Nobody knew what to say, so silence was once more the answer for everybody.
Even the King turned his head attentively to Ivy, with a disdaining glint in his eyes.
My father had also placed his attention on the young lady, but with uninterested eyes as if he were looking at a fool.
Like always, Albert broke the awkward silence where nobody dared to do or say anything.
"Lady Castria, do you have something to say in the defence of your father?"
Ivy scrunched up her face as if she were the wronged one standing here, and opened her mouth to proclaim her statement.
"If there's anybody here capable of doing these things, shouldn't it be The Villinie Household."
There wasn't a single person in the ball that dared to refute this fact, since this was their original thought, too.
But nobody came up to support Ivy's statement, either, because of what the Crown Prince had announced.
At this point, everybody's thoughts were spinning at the possibilities and were contemplating who did it.
"Perhaps they both had a hand in it?", someone unwisely declared for a lot of people to hear.
The sound of a light slap was heard, followed by a, "Idiot! Did you forget that Count Castria's daughter is the Crown Prince's lover, whereas Lady Villinie would be his official fiancee? There's no way a collaboration would work!"
"But what Lady Castria said wasn't wrong, perhaps the Villinies actually wanted to frame Count Castria."
Although this one statement was said in a supposed hushed whisper, the majority of the crowd who were paying attention heard it.
"How could a man who raised such a wonderful lady be the prime culprit of an evil drug distribution!"
Murmurs of agreement soon followed, with more and more people agreeing that there was no way Count Castria could have done it.
I had to admit, even if Ivy messed up a few times with her act in front of me, she did pretty well in the role of the innocent heroine.
Although most of these people had only seen Ivy a few times or none at all, the rumours did well on her image.
Pure, innocent, and untainted by evil, which was how she managed to attract the Crown Prince himself.
Ivy's appearance itself contributed to this public appearance of hers greatly.
No matter what, her clear blue eyes always seemed innocent, and her pink hair gave off a fluffy and cute image.
All she has to do was to smile once, and people would fall over heels saying how uncontaminated her personality was.
Being seen as pure was a very rare thing in this world, with all the schemes and plots flying around.
With that bird flying around her, she might have been unconsciously perceived as a kind animal lover.
And with her wide-known healing magic, which was very rare, people might connect her personality to a holy figure of some sort.
Most people either admired or envied her, never an in-between sentiment.
***
Now that the public had mostly been convinced that there was something wrong with the evidence Albert presented and that it was my father doing it out of spite, I had a much more difficult time watching this scene.
One sentence was all it took to shove buckets of confidence on these so-called 'righteous' nobles, making their ideas go down the spiralling abyss of falsehood.
And being the daughter of Duke Villinie, and also not being perceived with the same cleanliness as Ivy, I couldn't say anything hence it would only make it worse.
Although my reputation was certainly more known than Ivy's, it could defined as more graceful and intelligent compared to Ivy's flowery stature.
If my reputation would make me a 'good' person, then Ivy's would make her some 'saintess' of some sort.
It was almost unbelievable how much differently I saw Albert contrary to before, from an enemy to being an almost saviour.
But now that the crowd was convinced that his research was a scam, he evidently had a much harder time.
He couldn't displease the crowd just because he was a Crown Prince, but he would have to get the idea in their heads somehow.
He glanced at me for a moment, then the expectant King, then my annoyed father, then sighed in visible frustration.
"I understand it's hard to believe, that such a good man such as Count Castria could do such a thing. But the evidence I have collected truly says otherwise."
He swung the clipped pieces of paper in his hand, then reached to tug out the sheet on top.
"As nobles, the majority of you should know how to work out bills and contracts. If anybody doesn't believe me, then please come up and examine this."
It was very strange for him to straight up showcase the evidence, but this was a way to placate anybody who didn't believe him.
Nobody talked about how the evidence was fake due to the Crown Prince's brimming confidence.
It took a moment for somebody to actually come up and inspect the sheet of paper, and they dejectedly shook their head for the crowd to see.
Some people still didn't believe it, and came up the the Crown Prince themselves to recheck it.
But these records were impossible to fake; there wasn't any possibilities of it being a fraud at all.
This act quickly hushed people's suspicions, and people were already starting to hypocritically change the target of their accusations as if the ones before didn't exist.
"To think Count Castria would do something so evil!"
"That's right! His actions caused the harm of countless innocent people!"
Usually, if this were only one person, then nobody would have the courage to change their face so quickly.
But if it were in a crowd, then they could do it easily with their dignity intact.
I rolled my eyes at these corrupt nobles, they certainly did talk more than do at the topic of being 'righteous'!
"Guards, take him away."
This time it was the King who spoke, and a few knights burst in to drag away the Count who was begging with tears in front of the Crown Prince.
"No, no, no, I swear, my family has been upright, it always has—"
"Save that for the judge in court to listen to, but there certainly more iron-clad evidence proving your guilt. Have a good day, Count Castria."
Albert then turned his head away to ignore the poor Count as he was dragged out the door, thus concluding this whole incident.
//School started, Q-Q, lemme just adapt into the environment from online to in person first then I'll start posting again. It's so close to the end, I'm not going to abandon this story anyways. Thank you for understanding, to whoever's reading right now.