After I Died, My Husband Went Mad [EN]: Chapter 94

“What disgusting behavior is this…!”

When Ryan finally found Silas, he had already dug up Sebelia’s grave. The mound of piled-up dirt was taking up the space where Dihart would be buried in the future.

“There’s no need to hear your excuses. Marquis Silas Weden, I’m arresting you on the spot.”

Ryan, having dropped honorifics, cast a look of utter contempt at Silas. Standing alone, without the son he brought with him every day, he was unusually composed.

‘The young marquis isn’t here. That’s a relief, at least.’

Ryan was alone because he had spread the knights throughout Hillen Hall to find Silas. He placed his hand on the hilt of his sword and took a step forward. Just then, a bizarre sound pierced his eardrums.

*Screech*, it was the sound of Silas’s servant, who was down in the pit, opening the coffin lid.

Ryan contorted his face in disgust. Just as he was about to shout at the servant, the lid fell to the ground with a thud.

“……”

Ryan froze, unable to close his mouth. Silas’s laughter echoed through the cemetery. It was a very satisfied laugh.

“Hahaha.”

Ryan remained silent under the suffocating stillness. A desolate wind swept past his ears. Unable to believe what he was seeing, Ryan opened and closed his lips repeatedly. When Ryan finally spoke, his voice was severely rough.

“Did you do this?”

“Of course not.”

Silas’s lips curved into a deep arc. He turned his gloved palm to the sky and shrugged.

“Lord Ryan, if you have eyes, you should see this situation. Caught in the act? Am I caught in the act? No, that’s not it.”

“……”

“I should say that I personally uncovered a terrible crime that you couldn’t even imagine, Lord Ryan.”

Silas kicked the ground. A stone rolled and fell into the pit.

*Clang.*

The sound of the stone bouncing off the empty coffin pierced his eardrums. Silas, staring at Ryan clutching his sword hilt, whispered slyly like a snake.

“Surely you’re not going to arrest me on suspicion of opening an empty coffin? Or for revealing that someone stole the Duchess’s body like a fool who didn’t even notice? Hmm, that’s not bad either. I could drag Inverness’s reputation through the mud.”

Silas, looking at Ryan’s eyes, spread his hands and pointed to his daughter’s coffin as if to show off.

“Choose which one you like, Lord. If you want to arrest me, a nobleman from the capital, you’ll have to announce my charges to the Central Security Bureau [the main law enforcement agency], wouldn’t you?”

“……”

Ryan couldn’t say anything. Since the Duchess’s coffin was opened, all he could do was stare with wide eyes and grit his teeth.

Sebelia Inverness’s coffin. The final resting place where the late Duchess, the woman Dihart longed for so dearly, was supposed to be sleeping. But all that was inside were rolling sachets and a few gold coins. Sebelia’s body was nowhere to be found.

‘What on earth…!’

Ryan bit his lip. This couldn’t be happening. This wasn’t what he had expected when the nailed coffin lid was opened. What should have been there was lifeless skin, beauty beginning to decay.

The rotting flesh, the muslin covering it, the stench of maggots mixed with the sweetness of the sachets placed throughout the coffin should have been creating a terrible smell.

But reality betrayed his expectations. The body to be desecrated was not there, and the criminal who dared to dig up Inverness’s cemetery claimed that he had uncovered a terrible crime.

This was not something that he, as the acting head of the family, could handle. Ryan quickly sorted out the confusion.

‘This fact must not be made public.’

Ryan understood why Silas was acting so confidently. First, the terrible act of digging up the grave would be difficult to establish since the desecrated body itself was missing. Second, he…

“As a father, I am heartbroken by the unbearable reality. Not only was she mistreated by her husband and driven mad to the point of taking her own life, but she is in such a miserable state even in death!”

…He would surely claim to be a meritorious person who revealed that the Duchess’s body had been taken by someone.

“I will not listen to any more nonsense.”

He had to buy time, at least until Dihart returned. Ryan gritted his teeth and shouted. The sharp sound of a sword being drawn from its scabbard echoed.

“Hmm.”

Despite the obvious crisis, Silas was relaxed. Ryan kicked off the ground and lunged forward.

*Whoosh-!*

“Keuk!”

At that moment, Ryan’s body was pushed back with a powerful force. The only reason he didn’t fall was that he had good balance.

“Is it that sorcerer again!”

Ryan roared at the barrier blocking his path. A force spread from his fingertips with a humming sound. The light surrounding the sword was a pale gold. But the opponent had no intention of fighting him from the start.

“You can’t stop me, Lord Ryan. The outcome was decided from the beginning. I am the father of that poor child who passed away, and you are the monsters who mistreated the poor Duchess and eventually drove her to take her own life.”

