Beguiling the Enemy’s Patriarch - Chapter 50

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Chapter 50
I held my fists clenched, breathing as shallowly as possible. I’d endured these nightmares thoroughly enough in high school—I’d graduated from them!
Mother’s specter whispered sweetly.
[Then, my dear, won’t you come with Mother?]
I barely managed to tear my gaze away from the faceless visage of the mother I’d never known. The greatest attribute of dark magic is enchantment. I couldn’t let myself fall under its spell.
[Yes. I suppose I could go with your mother.]
[Yes, yes. That would work.]
Faceless black masses surrounded me, laughing. Among them, Mother’s specter—the only one with a face—slowly embraced me.
[Come with me, Eun-seo. I’ll never leave you alone again….]
The specter that now held me completely felt weightless. And at that moment, I realized I needed to speak—words I’d uttered countless times in dreams past.
My voice trembled as it emerged.
“Wow, this is seriously a ridiculous dream.”
[Come with Mother, dear. With Mother. To a beautiful place.]
If I listened to the specter’s words, enchantment would claim me instantly. And mercifully, though my body might suffer at the gentlest breeze, my mind was diamond-hard.
I forced my lips open, taking great care not to bite my tongue.
“N… n….”
[Yes, dear. What is it?]
“N…no thanks!”
I babbled nonsense and squeezed my eyes shut. I had to escape. Don’t look, don’t listen!
My body, stiffened by the weightless specter’s crushing embrace, creaked as it moved. The pace was agonizingly slow, but I managed to take one step forward. I felt with nauseating clarity as my body passed straight through the specter.
[Where are you going!]
The specter shrieked. This was no whisper—a piercing wail that drove into my ear canal like an arrow.
I screamed right back at it.
“No, don’t follow me!”
And I bolted. The phrase “discretion is the better part of valor” exists for moments exactly like this!
I ran for my life. I’d never run with such desperate urgency. A tearing shriek ripped through my eardrums.
[Seun-seo!]
“Aaaahhh!”
Each time my feet pushed off the ground to propel me forward, the surrounding darkness convulsed violently. My center of balance swayed wildly.
[Stop right there!]
As if on cue, dozens of black masses suddenly swarmed behind me. Among them were several with faces. Those must be the actual dead spirits. The specters cried out in unison, their voices ringing out.
[Where are you going, where!]
[Eun-seo!]
“I’m going back to my room, why!”
Goosebumps erupted across my scalp, and my trembling voice spilled out in delirious rambling. But I couldn’t stop babbling—it was the only way to keep them at bay.
“Soleia, you terrifying person! It would be better if you just cast dark magic outright…!”
[Come with us!]
“Just because you’re pretty, huff, is that all there is to it, really…!”
My breath came in gasps, reaching the limit of my throat. The ground’s convulsions made running exponentially harder.
But I couldn’t stop. I had to run desperately to avoid being caught by that army of specters. Until this cursed dream ended!
“Gasp….”
Damn it, damn it. I cursed under my breath hundreds of times as I ran.
A blurred, flesh-colored hand kept shooting up right beside my ear, then falling back. Just when I thought I’d finally shaken them off, I’d glance back to see specters surging toward me like a tidal wave. It was absolutely maddening.
Eventually, tears streamed down my cheeks.
“Ugh…. When will I wake up, for heaven’s sake!”
I refused to be consumed by nothing more than a dream…!
That was when a familiar voice cut through the cacophony of air splitting and specters wailing.
[Princess.]
Stumble!
“…!”
My body lurched violently.
I gasped sharply. In that brief moment of distraction, a chilling cold clung to the back of my neck.
“Hm….”
Fortunately, I didn’t fall. But before I could even catch my breath, that voice spoke again.
[Where are you rushing off to?]
It was unmistakably my human tonic’s voice. I whimpered and ran faster.
“Ugh. This is really bad.”
[Princess Yerenika!]
