"You did a great job, Miss Rosalind."
"It was really great."
"You all did a great job too! Thank you all for your hard work!"
Rosalind happily greeted the members. Just thinking about the applause and cheers she had just heard made her heart pound as if it was going to burst.
'This is the first time in my life that I've ever experienced something like that...'
So many people liked her song. It was an experience she would never forget until the day she died.
When Ariana first told her that she would sing in the square, she was shocked and a little scared, but now she was so happy that she felt like an idiot. And there was someone else who had planned everything so that she could feel this happiness.
"Miss Ariana!"
Rosalind ran down the stage and hugged Ariana tightly.
"Thank you. I, I, this is the first time I've received this much applause."
As if to prove that it was her first time, Rosalind was shaking all over. Ariana smiled brightly and lightly patted Rosalind on the back.
"You did well. Without showing any sign of nervousness."
"It's all thanks to Miss Ariana watching over us!"
I looked around the square, calming Rosalind down. I saw countless people sharing their thoughts on the song they had just heard with excited faces. I had expected a crowd to gather, but I didn't know it would be this big. It was a success beyond my plans.
I smiled brightly and thought, 'It's about time they came.' The guests I had personally invited, had even walked in themselves. I was counting down to ten seconds in my head.
"Ariana Lopez!"
A shout was heard at the obvious timing. I turned around and faced the faces I had been waiting for.
"Brother. And Marquis."
I nodded slightly and tilted my head.
"Elena hasn't come yet? Is she still in shock?"
"Is she in shock? Ha, you crazy thing."
Edward approached me with brisk strides as if he was even more excited by my calm tone.
"How dare you steal my stage!"
"Stealed?"
I tilted my head and corrected him.
"I think it would be more correct to say I got it back, Brother."
"What? What the hell are you talking about!"
"It was the score wrote."
Edward tried to refute me right away, but I smiled brightly as if I knew what he was saying.
"Oh, are you talking about the extra stuff that Brother added to my original song as an arrangement? I cleaned it all out, so you can rest assured."
"What? Thing... More?"
Edward, who had considerable pride in his arranging ability, blushed.
"You're really crazy."
"The members? They were all caught up in Brother's fake composing ability, but I told them that it was actually all my work. Oh, of course."
I added kindly.
"I told you that I would pay a lot of penalty for leaving the contract early, but I would pay for it all. So, please use the deposit I'll give you well. It'll cost you a lot of money if I refund all the tickets."
"You..."
Edward gasped.
"You don't know because you're uneducated... This level of obstruction of business is a felony. Do you think I'll let you off, your family? You're going embarrass me like this, you bitch? Instead of the deposit, you should be figuring out how to pay the bail if you get taken away by the police. Even the fact that you have the money to pay the deposit is just a bluff!"
"I'll take care of the legal issues, so don't worry about it."
I continued softly, ignoring the threatening voice.
"The soprano also used a child I personally discovered instead of my sister... Oh, right. Lyrics."
A sneer formed on my lips.
"The lyrics are mine, melted down from my own personal experiences."
Crunch.
The sound of Lucas's teeth grinding eerily came from him. I turned to Lucas and drove the wedge in.
"So, 'stolen' is a bit misleading. Please say I got it back."
Ah, I added.
"I'll get more back in the future, so be prepared."
"... This."
Edward gasped in anger. The people around them were casting curious glances at them due to the sudden commotion. However, Edward, whose eyes had already turned away, seemed to be unable to see anything.
Edward raised his right hand, his eyes unfocused, twitching.
"This crazy bastard..."
"Count Lopez!"
Lucas shouted in a stern voice and blocked Lucas' path. Edward clearly had anger management issues. If he used violence here, wouldn't Ariana be sympathetic?
Lucas clicked his tongue at the foolish Edward and made a threat.
"Come out here."
Edward stepped back, gritting his teeth and breathing Irregularly at his firm gaze. Lucas, who had taken his place, glared at me.
