Chapter 22

Edited by Sleepypanda

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My whole body stiffened at the creepy thought of passing by my head.

It was when I closed my eyes.

Something hot poured over my body.

I opened my eyes for a moment.

What’s this?

I rubbed around my eyes with my hands.

“Blood…”

There was a lot of red blood on my hand.

Was I dead? It didn’t hurt at all. Or did I get hurt?

Yeah, that magic thing looked silly, so maybe it didn’t kill me immediately.

But how did I not die when I was covered with blood? Why didn’t it hurt?

Thoughts led to the flow of consciousness.

It was that moment.

The sound of someone stepping on the snow and breaking it, and the sound of a branch breaking was heard.

It was the sound of human footsteps.

I hurriedly wiped off the blood that covered my eyes and barely looked ahead.

Then, as soon as I checked the source of the sound, I fell into the snow.

It was a man with a horrifyingly beautiful appearance in front of me.

A man with cool eyes enough to think it’s better to die in the hands of a beast.

It was a gaze that I had never encountered, but I could see it at once.

Devan Lantimos, it was him.

Devan stepped closer to me, where I sat down.

The snow piled up on the floor didn’t seem to interfere with him.

He was in a black uniform and held a black sword in one hand, from black shoes to handles.

It was a sword that I remembered seeing in his office one day.

Devan was also half covered with the blood of the beast.

To the point where I wondered if it was the same as the uncomfortable liquid on my body, the dark red liquid went terribly well with him.

After shaking off the blood around his eyes, he said.

“You were here. How dare you run away from me?”

“How…”

I stepped back while sitting.

Pook – Devan put a sword right behind my head. He was in an attitude that he would not allow running away anymore.

Was it a dream?

Suddenly, I thought of that.

It’s already been a little over a year since I ran away from him. In terms of the number of years alone, it was two years. I was already 20 years old.

But at this time, I can’t believe he came here.

I looked up at him with faint eyes.

Furthermore, he was different from what I had seen so far.

The black eye patch, which was always in his eyes, disappeared. So his eyes…

Devan bent down and came out to make eye contact with me.

The first thing I saw was the left eye, so red that I thought the blood of the magic that just poured out went into his eyes.

Next was the right eye, which was spread black as if it were about to be sucked in.

He grabbed my chin with his blood-stained hand.

The corners of his mouth were drawing lines.

“What do you think? Is it exactly what you imagined?”

I couldn’t understand what he was saying.

When I blinked and didn’t answer, Devan tilted his head to the right.

“I mean these eyes.”

“……eyes, why?”

When he answered blankly, he burst into laughter and rummaged through the product.

Then he took something out and put it right in front of me.

My body became stiff.

He had a necklace with a yellow pendant in his hand.

The magic item, which was enriched with the scent of daisy flowers, that Killian gived.

“You won’t say you don’t know what this is.”

“….”

“The goddess of the young sun, who embraces the scent of daisy flowers, will lift your curse.”

As if reciting a poem, he spoke in a wonderful voice.

“I’m sure you already know what it’s about. I don’t know how you found out, but I was fooled because I’ve never seen such a creative and enthusiastic person. I can’t believe you even used a magic tool.”

“…That’s….”

My lips are very dry.

He noticed everything. That I cheated on him. That I’m not the star of the prophecy.

“No wonder I thought it was weird to fall down even if you used a little bit of your energy. You can’t be the main character of the prophecy.”

It was not because of the curse…

I was making excuses now. There was no way that they would trust me.

A cool voice flew into my ear and stuck in.

“When you deceived me, you must have felt that determination, right? The weight of responsibility won’t be light.”

Paat—Devan grabbed the sword that was stuck in the top of me and pulled it out.

I flinched and shivering.

The fear of death, which was just around the corner, rewound around my whole body.

I’ve only come this far. Am I going to die from this person’s hands?

What he said when we first met came to my mind.

‘I hate lying a lot. I pray that you will be alive for a long time.’

I got goosebumps on my back.

Did he follow me all the way here to take responsibility for my lie?

After a year? Really… is he going to kill me?

I recalled a vicious rumor that spread throughout the continent. He deserved it.

I hurriedly opened my mouth.

“I…”

“However, it is clear that you are a great power holder anyway.”

I muttered as if I were talking to myself, and he looked down at me.

