My Anime Shopping Tree & My Cold Prodigy Wife!
Episode-154

Chapter : 307

He looked first at the woman, whose unease had now morphed into a barely concealed panic. She saw the look in his eyes, the look of a man who has just solved a puzzle, and she knew, with a sudden, chilling certainty, that her carefully constructed lie was unraveling.

Then, he turned to his father. He met the Arch Duke’s questioning, still-furious gaze without flinching. He didn't offer a complex explanation. He didn't present his evidence. He didn't even bother to accuse the woman directly. He simply made a statement, his voice calm, level, and imbued with an authority that was absolute.

“Tell her,” Lloyd said, his gaze flicking contemptuously towards the now-trembling woman, “to return tomorrow. At noon. To the main hall. She will receive her… ‘compensation’… then. In full. And in public.”

The room fell silent. Roy stared at him, bewildered. What was this? Was he admitting guilt? Agreeing to this outrageous demand? Grimaldi frowned, stroking his beard, clearly confused. Elmsworth looked as if he might faint.

But Lloyd just stood there, his expression unreadable, radiating a quiet, chilling confidence. He had seen the truth. And he had just set a trap. A public, inescapable, beautifully simple trap. And tomorrow, at noon, he would spring it.

The moment the study doors closed behind the woman and her whimpering child—the woman practically fleeing, dragging the boy behind her, her earlier righteous indignation replaced by a stark, almost feral, panic—the fragile dam of Arch Duke Roy Ferrum’s control broke.

“Are you mad, Lloyd?!” Roy’s voice was a low, dangerous roar, the sound of a gathering thunderstorm. He slammed his fist on the desk again, the impact making the inkwell jump and the very foundations of the study seem to tremble. “Compensation?! Publicly?! You have as good as admitted guilt! You have handed that… that grifter… and whoever is behind her, a victory on a silver platter! You have legitimized her claim in front of Kyle, in front of Grimaldi, in front of Elmsworth! You have poisoned our own brand with your own words! Have you taken complete leave of your senses?!”

Master Elmsworth wrung his hands, his face a mask of pure economic despair. “A thousand Gold, Young Lord! The potential damage to investor confidence… the implications for our projected five-year growth model… it’s catastrophic!”

Even Lord Kyle Ferrum, usually so stoic, looked profoundly, deeply, disappointed. “Lloyd,” he said, his voice grave, “if the product is flawed, it must be recalled. But to admit fault so publicly, to capitulate to such an outrageous demand… it shows a weakness that our enemies will not fail to exploit.”

Lloyd stood calmly amidst the storm of his father’s fury and his advisors’ panic. He waited, letting the initial wave of outrage wash over him, his expression unwavering. He had expected this reaction. It was logical. It was predictable. And it was wrong.

Finally, when his father paused to draw a breath, his chest heaving with barely suppressed rage, Lloyd spoke. His voice was quiet, a stark contrast to the thunderous atmosphere in the room, but it cut through the chaos with the clean, sharp precision of a surgeon’s scalpel.

“The soap is not poisoned, Father,” he stated simply.

Roy stared at him, momentarily speechless. “Not… what did you say?”

“The soap is not the cause of the boy’s affliction,” Lloyd repeated, his voice gaining a quiet, firm confidence. He began to lay out his observations, not as a panicked defense, but as a calm, logical diagnosis. The engineer, the scientist, the analyst, took over. “I examined the boy. Closely. The welts, the primary symptom, are inconsistent with a topical corrosive or allergen. If our soap were the cause, the reaction would be most severe on the hands, where it was most concentrated during washing. Yet his palms were relatively clear. The worst inflammation was on his face, his neck, his arms—areas of thinner, more sensitive skin, yes, but not the areas of primary contact.”

He looked at Grand Master Grimaldi, whose sharp, intelligent eyes were now fixed on him with a new, intense curiosity. “Furthermore, Master Grimaldi,” Lloyd continued, addressing the alchemist directly, “I detected no unusual scent on the child. No chemical reactant, no magical residue. The faint aroma of rosemary was present, yes, but it was weak, almost an afterthought. It did not smell like a child who had just been bathed in a potent, concentrated elixir. It smelled like a child who had perhaps had his hands briefly rinsed with it, as a final, plausible touch to the deception.”

