I Thought It Was the Monster Duke's Fake Sedative - Chapter 101

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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 101
‘That’s right. I’m inside a carriage!’
A carriage where servants bustled about outside, coming and going constantly!
In a few moments, Tepe or Gorgo would arrive with word that they were leaving soon.
Even so, showing herself like this in front of them would be somewhat….
‘Of course, a place like this is perfect for indulging in such things, but—no, what am I thinking!’
Without meaning to, Luciana’s neck flushed a deep crimson as she recalled the carriage scenes from countless adult novels she’d read in her past life.
If she claimed she wasn’t curious about such things, she’d be lying.
‘No, no… but not now.’
Edward, catching the brief conflict and hesitation in her expression, whispered like a devil.
“They say it’s more thrilling when the carriage rocks.”
“…….”
“Aren’t you curious?”
“Y-yes… what?!”
Edward, who once would have demanded she choose between liking it or not, merely laughed softly at her answer as though finding her adorable.
Luciana rubbed her flushed cheeks over and over.
‘When he says things like that, of course I get curious!’
This was precisely why she couldn’t even call Edward a pervert.
As Luciana grew more flustered and her neck deepened in color, Edward watched with evident delight.
And unable to resist, he lowered his lips to hers.
“Oh!”
“I’m curious.”
When he pulled her closer, he savored the feel of her body responding to him, the supple warmth filling his palms.
Truth be told, Edward hadn’t planned to go this far.
It was simply that the mad scientist lingering constantly at Luciana’s side irritated him.
Though he understood perfectly well why the man had to be kept alive, it grated on him nonetheless.
The way the man shamelessly praised Luciana and clung to her side with such persistence was unbearable.
‘Of course the madman recognizes beauty when he sees it.’
Who could say what he truly felt beneath his talk of parental affection and such?
If he genuinely harbored parental sentiment, it made things all the more disturbing.
His hatred for the man was entirely justified.
That he’d dared harm people within Edward’s own domain was a sin deserving a hundred deaths.
Yet there was an even more fundamental original sin to lay at his feet.
‘If not for him.’
Then Luciana would never have been imprisoned in the Temple’s depths and subjected to such horrors.
It troubled Edward deeply that Luciana remained composed and steady in her dealings with the man.
He would have preferred she show fear—asked him to protect her from that monster.
He would have done so a thousand times over if it meant keeping her safe.
Yet instead, witnessing her treat the man with such dignified restraint, jealousy began to simmer within him.
As he gave voice to these feelings, desire kindled unexpectedly, and he suddenly wanted nothing more than to consume her entirely.
Edward, gathering these tumultuous emotions, whispered to Luciana in a tone of reproach.
“Look. Standing there so stiffly.”
Across her dress, wrinkles formed obscenely along the curves where his fingers pressed and her skin spilled free.
The sight of it alone set Edward’s mind aflame, and he released a low growl.
“You’re… the one… standing stiffly.”
Luciana suddenly found her voice.
“When you’re… doing the same….”
And this time, she did something unexpected.
“…….”
“…….”
With remarkable audacity, she reached her hand behind her and grasped his hardness firmly.
Her face flushed crimson, she did not look away from his gaze.
While Edward fell silent in surprise, Luciana swallowed repeatedly.
Now that she’d done it, she wondered if it had been too provocative….
‘Oh, whatever.’
The preparations would take a bit longer anyway, and as long as they made no sound, it should be manageable.
If they simply touched and did nothing more, surely they could manage?
Having rationalized it to suit herself, Luciana squeezed her eyes shut and thrust her lips forward slightly.
A pleased laugh erupted from above.
“I’m losing my mind.”
Edward laughed heartily at the obsessive mage’s words, as commanding as a general, and bent down to kiss the woman in his arms.
“We’re departing!”
Shortly after, the carriage began moving toward the Capital.
Tepe and Gorgo, who had discreetly excused themselves, dismissed all the servants in the vicinity.
The carriage door where the two men rode remained closed for a long time.
“…Safe travels to you.”
Meanwhile, Rosendal, who watched the departing carriage from afar, smiled with satisfaction.
He’d already offered his farewells beforehand, so there was no need to feel regret now.
His duty was to remain and guard Teseron Castle.
