yes he straight up kills her for not telling him where the lead is. And yeah I'm pretty sure the MC knows. I forgot about the murdered best friend because it pretty much gets glossed over. What sucks the most is that there's a second male lead who is just such a perfect boi. He's got his own faults and all that but he's always trying to make the MC's life as comfortable as possible and does his best to make her happy. And she's just like "Damn I could get with this cute guy who respects me and my needs, is kind, considerate, honest, OOORRR I could get back together with the guy who sold me, the guy who murdered my best friend and raped me *drum roll* the Emperor!"
And the author really does push the whole angsty male lead shit. He's so broken boo hoo dsfldsfj