Grimaldi stroked his long silver beard, nodding slowly. “Your observations are… astute, Young Lord. Indeed, a true alchemical poison or a poorly balanced caustic agent would leave a distinct residual signature, an olfactory marker. The absence of one is… significant.”

Chapter : 308

“But the key,” Lloyd continued, his voice dropping, drawing them all in, “was not on his skin. It was in his eyes. And his nose.” He looked back at his father. “His sclera were bloodshot. His nasal passages, visibly inflamed and swollen. These are not symptoms of a contact dermatitis, Father. They are the classic signs of a severe, acute, airborne allergic reaction. The boy did not absorb a poison through his skin. He inhaled one.”

The room fell silent as they processed the implications.

“An airborne agent?” Roy rumbled, his fury slowly being replaced by a dawning, sharp suspicion. “What are you suggesting, Lloyd?”

“I am suggesting,” Lloyd stated, “that the boy was deliberately, and heavily, exposed to a potent natural allergen—most likely the pollen from a specific, highly irritant flower—just prior to being brought here. The welts, the rash… they are a secondary, systemic histamine reaction to that primary irritant. The soap was merely the scapegoat. The entire performance,” his gaze hardened, a cold, dangerous light entering his eyes, “was a fabrication. A frame-up. A very clever, very vicious, and very public, act of commercial sabotage.”

A profound, stunned silence descended upon the study. The pieces clicked into place with a horrifying, undeniable logic. It made sense. The timing. The public nature of the accusation. The outrageous demand for compensation. It wasn’t a tragic accident; it was a calculated attack.

“By the ancestors…” Lord Kyle breathed, his face paling as he grasped the full, insidious nature of the plot. “To use a child in such a way…”

Master Elmsworth looked positively green. “Sabotage… but who would dare? Who would risk the wrath of House Ferrum to such a degree?”

“Someone,” Roy Ferrum growled, his earlier fury now coalescing into a cold, black, terrifying rage directed not at Lloyd, but at the unseen enemies who had dared to orchestrate this, “who has a great deal to lose from AURA’s success. Someone whose own livelihood is being threatened by our innovation.”

His mind, and Lloyd’s, instantly went to the same place. The traditionalists. The ones whose businesses were being rendered obsolete by the new standard of cleanliness.

“The Washerman’s Guild,” Roy snarled. “And the Bathhouse owners. They have complained for weeks, sent petitions protesting our ‘unfair market advantage’. I dismissed them as the usual grumblings of men unable to adapt. I did not think them capable of such… viciousness.”

“We must act, Your Grace!” Elmsworth urged, his voice trembling with a mixture of fear and righteous indignation. “We must bring this woman back, force a confession! We must summon the Royal Healer to verify Lord Lloyd’s diagnosis!”

“No,” Lloyd said, his voice sharp, decisive, cutting through the rising tide of anger. All eyes snapped back to him.

“No?” his father questioned, his brow furrowed. “Explain yourself, Lloyd. Why not act immediately?”

“Because, Father,” Lloyd explained, the strategist now fully in command, “they are expecting us to do just that. They are expecting us to panic, to react, to drag the woman back and beat a confession out of her. A confession she would then publicly recant, claiming she was coerced by the great and powerful House Ferrum, further painting us as villains. They are expecting us to call in a Royal Healer, a move that would take time, that would allow them to muddy the waters, to spread more rumors, to make it our word against a poor, terrified, ‘abused’ commoner.”

He shook his head. “We will not play their game by their rules. We will play it by mine.” He looked at his father, his expression grim, determined. “The trap is already set. Tomorrow, at noon, in the Grand Hall, she will come expecting her gold. And we will be ready. But we do not need a Royal Healer. We need our own healer. Someone loyal, discreet, and whose authority within this household is absolute.”

He paused, a slow, predatory smile touching his lips. “Summon the Head Healer of the Ferrum household, Father. Summon Mistress Dorathi. Let her be the one to deliver the verdict. In public. And let us see how our accuser reacts when confronted not by a furious Duke, but by the quiet, undeniable, and utterly irrefutable, truth.”

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