Adopting the Male Protagonist Changed the Genre - Chapter 201
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This chapter was translated by Lunox Team. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Chapter 201
“The Red Mage Tower Master’s immortality dark magic didn’t fail. If the price had been insufficient, it wouldn’t have manifested at all.”
“Then… you’re saying that’s what the magic was like from the beginning?”
“I don’t know what the Red Mage Tower Master thinks, but it is immortality, isn’t it.”
Chaser spoke as if joking, but terrifyingly, those words were true.
Neither Cheri’s aura, nor Chaser’s magic, nor even Giuseppe’s divine power could kill ‘that thing’ that had once been the Red Mage Tower Master.
‘In the end, we learned nothing about the Veil Lifters.’
The only gain was successfully protecting Baliko.
It was an unsatisfying conclusion in many ways, but I decided to save the reflection for later and be grateful for the fact that we could return home safely for now.
‘It’s already been two weeks since I’ve seen Leo.’
When I thought of Leo, longing filled the space where anxiety had been pooling.
“Chaser, can’t we return to the Royal Capital by magic like when you summoned Cheri to Baliko? That would only take a moment.”
“Well, it’s quite a tricky magic.”
Since Chaser had even summoned his staff, those words were probably true.
However, as soon as I saw Chaser sitting across from me with a sly smile, I instinctively knew he was hiding something. Chaser had a habit of answering vaguely whenever he had something he wanted to hide.
“Chaser. You’re hiding something from me.”
At my words, Chaser’s eyes widened and he answered with a truly aggrieved expression.
“There’s nothing like that. How could I possibly deceive my master.”
I turned my head toward Cheri, who was sitting alongside Chaser.
“Cheri.”
“Yes, he’s hiding something.”
At Cheri’s immediate answer, Chaser glared at him with an expression that said ‘what kind of person is this,’ then immediately resorted to tattling.
“His Excellency asked me to do it first! I definitely refused several times.”
Chaser’s words were tantamount to suggesting that some kind of deal had taken place between him and Cheri.
When I crossed my arms and looked back and forth between the two with a face demanding explanation, Chaser was the first to confess.
“His Excellency simply asked me to summon him by magic if something dangerous happened to master in Baliko.”
No wonder when I met Chaser in Baliko, he didn’t ask why I was there. He must have heard various circumstances from Cheri.
“And.”
“And what?”
Chaser shamelessly asked back with a face that said he didn’t know what I was talking about. I immediately turned to Cheri, and this time too, he honestly confessed.
“Summoning living beings by magic is forbidden.”
“Why is it forbidden?”
“Even if there seems to be no problem on the surface, there’s a risk that the essence could be damaged upon arrival.”
“The essence gets damaged?”
“It’s not a big problem, just things like going crazy or having brain problems that cause memory disorders or something like that?”
I blinked in disbelief at Chaser’s words as he casually interjected again.
“So now… you’re both saying that you requested and agreed to it while knowing that summoning a person is extremely dangerous.”
“Master, when you put it that way it sounds like there’s some misunderstanding, but I definitely refused several times…”
“Yes, that’s right.”
Cheri’s single sentence cut off Chaser’s pathetic excuse in one stroke.
Chaser, who had been thwarted by Cheri at every turn, glanced at Cheri with a sour expression.
“Your Excellency, didn’t your essence really get strange?”
“Same as usual.”
“Ah, so your head was originally strange but I just didn’t know it until now.”
“Having a strange head would be better than making pathetic excuses to the Marquess’s Daughter.”
I couldn’t hide my bewilderment at the sight of the two men who suddenly started arguing.
Earlier they were fighting over who would sit next to me, and now they’re bickering like this again?
When they should be reflecting on never doing such dangerous things again!
“Cheri, Chaser.”
The heads of Cheri and Chaser, who had been stabbing and blocking each other like spear and shield, turned toward me.
I knocked on the wall where the coachman was to stop the carriage, then smiled menacingly and said.
“You two go back to the Royal Capital together. And reflect on what you did wrong while you’re traveling back.”
“What? Why should I leave master behind…”
“Marquess’s Daughter, wait a moment…”
Bang!