A laughing voice echoed eerily.

“If I told someone that I had heard the terrible news that ‘my daughter’s body had disappeared’ and dug up the grave in disbelief, everyone would sympathize with me, not take your side.”

A laughing voice echoed eerily. At the same time, the barrier emitted a strong light and began to close in. Only then did Ryan realize that the sorcerer’s barrier was not to protect Silas.

This barrier was intended to trap him.

“Damn it…!”

The light-filled sword struck the barrier several times, but to no avail. The barrier that had trapped Ryan was released an hour later.

“Lord Ryan!”

The knights who had been scattered throughout Hillen Hall found him and came to the cemetery.

* * *

‘How could things get so twisted?’

A sigh, like a scream, escaped from the emotions that were boiling up from within. Instead of capturing Silas, he found out that Sebelia’s body was missing, which was truly the worst news.

Dihart let out a groan and slumped down on the chair.

“Ha…!”

The power that had been raging madly in the face of the tangled reality lost its momentum. The vengeance that had been burning bravely was now pushed behind the desire to protect Sebelia. It was only natural. Sebelia’s safety and peace came first, before that cunning and disgusting Silas.

But the biggest challenge he faced was telling Sebelia this fact.

“Damn it……”

The sparks that had been popping up lost their strength and died down.

“Is it bad news, Duke? Should I go down and tell them to prepare to go to the North right away?”

Ilay, noticing his more subdued mood than before, hesitated before finally speaking, but was quietly ignored. Dihart didn’t have the time to explain the situation right now.

“Hoo.”

Dihart, who had been sighing, jumped up from his seat. Ilay was startled by the sudden movement and jumped a little in place.

“Never mind, go down and pack your bags. And cancel the lockdown.”

Dihart left those last words and stormed out of the office.

“What on earth is going on……”

Ilay’s gaze, which had been resentfully watching Dihart’s back, turned to the floor. The letter that Dihart had thrown away was lying there alone.

“……”

Touching a superior’s belongings, especially a sealed letter, was clearly a punishable offense. But wouldn’t it be okay to just scan it with your eyes without even touching it?

Slyly, Ilay’s feet moved little by little to the side. After confirming that no one was in the hallway in front of the office, he carefully lowered his upper body.

“You crazy……!”

Ilay, who covered his mouth with his hand, raised his head. In his mind, Dihart running somewhere and… Bella’s face, which looked so much like the dead Duchess, came to mind.

“No way, no. It can’t be, right?”

Again, Ilay was not an oblivious man.

* * *

Dihart had no particular plan as he went to see Sebelia. It wasn’t that he had no plan, but rather that he had realized early on that making a plan would be of little use.

‘Either way, the important thing is her will.’

It didn’t matter how Silas found out that Sebelia’s body wasn’t in the coffin and dug up the grave. No matter what he did after that, Dihart had the ability to do everything in his power to stop him.

But that was only possible if Sebelia wanted it. Dihart clenched his constantly chattering teeth and knocked on the door.

*Knock knock.*

“Bella, do you have time right now?”

“……”

“Bella?”

No answer came back. Dihart knocked on the door a few more times and raised his eyes. Come to think of it, he couldn’t feel any sign of a person. Dihart seemed to hesitate for a moment before turning back. He was going to get the key he had taken from the caretaker.

“Dihart.”

“…Claude.”

Claude came out of a room a few steps away, as if he had heard the knocking, and called him.

“What’s wrong? Did you come to see Bella?”

“It’s none of your business.”

Since he didn’t have time to argue with him, Dihart tried to pass by Claude as he was. He would have, if Claude hadn’t said that.

“If it’s Bella, she seemed to have received a fast mail [urgent message delivery] earlier and went to meet someone.”

“…What?”

“Ah, to be exact, I should say she went to pick someone up.”

Claude slowly stroked his chin and said. His eyes scanned Dihart up and down. He seemed to be gauging how much he could say. When Dihart glared at him and growled, Claude shrugged.

‘Well, it seems like the two have reconciled to some extent.’

Unfortunately for Dihart, Claude had unintentionally overheard his tearful apology last night. It was because his room was not far from Sebelia’s room.

“She said that person is Bella’s only family, and that person was in Earlsick until recently. Originally, she was planning to receive a reply and come, but… I guess she couldn’t wait and moved first. Bella went to pick her up because she sent a fast mail from a nearby city.”

“Ha, damn it. Things are going wrong in a big way……”

Dihart swallowed a groan, gave himself a dry wash [mentally prepared himself], and immediately ran out of the mansion. He knew who the other person was as soon as he heard Claude’s words.

‘Denisa, it’s that woman.’

Out of the frying pan, into the fire.