Late at night on the empty streets, the moment Leonard left the room, he immediately started sprinting wildly.
At that instant, he truly understood the meaning of freedom.
So it turned out that having the right to refuse was true freedom.
On streets where it was already impossible to tell how late it was, it was hard to see any pedestrians, only the occasional glimpse of homeless people huddled together for warmth.
After running for a long distance, Leonard recovered a bit of his calm and began heading toward the nearest Church, which if he remembered correctly was the Harvest Church.
Only by fleeing to a place covered by the power of the Church could he truly be considered out of danger.
The Harvest Church was located in the South Borough, adjacent to the Backlund Bridge, and was the fastest place where he could find support at the moment.
Leonard had no idea how long he had been running. It was only when he arrived at the main entrance of the Harvest Church, panting heavily with his legs aching, that he finally let out a sigh of relief.
He did not know why Seraphina had not chased after him. What he wanted to do most right now was to go to the washroom to clean up his utterly disheveled self, then lie down on the bed, pull over the blanket, and cover the self that had no face to see anyone.
When a kind-looking, tall and burly priest of the Harvest Church asked him why he had appeared here so late at night.
Leonard forced a smile and said, "Because of love."
....
The next day, it was not until the sun was high in the sky that Leonard hailed a carriage and returned to Saint Samuel Church in the North Borough.
As soon as he arrived at the church, he was reprimanded a few times by his captain, who told him not to be late for work again because of drinking.
"Won't happen again, never again." Leonard shook his head, just short of raising both hands to swear an oath.
In the end, he still did not tell his captain about how he had spent last night talking heart-to-heart with a witch.
When it was time to rest, he returned to his room. The first thing he did was hide in the washroom for over an hour, and only then did he collapse onto the bed, pulling the blanket over his head.
"Heh heh, now you know you don't have the face to see anyone, huh?" The old man's schadenfreude-filled voice sounded right on time.
Leonard was overwhelmed with shame, his cheeks burning. He truly wished he could find a thin crack in the ground and crawl into it.
"That was an ageless witch, you know. And yet you didn't rise to the challenge at all. You've really disappointed me."
"...." Leonard really wanted to retort that if it weren't for you suddenly blurting out Seraphina's true identity, he might still be immersed in the taste of a witch right now.
But such a rebuttal would only make him look even more pathetic. Silently accepting the criticism and mockery was what suited his current self best.
After a while, when the old man's ridicule and cheerful laughter finally stopped, Leonard, having adjusted his mindset, asked, "Old man, since you already knew Seraphina's true identity, why didn't you warn me earlier?"
"Wouldn't a wonderful encounter with a witch also be a beautiful poem?"
"You clearly did it on purpose, just to watch me make a fool of myself!"
"That's right. And then what? If you yourself hadn't been tempted by her looks, how would you have ended up like this?"
"...." Leonard was left speechless. He thought of many excuses to argue back.
Yet he could never get around the fact that he really had lost his usual calm judgment because of Seraphina's beauty.
Even if the other party had not been a witch, with his kind of personality, it was only a matter of time before he took a big fall in this sort of situation.
"In this regard, your friend Hastur is much smarter than you."
"Hastur? Is he that outstanding in this area too?" Leonard felt immense pressure.
The voice deep within fell silent, no longer continuing the topic.
"Haah...." Leonard lifted the blanket and let out a heavy sigh. He realized that now, as soon as he closed his eyes, the scene of his heart being dug out by Seraphina would appear in his mind.
What was even more maddening was that Seraphina, while committing such a cruel act, was still as beautiful as ever. Even if she chewed on his heart, with blood freshly spurting from his heart's vessels staining her lips.
She still carried a soul-stirring beauty.
....
"How should I reply?"
In the study, Hastur sat in front of his desk. To his right lay a sheet of letter paper.
It was an invitation to a banquet from Mrs. Germani.
Normally, Hastur would always directly refuse such banquet invitations.
Especially since he had just witnessed the chaotic situation of Mrs. Germani's family last time, he was even more unwilling to attend this banquet.
But this time, Mrs. Germani had written a lot in the letter, full of sincere emotion, saying that she wanted to explain in person what had happened that night.
Hastur did not care about that.
However, the letter also said that if Hastur did not come to the banquet this time, she would come directly to visit him.
If he avoided seeing her, she would come every day. This was a very practical threat.
But he still did not plan to attend the banquet. If Mrs. Germani really disregarded her dignity and kept coming to visit, he could temporarily go to the countryside estate to relax.
