My Step-Daughters Are The Villainesses

"My Lord."

The moment Ulrich stepped across the threshold, a line of dressed servants bowed in perfect synchronization. He had dispatched couriers via the fastest merchant relays over a week ago, delivering orders to open the estate, staff the kitchens, and prepare the suites for future occupancy.

"Take them upstairs to their respective rooms," Ulrich said to the maid at the lead before turning his gaze back to the sisters hovering in the entryway. "You have until evening to be completely prepared. You may rest for now if you wish. However, bear in mind the time required to dress, secure the jewelry, and finalize your presentation; you will need several hours to get ready for the event. Take that timing into consideration."

He said without a trace of warmth, turned on his heel, and walked out of the mansion.

Airam, Hermione, and Esther stood there in the grand entrance, temporarily overwhelmed by the towering ceilings, the elaborate crystal chandeliers, and the sheer number of servants waiting at their command.

This mansion was a secondary house for Ulrich. It was actually quite shocking, even more so when it was in the capital, where the prices were staggering. Well, even money wasn’t enough to secure such a mansion in the capital. Connections and status were also required, which Ulrich had.

"This way, my ladies," one of the senior maids prompted, offering a polite smile. "We have already prepared your rooms."

The sisters followed the maid toward the sweeping staircase. It was still early morning; attempting to don their silk gowns and elaborate corsetry now would only result in ruined fabric and unnecessary physical exhaustion. If the royal event started at dusk, they required two to three hours of dedicated preparation in the late afternoon. Until then, they possessed a rare window of unstructured time.

Esther trailed a hand along the banister, her lower lip jutting out in a small sulk. "We should have maybe asked if we could visit around the capital. Just to look at the markets."

"There is no way Ulrich is ever letting us out of this, Esther, and you know it," Hermione replied, rolling her eyes.

Ulrich’s security protocols had always been stringent, but following Libra’s incident in New Ruben, his protective measures had escalated into something bordering on paranoia. He planned under the assumption that hostiles were actively hunting them.

Hermione did not actively dislike the heavy security, but she possessed a cynical edge that Esther lacked. She was not naive. She and Airam both understood it already. Ulrich had somehow discovered their existence. He knew exactly who their mother was, and he understood the great potential of their combined magical affinities. That knowledge was the exact reason he had saved them.

All this intense protection, the lavish spending, the meticulous oversight, it was an investment. He knew how powerful they could become if properly trained and raised under his direct command.

Hermione refused to fall blindly into the illusion of Ulrich’s selfless devotion the way Esther had on day one. She maintained her guard. Yet, as they reached the landing, she hesitated. If Ulrich merely viewed them as living weapons to be secured and deployed, he would not bother orchestrating padded carriages, timing their rest stops to prevent nausea, or personally standing guard in the freezing dark while they slept. A ruthless handler would not care if his weapons were tired or uncomfortable, only that they were functional. There was a genuine degree of personal concern embedded within his way of handling them, though she didn’t think of it as being that big.

Hermione shook the conflicting thoughts from her head, offering one final glance down where Ulrich had disappeared before turning to follow the maid into the luxurious upper suites.

◊◊◊

The well-tended flagstones of the aristocratic district surrendered to the cracked, uneven cobblestones of the lower commercial sector. The density of the crowd thickened into a solid mass of bodies. Ulrich strode through the press of laborers and merchants, pulling the rough wool of his brown cloak tighter to conceal his posture and the leather grip of his sword. The air here was saturated with the sharp sting of boiling tallow, the rot of the nearby river mud, and the metallic tang of crushed coal burning in the open forge of a street-side blacksmith.

He walked carefully, matching the rhythm of the exhausted commoners. He possessed zero personal experience with the Skargardian capital’s underbelly, but the path was etched into his mind. He relied entirely on the detailed prose of the novel he had read in his past life.