“Did you think just mimicking that man’s voice would fool me!”
I shrieked in a nasal tone. Auredhian Belgot doesn’t call me ‘Yerenika’, you wicked witch!
Yet undeniably, it was the voice I most desperately wanted to hear. That man who’d vanished from the Imperial Palace all day for reasons unknown. This made it perfectly clear.
This nightmare targets my ‘weakness’. The thing I least want exposed. The thing I most despise. The thing I most….
“Hm….”
The thing I most refuse to lose.
A glimmer of silver seemed to flicker across my darkened vision. I hadn’t seen him in just two days, yet I missed him unbearably. His name circled on the tip of my tongue.
“Ugh.”
I rubbed my eyes roughly. No matter how desperately I called out his name, Auredhian Belgot wouldn’t come find me even in my dreams. I had to escape this place through my own strength alone.
“Ugh…. I won’t let this stand….”
So I kept running endlessly, tears or saliva streaming down my face. And finally, I saw the end.
A faint glow wavered in the distance. My instincts screamed it—that was the exit. The way out of this cursed nightmare!
I ran toward that light instinctively, unable to even tell if I was breathing anymore, running with everything I had.
That small, dim light grew larger and brighter as I approached. What had been the size of a fingernail became a fist, then a head, and finally as large as my entire body.
“…!”
Brilliant light poured down mercilessly, stabbing my eyes. I was almost there.
And finally, the radiant exit swallowed me whole. I reflexively squeezed my eyes shut. Beyond my closed eyelids, light erupted in blinding white.
[Gasp!]
And I was forcibly dragged from the nightmare as if pulled up through water. The weight of the specters crushing my entire body vanished in an instant, and I felt myself grow light.
I rolled across the sheets and finally exhaled the breath I’d been holding.
[Hm…. Huh?]
And it was in the very next moment that I sensed something was wrong.
[…?]
I was back in my bedroom, lying sprawled across the bed. My body was tumbling across the sheets as if I’d collapsed there.
But I couldn’t feel anything.
A chilling silence descended. I lay frozen against the bedding, my face buried in the sheets.
[….]
Rub, rub. I pressed my face against the blanket before me, yet no sensation reached me. My mouth fell open blankly.
[Huh?]
Even the voice spilling from my lips didn’t sound human at all.
A hollow, echoing sound that reverberated through empty air before scattering away.
Shudder. Every hair on my body stood on end. I’d thought I’d barely escaped the nightmare by running for my life. What on earth was happening?
Rustle. The sheets moved. Not because I’d moved them. I lay perfectly still, yet the sheets shifted.
Rustle. Crackle.
[….]
Slowly, as if entranced, I lifted my head. The room was filled with the dim light of dawn. In that profound silence, I heard a faint, barely audible whimper. And then I understood what had moved the sheets.
“Hnn….”
It was, that is to say.
“Hnn…. Ugh.”
My body. I jolted upright in shock, nearly fainting, and scrambled backward in panic. My gaze remained fixed, unable to tear away from my ‘body’ on the bed.
I finally let out a scream.
[What is this!]
Of course, even that sound didn’t emerge as a real voice. My mouth opened as wide as it possibly could.
Soft, long pink hair lay limp across the white sheets. The face, drained of all color, was pale and corpse-like. Brows twisted as if wracked with agony. Blue lips, with faint whimpers seeping through at intervals.
A thunderbolt of realization crashed over me. A foolish murmur escaped.
[Y…Yerenika….]
That body was unmistakably Yerenika’s. Then what was I now…?
My wavering gaze swept across my own form. A translucent, luminous body. The bedding showed right through the back of my forearm. No voice emerged, my body had become transparent, and I felt no sensation whatsoever.
[I’m….]
I’m insane. No wonder my body felt so light…! I stared wide-eyed and let out a short gasp.
I didn’t just become light—I’ve turned into a ghost…!

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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