Lance opened his mouth to say something but in the end, he didn't. For the next moments, he kept silent. What had happened in
the past couldn't be changed no matter how hard he tried, and he couldn't choose to change anything even if he were able to do
so. Perhaps, the position of the Holy Maiden shouldn't have existed at all.
"You don't have anything to say?" From Catherine's perspective, the silence of Lance was acquiescence to what she was
accusing him of. Instead of having any sort of satisfaction, she became even more furious. "Now that you're feeling guilty with
what you did to me, there's one thing you can do to try and make it up to me. Write an imperial edict to appoint me as the heir to
the throne. I want the throne of the South Kingdom."
"You don't know how to rule a country."
"I never said I want to rule the South Kingdom. What I need is merely the position of Queen. He has a very prominent status. If I
marry him as a queen with our entire territory as my dowry, he'll definitely be willing to marry me," Catherine said in a low voice.
"He? Who are you talking about?" Lance asked, very much confused with Catherine's statement.
"Prince Matthew Jun."
Lance looked at Catherine in total disbelief. He had never expected that the man Catherine fell in love with was Matthew. He was
well aware of what kind of person Matthew was. Even if Catherine was the empress of the Bright Dynasty, Matthew wouldn't
even look at her for a brief second, let alone if she was the queen of the South Kingdom. Matthew was no less arrogant than an
emperor. And so far, there had been only one woman who got the chance to be by his side, and that was Harper.
"He has a wife!"
"Your Majesty, have you forgotten that Harper entered the Labyrinth Swamp, together with Sister Diana?" Catherine said while
placing a blank imperial edict in front of him. She then helped Lance in a sitting position before saying, "Your Majesty, the time
has come for you to compensate me."
Instead of writing the imperial edict, Lance calmly stated, "Even if you give him the entire territory of the South Kingdom as a gift,
Matthew wouldn't even take a look at you. Don't you know that Matthew and his wife love each other very much?"
"Do you think I'm stupid? I know that. That's why Harper needed to die. Otherwise, why do you think she was taken by the library
for no reason? In addition to her own spiritual energy, I was responsible for the other half of it," Catherine said with a broad smile
on her face.
"Did you have anything to do with the collapse of the library as well?" Lance asked in disbelief. He didn't think he could be more
surprised that day. The library was an important place for the South Kingdom, but Catherine had the nerve to destroy it, just so
her plot against Harper could come to fruition.
"The collapse of the library had nothing to do with me, but it happened just as I expected. My original plan was to lock Harper in
the library so I can use the mechanism inside to kill her. After all, a lot of people who had trespassed into the library had been
killed. I thought that Prince Matthew would destroy the library out of rage because of Harper's death. Although things didn't go as
I had planned, it was fine as long as the result is the same," Catherine slowly said.
"Then, why did Harper take Diana into the Labyrinth Swamp?" Lance asked, still confused with the revelations.
"Because I tried to kill Diana. Perhaps, Harper didn't want to be accused of killing her. Or perhaps, she thought it would be
helpful to her if she took Diana as a hostage or as a bargaining chip. Anyway, if she didn't take Diana away, I would have still
killed her. What Harper did was unnecessary, to be honest," Catherine said while shrugging, as if she was talking about a trivial
matter.
Lance thought that the whole world had just been thrown upside down. He felt dejected, defeated, and distressed. He had
thought that it should be Harper who wanted to kill Diana. But it turned out that Catherine had been planning to kill her sister all
along. He asked, "Catherine, when did you become so cruel?"
With a deep-rooted hatred bursting out of her eyes, Catherine responded, "From the moment you sent me to the Starry Palace.
Do you know what kind of life I had in there? I have been forced to practice my poison skills every single day. Whenever I hurt
myself, I had to endure it all alone. When I'm afraid, I had to endure it. When I feel lonely, I still had to endure it. No one cares
about whether I'm alive or dead. You don't care about me, nor does anybody else in this entire kingdom!"
"No, that's not true..." Lance felt helpless. As the Holy Maiden, Catherine certainly had to work harder than ordinary people. The
purpose of the training which she had received was to make her stronger. Lance hadn't expected that those lessons would make
her hate them more.
"Write the imperial edict and make me the heir to the throne right now!" Catherine commanded, putting the brush pen in Lance's
hand. "Now that Diana is dead, I'm your only daughter. You have no choice but to give the South Kingdom to me!"
However, Lance refused to yield. He no longer said anything but still, he didn't write the edict as Catherine ordered him to do. He
was determined not to give the South Kingdom to her. Her mind was filled with hatred, so Lance thought that she would be
incapable of being kind to the people of the South Kingdom. Moreover, Matthew would never marry her just because she
became the queen. On the contrary, once he found out that Catherine had something to do with Harper's death, he would
probably destroy the South Kingdom in a fit of rage.
"Hurry up!" Catherine exclaimed in rage.
Lance only closed his eyes and did nothing despite Catherine's uncompromising and ruthless attitude. In return, she was even
more enraged by Lance's stubbornness. Without a bit of hesitation and regard for her father, she instigated the poison in his
body. Lance instantly widened his eyes in pain, unable to make any sound.
"Your Majesty, to relieve yourself of the pain, you'd better write down the imperial edict as I said. Otherwise, you're going to be in
hell every single day!"
Lance clenched his teeth and closed his eyes once again, cold sweat trickling down his forehead. But still, he didn't make any
sound. He thought that he had already made a grave mistake before, so if he was going to die anyway, he couldn't allow himself
to make another one.