Hiding the Fact That We Are Dating From the Amnesiac Villain - Chapter 17

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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 17
Freena stared helplessly at the wine Decklin Caesar had taken with him.
‘What on earth have I done?’
To save Hugho, I lingered beside the Assassin, swapped out the wine from Daisy Hall, and even replaced the poisoned drink with another….
I had tried to save Decklin Caesar.
“You shouldn’t regret it.”
“…Pardon?”
A soft voice descended from above her head. The empty glass tilted once more between his fingertips.
“So don’t mistake people. Did you think I was Draven?”
Decklin Caesar’s eyes curved with a beauty so exquisite it was cruel.
Who was Decklin Caesar?
With a mere gesture, he possessed the power to crush a human skull from unseen places, a ruthless man who spared neither torture nor imprisonment, coercion nor violation.
Such a man….
Hugho?
The knight suddenly named flinched, his shoulders trembling slightly beside her.
“This fellow is too rigid to be any fun.”
Decklin Caesar smiled as though delighted, but Freena and everyone else turned to stone.
His voice carried laughter lightly, yet within it lay not a question but a confirmation.
A warning masquerading as curiosity.
“….”
“This is my first time experiencing something like this.”
He tilted his head slightly.
“I’m uncertain how I should react.”
It meant he already suspected her. He knew she had switched the contents.
Freena felt a suffocating chill wash over her.
The sensation trickling down her spine was far too vivid to deny.
‘This is probably….’
Completely ruined….
“You may leave now.”
His voice was gentle, yet it always carried a tone that terrified Freena.
She had been frightened when he was Hugho, but now the fear had doubled.
“By the way, this isn’t a farewell.”
He smiled softly.
It was an excessively beautiful smile, as though nothing had happened at all.
* * *
Freena fled the Banquet Hall and rushed back to the Imperial Kitchen.
‘No! No, no, no—!’
She couldn’t accept this situation at all.
“…O, okay, c, c, calm down… stay calm and, c, compose yourself, let me sort through the situation.”
I don’t even know what I’m saying anymore.
1. Hugho is Decklin Caesar.
2. But why did he fall in love with me…?
-He even confessed it was love at first sight.
-To reiterate, Hugho—no, Decklin… confessed.
3. Yet he doesn’t seem to remember me. Perhaps….
4. I brazenly sabotaged his plans right before Decklin’s eyes….
“Ugh!”
My head was spinning.
I said I’d organize my thoughts, but nothing makes sense!
‘The confession about love at first sight was suspicious from the start!’
But back then, Freena let it slide. Why?
Because Hugho’s face was far too beautiful….
‘I thought it was the transmigrator’s blessing….’
…I must be insane.
But life was about practical experience.
‘Hugho is really Decklin?’
Then why did he pursue a relationship with me?
Why me….
Every action of Decklin Caesar in the novel was the result of meticulous calculation.
He was born incapable of loving anyone, and he never granted his presence to a single soul.
Yet whenever Decklin needed something, he seduced his target without hesitation.
As a result, many fell for his abhorrent performance.
They believed without question that he loved them, and followed him even unto ruin.
‘…But do I possess any value worth exploiting?’
In that moment, a passage that had flitted through the novel came to mind.
Does not memory sharpen at the threshold of death?
[He seduced and destroyed a bastard living as though dead, using their anxiety as bait with honeyed words; he approached a noble on the brink of collapse as a savior; and to the knight who swore loyalty, he….]
And Freena’s thoughts naturally halted at one sentence.
‘A bastard living as though dead.’
Could that possibly… be me?
It certainly seems that way….
Somewhere, the sound of a life bell tolling echoed.
* * *
Imperial Palace Outskirts.
A locket pendant suspended in midair gleamed beneath the moonlight.
Click.
The pendant’s cover opened, revealing a blood-stained portrait within.
The subject’s face was completely obscured by bloodstains.
Decklin stared at the pendant with unwavering intensity.
Why had he still not discarded this worthless thing?
I cannot fathom the reason for this.
Something hovered on the edge of my consciousness, refusing to crystallize. By now, frustration had evolved into an aching thirst for answers.
Whenever I gazed upon the pendant, an overwhelming urge to return to the past seized me.
Had I not shed blood at Enemy Nation’s Fortress back then, might I have discovered the identity of the face that so vexed me?
I could not even recall why my head had been struck in the first place.
It was certain that a portion of my memory had been lost.
Since it did not impede my daily affairs, I had convinced myself it was inconsequential—but that was a grave miscalculation.
My own delusion.
It gnawed at me relentlessly.
I wish the delusion had persisted far longer.
“…Your Excellency, why did you drink the wine directly?”
A desolate wind rustled the leaves overhead. The Aide watched Decklin Caesar beneath the tree, rolling the pendant carefully between his fingers.
According to the plan, that wine was meant to be consumed by Draven, the knight planted by Count Seiton.
He, who had played the role of spy, was to receive his karmic retribution there.
Decklin Caesar had merely intended to observe Count Seiton’s face drain of color at his leisure.
Yet he had abruptly altered the plan.
“The poison was never in it to begin with.”
“…What do you mean by that, Your Excellency?”
The Attendant who brought Count Seiton’s ceremonial wine was the Assassin they had purchased.
They had even received word of his success.
“Investigate the maidservant who brought the wine.”
“Yes. I shall look into it at once, as you command.”
Renia Felt.
Her involvement was undeniable.
I needed to understand her purpose in this.
Could she truly be a spy for Count Seiton?
“Are you not a knight of Caesar?”
Why did that voice suddenly echo in my mind?
The one who had profited most from the stolen poison was Draven, who was meant to die smoothly, and Count Seiton, who would be framed.
Could she have been trying to save Draven?
Her actions contained too many contradictions to be those of a spy, and my thoughts naturally gravitated toward that conclusion.
Perhaps because of that thought, my irritation deepened.
That was why I kicked the man sprawled at my feet.
“Gack!”
“Sir Draven, you’re bleeding quite heavily. Does it hurt?”
Decklin Caesar gazed down coldly at Draven, who lay dying and hemorrhaging.
The foolish knight had ambushed me the moment the banquet concluded.
My unguarded back, devoid of a sword, must have appeared defenseless to him.
“What can be done? If you were to live as a dog, you should have judged correctly who held your leash.”
“Ugh… Y-you too will one day… never escape unscathed, you abominable monster….”
Even within the pitch-black silence, countless stars scattered across the heavens.
Decklin Caesar fell into thought for a moment, then slowly smiled.
“It seems I must send Count Seiton another gift.”
Decklin Caesar slowly picked up the longsword that had fallen to the ground.
It had once hung from Draven’s waist, but now it rested entirely in his grasp.
This was the Imperial Palace Outskirts, where no soul dared tread.
So there was more than enough time to spend the night carving flesh and savoring screams.
“…And Your Excellency, I have something to report regarding the stolen Caesar heirloom.”
“Speak.”
Decklin Caesar answered coldly, raising the blade’s tip.
The object that had vanished without a trace while he was away at war—the ring he always wore.
Who could have stolen it, and by what means?
Decklin Caesar’s crimson eyes grew deathly cold.
Whoever took it would never escape unscathed.
A ring bound to its master through blood oath would unleash a terrible curse the moment it recognized another as its bearer, withering the thief’s body into a pitiful husk.
“A tracking artifact was discovered on the Arke Plateau. It will be auctioned soon, they say.”
At this unexpected news, Decklin Caesar rested his chin in his hand.
“It seems I shall recover the heirloom shortly.”
The life of the thief whose whereabouts remained unknown was already within his grasp.

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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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