When You Turned Your Back On Me, We Became Strangers [EN]: Chapter 64

Turning Around, It’s Someone Else (63)

“Where are you off to so early in the morning?”

Ren asked, a bit disgruntled, watching Lailly bustling around. Lailly seemed to be sulking, having gone straight to her room last night and locked the door.

Worried, he came by early in the morning, only to find Lailly getting ready to go out.

Lailly didn’t even look at Ren as she replied.

“To where I originally belong.”

After tossing and turning all night, she had decided to go to the Duke’s mansion.

The place she should return to.

Perhaps going there would help her sort out her complicated feelings.

“They won’t welcome you, you know?”

That wasn’t what she wanted to hear. She couldn’t help but agree with Ren’s words.

“I’m not going there to be welcomed, so don’t worry about it.”

She needed to see for herself what the people were like in the place she was returning to.

She wouldn’t let Leta and herself get hurt again, not twice.

“I’ll go with you.”

“Okay, then.”

A smile spread across Ren’s face at Lailly’s words.

He thought she would flatly refuse, but she agreed to let him accompany her.

“But, you can’t cause any trouble.”

“Of course.”

Lailly was inwardly bothered by Ren’s smile, but she decided to let it go.

‘It might be okay to cause some trouble there.’

Instead of returning the actions they had done to her when she was young, Ren moving once would be a bigger deal.

* * *

“Butler, there’s a carriage parked in front!”

A maid, startled by the imperial insignia visible in front of the Duke’s mansion, spoke to the butler.

‘We’re not expecting anyone?’

Surely, the Duke of the Trailla family had been executed, so the position of head of the family was vacant.

As a result, the maids and butlers staying at the Duke’s mansion were living in paradise.

“If it’s a carriage from the imperial family…….”

The butler slightly parted the curtains with his finger and looked outside.

“They’ve moved quite quickly.”

She was completely different from when she had left this place. The figure of the young girl who had fled as if running away was no longer visible.

“Wh-what should we do?”

“Why are you so anxious? We’ve only done our jobs.”

The butler passed the anxious-looking maids and approached the front door.

‘No matter how much she’s grown, the terrified child from back then can’t have gone anywhere.’

Lailly had been someone who couldn’t even express her own opinion even as an adult. Although rumors circulating said she had changed quite a bit, traumas don’t disappear easily.

The butler knew very well that he was her trauma and a past she wanted to erase.

“It’s been a while.”

The butler’s expression, as he opened the door and greeted Lailly, was full of composure.

Lailly simply nodded at the butler without replying. She lightly passed him and walked inside.

‘A bodyguard with an unpleasant face.’

The butler squinted at Ren. His attire was too simple to be someone sent by the imperial family.

“What are you looking at?”

Ren looked down at the butler and scanned him from head to toe.

‘Still the same annoying old geezer.’

Thinking about how he had ignored and deceived Lailly when she was young, anger still surged to the top of his head.

Time couldn’t be ignored; wrinkles were thickly spread across his face.

“You’ve got a long life.”

Ren whispered quietly, passed the butler, and approached Lailly from behind.

“Nothing has changed here.”

Lailly looked around with a queasy expression.

Not only was it well-maintained despite the absence of an owner, but also decorations that seemed far from her father’s taste caught her eye.

Her brow furrowed as memories of the past came to mind one by one.

The butler, who continued to follow her, persistently watched Lailly’s actions.

Lailly turned around and stared at the butler, feeling his gaze was too blatant.

“I’ll be here for a while, so don’t mind me and go do your work.”

The butler’s eyebrows subtly furrowed at the somewhat commanding tone.

The butler was dying to ask why she had come.

She shouldn’t have any desire to come to this place, so what was she thinking?

‘There are still many items that haven’t been taken out.’

After hearing the Duke’s news, the butler had quickly secured his share. It wasn’t difficult since he was also managing the ledger.

“Then, please call me after you’re done with your work.”

If he retorted wrongly here, it felt like the guard standing behind Lailly would cut his throat at any moment.

His eyes were fierce, and after exchanging a few words with him earlier, he was someone best left untouched.

In the end, he decided to step back a few paces and watch Lailly.

Lailly slowly walked up the stairs and headed to her room.

“Ren, I was humiliated in this place to hide the crest.”

