I Accidentally Resurrected My Dead Husband - Chapter 35

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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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Episode 35
The next morning, Erne woke later than usual.
His head felt heavy, and he was not in good form. He caught Udith as she hurried about her morning tasks and asked her a question.
“Did you come to my room last night?”
“Last night? No.”
Udith said she had been unusually tired yesterday and had gone to bed early. There was no reason for her to lie about such a thing, so if that was the case, what on earth had that been? A dream, perhaps.
Erne tried to recall the night before. He’d heard Udith’s voice and opened the door, but no one was there.
Or had he opened the door at all? His memory was hazy, as though he’d drunk too much. It was possible that even the memory of hearing Udith’s voice and opening the door was itself a dream.
While Erne sat lost in thought, Udith pressed her hand against his forehead.
“What is it?”
“Erne, you have a fever.”
“A fever?”
Erne brushed her hand away and felt his own forehead once, then Udith’s forehead once. Her hand was cool to the touch, but he had a mild fever.
“Looks like you might be catching a cold.”
He never caught colds even when soaked in rain during the depths of winter, yet here he was. Had he really become so weak after staying away from training for a while? Wait—a fever?
“Don’t touch me.”
Erne hastily pulled his hand away from Udith’s forehead. She gave him a bewildered look.
“But you were the one touching, Erne.”
“It could spread.”
“I suppose so. It’s just a cold, after all.”
“It’s not that.”
Erne irritably swept his hair back, then pressed a hand to his throbbing head.
Damn it—this was definitely the illness Henry had mentioned. The one with an unknown cause and no known cure, whether it was an epidemic or a pathogen.
* * *
It began with a mild fever. Even at that point, Erne conversed with Henry, who had come to pay his respects after being notified, well enough.
“It doesn’t appear to be an epidemic. No new victims have emerged. Still, you should be careful just in case, madam.”
Udith had also heard the full story from Henry.
People who had come into contact with Mira or been near her seemed to have been contaminated by the pathogen, but a few others had also died despite no such contact, so he cautioned them to be careful.
“Still, it’s odd. Erne seemed fine—why did he suddenly come down with it?”
According to the Security Force’s investigation, all the afflicted had shown symptoms on the same day. If Erne’s fever came later, perhaps it was merely a simple cold rather than something caused by Mira?
Unfortunately, that proved to be a vain hope. From the next day onward, Erne’s symptoms grew far worse. His fever spiked and subsided in violent cycles, and he could not maintain consciousness.
“Erne, are you awake?”
……
Erne gave no answer. Udith cracked open the door to his room and peered inside. He lay motionless on the bed.
She quietly set down a tray with thin gruel and fever medicine on the table, then returned with a basin of cold water and a cloth.
“Burning up—absolutely burning up.”
As Udith lightly pressed her hand to Erne’s forehead, feeling the heat radiating through her palm, she bit her lip. With a fever this high, even the legendary Erne seemed ready to collapse.
‘What kind of pathogen was on Mira?’
In trying to examine a corpse that wouldn’t decay, he looked liable to become one himself.
……
Erne’s breathing was ragged. The man who hadn’t changed color even when struck by a poison-coated blade now lay unconscious, and Udith found the sight deeply unsettling.
Udith carefully wiped his forehead and the nape of his neck with the cold-dampened cloth. But the heat radiating from him was too intense to be brought down by merely pressing a cool cloth to his neck.
After considering her options, Udith unfastened his shirt buttons and pulled it open. His chest heaved in irregular surges, and it too was blazing hot. The wet cloth slid repeatedly from his neck to his chest, then along his ribs to his abdominal muscles.
“What good are muscles if you can’t even overcome a fever?”
Should she remove his trousers as well? Udith placed her hand on Erne’s thigh. Even through the fabric, she could feel the searing warmth of his body heat.
……
She would have to. Taking off a sleeping man’s trousers made her feel like the world’s most depraved pervert, but this was legitimate medical care. She was doing it to save his life. It wasn’t as though his body was unknown to her anyway. Of course, she had no intention of removing everything.
Just the trousers—only the trousers—then…!
“……What are you doing?”
The moment her trembling fingers grasped his waistband, a rough hand seized her wrist. The fever-hot skin that met hers radiated unbearable heat.
“Every time I lose consciousness and wake up, you’re always doing something like this.”
His voice was interspersed with labored, ragged breathing.
“How am I supposed to rest easy and recover like this?”
The fact that he had the energy to jest suggested he might yet pull through.
“What are you talking about? I’m tending to you.”
“What kind of care starts by undressing? This is harassment, Miss Herrington.”
“Tch—and despite my care.”