“Aren’t you?”

“… That’s right.”

I heard a low sigh.

He seemed to gauge something, and skillfully put the sword in the censorship.

Then he crouched down in front of me.

“……Can you fix this right eye?”

The right eye? I peeked into his eyes.

And when our eyes met, I trembled without realizing it.

He was super handsome when he wore an eye patch, but he looked even more creepy when he took it off.

I even forgot that he was a man who could control my life right away.

In particular, his eyes, which I met for the first time, had a place to fascinate people somewhere.

I swallowed my saliva.

“Don’t just stare at me.”

He spoke in an arrogant way.

Like you know what I’m thinking clearly.

Trying not to be conscious, I carefully looked into his eyes.

Unlike the red left eye, the right side was black.

“Can’t you see the right side?”

“I can see it faintly.”

As expected, the curse hasn’t been resolved yet? Even though I put all my energy into it…

I was frowning a lot, but he calmly said.

“The curse is all gone.”

I opened my eyes round. I thought for a while and opened my mouth.

“As expected, that’s not a curse. I told you before. There’s something. Because of that, this right eye….”

“That’s why I’m asking if you know something.”

“…I don’t know. I didn’t know then, and I don’t know now. I just knew it wasn’t a curse.”

“Did you know that you can’t cure it completely?”

I lowered my eyes and only looked at my fingertips.

Once again, I heard a low sigh.

“You treated my left eye first. Saying that there’s an order in everything….. Why didn’t you tell me then?”

I couldn’t have said it.

As he mumbled, Devan shook his head with an expression that it was understandable.

“You were afraid that lies would be revealed. Whatever the truth is, if I have a problem solving the curse, I’ll investigate you in more detail.”

“……yes, but I wouldn’t have solved it whether I was the hero of the prophecy or not.”

This didn’t come out in the original, so probably.

Cordelia couldn’t have solved that either.

“So what’s the way to fix it?”

“…”

When he couldn’t answer and just bowed his head, he sighed for the third time.

Then, suddenly, I grabbed my chin and turned it around as if I were evaluating it.

“What- What are you doing?”

His eyes went down to my hair, eyes, nose, and mouth.

“The butler is right.”

“What?”

Devan stared deeply at me when he said an unknown sound.

Certainly, seeing and not seeing eyes were at a different level.

I don’t know if it’s because it’s blood-colored.

Facing those eyes, it was hard to stick to the arrogant attitude I had taken toward him until then.

He gently pressed my lips with his thumb. My eyebrows frowned at the unfamiliar feeling.

“What are you doing…”

“You don’t know what it is, you don’t know how to fix it. So there’s only one way left.”

He cut me off and said drowsy.

“Marry me.”

***

Through the conversation, I found out that Devan had been unconscious for a year and had released his eye patch a few weeks ago.

I also knew that the old butler, Karen, and Hilda were still living there.

That’s all he let me know.

Devan, on the other hand, knew everything.

He knew that I was not the protagonist of the prophecy, and that I was not the Count’s beloved daughter.

It was because the old butler testified that he seemed to have seen a bruise on my body at first glance.

He even knew that Killian was abnormally obsessed with me…

He even knew what I didn’t know.

“That necklace……What you said?”

In the wagon heading to the Grand Dukedom, I shouted back, forgetting my situation.

“You know that pendant is a magic tool. It wasn’t just the scent concentrated, but there was a magic at stake to track the location.”

I opened my mouth wide.

It was only a year ago that I could see why Killian came to the Archduke so quickly.

Somehow, I said I would get a necklace, but I had everything in mind.

“I don’t think you did it.”

Devan smiled as if he knew everything.

“What about now? Aren’t they all being tracked right now?”

“It doesn’t matter if it’s tracked down or not. He would already think you were with me.”

“But if you knew that we’re in Ellywoon now…”

I closed my mouth while I was talking.

Devan was right. I’m already convinced of my position and came all the way to the Archduke, but does it matter a lot whether I’m in Ellywoon now or not?

“…I still feel uncomfortable. You can just break it. Why didn’t you do it?”

“…It could be useful somewhere.”

He looked a little upset.

“Then Killian. Did you meet him?”

“Sure.”

“What did you talk about when you met…”

“More than that.”

Devan stared at me.

He seemed to want to change the subject.

“I think you have to thank me first.”