The Marchioness’s body would be cremated according to funeral custom and then laid to rest in the Ellient family mausoleum.
The cremation itself was performed only after all the guests had departed, leaving behind only the deceased’s immediate family. The public was permitted to see the body only before it was taken for cremation.
The coffin containing the Marchioness appeared before the mourners. By tradition, the coffin was carried by the deceased’s family or those closest to them. Wrapped in black velvet, it was borne forward by the Marquis, the Marchioness’s father, and several knights of the house.
According to custom, the coffin lid would then be opened so the mourners could look upon the deceased one final time. Seeing the dead face-to-face, they would offer farewell words and pray for happiness in the afterlife.
But the “afterlife” spoken of here was not reincarnation, as in Buddhist belief. The people of this world believed that when someone died, they crossed into another realm while retaining the same appearance they had in life.
The more beautiful the deceased looked in their final moments, the happier they were believed to be in that next world.
For that reason, the dead were adorned lavishly before being shown to others.
The body would be washed carefully, cosmetics applied to the bluish skin to restore the healthy complexion they once possessed in life. They were dressed in the finest clothes they owned, decorated with jewelry, and prepared to resemble their living selves as closely as possible. There were even people who specialized solely in preparing corpses for funerals.
The mourners gathered in the funeral hall waited for the Marquis to open the coffin.
Usually, it was the husband, father, or son of the deceased who revealed the final 모습 of the dead.
Once the coffin was opened, those closest to the deceased would begin offering their farewells one by one. Each person placed a yellow flower beside the body and spoke to the dead as though speaking to someone still alive. Only after everyone present had said goodbye would the public portion of the funeral finally come to an end.
Since the process proceeded in order from those closest to the deceased onward, the farewells alone could continue for several days.
Out of all these people… how many are truly grieving her death?
I slowly looked around the funeral hall.
There were a few familiar faces, but far more strangers. The Marchioness herself likely would not have recognized even half the people gathered here. There were so many mourners that the thought itself became absurdly curious to me. At this rate, several days would not be enough for everyone here to offer their farewells.
I frowned slightly at the thought of the endless ceremony ahead when a disturbance rippled through the crowd.
Before I could wonder why, I saw the cause.
“……”
The Marquis did not open the coffin.
Without lifting the lid, he simply placed a yellow flower atop the black velvet and stepped away.
There were no farewell words.
No prayers for the Marchioness’s happiness in the next life.
As though he had fulfilled every obligation required of him, he merely returned to his place and stood there in rigid silence.
“…Ha.”
I had already known this would happen, yet I could not stop the sigh that escaped me.
It was exactly the same as back then.
At the time, I had screamed and cried in outrage. Not because I was heartbroken over losing my mother. I had never once experienced maternal affection from her, so grief had been impossible. If anything, I remembered feeling slightly relieved.
Back then, I had not known the true reason for the Marchioness’s death.
The Marquis had silenced everyone thoroughly. Only a handful of people—including him—knew the exact cause of death. Unable to understand why, I had grown furious at the Marquis for dishonoring the Marchioness by even violating funeral etiquette. I believed he hated her so much that he would not even pray for her happiness in the afterlife.
At the time, I had foolishly convinced myself that because he hated the Marchioness, he must hate me as well.
“So the rumors were true…”
“As expected, the Marquis truly despised his wife…”
The murmuring throughout the hall grew louder.
No one could understand the Marquis’s behavior. Speculations flew wildly from person to person. Some sounded absurdly believable; others came dangerously close to the truth.
Each person repeated their guesses as though they were established fact. By the time the rumors passed from mouth to mouth, countless fictional stories starring the Marquis and the Marchioness had already been created.
There were well over a hundred people gathered at the funeral. No matter how quietly they whispered, it was impossible for their voices not to carry.
If I could hear them, then surely the Marquis could hear them too.
And yet he stood there silently, guarding only his place.
That silence only fueled their misunderstandings further.
“Then Lady Ellient really is, just as the rumors say…”
“Shh! She’ll hear you. Lower your voice.”
Some who had already accepted their own speculations as truth looked at me with pity.
Seeing the Marquis ignore me throughout the funeral without so much as a glance, they became even more convinced of their fantasies. In their eyes, I was a poor child abandoned by her father.
Back then, unable to endure the Marquis’s cold indifference, the whispers of the crowd, and their pitying gazes, I had stormed out of the funeral in fury.
