Isn’t Being A Wicked Woman Much Better?
Chapter 96

“Tsk.”

Princess Emmanuelle clicked her tongue lightly as she read Philap’s letter asking her to prepare a spot for Mia to showcase her strong divine power.

Mia Vinoche. Although the low-rank noble seemed quick-witted, her judgement was surprisingly unexpected.

‘But she might be useful someday, so let’s give her a chance.’

While quickly calculating the profit and loss, Princess Emmanuelle, who was sipping tea in an elegant pose, rose from her seat at the call of Duke Serig.

“Emmanuelle.”

“Yes, Father.”

Duke Serig opened his mouth with a stiff expression.

“Have you looked at the ledgers well? Anything suspicious?”

Duke Serig was convinced that the reason for the recent sharp decline in sales in Bruno’s business was because Bruno, the owner, was secretly embezzling a lot of money.

Although it was because regular customers had left because the quality of raw materials had been lowered to meet the sales decline due to competitors and the payments imposed by the Duke, he wasn’t interested in the specific facts.

The business was just a part that filled his slush fund pocket.

The suspicious Duke Serig left Emmanuelle, who was the most skillful of his children, in charge of Bruno’s business, and told her to keep an eye on the accounting books.

“Nothing yet… I think I’ll have to spend some time looking at the books, Father.”

Emmanuelle replied, flustered at her father’s question.

The truth was, she didn’t even care about Bruno’s business.

Emmanuelle considered commerce to be incompatible with herself.

She thought that as a noble, she should be elegant, and was planning the empire’s most notable debutante to create such a noble self.

Not only gentlemen, but also young ladies were busy managing their connections by holding parties often so that they would be liked.

She tried to give a sense of belonging to the ladies in her group, and she made an enemy outside to unite them.

Leading a large faction. It was the best way she knew to survive in the social world.

However, Princess Deborah, acting as she pleased with no dignity at all, attracted the attention of several leading figures, such as the 5th Princess.

It was really a thorn in the eye.

‘That’s right. It won’t be long before she isn’t that big of a deal.’

Duke Serig was annoyed by his quiet daughter.

“Emmanuelle. Aren’t you more relaxed than your brothers? And you’re telling me you still haven’t found anything suspicious in the books?”

Emmanuelle’s brows narrowed slightly as Duke Serig asked with a displeased face.

‘What do you mean, relaxed! I have a lot of work to do.’

Is there a young lady who is as popular and as well-connected as herself? How could he talk so coldly to her?

If she got a good marriage and controlled the center of the social world, her father and family would profit even more in the future.

Her dissatisfaction soared, but she held it back and opened her mouth calmly.

“I am currently checking the books. I delayed confirming the numbers for a while as I was working hard on my thesis. I’ll look into it again after the academic conference.”

“Be sure to finish it after the academic conference. Do you think only a penny or two are spent on a party?”

“Yes, Father.”

Emmanuelle frowned as he came out of the private meeting with her father.

‘I’m so busy I could die.’

Returning to her room with rough steps, she began to write letters to the young ladies of the influential families she managed.

To ask them to go to the Epsilon group conference together.

A cold smile appeared on her soft lips, as if it was being drawn over a mask.

***

The present day. The Epsilon group conference was going to be held in an hour, in the first-floor auditorium of the Epsilon frat house.

Starting with professors, the group conference was attended by various people from diverse fields and social classes.

Students from other social clubs also attended and competed for knowledge while exchanging criticism of the theses.

Because of this, the four prestigious clubs did not hold academic conferences on the same date, but presented them with a time difference.

And this year, Epsilon was the first to hold the presentations.

I recalled the words of the 5th Princess.

‘There is a reason why Sir Isidor obstinately took the first place in line.’

Last year, there was a student who was writing a thesis on the same subject as Princess Emmanuelle of Omicron.

Since the subject was the same, the contents overlapped here and there, but it was unclear who wrote it first.

‘Because Omicron had held their academic conference first, they came forward as a group, and that student was accused of plagiarism. It was a similar thesis, so they were trying to undermine one side. They even picked on the presenter’s private life.’

Attacking the messenger and not the message is a common trick, but it works quite well.

Because the audience focuses more on judging the character of the subject of criticism than on the content of the criticism.

‘The presenter, whose private life was revealed, gave up, feeling humiliated.’

It seems that Epsilon’s presenter said he would scrap the thesis first, and it eventually led to a situation where he could not be defended.

