All Chapters of REVENGE AFTER REBIRTH-THE LORD'S FORSAKEN BRIBE: Chapter 71 - Chapter 80

The words carried through corridors, over banquet tables, even in the kitchens where servants scrubbed soot from their hands. And though I never encouraged them, I never silenced them either.It was time.I began with the guards.Those who had stood beside me in the square, who had bled under my orders, who had seen me strike down serpents with my own hand. Their loyalty was already leaning. I only had to anchor it.In the training yard, I walked among them as they drilled. Their salutes were sharp, their eyes alight.“You fought with honor,” I told them, my voice carrying. “When shadows threatened to swallow our city, you stood firm. Remember this: a blade obeys the hand it trusts. And I trust you.”Their captain bowed deeply, his voice fierce. “And we trust you, my lady. To the last breath.”The oath was not shouted. It was whispered. But whispers are stronger than shouts when spoken in unison.Next came the nobles.I invited them not to the council hall, where Damien raged, but to

The council chamber had always felt suffocating. Its heavy oak doors, high-arched ceilings, and tapestries of battles fought long before any of us were born were meant to inspire awe and remind all who entered that power was ancient, eternal, beyond the reach of mortal hands.But power was not in the stone walls or painted banners.It was in the eyes that turned toward me as I crossed the threshold.Every noble, every minister, every guard present felt it, shift subtle as a whisper yet heavy as a storm. They did not rise for Damien. They rose for me.I wore no crown, only the silver circlet Countess Miriel had gifted me. It was simple, save for the garnet that caught the light like a drop of blood. But I saw how their gazes lingered on it, how even silence seemed to bend beneath its weight.Damien noticed too.He sat slouched at the head of the long table, a goblet already half-empty in his hand. His eyes were bloodshot, his smile too wide. “My lords, my ladies,” he drawled, his voice

Night draped the palace in velvet silence.The torches along the eastern wing burned low, their flames thin, their light trembling. Beyond my chamber doors, the corridors were still. Too still.I sat at my vanity, brushing my hair slowly, each stroke deliberate. To any passerby, I was no more than a weary duchess readying for bed.But the mirror before me reflected more than my own face. It reflected shadows shifting at the edges of the room, the faint glint of steel in the dark.They had come.The first movement was soundless. A whisper of cloth, the flicker of a blade catching moonlight.I did not turn.Instead, I spoke, my voice calm. “Did you think me blind?”The figure froze, dagger poised. A second shadow slipped from behind the curtain, then a third from the far corner.Three assassins.Too few to storm a palace, but enough to silence one woman in her bed.I set the brush down gently, rising to my feet. “If serpents wish to strike,” I said softly, “they should not slither where

Aria.She had fled there after breakfast, her veil trembling, her tears flowing in rehearsed rivers. And Damien, ever the fool for pity, had opened his door, and his heart, to her poison.Inside his chamber, the air stunk of wine. Damien paced like a caged beast, his sword belt slung carelessly over a chair, his goblet spilling red across the table.Aria knelt beside him, her veil loosened, her hands clutching his arm as though she alone could tether him to sanity.“They mock you,” she whispered, her voice low and trembling. “They mock us both. My sister twists every word, every glance, until they see her as their savior and you as…”“Enough!” Damien roared, his goblet shattering against the wall. Wine dripped down the stones like blood.Aria flinched, then leaned closer, her tears glinting in the torchlight. “I only want to protect you, my lord. But she… she wants your throne. She already wears it in their eyes. If you do not stop her, she will destroy you.”Damien’s hands clenched,

Morning light crept into the palace like a reluctant guest, slanting across scorched stone and corridors that still reeked of smoke. Servants whispered as they scrubbed blood from the floors. Guards moved with sharper eyes, tighter grips on their spears.The serpent attack had failed.But the venom lingered.Aria appeared later than usual, her veil drawn low, her steps measured. She entered the solar where a cluster of noblewomen sat, their voices hushed, their fans fluttering nervously.“My dear ladies,” she greeted, her voice soft as ever. “What a dreadful night we endured. Were it not for my sister’s fortune, we might all be in mourning today.”A murmur lapped through the group not agreement, but unease.Lady Veyra raised a brow. “Fortune, you say? I heard the duchess fought herself. That she struck down two of them with her own hands.”Aria’s smile faltered beneath the veil. “So they claim. But one wonders… how did the serpents slip past so many guards, yet walk straight into