I did not care in the slightest that the deceased was meant to receive a final farewell before departing for another world.
The Marquis had not stopped me then.
Even if I walked out again now, he would not stop me this time either.
I looked at the Marquis standing silently beneath the sunlight.
Just as before, he ignored the whispers surrounding him. Mixed among them were criticisms directed at him, yet he remained completely motionless, as though none of it reached his ears.
It was exceedingly rare for a body not to be displayed at a funeral.
There were only two accepted exceptions: when the corpse had been damaged beyond recognition, or when the deceased had died of a contagious disease. In such cases, the mourners would be informed in advance and asked for their understanding.
But the Marquis had not even offered such an explanation.
No… from his perspective, he could not.
To ask for understanding, he would have needed to explain exactly why the body could not be shown.
There was no way he could reveal her.
The Marchioness had committed suicide.
During the brief moment the maids looked away, she had thrown herself from the window of her room.
Her chambers were on the third floor.
And this was the Ellient estate—a mansion enormous enough that even a third-floor fall was fatal. The ceilings alone were extraordinarily high.
She died instantly, before anyone could do anything.
Her skull had shattered. Her limbs were twisted grotesquely. Fate had shown her no mercy at all.
Her body had not remained intact.
It was too horribly damaged to be shown publicly.
Not only would the Marchioness’s suicide disgrace the family, it would utterly destroy her honor as well.
In the Empire, suicide was considered a terrible taboo.
People believed that those who took their own lives would suffer only misfortune in the next world. The dead received neither farewell words nor blessings for the afterlife. In severe cases, even the family of the deceased could be treated like potential criminals.
That was why I had never known the truth behind her death.
The Marquis’s order of silence had been absolute. None of the servants had dared tell me. It was only much later, after a great deal of time had passed, that my nanny finally revealed the truth to me.
Officially, the Marchioness had died from illness.
For a long time, she had rarely left the estate. In recent years, she had ceased all social activity entirely. Her seclusion gave birth to endless rumors—rumors that she was gravely ill, rumors that she was already dead.
There were even whispers that she had gone mad.
But there had been so many rumors surrounding her that none of them received much serious attention.
The Marquis simply used one of them.
He announced that the Marchioness, whose poor health had confined her indoors for years, had finally passed away.
Because she had hidden herself away for so long, no one questioned it.
The problem was… the funeral.
If the body were revealed, her suicide could not be concealed.
So the Marquis resolved the matter by refusing to display the corpse at all, without offering a single explanation.
Rather than face public condemnation for the Marchioness’s suicide, he chose scandal and suspicion instead.
Even if someone somehow learned the truth, they would never dare speak openly without undeniable proof. Officially, the Marchioness had died of illness, and without the body being displayed, there was no evidence to contradict it.
By refusing to reveal the corpse, the Marquis erased even the smallest opening for doubt.
To expose the Marchioness’s disgrace was the same as declaring oneself an enemy of House Ellient.
Unless someone was prepared to make an enemy of the Marquis himself, no one could speak the truth aloud.
The real cause of the Marchioness’s death would remain hidden forever.
“Ah!”
“Oh my…”
Slowly, I approached the coffin containing the Marchioness’s body.
The people who had been busy whispering fell silent at once and turned to stare at me. Some watched with interest, others with pity. Among them, I could occasionally feel gazes laced with inexplicable malice.
For the first time that day, the Marquis looked at me.
I smiled softly at him.
As always, his expression did not change.
Sometimes he felt less like a human being and more like a machine.
I gently laid the yellow rose I carried atop the velvet-covered coffin.
Against the black velvet, the flower stood out vividly.
“……”
Just as the Marquis had done, I offered neither farewell words nor blessings for the afterlife.
Without saying anything, I bowed toward the coffin.
My left hand rested over my chest while my right lightly held my skirt—a simplified formal salute. Instead of bending my knees, however, I lowered my waist deeply to show proper respect.
Once I had finished, I returned to stand beside the Marquis.
His expression remained unchanged.
But standing so close, I could see the faint tremor in his eyes.
His gaze lingered on me briefly before returning forward.
Like him, I stood straight and faced ahead in silence.
The funeral hall fell deathly quiet.
The mourners looked back and forth between the Marquis and me, uncertain of what to do.
Then, through the frozen crowd, one person finally stepped forward carrying a yellow flower.