Without listening to either of their protests, I got out of the carriage and closed the door.
“When did their relationship get so bad.”
Leaving behind the carriage that had become quiet as soon as I got out, I headed toward the Temple carriage that had been following us.
When I knocked on the carriage door, after a moment of silence, the door opened without resistance and Giuseppe’s face appeared inside.
As if he had been reading a book just moments before, his golden eyes behind his glasses looked directly at me.
“Let’s talk.”
“…Please come in.”
When the carriage began moving again, an awkward silence hung in the air inside.
I broke the silence with a light sigh, then brought up the question that had been bothering a corner of my mind.
“You asked me before. Whether I could trust the High Priest.”
Before the dark mage’s attack, he had asked me.
“Can you trust me, Marquess?”
The answer I couldn’t give then finally spilled from my lips.
“Unfortunately, I cannot trust you.”
I cannot trust him.
The previous day, avoiding his hand that he had extended with good intentions was probably because of that.
Because I would suspect that the moment our fingertips accidentally brushed, he might glimpse into my past with his power of insight.
‘If Leo’s existence were exposed that way…’
I didn’t even want to imagine how Giuseppe, who considered even his own sacrifice natural, would react if he learned of the Star of the Hero’s existence.
However, it would be absurd for me to ask him to trust me while I myself don’t trust Giuseppe.
“So could you promise me one thing so that I can trust you?”
Giuseppe answered immediately.
“I will promise anything with a divine oath…”
“No, a divine oath isn’t necessary.”
I cut off his words and shook my head self-deprecatingly.
“Divine power isn’t needed to trust a person. Even the twelve-year-old child in my house knows this, but I stupidly forgot it.”
Perhaps I should have done this from the beginning.
If I had talked openly and honestly instead of probing his intentions, deceiving him, and proposing deals, trusting each other wouldn’t have been so difficult.
I extended my hand to him and continued speaking.
“So just promise me this one thing. That you won’t judge me with divine power without my permission.”
“…”
“Let’s try having conversations while judging each other with human eyes, not divine eyes. How about it?”
Giuseppe looked down at my hand with an unreadable expression.
Soon he muttered as if to himself.
“You’re trying to take the difficult path when there’s an easy one available.”
Rarely, there wasn’t a trace of amusement at the corners of his mouth.
Then Giuseppe bit the tip of his glove to remove it, then slowly took my hand.
“I promise.”
I had no way of knowing whether divine power dwelt in Giuseppe’s golden eyes as he answered thus.
I could only trust that he would keep his promise with me.
* * *
The carriage carrying Giuseppe stopped in the dark dawn just before daybreak.
As soon as he arrived at the Grand Temple in the Royal Capital, he immediately sent people to spread descriptions of the surviving dark mages and issue wanted orders.
“High Priest, did the Saintess not come with you?”
“She said she would attend the funeral of those who lost their lives in this incident. So she plans to depart from Baliko in a week.”
“I see. You must be exhausted, so please rest now.”
Giuseppe’s footsteps, which had been heading familiarly toward the dormitory, suddenly stopped dead in the middle of the dark corridor.
“‘God’s power is not needed to trust people’…”
Self-mockery mixed into his muttered words.
Did she know that those words negated his entire life?
Giuseppe had always judged everything by God’s power.
But now, even if she told him not to judge her by God’s power, those words couldn’t possibly resonate with him.
Nevertheless, the reason he had clasped her hand was due to a certain doubt.
The distrust that perhaps her past shown by the power of divine insight might have been wrong.
The woman he saw with human eyes rather than God’s eyes was a good person who knew the value of human life and wouldn’t ignore those in danger.
The only gray existence in his world divided into black and white.
However, in the end, Giuseppe still couldn’t define her existence this time either.
“Ha.”
A hollow laugh escaped through Giuseppe’s lips. He decided he would no longer care whether Belinda Blanche was good or evil.
What mattered was only that she was someone necessary to prevent destruction.
He repeated this fact several times as if trying not to forget it.
As if the moment he let his guard down, that fact would fade and take on new meaning.
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This chapter was translated by Lunox Team. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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