I’m Sick of the Kind Protagonist, so I Might as Well Just Die - Chapter 27

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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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#27
“Estella!”
The Grand Duchess, who had kept her lips sealed even as she was dragged forward and forced into a humiliating position on the ground, called out her daughter’s name with a face twisted in fury. Estella didn’t even turn her head toward her mother as she continued speaking.
“I shall become a glorious guide to show where the seeds of anxiety must be uprooted. Therefore, please make me the ruler of Keldrian.”
“That’s quite an excessive demand for a mere guide.”
“It would be the easiest and most convenient path to grasp what Your Majesty desires.”
Interest and agitation flickered simultaneously in the man’s sallow eyes.
“You would serve me?”
“No. I mean to protect Keldrian. I cannot bear to watch the pride of a house that has never been broken crumble into the dust.”
“Estella! How could you do this! Your brother sacrificed his life for the Crown Prince, and your father wagered everything!”
The Grand Duchess’s voice trembled—a mixture of anger, sorrow, and betrayal.
“That is precisely why I have stepped forward, Mother. The pride of Keldrian cannot be reduced to some vague notion of ‘everything.’ Never.”
‘What on earth is this family pride she speaks of…?’
I attempted to empathize with Estella’s feelings, though I understood them not at all.
‘Is it similar to my promise with Perenustus to protect the people of my village? But I called it something I had to do—I was never this solemn about it.’
As I struggled to comprehend the original body’s emotions, a peculiar gleam passed through the man’s yellow eyes. Estella let her mother’s reproaches and curses flow through one ear and out the other, her gaze fixed solely on the man before her.
“Very well. Let us see if you possess the qualifications for such a claim.”
The man, a sneer on his lips, flicked his fingertips. A Knight waiting in attendance hurled his longsword before Estella. The blade, sticky with blood and flesh, clattered against the ground with a metallic ring.
“Behead the Grand Duke and Grand Duchess with your own hands.”
Estella didn’t hesitate for even a moment before kicking the sword away. The man laughed as though he had anticipated precisely this.
“So a delicately raised noblewoman lacks the resolve to sever her parents’ necks.”
“I was raised with such refinement that I have never held such a crude instrument. Rather than such filthy things, grant me a blade befitting the dignity of inheriting Keldrian’s pride.”
The Emperor’s eyebrows rose sharply. It was clearly an answer he had not anticipated. He, who had been regarding Estella with disdain, burst into genuine laughter for the first time.
“Ha, remarkable. My reverence for you has diminished somewhat.”
“Considerably, not merely somewhat. Unfortunately for you.”
It was quite an insolent retort. Yet the man seemed pleased with Estella’s response, laughing heartily once more before drawing the sword at his waist and tossing it to her.
“A blade given to the Emperor’s son. It once belonged to my father, then to my half-brother, and now it is mine—a precious sword indeed. Will that suffice?”
This time, Estella accepted the weighty sword with both hands, offering a respectful bow. The blade was so heavy that her slender arms trembled beneath its weight.
“Then, please bear witness.”
As Estella approached her parents’ necks with an elegant smile, the Knights let out soft clicks of their tongues, as though growing weary of the spectacle.
‘Hey. Are you alright? Can you really do this? The sword looks so heavy you can barely lift it.’
My words struck true, for Estella, frustrated by the sluggish pace her heavy sword forced upon her, finally responded to me for the first time.
‘You there, inside me. Do you know how to wield a sword?’
‘What if I do?’
‘Then spare our parents from pain as you sever their necks. And once that bastard’s anticipation reaches its peak, end my life as well.’
‘…Are you serious?’
‘I am the sort who cannot sleep unless I repay what I have received. It suffices to repay only the humiliation of that undeserved death I once suffered.’
‘Wow… quite the temperament.’
‘If you do only that, I shall allow you to act as you wish next time.’
…Well. It wasn’t a bad proposition. I nodded eagerly before Estella could change her mind.
‘I understand. In this situation, whether it’s the Grand Duke or you, there’s no chance of survival anyway—so you’re just going to have some fun before you die, right?’
‘A crude way of putting it, but I won’t deny it.’
‘If I’m the one chosen by the Holy Sword, there might be a chance of winning. Want to fight?’
‘How foolish. To borrow your phrasing, the one I want to “have fun with” before dying includes even the Creator who made this World.’
I tilted my head like an idiot, letting out a confused sound. From Estella came a laugh that sounded genuinely delighted.