"... I."
Lucas took a deep breath as if trying to control his anger and growled in a low voice.
"I seem to have done a terrible job of educating Ariana, my fiancée. Come here first. Let's talk."
Just as Lucas was about to grab Ariana's wrist,
"Get back."
Knights in black armor suddenly appeared and blocked Lucas. Lucas glared with a fierce face.
"Who are you, you? How dare you block Marquis Pedegreen's path!"
"Speak up. I was ordered to protect Her Excellency the Reserve Duchess."
"Her Excellency the Reserve Duchess?... Hahaha!"
Lucas let out a hollow laugh as if he was dumbfounded.
"Look at this. The one who had an affair with the Duke was you, Ariana. Back then! When you ran into each other in front of the jewelry store, you were actually having an affair, right?!"
Lucas growled in a rough voice.
"On that topic, how dare you try to slander someone with such a ridiculous stage!"
The moment he entered the square to see what Ariana's 'invitation' was all about, Lucas was furious when he first saw all the orchestra members who had gone missing lined up in front of the fountain.
It was all... Ariana's scheme.
He was both disappointed and astonished. Isn't this Ariana, who was always timid and reserved, beaten to death by her brother and sister? How on earth could such a woman change into someone else overnight and continue to counterattack like this?
However, his confusion was overwhelmed by a great sense of astonishment and anger the moment he heard the lyrics.
'They're making fun of me. The main character of the song is having an affair with her friend's husband. There was no way she wouldn't know who she was satirizing. That song was Ariana's declaration of war to me. This... This impudent bitch dares.'
Ariana dared to create a satirical play targeting him. She even performed it in a square where many people gathered. Her intention was clear: to humiliate him on a grand scale.
In this ridiculous public opinion war, Lucas had a simple way to turn the tide. He would force her to counterattack.
'Do you think you can find fault with me with a song? I am the Marquis of Pedegreen.'
He was the head of the prestigious Marquis of Pedegreen, the founding father of the family. There was no way he could lose to a young lady from a fallen family who only knew how to write music in a public opinion battle.
"You are the one who cheated on me with the Duke, leaving me, your fiancé, behind. Elena was just comforting me!"
Lucas raised his voice openly. The voice that often shouted at the servants burst out with quite a dignified tone. He could feel the curious gazes focused on him. He could also hear the whispers of those who recognized Lucas' face.
Fighting in a square like this was against the honor of the Marquis family, but it was not the job of a man to run away from a fight that was initiated by his opponent.
"I will definitely break your spirit here, Ariana. How can you have such a dirty misunderstanding with that? I told you over and over again. You have a delusional disorder. You would jump and get suspicious if you even brushed the collar of a passing lady, but I never thought your illness would evolve to this extent!"
The day after the wedding, when Ariana whispered that she knew about his relationship with Elena, Lucas first visited the Lopez family's doctor. Until recently, the Lopez family was poor, and even their doctor was not very good. They could move around with money. They had to pay a considerable amount of gold coins.
However, the doctor who received enough money quickly presented a fake diagnosis. A diagnosis was that Ariana Lopez had a history of delusional disorder.
'You crossed the line, Ariana.'
No matter how much the family's fortunes were temporarily sluggish due to failed investments, the Pedegreen Marquis was one of the most prestigious families. If they had mobilized all of the connections and skills they had accumulated over hundreds of years, there was no way they wouldn't be able to make even a daughter of a lowly count family kneel...
It was annoying that there was a Duke behind him, but wasn't Ariana the woman he had spit on first?
If he appealed to the noble society about that, be could get my ownership of Ariana back. 'After that, he'll have to really crush her. Sending her to a mental hospital notorious for treating its patients harshly for a few months wouldn't be a bad idea.
Lucas made that plan and took a step closer to Ariana.
"You, I told you to get treatment a long time ago. Delusions are a treatable illness. Your doctor always said that too. Phew... Damn it. I'm just worried about you."
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