Cinderella Crazy
Crazy lady

After a meal with Vincent and Marion, Ashley returns to her room but Bellena is still not back. Ashley started to worry if anything happened to the weakling. Not because he cares, of course, but because Bellena is the only source of information that knows who she is and what she has to do to get back.

It's a blow to his head if Bellena runs away, but he's sure Bellena's not that stupid. Or perhaps, Bellena's stupidity is not to run away?

As Ashley was busy thinking about whether she should look for Bellena or wait a little longer, someone knocked on her bedroom door.

"Miss Ashelia, Madam wants to see you."

Ashley thought the person knocking at the door was Bellena, but it turned out that she was another servant delivering a message from the only Midgraff Lady at the moment.

Ashley ignored him for a moment, letting him stand in front of the door for a few minutes before finally exiting. The servant did not even dare to call his nonanya twice. He was thinking of an excuse to give to Marion when Ashley opened her bedroom door.

At first Ashley had no intention of paying him any heed, but knowing the person she thought was nobody dared to call her, hurt her pride a little. Get the rough woman out of her resting place to greet her stepmother directly.

Ashley did become very submissive when he was in front of Vincent. He doesn't look as good when he's alone. Maybe that's what keeps Marion from feeling any threat. However, since when did Ashley become an obedient child? That's how much influence Vincent has for that woman.

No, that's how big the papa's influence is.

Guided by the waiter in front of her, Ashley walked, still barefoot, towards where Marion was. They walked and continued to walk down the hallways that Ashley had never passed, down the stairs of one and the other. Without knowing the location he was headed, the trip felt very long, as if he was being played by the servant who guided him.

Ashley suddenly stopped, shortly after coming down the stairs, entering the hallway with minimal lighting.

"Damn it, you want to die?"

"ah! Sorry, Miss! I'm just being asked to call you to the wine cellar!"

The servant immediately kowtowed in front of Ashley and did not dare to raise his head before Ashley allowed it.

The wine? Ashley thought back. Soon he smiled, recalling the taste of the wine they had provided at dinner. There's no harm in seeing her stepmother and coming back with a bottle of wine, right?

"Where's Marion?"

"The lady's there waiting for you." The servant replied looking back still in a position of rest.

A door at the end of the dark hallway had been waiting for him. As the room he was heading to was already in front of them, Ashley asked the maid to return, leaving her to continue the journey alone.

Throw that doorknob. There was a gap before Ashley opened it. A familiar feeling he had felt several times. The feeling of someone waiting and watching him from behind the door.

Ashley doesn't know how to get along in her new world. He did not know whether it was normal for one to meet another in the wine storage room. However, he felt a strange thing after entering that passageway.

The closer he got to the door, the more his chest felt tight and his hands trembled.

The temperature there was indeed cold, but not that cold to the point of making someone shiver. What did Ashley feel?

He did not like the feeling he was feeling at the time. Worry, anxiety, and a sense of wanting to escape. This feeling had long since not felt Ashley anymore. Not instinct, Ashley knows exactly where all those feelings come from.

Ashelia's body memory.

It actually makes women without fear increasingly want to enter. There was that door, displaying wooden shelves with hundreds, perhaps thousands, of bottles of wine neatly lined up in the dark room. The lack of illumination there reminded Ashley of the summoning tower, a fleeting memory that annoyed her.

Ashley walked in through a row of wine bottles arranged by type and year. The smile on his lips expanded glancing at the bottles.

Because it was dark, he could not read the writings that were there, but at least the grapes must have been more than a year, right? Even better if he finds the age of 20 to 30 years.

For a moment, Ashley had forgotten the uncomfortable feeling brought about by Ashelia's memory. But he remembered it again as his trembling hand tried to grab a bottle of wine.

Thinking that he was trembling had upset him, his unstable hand was now in front of him, trying to grab his wine bottle. He caught his own wrist, as if he was being controlled by someone else.

He turned toward the end of the shelves, where, perhaps, Marion was waiting for him. With a serious face, the woman continued her footsteps approaching Ashelia's stepmother who might know the reason for her body's fear.

He was at the end of the room. The place was quite spacious yet it was intentionally emptied.

Ashley approached the wall, checking for scratches there, a sign that before, where she was standing was not empty space as she sees it today.

Then suddenly,

Ctas!

Ashley was struck with a hard whip on her back. He then looked back quickly, finding out who the mastermind was. However, before he could see the person in front of him, another lash was pointing at Ashley's face.