‘They are unlikeable, as expected from the group led by Philap.’

Thinking that I did well in avoiding Omicron, I took a big sigh and then exhaled.

‘I’m nervous.’

Because I was also one of the presenters. Who was exposed to attack at any time.

“Are you nervous?”

I raised my head at the friendly voice that seemed to have read my feelings.

White-gloved hands were holding two steamy paper cups.

When our eyes met, Isidor, who smiled kindly, sat beside me.

“Not really.”

Pretending to be calm, I hesitated for a moment and then opened my mouth as I looked at the flower tea he was giving me.

“Didn’t you hear the rumors? If you bring me a drink I don’t like, I’ll throw it away.”

“Throw it. I’ll bring you another one. Until I bring one the Princess likes.”

Although it was an easy line that even a pushover could catch, seeing him smiling weakly and leisurely, there seemed to be something.

“Is there anything I can do to help the Princess’ academic conference presentation?”

Eventually slurping on the warm tea he gave me, I shook my head.

“I just need you to do the part I told you about.”

“Don’t worry about that. And you’ll do great. Like you did at the fact-finding meeting last time.”

I paused as I was drinking the tea.

“Come to think of it… All the Epsilon executives came to watch the fact-finding meeting even though we hadn’t met before. It wasn’t such a controversial issue in the social world for even the imperial family to attend. Did Sir Isidor have anything to do with it?”

He narrowed his eyes slightly at my question.

“I tried to be a bit nosy.”

“Why?”

“Because I thought you’d do well. Like today.”

“What if I can’t do well today?”

I asked bluntly for no reason. While hiding my weak thoughts.

“Is someone who succeeds every time a person? It’s a dragon.”

Although the dragon-like figure that only appeared on the front of the coin that was tossed suddenly came to my mind, I still felt a little relieved by Isidor’s words.

Soon after, as the time for the presentation drew near, I followed Isidor and got up from my seat.

Being the Epsilon leader, Isidor was in charge of proceeding with the conference, so he walked in front of the auditorium with a script. As for me, I sat outside as I was the last presenter.

Subsequently, Epsilon’s thesis presenters begin to sit down one after the other. There was also a young lady whom I had briefly seen at the ruined tea party the other day.

When it was time, the auditorium was filled with students who came to see the theses.

‘They’re here.’

I swallowed a bitter smile seeing the Omicron group rushing in with Philap in the lead, and narrowed my eyes as the audience suddenly became quiet.

‘My father is here? Well, he used to be the leader of Epsilon.’

Silence fell as Duke Seymour, who sat in the reserved seat, made his appearance.

Besides, I could see the Wizardry Association manager and the elder who I met once sitting next to him.

‘It seems like everyone is working hard for their social life today.’

While I was in an astonished state, the conference began, and I cast my gaze to the front of the podium.

Isidor came up in a refreshing gait and gave a welcome greeting.

Because of his big, sleek body, soft voice, and handsome face, everyone was interested even though he was only introducing the academic conference and talking about the order of presentations.

“I can’t believe it’s over already.”

As Isidor came down, a young lady muttered in a regretful voice.

However, immediately afterwards, the 5th Princess made a great start to the conference.

There were some presenters who were struggling to speak because of the sharp criticism that came from other clubs in the middle of the presentation, but they were able to finish it without any problems because the level of the thesis was generally high.

In particular, the response to Michelle Granbert’s thesis, “A Case Study on Armand’s Customer Impression”, was good.

She focused only on one thing, so the topic was clear, and her sharp insight stood out.

‘Well done.’

Her thesis was positive for Armand, and since there were many noble children here, the main customer base of my shop, whenever she received praise from a professor, I was as pleased as if it were directed at me.

The conference proceeded smoothly until the second half, and soon Isidor called my name.

“The next presenter is Princess Deborah Seymour.”

When I got up from my seat, a subtle murmur passed by.

‘Is it a formula again?’

‘Probably.’

I walked slowly to the front of the podium to make the presentation, not paying attention to it.

Then.

Someone who was sitting in the center raised a hand, and Isidor pointed to the girl.

“Is something wrong?”

“I will raise one objection before Princess Deborah presents her thesis.”

“One objection?”

She opened her mouth with confidence.

“Yes. The thesis that Princess Deborah is about to present wasn’t written by her.”

Unlike before, there was a loud buzz at Emmanuelle’s explosive remarks.

‘She took the bait properly.’

I stared calmly at Princess Emmanuelle and remained silent.