Udith tossed the cloth back into the basin and shot him a sidelong glare. Even so, she retrieved the tray she had left on the table.
“If you have energy enough to joke, you can eat some gruel.”
Though his forehead creased with pain whenever he moved, Erne propped himself up at an angle against the headboard.
He stared at the lukewarm rice gruel without appetite. He wanted nothing in his mouth. Yet Erne forced himself to lift the spoon, remembering Udith’s care in preparing it—made while she was preoccupied with whatever she was concocting, fragrant items or otherwise. He couldn’t turn away from such devotion.
The gruel softened gently against his parched mouth. It wasn’t without flavor. Everything tasted like chewing sand, but this was respectable. Still, his lips curled into a petulant sound.
“Tasteless.”
“Gruel isn’t meant to be eaten for taste—it’s meant to keep you alive.”
Udith paid little mind to Erne’s complaint. True enough, we’re hardly the sort to exchange flowery compliments.
“Finish it all, and take your medicine too.”
“Why?”
Why? Did he really expect her to explain why a sick person should take medicine? Udith fixed him with a look of incomprehension.
“Wouldn’t our Herington lady be pleased if I died?”
Erne didn’t understand himself—why he was picking at his caretaker like this. Perhaps the fever made him petulant, a child’s whining.
Yet at the same time, he was curious. In this situation, if he died, Udith would gain the most. No more threat of divorce, reduced living expenses to half, and eventually she could keep all the proceeds from selling the Mansion. In other words, his survival was a loss for her. So why did Udith—who hated losing anything worse than death itself—bother trying to keep him alive?
“Well, it seems you’ll live as long as you get some proper food in you.”
Udith dismissed it as Erne’s usual teasing.
“Now drink your medicine.”
“It’s bitter.”
“Of course it’s bitter—would you expect it to be sweet? The saying goes that bitter tastes mean good for the body.”
“I’ve never heard that. You’re making it up.”
Does such a saying not exist here? Udith denied it as she cleared away the tray. The medicine began taking effect quickly; Erne’s eyelids grew heavy.
“Wait, Erne. Take off your clothes before you sleep.”
As she wiped his body with a damp cloth, his shirt kept getting soaked. Even if she wanted to change him into dry clothes, she alone couldn’t manage his large frame.
Erne forced his eyes open and began removing his sweat-and-water-soaked shirt when he hesitated, subtly turning his body away from her.
“You’re not using the fever as an excuse to indulge yourself? Don’t do that to a sick man.”
Watching him undress with such fumbling care, Udith gritted her teeth.
“I could just wrap you up in a blanket and roll you in it, I swear.”
* * *
So that’s what they meant by “all mouth.” Erne, who’d been complaining about the medicine being bitter and difficult, fell asleep quickly. His waking hours were growing shorter each day. Udith rose with the lukewarm basin.
“My sleeves are soaked.”
She’d wetted the cloth so many times that her sleeves were drenched. Udith returned to her room for a moment to change.
“What nonsense Erne talks.”
If I died, wouldn’t that be good for you?
Given Erne’s nature, it was likely just one of his crude jokes, but in these circumstances, it didn’t sound light. It sounded almost like a deathbed confession.
Whether it was a jest or earnest, Udith felt a stab of guilt. When Erne first came back to life, yes—then it hadn’t been welcome.
Because his survival meant she had to split the Earldom and the proceeds from selling the Mansion, which she’d thought were entirely hers. But if asked whether she felt the same now…….
‘I’m not sure.’
Honestly, when they eventually split the house money in half, it will sting a bit. But she’d never once wished Erne dead again because of it.
No, she didn’t hope for his death. Somewhere along the way, Udith had completely adapted to life with him. Waking in the morning to bicker, sharing meals, dividing the day’s work. Now, if Erne were to die, she’d be alone, hastily scraping together meals, living in heavy silence without a single reason to laugh.
She’d spent her whole life that way, so it wouldn’t be difficult, but still,
‘I hope Erne doesn’t die.’
This is Udith’s true heart. She could have told him the truth then,
“Ugh, ugh.”
but the mere thought made her flush. She couldn’t say such a thing, never. Udith scratched her forearm self-consciously. She was just snuffing out the candle in her room to head back to Erne’s when,
Whinny—
a horse cried out loudly from the garden.
“Look at that thing, eating expensive fodder and not sleeping because it has nothing better to do.”
Horses weren’t nocturnal, so why wasn’t this one sleeping? Udith clicked her tongue and headed toward the window. She was concerned—the horse was expensive; something might be wrong.
“What’s the matter? Why is it whinnying at me?”
Strange. Udith tilted her head in puzzlement when,
Knock-knock—
a knock sounded.
Knock-knock—
No one came knocking at this Mansion.

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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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