Upon entering the room, the old, worn-out curtains and bedding were still there. One would think they would have been cleaned up, but how could they be so unchanged?

The day she had clutched her torn collar on the floor and cried all night came to mind. The days she had lived being treated worse than an object were once again vividly drawn before her eyes.

“How could nothing have changed?”

Lailly frowned as she saw traces of her childhood everywhere.

She lightly stroked her neck, where the crest was faintly drawn, sat on the bed, and blankly looked at the room.

“He’s a terrible person.”

Was it to make sure she wouldn’t forget her place when she eventually returned?

Even now, less than four years later, it felt like she was stuck in the past.

“You don’t look good.”

Ren looked at Lailly’s face with concern.

‘Kavern blocked her from going to the Duke’s mansion. If he knew she looked like death, he’d be furious.’

He predicted that nothing good would come of Lailly going to the Duke’s mansion while she hadn’t yet received the succession.

However, Lailly was more composed than he thought, and her emotional changes weren’t that great.

“I need to change everything.”

“What?”

“Leta doesn’t need to recall past memories either.”

Lailly slowly began to write a list on the table. First, starting with her room, and then she planned to change everything in the Duke’s mansion.

After looking around, Lailly concluded that she didn’t need to see other places.

Broadly speaking, not a single thing had changed from her childhood.

After finishing everything, Lailly called the butler.

Not a single maid was in sight where her gaze rested. They thought that not being seen by her was the wise way to remain here.

Unfortunately, Lailly hadn’t forgotten a single one of their faces.

“Make sure to finish this within the written time frame.”

The butler’s expression darkened rapidly as he looked at the paper Lailly handed him.

“You do not have any authority regarding the Duke’s mansion yet.”

“What do you mean?”

“Although the Duke has been stripped of his position as head of the family, you have not formally received the succession, so you cannot touch anything.”

Lailly lightly scoffed at the butler’s tone.

‘Since nothing has been announced yet, it’s only natural for him to act like this.’

Not only the interior, but everything needs to be changed.

If he were a clever butler with good social skills, she might have used him a bit more.

However, judging from his current actions, it seemed she needed to remind him of his place.

As the butler said, there was a procedure to go through to formally become the head of the family in the current empire.

The first method was to legitimately inherit the title from the head of the family.

The second was to receive recognition from the imperial family and nobles.

And Lailly was scheduled to become the head of the family soon through the second method.

The butler, who had no way of knowing this, was acting as if it were his own home.

“Has the butler been working here for over 20 years?”

Lailly stroked the stairs with her hand in a calm voice.

“That is correct.”

The butler’s arrogant gaze resembled her father’s.

‘He must be resembling him after being together for so long.’

Lailly felt like the Duke’s mansion was filled with a rotting smell.

She thought she would be fine after cutting out the rotten part, but it had already rotted around it.

“You’ve worked hard. That’s long enough.”

“What do you mean…….”

The butler asked Lailly back as if he had misheard.

He had been with the Trailla family longer than Lailly. There was no way she could dismiss him as she pleased.

“This is unfair!”

“Was what you’ve been embezzling not enough?”

Lailly’s coldly hardened eyes turned to the decorations that didn’t match the Duke’s mansion.

“You do not have any personnel authority!”

Clang-

An expensive ornament fell to the floor and broke in Lailly’s hand.

“Did Father have such tastes?”

“Th-that’s.”

“This, that, everything doesn’t seem to match the Trailla family in my eyes.”

No matter how expensive the crafts were, they didn’t meet the eyes of Lailly, who had grown up seeing good things since she was young.

The butler couldn’t enter the stores that nobles could frequent, so he had bought things on his own.

The maids, startled by the broken crafts on the floor, came out and stood frozen in place.

The young lady who had been ignored and looked down upon in the past was no longer there.

Her two eyes, containing the fresh greenery, were full of life, and confidence overflowed. She was not the Lailly who wore shabby clothes and couldn’t even lift her head in fear.

Her dignity overflowed with elegance, and her two eyes felt so oppressive that they couldn’t be met.

Lailly looked at the butler and maids and said.

“If you have any complaints about my authority, formally raise an objection.”

You’ll lose anyway.

“It seems the butler doesn’t need to do this. You’re fired as of today.”

She looked at the paper in the butler’s hand and gave a radiant smile.