Chapter 221

Chapter 221

“Sins?”

Lucius responded with renewed incredulity. After six years, she came to talk about “sins,” and he found it hard to comprehend.

To be honest, he felt more irritated than bored and replied with a slightly annoyed attitude.

“It would have been better to say that you came to ask for money. Now it’s a sin. If you’re going to talk about how you couldn’t bear it as you neared death, thinking about the son you abandoned for money, it would be better to just leave. You won’t go back as quickly as six years ago anyway, so just come back again in another six years.”

To his sarcastic words, Elena cowered, feeling more of a sudden disdain than anger.

“That’s not it…”

“Or is it? Do you need money again?”

“No, I want to confess that everything I said back then was a lie.”

Everything, a lie?

Lucius’ face frowned at those two words. What nonsense was she talking about? Elena handed him the prepared items.

A locket and a marriage certificate.

Lucius read the marriage certificate first and then opened the locket. The marriage certificate stated that Bella Anise had married Connor Fenry, and the locket contained an old portrait of the deceased count.

There was no way he couldn’t recognize it. Because it was the face of a man he believed to be his father until the truth had pushed him over the cliff at the age of twenty-three.

“Lucius, you are my brother’s son. But from now on, you will live as my son.”

Count Chris Fenry said this while holding young Lucius’ shoulder.

“Parental children have more rights to exercise than adopted children. People’s views are like that too. So, Lucius. From now on, you must be my son, more perfect than anyone else. Even if I have my own child born later, my firstborn is you. Understand?”

Because Count Chris Fenry said so, Lucius considered the him and the countess his parents in his heart and outwardly did his best.

But sometimes, when he walked through the room where the family portraits were hung, he would linger at the portrait of Connor Fenry, the man who was considered his real father for so long.

During his younger years, when he was establishing himself as a person, Lucius often looked closely at the portrait and quickly ran to face the mirror, examining which part of himself resembled the man. When he excluded the similar parts, he could now recall the blurred face of his mother.

But it all turned out to be false. But, as if mocking him again, proof that this was in fact correct came into his hands.

Elena Anise spoke.

“I am Elena Anise. Bella Anise is my sister. She and Connor married more than thirty years ago—of course, I didn’t know at the time—and you were born between them. So, you weren’t a bastard from the beginning.”

It was a shocking confession.

For a moment, there was silence in the room, and Lucius showed no significant change in his expression. His face, as he silently gazed at her, seemed to contemplate how best to punish her for orchestrating such a scheme.

Elena hurriedly presented her prepared explanation.

“I didn’t know everything from the beginning. I was also mistaken. I thought my sister was really committing adultery, bringing a man with a wife… and giving birth to a child. My sister got pregnant with you and was kicked out of the house. I occasionally delivered necessary items to her and lived with her briefly. One day, however, after my sister died, I found the heirloom. At that time, my situation—though you probably don’t care—was about to face the most terrible catastrophe a woman could encounter. If I could avoid all that by killing someone, I would have gladly done so. So, I took that heirloom and… Even if it meant destroying you, I honestly didn’t care. You probably know the rest. I exposed your birth for the money provided by the Duke.”

“Eden?”

A stranger, but undoubtedly a woman resembling him, calling out to him in the Duke’s reception room. Lucius recalled the moment as he left the stables after finishing riding. With bare hands waving the fan, young nobles, including Lucius, were betting on the winner of the card game scheduled for the evening.

While exchanging some pleasantries, Lucius was also thinking about his fiancée. As soon as they entered, he planned to approach her and imagine the moment of kissing her.

He anticipated the kiss, a possession-like seal that would be imprinted on her, a moment the Duke, who had always been unsatisfactory to him, could do nothing about.

At that moment, the woman rose, calling him a name he didn’t know.

“Eden.”

He, still bewildered, confirmed his fiancée. She looked at him with a puzzled expression, doubt tinged with faint suspicion. The eyes she had back then…

Doubt or despair, the face marked with the suspicion that the person she loved might not be the one before her. Unable to endure that face, Lucius turned away.

In the midst of it, the Emperor unexpectedly revealed the truth.

At that moment of hearing Elena’s confession, the first thought that came to mind was, ‘If that’s the case, there was no reason for him and her mother to part six years ago, if he would just go through this humiliation in the end.’

He turned away, as if unable to bear the face of Deatrice, the woman who might question whether the person she loved was him.

While he was lost in his thoughts, Elena Anise continued to justify that day’s events.

“But only recently did I realize that it was all my misunderstanding.”

Her voice, as always when speaking of tragic matters, carried a hint of exaggeration.

“I discovered that necklace just a while ago. Looking at the portrait, I thought everything was wrong. I had a terrible realization that I had been mistaken about a person. Day by day, the guilt deepened. I couldn’t live a normal life. I thought I had… well, we can be considered niece and aunt in some way. I couldn’t bear the thought of tormenting a relative so horribly. However, at that time, the Duke knew my true identity and threatened me, so I couldn’t easily come forward. He knew I wasn’t Bella Anise. If I ever changed my story later, he threatened to accuse me of impersonation. So, I hesitated and a few months passed. It’s late, but I came to see if there was any way to undo it.”

Her prepared words were almost over by now. Elena anxiously watched to see how her nephew would react.