‘The Creator? You mean Perenustus?’
‘Yes. You seem to call the Creator that way. Regardless, no matter how much of a Creator he is, I cannot tolerate him designating me as the companion of such a bastard.’
‘Wow, you too? I’ve never understood why Perenustus insists on attaching such pointless relationships across every World. Love, marriage, and all that—there’s nothing more destructive to a person than those things, yet Perenustus is obsessed with them.’
Estella and I experienced genuine, passionate agreement for the first time. Rowan came to mind. Her unconditional love for Damian. The love that ultimately led her to destruction.
‘After experiencing it, it really was utterly useless to life.’
I muttered to myself. Thanks to that, Estella, who had opened her heart to me just a little more, slowly revealed the true feelings she had been hiding away.
‘Promise me. That even after you’ve completely claimed my body, you will never marry that bastard according to the Creator’s will. Swear by Keldrian’s name that you’ll take revenge for me.’
‘Ha, if it’s something like that, I’m confident.’
I answered Estella’s earnest plea with a bright smile. I was sincere too. I had learned enough from Rowan about how love destroys a person.
Just as I had read Estella’s true heart, she sensed my sincerity and lifted the corners of her lips in a cunning smile. Walking toward her parents with deliberate slowness, she tilted her chin in the most insolent manner I had yet seen from her.
“You foul-smelling men there. Those of you who are worse than useless—step back. You are far too inadequate to be witnesses to a glorious death.”
“….”
The Knights pressing down on the Grand Duke and Grand Duchess rolled their eyes in disgust and retreated. Only after they had withdrawn far enough that Estella’s words couldn’t reach them did she meet the eyes of her parents, who were glaring at her.
“There’s no time for lengthy explanations, so just listen. I don’t know what that bastard wants. You would know better than I would, Father.”
The Grand Duke and Grand Duchess, who had been glaring at their daughter with eyes bulging with rage, slowly opened their mouths. Their anger transformed into bewilderment, then quickly into confusion. Estella answered her parents’ unspoken questions with merely a single nod instead of lengthy words.
“I don’t understand grand causes or politics like my brother does. But thanks to the care you’ve given me, precious and refined as I am, I simply cannot bear to watch anything filthy touch Keldrian.”
“You….”
“My beloved parents, Estella will follow you shortly. Please wait just a moment.”
Estella repeated the words her father had spoken to her and gently kissed her parents’ cheeks. The moment her farewell was complete, she surrendered her body to me.
At last, full control had passed to me. With indescribable emotion, I swiftly cut off the breath of the Grand Duke and Grand Duchess and turned away. It was a quick, precise, and painless death, exactly as Estella had wished.
“A martial prowess superior to your brother’s.”
“You flatter me.”
“I have not heard that the young lady learned swordplay.”
“Oh my. Then you must not have heard that the young lady was chosen by the Holy Sword Basilect either.”
I met the gaze of the frowning man and smiled wickedly while summoning Basilect in the form of a greatsword. With an explosion of light, a massive blade far larger than the delicate young lady’s frame materialized. The formless aura that erupted as the blade rent the air caused the Knights to flinch and stiffen their shoulders.
‘Now!’
I seized that instant and struck the Emperor down with the flat of the blade, then straddled his body.
“How dare you lay hands on His Majesty!”
In an instant, countless sword points encircled my neck. Cold blades pressed against my throat. The Knights shouted with veins bulging, yet they hesitated to move, wary of what the woman wielding the Holy Sword might do to their master.
“You will remember this moment for a long time to come.”
“How could I forget? The moment when the most radiant woman in the world, adorned with the most exquisite necklace, straddled me.”
“No. The moment when you lose all possibility of uprooting the seeds of anxiety you so eagerly anticipated eliminating.”
“What…?”
“A crown that is not yours will endlessly tighten around your neck. Until the true owner of that crown comes to sever it.”
I savored the moment as the man’s yellow eyes trembled with uncertainty, then drove Basilect into my own abdomen. The sharp pain dissolved beneath a strange ecstasy unlike anything I had ever felt before.
The sensation of blood flowing from my abdomen drenching his body, the clamor of him screaming to save me—all of it was exquisite. Death arrived in a shade of pure black, accompanied by a euphoria bordering on madness.
Truly, it was a sweet death. As sweet as the moment Rowan’s body first tasted chocolate.

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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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