“Rosendal.”
It was then that an attendant approached with an expression of considerable distress.
“What is the matter?”
“A message has come from the dungeons, sir.”
“…Has something happened to the Duchess Consort?”
Publicly, the Duchess Consort was known to have suffered a seizure that left her unable to speak.
After receiving treatment from the physician, she’d been spending her days in a blank stare, looking only at the walls, or so he’d heard.
As Rosendal’s expression hardened, the attendant shook his head.
“No, sir. It’s not about the prisoners… it’s about a witness.”
“A witness?”
“It concerns Erenta…”
* * *
Several days after the party departed for the Capital, in the afternoon.
Bang!
With a violent crack, sharp claws snapped clean in two.
Screech!
Shrill!
As flesh tore with a sickening sound, Edward finished off the last monster lunging at him.
Gurgle, gurgle.
While the monster, whose breath hadn’t yet fully ceased, dragged itself across the ground in agony, Tepe and Gorgo, who had been dealing with another creature behind him, approached Edward and made their report.
“This section of the road is completely cleared.”
“I believe we can resume our departure.”
Before answering, Edward surveyed the road ahead.
The carriage route was entirely blackened with monster corpses and blood.
The merchants who had huddled in fear now crept cautiously from their hiding places.
“L-long live the Duke!”
“Long live the Divine Incarnation!”
They praised Edward from a safe distance, then hastily gathered their goods and fled, fearing another monster might appear.
Edward narrowed his eyes and swept back the hair that hung before his face.
‘They’re appearing even near the road to the Capital now.’
The first monster attack had come not long after they’d set out.
He’d deliberately chosen a remote mountain pass to take a faster route, so it had been expected; he’d quickly disposed of them and moved on to the next stretch, but…
“Duke! There are monsters ahead…!”
“There’s a pack of them behind us too!”
Even as they left the mountain pass and made their way onto roads where people lived, monsters continued to emerge.
In the end, Edward found himself stopping to rescue people under attack along the way, and thus his journey had become a series of rescues.
Sometimes he’d even save nearby dwellings from attack, which caused his passage to take somewhat longer.
Not that he cared whether the Emperor and the Temple were waiting…
Tsk.
Edward gazed at the monster corpse sprawled on the ground, his brow furrowing.
‘The situation is growing worse.’
As time passed, monsters appeared more frequently and the Corruption of the land intensified.
He’d suspected something was amiss, but he hadn’t realized it would deteriorate to this degree.
‘I’d almost prefer these were summoned by Ancient Rituals.’
Artificially summoned monsters could simply be destroyed.
But this — Corruption accumulating and overflowing across the continent, spawning monsters everywhere — was an unstoppable natural phenomenon.
And the fact that there was only one Divine Incarnation to fight them made matters worse.
Eventually, unable to bear the overwhelming number of monsters, some territories and nations had begun cultivating orders of knights to fight them, rather than waiting for a Divine Incarnation to come to their aid.
‘But only those nations and territories with the resources to do so.’
Training knights to fight monsters required tremendous wealth and effort.
The land was becoming increasingly tainted, crops had fewer places to grow, and some sources of water had become so polluted that people could no longer drink from them.
Even now, forced toward the Emperor as he was, people across the continent who couldn’t receive his aid were surely dying.
Edward found himself thinking, without quite meaning to.
‘…Perhaps.’
Perhaps this was how it was meant to end—the world’s natural, inevitable fate.
It wasn’t a new thought.
It was something he’d turned over in his mind countless times, facing the ever-multiplying monsters.
After all, he himself was a Divine Incarnation created through experiments that amounted to torture, and true Divine Incarnations were born no longer.
So why should it be strange if the world simply ended one day without warning?
In the past, he hadn’t cared one way or the other.
He’d thought: when the day came that he could no longer fight monsters, that would be the end.
But lately…
“Is it all over?”
His thoughts were cut short by Luciana’s presence beside him—she’d come close, studying him with worry in her eyes.
“Just to be safe, I’ll check if any of them remain nearby.”
“And I’ll make sure the servants are unharmed.”
Tepe and Gorgo naturally withdrew, giving them space.
Feeling her hands tremble slightly as she reached for him, Edward gently drew Luciana into his arms and held her with care.

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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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