He could also bring along the hunting dogs trained by Glaint and see how their actual hunting ability was, and whether they could catch Count Hall's eye.
After thinking for a while, Hastur began writing on the letter paper: "I once thought Mrs. Germani was a woman with strong moral boundaries, different from those noble ladies who only know how to pursue love and carnal desire."
"But I did not expect that you are gradually becoming a woman people resent. Even through the letter paper, your desire, your greed, your imperfect image leap vividly off the page."
"I hope you can abandon your meaningless fantasies and actively embrace a new life...."
Hastur wrote several more lines at the end. All in all, this was the longest reply he had ever written to Mrs. Germani.
After asking Butler Neil to have someone deliver this letter to Mrs. Germani, Hastur threw the matter to the back of his mind.
At the moment, holding the pen, his desire to write was strong, so he took the opportunity to write out The Adventures of Pinocchio, which Miss Sharon liked to read.
After a full eight or nine sheets, roughly enough for two small volumes, Hastur stopped writing, put the manuscript away, and then took out another stack of fresh blank paper.
He planned to forge another batch of Roselle's diaries to sell to Audrey.
Recently, Audrey did not seem to have made much progress in her search for Roselle's diaries.
She had already asked him twice whether he had any new Roselle diaries, and had subtly hinted that she would raise the purchase price a bit.
Although Hastur already possessed considerable wealth, after buying Count Abel's land last time, there was not much spare money he could actually use.
He was in urgent need of earning a sum to replenish his coffers.
In any case, when it came to imitating Roselle's diaries, Hastur had basically reached a level of complete mastery. Other than Roselle himself, outsiders could no longer tell real from fake.
Since these Roselle diaries were only meant to make money, Hastur did not need to care at all about the density of knowledge in the content.
On a single page, he could write four of Roselle's romantic escapades, plus a bit of mysticism knowledge.
Aside from the mysticism knowledge being useful, all the other content was formatted description.
The specific format was as follows: month and day, which noble lady, the back garden, post-event evaluation.
Very simple and clear diary style.
Of course, besides the romantic affairs with noble ladies, Hastur also kindly prepared some other little treats for Roselle.
For example, the leering desire of some potbellied noble toward him, temptation from witches, explosive performances by dance troupes, and so on.
In short, it was roughly these categories. Hastur tried to vary the patterns as much as possible, so that Roselle's private life would not appear too monotonous and boring.
As for the source of the mysticism knowledge revealed, he could let Mr. Door, Zaratul, the Twilight Hermit Order, Steam Church clergy, and others make free guest appearances.
Ever since adopting this Roselle diary format, Hastur found it increasingly easy and casual to imitate Roselle's diaries.
About an hour later, Hastur shook his slightly sore arm and looked very satisfied at the more than twenty Roselle diaries spread out on the desk.
Based on the price at which he sold them to Audrey, these Roselle diaries could earn him several thousand pounds.
Earning several thousand pounds in one hour meant tens of thousands in a day.
He could be considered to have basically realized Fors' dream of becoming ricj just by writing every day.
As for Roselle's reputation being affected, and the feelings of dear Mr. Fool being polluted by this knowledge, Hastur chose to selectively ignore them.
After all, the shining gold pounds were enough to temporarily blind his eyes.
"Thanks to Emperor Roselle for leaving behind such precious wealth."
"Thanks to Mr. Fool for his pursuit of Roselle's diaries."
"Thanks to Miss Audrey for her generosity and her current healthy financial situation."
After silently offering his thanks once in his heart, Hastur then separated the more than twenty Roselle diaries and stored them in drawers.
Now, he only needed to wait for Audrey to come knocking to purchase them, and he could earn a handsome processing fee.
"Knowledge is wealth." With a sigh of emotion, Hastur stood up and left the study, going into the adjacent room and picking up Ariella, who was already about to pounce over.
"Ariella, have you been overeating again lately?"
"Meow. (*^▽^*)"
"Good that you admit it. No objections to halving your cat food tonight, right?"
"Meow? (⊙_⊙)?"
"Alright, I knew you wouldn't have any objections. Then let's happily carry out this decision from now on."
"Meow?! (⊙o⊙)"
"You're saying you firmly support the decision to halve the cat food? Ariella, you're becoming more and more righteous, even knowing how to save money for the family."
"Meow.... (´.＿.｀)"
In the end, Ariella only let out a weak, powerless meow.