During the Skargardian Arc, the protagonist had frequently relied on a clandestine intelligence network known as the Copper Guild to circumvent the Crown’s authority. The author had dedicated entire Chapters to mapping the Guild’s territory. They were not common thugs or street-level cutpurses. The syndicate was orchestrated by a disgraced former Royal Spymaster who had weaponized the capital’s invisible workforce. Every scullery maid pouring wine in the palace, every stable boy brushing the knights’ warhorses, and every beggar asking for coppers by the western gates fed information back to the Guild. They hoarded the kingdom’s secrets and sold them to the highest bidder, working with total neutrality.

According to Silas’s memories, the main access point to this network was hidden deep within the artisan’s ward.

Ulrich turned down a narrow, perpetually shadowed alleyway sandwiched between a leather tannery and a crumbling grain silo. The sun could not penetrate the overlapping rooftops, plunging the corridor into perpetual twilight. At the dead end, a rotting wooden door hung slightly off its rusted iron hinges. A faded wooden sign depicting a mortar and pestle swung above the frame.

He pushed the door open. The interior of the blind apothecary was hot and fragrant. The stench of dried sulfur and crushed peppermint assaulted his lungs, layered over the chemical bite leaking from dozens of glass specimen jars lining the warped wooden shelves. Dust coated every surface, thick enough to muffle the sound of his boots on the floorboards.

A hunched figure stood behind the scarred oak counter, methodically grinding an iron pestle into a stone bowl. The old man wore a stained canvas apron over a frayed tunic. He did not look up from his work, focusing entirely on the grey powder accumulating in the bowl.

"The shop is closed," the apothecary said. His voice was quite damaged, carrying a harsh, rattling wheeze from decades of inhaling chemical dust.

Ulrich stepped up to the counter, ignoring the dismissal. This man was not a simple merchant; he was a designated Listener for the Copper Guild, a gatekeeper who filtered genuine buyers from the city guard.

"I require the current duty roster for the Skargardian’s keep," Ulrich said. "Specifically, I need the names, the rotation schedules, and the designated relief times of the royal guards who assumed their posts this morning."

The rhythmic grinding of the iron pestle stopped. The old man kept his head bowed, his dirt-caked fingers resting on the rim of the stone bowl. Selling information regarding the royal guard deployment was highly classified. In Skargardia, the distribution of palace security details carried a mandatory penalty of public hanging for high treason.

"That is not a tincture sold over a counter," the apothecary rasped. He finally raised his head. His left eye was clouded over with dense white cataracts, but his right eye locked onto Ulrich’s hooded face with sharp eyes.

Ulrich reached beneath his wool cloak. He withdrew a solid gold Skargardian coin, thick and newly minted. He placed it flat on the scratched wood.

"I am not attempting to purchase a tincture," Ulrich replied. He placed his index finger on the center of the coin and pushed it slowly across the counter until it tipped over the edge, dropping directly into the man’s waiting, calloused palm. "I am compensating the Guild for the extreme risk of retrieving that ledger from your contacts inside the Skargardian Keep. I need the information before dusk."

The apothecary tested the weight of the gold in his palm, running his dirty thumb over the stamped profile embedded into it. He slipped the coin into a deep pocket within his canvas apron and picked up the heavy iron pestle.

"Return to this counter in two hours," the old man said, immediately resuming his grinding.

Ulrich turned away from the chemical heat of the shop and pushed the rotting wooden door open, stepping back out into the shadowed, humid air of the alleyway.

The timing was dangerously tight.

He understood the high probability that this small excursion was a waste of resources, thought, and maybe even time.

But Ulrich wanted to be prepared to neutralize that assassination attempt because he could not allow Kaliantha to die tonight.

She was not a mere symbol. She possessed an intellect, a real capacity for military logistics, and the will necessary to force the Skargardian nobility to fund the Seven Pillared Bridge. She was, unequivocally, the most capable ruler the kingdom had produced in a century. And more importantly, alive, she would be an unexpected huge advantage in the novel’s story.

Ulrich wasn’t someone who easily praised others, which said a lot about his thoughts concerning Kaliantha.