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Emilia was keenly aware of the fact that Noelle was only telling her everything as a way to 'vent', and had neither the expectation nor the desire for her confessions to produce any results.
However, how could Emilia allow someone to wrong a girl she favored so much and get away with it?
She had long since realized Noelle's potential when it came to managing and organizing both resources and people alike, and now that she also had a firm grasp of her personality, Emilia had long since fancied taking her in as a subordinate.
Whether Noelle chose to develop their relationship further than that would be up to the girl herself, however.
Thus, Emilia believed she had both the right and the obligation to avenge this slight. However, the problem remained that Noelle had never mentioned the name of the family, or where they were from.
Emilia knew it was definitely intentional, but so what? While she would generally give the people she liked however much privacy they wanted, that was limited to when she didn't believe they would wrong themselves.
Since Noelle wanted revenge in her heart but didn't dare to act on it herself, Emilia wouldn't let her keep hiding.
She knew it wouldn't be so easy, however. Since Noelle refused to mention it, simply asking the quest straight would get her either a denial or a lie. So Emilia decided to approach the topic from another perspective.
Many of the things that Noelle mentioned were impossible for anyone but the involved parties to know, but since Noelle believed in them so firmly, Emilia soon realized there had to be more to the situation than she thought.
"Do you trust the person who told you all of this?"
Noelle's smile was grim as she nodded. "I checked everything myself after she told me."
Emilia blinked. "This 'she' you speak of is…?"
The gray-haired girl was already starting to regret letting Emilia know all of this, since now that her curiosity was aroused, it would be almost impossible to prevent her from knowing what she wanted to know.
Noelle could only sigh. "Four years ago, when I got to work at the regular time, a haggard-looking woman approached me. According to her—"
This time, Noelle didn't hide as many details from Emilia as she previously had, perhaps in an effort to make her stop digging further into the subject.
Emilia soon discovered that the name of Noelle's biological mother was Narcissa, and the maidservant was named Dolores.
And as expected, the person who first let Noelle know of her origins turned out to be the very woman who gave birth to the boy who replaced Nicole, Abey.
This woman wasn't some nobody, since the baby she gave birth to still had to have the bloodline of the clan, or it would be easily discovered. After all, while no one would doubt the leader's wife, the child born from a maidservant always had to withstand some scrutiny.
Therefore, although Abey's status wasn't high, she was still one of the cousins of Noelle's biological mother, Narcissa, and had been serving her in the mansion for decades.
With access to the clan leader's seal, it was easy for Nicole's biological mother, Dolores, to forge an order to send her to a place where she could be easily taken captive, and the woman never doubted that her coworker would be so daring and insidious, and fell into the worst nightmare of her life.
Knowing that the mistress she had served for years didn't care for her sudden disappearance at all dealt a huge blow to Abey's psyche. Naturally, her pregnancy was also a tragedy that befell her after being taken away.
After she suffered for months under captivity, and even had her newborn son taken away, Abey inevitably stopped speaking as her eyes lost their light and her body moved like a puppet without a soul.
Even Dolores believed that the woman had been completely broken, and stopped taunting and goading her further.
Abey's disappearance wasn't without any repercussions, however, and the old clan did dispatch some people to look for her. Thus, eventually, she was rescued by the branch family before she could die in a dark, locked basement from starvation. But as far as Abey was concerned, they came to her too late.
Dolores was meticulous and had left no clues of her presence where Abey was locked up to starve to death, and with the victim herself refusing to speak, no one had any idea who kidnapped her.
Seeing her state, they assumed it must be some pervert who kept her for his pleasure. The clan's search for this mysterious man was destined to be futile, and they abandoned it shortly after due to the lack of progress and direction.
Once Abey was brought back to the clan, Noelle's biological mother, Narcissa, was naturally informed, and perhaps out of guilt, she started paying her regular visits. Of course, she too failed to get a word out of Abey, just like everyone else, but that was no surprise.
Everyone thought that this unfortunate woman had become an empty shell, waiting to die, but her mind was very much still there.
The reason Abey remained silent was simple. At this point in her life, the only thing left in her heart was the desire to rip the woman who caused all this to shreds.
But Dolores was now the main wife of one of the leading branches, having married the old clan leader, she knew that speaking up against her would only shorten her remaining life and give her no result.
Abey could accept death, but she couldn't let that woman go.
Even with her silence, however, Abey knew it was only a matter of time before she 'died'. Perhaps the only reason she wasn't already dead was because Dolores was cautious and didn't have many ways to kill her in Narcissa's home.
Emilia couldn't help but sigh. "You know, at this point, you might as well tell me the name of your clan. I will find out eventually anyway, after all. You've given me enough clues."
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