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PRESENT TIME…

Inside an abandoned establishment between the border of the first and second districts of the capital, Aries sat alone on the dimly lit porch. The armchair she was sitting on was covered with a white sheet, just like the other chairs and furniture.

Sitting in this darkness all alone and in silence, she couldn\'t help but think about Violet.

Princess Violet. Delicate, modest, kind, and a woman of proper decorum. The perfect example of what a princess should be. She married the eighth prince Carlos Imperial for mutual benefits, but Violet was someone who hoped that this marriage, although arranged for political benefits, would become a heartwarming love story.

She was foolish.

She devoted her life to the eighth prince, put up with him, and forgave all the emotional, verbal, and physical abuse. Carlos, the eighth prince, was a man of greed. Someone like him who would spew words of love with a straight face, finding excuses for his actions, would never change.

Violet probably knew that but simply forgave him, putting in all her faith that her husband would change.

Yes. She was foolish, that was for sure. However, Violet was not weak. Choosing forgiveness despite the pain the man in question inflicted on her repeatedly was something worthy of respect. She could\'ve fooled around to get even, but Violet didn\'t, keeping her chin held high and would constantly smile despite the shattered pieces of her heart within that beautiful shell.

Which led to this mercy and the reason behind Aries\'s action.

In the past, while Aries was still Joaquin\'s war trophy, the drunk Carlos came to the crown prince\'s quarters. While waiting for his brother, Carlos roamed the palace — not the Sapphire palace — where Joaquin used to stay. While he did so, he encountered Aries inside one of the bedrooms.

She had her hand tied at the post of the bed, scrunched up on the corner outside the bed. When she raised her head, Carlos was so mesmerized by her beauty and, as if bound by a spell, he entered the room without taking his eyes off of her.

The second Aries heard the door closing, she knew what would happen… and it did.

Joaquin hadn\'t shared her with anyone back then and upon hearing this, the crown prince was enraged. Even so, the consequences Carlos received weren\'t anywhere close to what Aries had to face. During all that chaotic sitch, Princess Violet secretly visited Aries, who was beaten black and blue.

Just when Aries thought Violet would sneer at her for "receiving" her husband or ridicule her, she tended her wounds, crying, and repeatedly saying \'sorry,\' in between her sobs. Aries, although still in a daze from everything she had gone through, remembered that word: sorry.

No one in this empire ever uttered those words, yet Violet, whom she had met for the first time, apologized to her. Aries didn\'t cry when she was beaten up or when she was forcefully violated, but she welled up when the princess\'s gentle hands held her tenderly, feeling her heated tears on the back of her hand, listening to her sobs and words of apologies.

"Violet is the lost angel in hell," she whispered as her eyes softened, yet the sharpness in them remained dominant. "I hope she chooses herself and her children. It\'ll be a shame if I have to watch her march to the gallows to be punished for a crime she didn\'t commit."

Violet deserved more.

Although fleeing the imperial palace to start anew could be challenging for a princess who lived her life in comfort, it was the best option for her to survive. Aries would put her hand in her heart and swear Violet would recover. A kind and compassionate woman such as Violet, would find a better place than this hell clad with gold and luxury to hide the blazing fire and rotting corpses as the foundation of where the imperial palace stood.

Aries lowered her eyes, propping her jaw against her knuckles, resting her leg over the other. If Violet fled the eighth prince\'s quarters, she would have met the people Conan hired to escort her away from the empire. Both Aries and Conan had planned this back in Haimirich because Aries had always wanted Violet to leave the imperial palace.

"Although my first target is Inez, there were certain things that were beyond my control." — that included the situation between Ismael and Joaquin. She expected it would still take a few months before Joaquin would take Ismael out of the picture.

However, since this situation had already reached its boiling point, she had to change her plans as well. Fortunately, her advisor and the person who taught her how to scheme was Conan. The latter kept denying he wasn\'t good with concocting schemes and called it simply strategizing, but whatever he wanted to call it, Conan helped Aries a lot.

She was already good at creating plans, but Conan, the latter, was a man who considered every angle no matter how big and small the situation was. Therefore, here they were, skipping several plans and proceeding to adapt to the current while still aiming to gain the most out of it.

The side of her lips curled up when she heard the neighing of horses outside. All the thoughts that were in her head regarding Violet slowly faded, focusing on the matter at hand. And that was to start with her plan.

She would start with this one.

A loud creak resounded across the entire dimly lit lobby as the main entrance opened slowly. Her eyes fell on the two shadows stretching in before they entered the abandoned mansion. As soon as she raised her gaze, she caught an armored knight and then the man walking behind him.

"Welcome."

The armored knight jolted when Aries broke the silence, watching the two of them turn their heads in her direction. Aries ignored the armored knights and stared at Ismael, whose eyes went round upon recognizing her voice.

"You…" Frozen on his spot, Ismael held his breath. The light from the candelabra on the nearby stand only gave light to her lap down to her crossed feet. But he couldn\'t mistake this voice for a thick <anno data-annotation-id="1c94b39d-3b33-b08e-8642-d8f8ed99b178">Hillian </anno>accent.

,m The armored knight\'s next words confirmed it.

"Lady Aries, how can you startle me like that?! We\'re not in a horror genre!" Conan complained as he marched towards her, only to stop midway as he looked back at Ismael. "Right… she\'s the boss I\'m talking about who wants to help you."

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