Ashley scolded her with her right arm, letting the whip tear the thin cloth on her arm and leaving a soreness in the skin until later on the shoulder.

After which, the third whip came back without giving him any room to dodge. Ashley confronted her again with her right hand, but this time she also turned her hand to restrict the rope and caught it.

With just a single hit, even using Ashelia's weak left hand, the person fell to the floor. The woman in front of Ashley put on a surprised face while holding onto her cheek. Not a word came out of the lips of the two women. They just stared at each other with breaths.

The trembling on Ashley's body strengthened along with her shortened breath. He was eager to beat Marion who dared to attack him, but Ashelia's body was very unsupportive.

It felt as if Ashley's energy was getting drained, and her body was hard to move. Even after he hit his stepmother with all his might, Ashelia's trauma still lingered strongly. Ashley realized something.

Carrying the whip still wrapped around her hand, leaving Marion there, Ashley walked out looking for a mirror. His steps were difficult, he almost fell down a few times because his feet did not listen to his commands well.

As he looked at the sizable mirror in the hallway leading to the entrance hall, Ashley immediately undressed. Without thinking about anything else, he took off all the cloth covering his body except the bandages that wrapped his legs.

As he knew, there was no scar on his front body. But while turning her back, just as she had expected, Ashley could clearly see her back was filled with lash scars.

"Cewe's crazy."

In that quiet passageway, Ashley looked inside her who was inside the mirror.

A noble daughter whose mother died. Then his kind father marries the evil woman who secretly torments him. He feels he is replacing Ashelia whose life is like Cinderella.

Ashley recalled, Bellena did say that it was likely Ashelia did not like her stepmother. Ashley thought it was just Ashelia's defensive stance not wanting to accept the presence of new people in her house.

In fact, the dislike was due to the torture of Ashelia's stepmother who was done to him.

Seeing the attitude of Marion who never acted in front of Vincent, makes Ashley think that Marion always did it without the knowledge of Ashelia's father. Even when Ashley did some humiliation such as ignoring and occupying her seat, Marion seemed to have no problem with it.

Please me.

Ashelia's voice was ringing in Ashley's head.

His mind was full of despair, as if there was no way out in his life.

Right, he underestimated the people around him. Right, a lot of lash injuries on his back were signs of torture of his stepmother. Right, he lost one leg. But is there really no other way out?

Indeed his father did not entrust anything to him, but, was not his father a kind, friendly, and patient person? Maybe his father just 'yet' can entrust everything to Ashelia.

Doesn't that mean he still has a way out?

Was it because when Ashelia reported Marion's behavior to her father, her father didn't believe her?

Ashley recalled Marion's graceful and gentle demeanor in front of Vincent. Ashley's gaze turned into a lazy look as she recalled the woman's hypocrisy. No wonder Vincent did not believe Ashelia's words.

Slightly distracted from the topic, Ashley remembers thinking of herself as Cinderella, but here Vincent is still alive and very healthy.

"Belom is Cinderella, right?"

His chirp laughed at his own fate, still not wearing his shirt while sitting cross-legged in front of the mirror.

Although Vincent cannot help his daughter, still, is the torment of his stepmother enough to make Ashelia so desperate?

Ashelia's age was no longer the children who dared not resist or could not distinguish between right and wrong. The arrival of his stepmother was also not that long until it had a very big influence in him.

Different indeed, if Ashley is the stepmother.

But seeing Marion's expression when Ashley hit him, he did not believe Marion's character could be so influential that he was able to corner Ashelia.

Ashley doesn't understand anymore. Maybe because he was used to being beaten by his father since childhood, he did not feel it was enough to make someone feel desperate.

Of course Ashley had felt despair, and thought it might be better if he died, but it happened when he was a child.

As time went on Ashley understood that strength was important, mentally as well as physically. It also makes him grow into a strong, fearless, and charismatic person. He was grateful to have grown up in the Miller family, although others would have felt otherwise.

Despite all of Ashley's past, he must now kill Marion. If Marion is Ashelia's target, then she can come back. But if Marion is not the target, she must clear the trail before returning to find the real target.

Killing Marion who looks like an ordinary woman is not difficult for Ashley. The problem now, how do I kill Marion without a trace? Is not killing the wife of a good-natured official the same as being an enemy of society? Plus, being a notorious criminal would only hinder the survival of his mission.

Ashley took a long breath. He does not like troublesome things like long planning. Although sometimes he is forced to do it, but if possible, he will choose the frontal way, directly using his own two hands.

"Lo die alone can't you?"

^^^Connected...^^^