched David shaking the crumpled letter in fury.
“David, stop it! Who would even try to provoke us like this after all this time?”
“But, Tara…”
“It has been three years since we lost Cordelia. If someone wanted to use her to shake us, they would have done it much sooner. Not today.”
His wife’s reddened eyes and trembling hands made David’s heart ache.
In an instant, his aimless anger swirled back around and settled on the crumpled letter.
“Then… then why this letter? Who would…?”
“I don’t know either. We don’t know anything, but don’t be shaken, David. This nonsensical letter never existed. It simply didn’t come.”
“……”
David didn’t answer. Like water thrown onto a roaring fire, the Marquis’s eyes went dark in an instant.
Tara bit her lip and took the crumpled letter from her husband’s hand as he tried to suppress his emotions. Though she caught a glimpse of the words ‘I miss you’ through the creases, she forced herself to look away.
“……I’ll go throw this away. You finish sorting the other letters and get ready for bed.”
With those final words, the Marchioness turned her back on her husband and left the room.
At that time, Tara Grant believed this was merely an isolated incident—something that, for whatever reason, would never happen again once she closed her eyes that night.
However, contrary to her thoughts, another letter from their daughter, ‘Cordelia,’ arrived not long after.
[Mom, Dad. You’ve been well, right? It’s me, Cordelia. I didn’t know you would be able to send me a reply. Since you said you were curious about my life, if I were to tell you a bit… well… I planted some flowers a few days ago…….]
This time, it was a response, written as if she had received a reply from them.
Tara scowled deeply at the content, which was far longer and more detailed than the first letter. Now, even she felt something was suspicious.
“…If it’s like this, you might be right. Someone must be playing a joke, right? Otherwise, how could they send a letter like this to themselves… David?”
“……”
There was something unusual about her husband, who couldn’t take his eyes off the paper.
Though his eyes were brimming with tears, he read the letter intently without even blinking before speaking in a low, heavy voice.
“It’s… it’s a response to the reply I wrote……”
“What? David, did you write a reply to Cordelia while I went to throw that letter away? What on earth were you thinking……?”
“I just wanted to, Tara. If that letter really was from our daughter, I thought about how hurt she would be if we ignored her……”
Tara couldn’t say a word in response. She knew all too well the heart with which he must have written that letter.
“But I swear. I didn’t actually order that letter to be sent. The address from the start was a nonsensical place anyway. I intended to just write a reply for my own sake and leave it at that, but…”
“But, you’re saying a response came back?”
David nodded.
The two of them immediately began investigating this bizarre incident.
Fortunately, David’s letter hadn’t vanished through some supernatural means.
A servant who had entered the room to clean saw the letter placed neatly on the table and, assuming they had forgotten an errand, sent the letter out.
While the address was strange, truly capable servants were taught not to question their master’s actions.
It was a strange occurrence born of coincidence upon coincidence, but unexpectedly, the replies from their daughter ‘Cordelia’ became a source of comfort for the Marquis and his wife.
It felt as though they were unexpectedly receiving updates on their late daughter’s life.
“…She always loved flowers so much; it seems she wants to plant them herself now.”
“I know. But since she only ever looked at flowers that were already grown… I wonder if she’ll be able to raise them properly?”
As they talked while reading the letters Cordelia sent, the couple eventually could no longer resist the impulse and picked up their pens once more.
[To our beloved daughter, Cordelia.]
[To my Mom and dad, whom I miss.]
[Cordelia…]
[Mom, Dad…]
The exchange with their daughter, which they thought would end after a single time, continued for over several years without breaking.
They grew accustomed to this anonymous ‘someone’ who used their daughter’s name, until eventually…
“David, what if we… try to meet Cordelia?”
“…I think I would like that.”
They finally found the courage to open Pandora’s box.
Just as they were about to write a letter sincerely asking to meet the person they had conversed with for all this time:
“Master! A letter from Lady Cordelia… has arrived.”
“What? From Cordelia? But we haven’t even sent a reply yet…?”
One more unexpected letter had arrived from ‘Cordelia.’
This was an exceptional situation that had never occurred during all the years the letters had gone back and forth.
The two of them hurriedly accepted the letter.
The letter they checked began, without warning, with an apology.
[Mom, Dad. I’m sorry.]
