The Loser Lord Who Kept Getting Sweet Revenge and Somehow Rose to the Top - Chapter 01: Stolen From Me?? Fine Then, It’s Payback Time!

Chapter 01: Stolen From Me?? Fine Then, It’s Payback Time!

Sunlight and heat poured in through the open windows of the estate’s office.

I sat at my desk, picking up document after document from the endless stack waiting for the lord’s signature. Each time, I scribbled my name—Sean Norské Tourmaline—on the line, then handed it off to the maid sitting beside me. Again and again, like clockwork.

This was the reality of being a lord: tedious desk work. With a hollow heart, I went through the motions, sighing for what felt like the hundredth time, while my thoughts drifted back to betrayal—and the false charges that almost destroyed me.

—“Goodbye, Sean! We’ve known each other for years, but this is the end. Don’t you ever show your face to me again.”

Those were the last words I heard from Talia Retenable—my childhood friend, my fiancée. She cast me aside to marry into the more prestigious Shakara Count family.

But she hadn’t just abandoned me. To hide the fact she had been two-timing, and to force through a one-sided annulment she should never have been able to demand, she and her family tried to frame me for crimes I never committed.

Her sloppy scheming spared me from conviction, but with the Shakara family’s power backing her, the annulment was swept through regardless. In the end, I was left with nothing but disgrace—the man whose engagement had mysteriously collapsed.

―“What can a lowly viscount’s house do against a count’s family? Power! Influence! Strength! Those who have it can snatch whatever they want from the weak. If you want someone to blame, blame your pathetic house, loser viscount Tourmaline.”

Not only that—the Count of Shakara, who should’ve been condemned as nothing more than an adulterous homewrecker, instead hid behind his status and power. In the end, I was the one mocked, sneered at, and forced to choke down bitter humiliation. …Even now, my blood still boiled, and my anger hadn’t cooled in the slightest.

I was born into the Viscount House of Tourmaline, a family with long-standing roots in the Holy Kingdom of Bride. We weren’t some backwater nobodies either. Our title carried respect, our lands were enough to live in comfort, and above all, our territory was blessed with the very mineral that gave our family its name: tourmaline. I grew up in fortunate circumstances.

That said, for a viscount house to openly oppose a count’s family was a battle already lost. If it were war, I wouldn’t have minded gambling recklessly and fighting head-on—but politics didn’t work that way.

I had spent my boyhood in knight school, and after coming of age, served a few years in the army. But when my parents passed away, I inherited the estate and became the lord. I wasn’t completely green when it came to noble society—or at least, that’s what I told myself.

Still, after being branded as the man who dared to oppose a count’s house and lost his fiancée, no marriage talks ever came my way again. These days, I lived the life of a solitary lord, surrounded only by the loyal retainers and maids who had chosen to remain by my side.

As I later heard, the whole sordid affair came down to this: a count who’d been lusting after Talia finally seduced her, they started their little fling, and together they set me up—ending with a stolen bride and a stolen marriage.

Well, I couldn’t deny it—Talia had always been a beauty. In this kingdom, her light-purple hair was rare, and her well-shaped features stood out anywhere. She wasn’t voluptuous, but with her tall, slender frame and long legs, she was the type who always drew eyes at social gatherings ever since childhood.

But seriously—what was I supposed to do with that? To be mocked and betrayed when I hadn’t done a damn thing wrong… that wasn’t something I could just swallow.

And yet, no matter how much I ground my teeth, the reality was pure trash: viscount versus count, our ranks weren’t even close. If I raised objections, their influence would just crush me into silence.

I could’ve leaned on my old commanding officer—the Grand General himself, who’d looked after me plenty during my army days—but dragging him into my personal mess? No way. I wasn’t going to repay his kindness with trouble.

“Haaah… I don’t wanna just sit here and take it, but what the hell am I supposed to do?”

Slouched in my office chair, I muttered while staring out the wide-open window.

And right then—maybe drawn by my voice—a red-scaled dragon with two horns poked its head straight into the office.

“Grrr…!!”

This dragon was my beloved partner, Comet.

When I was a kid, I’d found his egg abandoned in the forests of my domain. Feeling sorry for it, I decided to hatch and raise him myself. Ever since then, Comet had clung to me like family, and before I knew it, he’d completely settled into life at my estate.

Oh, and by the way—whenever I went monster hunting or joined wars against foreign nations, it was always on Comet’s back. Thanks to him, I was the only dragon knight in the entire kingdom—a rarity so great it was practically a legend. After all, dragons were prideful creatures that never let humans ride them. The fact that Comet not only allowed me, but actually enjoyed flying with me, made him one of a kind.

“Gruuuh! Grrrrruuuhh!!”

Comet snorted furiously, huffing through his nostrils as if trying to growl something at me. Tilting my head, I tried to figure out what he meant.

At that moment, the maid working nearby, Kiriko, stepped forward. She nodded seriously at Comet’s growls, as if she understood them perfectly.

Kiriko had long brown hair tied back in a ponytail. After losing her parents as a child, I took her and her younger brother into my household. When she came of age, she chose to remain as a maid—and since we were close in age, she also served as my secretary.

As for her younger brother, I treated him like family too. These days, he lived in the capital, working as a journalist or something along those lines. Every so often, he sent me a letter, so I knew he was doing fine…

Just as I was thinking that, Kiriko turned her head toward me, fixed her eyes on mine, and muttered softly—

“Comet says… you should get some sweet revenge.”

“Ehh~? Seriously~?”

I tried to brush it off with a joking reply, but Kiriko wasn’t the type to spout nonsense. She had this natural gift—she could somehow grasp what animals were thinking or trying to say. That was why she got along so well with Comet to begin with.

When I shot her a half-doubtful look, Comet bobbed his head up and down furiously, clearly backing her up. …Guess she really was telling the truth.

“Well, sure, it’s not like I enjoy just sitting here doing nothing after what they pulled. But the real problem is—how the hell am I supposed to get back at that high-and-mighty count?”

As I muttered that, another one of my maids, Linna, suddenly sprang to her feet. Throwing her fist into the air, she shouted with wild enthusiasm:

“How about this—use the power of your mighty dragon and go SMASH☆CRUSH☆CHEERS! Splatter their guts all over the place!!”

“…That’s just straight-up murder. I’d be the one getting arrested.”

The moment I shot back with a retort, Linna slumped her shoulders. “Aww, no good, huh…”

…Well, if I could get away with it, I’d wanna kill them too!

Linna looked every bit the quiet, bookish type—black hair in braids, glasses perched neatly on her nose—but her words and actions were always violent. As for housework… total disaster across the board. Still, she was technically a maid. Her family had fallen into ruin back when I was in knight school, and after some twists of fate, I ended up taking her in. At this point, she was less a servant and more like a friend I didn’t need to put up a front with.

As our back-and-forth carried on, Kiriko cleared her throat softly. Then, in a calm, steady tone, she spoke:

“―Not all revenge requires killing or brute force. If you strip away what they treasure most and cast them into the pits of despair, forcing them to live in their own personal hell… that’s more than enough. What matters is making them suffer while you take everything away.”

Her words hung in the air, deliberate and heavy.

I glanced at Linna. She glanced back at me. Even Comet, still poking his head through the window, perked up his ears.

Wait… was she serious? Were we really about to go through with this?

…Sean, oh man—this is getting exciting!