Instead of My Beloved Sister, I Married a Monster - Chapter 77

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

Chapter 77

Ram clicked his tongue briefly and said.

“Actually, it’s not really a story I need to hear.”

“….”

“There must be some desperate story behind chasing after a married woman all the way here. It would be ridiculous to recite all those feelings in detail in front of that woman’s husband.”

Only now did he realize that his romantic feelings could be sinful just by harboring them.

Klaus quietly clenched his hand that was resting on his thigh.

Ram watched the veins bulge on the back of his opponent’s hand as he stubbed out his cigarette in the ashtray.

Ram, who had discarded the barely smoked cigar without regret, simply dismissed Klaus’s request.

“Unfortunately, I can’t let you meet her right now. She’s sick.”

“…Are you trying to hide her so I can’t meet her?”

Ram thought his opponent had crossed the line.

The reason he had let this uninvited guest into his house and engaged in conversation was entirely out of consideration for Evnia’s position.

If Evnia also had any intention of meeting Klaus, he thought it wasn’t something he could prevent on his own.

However, that didn’t mean he was providing natural courtesy.

He had already been more than generous enough to this challenger who dared come to covet his bride.

Ram, having erased even a trace of goodwill from his voice, spoke with a slight twist of his lips.

“Me? Why, what are you supposed to be.”

“….”

“Klaus Sidoer, born into a noble bloodline with a handsome face to boot, so life must have been quite easy for you so far. That’s why you naturally believe you’d be a threat to other men. How adorable.”

“That’s not what I meant….”

“If that’s not what you meant, then do you want me to understand your pure love for Evnia? Sorry, but what’s truly ridiculous is that pathetic sincerity of yours. You’re not going to claim you’re having some love of the century after coming to find a woman who has a husband, are you?”

“….”

“What’s more serious is that those feelings must have been even more sordid before marriage. At least now you came to save her.”

Klaus’s shoulders flinched greatly for a moment.

Ram knew the history of Klaus’s pathetic love better than Klaus thought.

He was a man who had run away from her, unable to even say he loved her once because he was afraid of the responsibilities.

“She came here to die. That means there were people who sent her here to die.”

“….”

“So I’m asking, Klaus Sidoer. Where have you been and what have you been doing all this time?”

Klaus realized that Ram was deliberately treating him like a child.

Though humiliation rose within him, it wasn’t shame from external contempt but embarrassment that originated from within himself.

Instead of getting angry and storming out of his seat, Klaus closed his eyes tightly and controlled the rushing shame.

His lips, confessing his cowardice, trembled slightly with embarrassment.

“I was cowardly hiding behind the excuse that there was nothing I could do.”

“….”

“I know my resolution came too late. I thought if I kept it covered up without revealing it, someday it would truly become something that never existed. I mistakenly thought I could naturally abandon feelings that should naturally be abandoned. Though I never succeeded even once.”

“….”

“If it’s not too late, I want to correct my mistake even now.”

Could this confession shake someone’s heart?

Could a man who had been cowardly truly seek forgiveness and love as the price for his apology?

After a long silence, Ram answered in a voice drained of emotion.

“…I’ll give you a guest room. Tell the detailed story directly to her yourself.”

* * *

For Klaus Sidoer, love was always something that was just there, something that didn’t need to be carefully tended to.

As soon as he became aware of his feelings, he hid them well in an invisible place, so his choices always moved in a different direction from his true intentions.

It wasn’t as difficult as he thought. He hadn’t been given many opportunities to face his feelings in the first place.

It was an era when it was natural for men and women to maintain distance, and House of Sidore and House of Hessen weren’t in direct contact either.

If he chose not to meet her, Klaus could have lived his entire life without encountering Evnia Hessen.

In fact, the last year before Evnia left for Litberg was a series of such days.

He stopped going to parties where young men and women would gather to watch her for a few minutes at most, and Evnia Hessen disappeared from his life just like that.

No, it wasn’t a farewell that only he experienced. She had finally left Hessen forever.

House of Hessen didn’t spread news of their second daughter’s marriage to the outside world. For similar reasons, they didn’t publicly mourn her either.

Evnia Hessen disappeared like that without even having a funeral, as if she had never existed in this world from the beginning.

But that couldn’t be right.

His heart couldn’t have been trampled so messily by mere hallucinations.

“Young Duke, that, I…. How did you know our child?”

Visiting Hessen Count’s Mansion was a rare impulsive decision for him.

He happened to have business passing through Hessen Estate, so memories of the day he first met her were close, and he happened to hear someone joking about her death.

When he offered to pray for the soul of a woman he officially had never even met, everyone except him was flustered.

The same was true for Count of Hessen, who was sweating profusely while greeting him.

Under the pouring suspicious gazes, Klaus hid his true intentions plausibly as always.

“I was just passing by the area and stopped in. I heard that you both had lost all your children, so I thought I’d offer my condolences out of sympathy.”

“Didn’t you have any contact with Evnia?”

“Not at all.”

He could assert that with certainty.

They were free from any scandals.

It wasn’t that they had never had meaningful encounters, but even those were from childhood when it would be hard to suspect a romantic relationship.

Perhaps the other party had already forgotten that they had even met.

“Come to think of it, this seems like a rather hasty visit. Did I perhaps visit too early when you were already preparing the funeral?”

“No, that’s not it. The funeral is…. I know in my heart that we should, but if we hold the ceremony, it feels like we’d really be letting that child go….”

Count of Hessen hurriedly shook his head and made excuses.

Klaus’s brow furrowed slightly at this.

“You’re not planning to let the deceased go without even a proper farewell, are you?”

“Of, of course not, but…. Actually, we still haven’t confirmed Evnia’s life or death. It wasn’t a situation where we could hold a funeral.”

“Weren’t there people who went with her? …Or perhaps, they didn’t return either?”

“No, all the companions returned safely. But they said they got scared and ran away early. They said they dropped our daughter off at the entrance to the path leading to the castle and came back.”

“You mean they didn’t even confirm their master’s final journey?”

“Even we parents didn’t have the courage to watch that, so we stayed here instead of following. How could we blame them….”

Count of Hessen couldn’t continue speaking and hung his head with a sorrowful expression.

Klaus felt inwardly disgusted at this.

Everyone in the western region knew that Countess and Count of Hessen had deliberately raised their second daughter without affection, knowing she would be offered as food to the monster.

They even wanted to avoid the guilt of sacrificing their daughter for the family.

Klaus thought the tears that Count of Hessen and his wife were struggling to squeeze out looked very much like acting.

Though it was probably a delusion born from a kind of self-loathing.

“Didn’t Litberg Castle send any communication?”

“That monster wouldn’t show such kindness.”

“Any contact would just be disturbing anyway.”

Klaus looked coldly at Countess and Count of Hessen chattering back and forth.

He began to feel like an idiot for expecting to hear some news about her by coming here.

Instead of wasting more time, Klaus rose from his seat without regret.

When the important figure who had visited unexpectedly was about to leave on his own again, Countess and Count of Hessen also panicked and hurriedly got up.

But Klaus actually had no intention of leaving the manor yet.

Having no more business with them didn’t mean his work here had disappeared.

“Could I take a look around your daughter’s room?”

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