Let the Whales Fight, This Shrimp is Leaving! - Chapter 49

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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 49
Tears have a momentum all their own; once they start to flow, they continue until every last one has been shed.
“Are you… crying?”
“…Yes. Probably.”
I nodded, feeling the hot warmth of the liquid trailing down my cheeks.
I was exhausted.
Utterly exhausted.
Worn out from keeping my nerves razor-sharp to monitor everything around me, from studying documents until my head ached, from checking the forces that hungered for this land.
Since this position had been foreseen from my birth, I’d convinced myself I could do it better than anyone.
I’d sworn and promised countless times that I would succeed.
Even now, with no one left to witness those promises, I’d struggled to keep them alone.
The reason I’d insisted so earnestly that this was right was because I had no certainty at all.
Was this really my best effort?
Constantly doubting and distrusting myself, yet weighed down by so many obligations, I’d pushed forward anyway.
But now I couldn’t find it in me to do the same.
In this moment, I simply wanted to remain exhausted, just for a little while longer.
“You’re crying, aren’t you.”
I admitted it flatly and lowered my head.
I hadn’t been able to hold back the tears, but that didn’t mean it was all right for Deyan to see me like this.
Honestly, it was shameful.
Before someone I needed to maintain advantage over, I was proving my own weakness with my own hands.
I’d likely regret this day for a long time to come.
Every time I remembered it, I’d kick off my blankets in mortification.
Even after I erased Deyan Boislav Nemanic from this world entirely, I would never forget him.
“Please, don’t cry. I… what should I… Ah! That handkerchief, I…”
Not knowing that I was imagining killing him simply for witnessing my tears, Deyan was visibly flustered.
He flailed his large hands uselessly in the air, fumbling through clothes soaked and clinging to his body, only to realize he had no handkerchief at all, and let out a helpless sigh.
He looked like a foolish bear.
Like a bear that had mindlessly thrust its paw into a hive looking for honey and gotten attacked by wasps.
Even as Deyan stood there looking thoroughly troubled, beads of cold sweat rolling down his face, I simply stood at a distance, tears dripping steadily down.
“Well.”
Unable to keep his hands still, Deyan clenched and unclenched them anxiously before dropping to one knee before me.
Kneeling with his head bowed, he met my eyes deliberately, and his voice took on a calmer tone.
“I did not act thoughtlessly. Of course, the plan has been disrupted somewhat, but I will ensure that neither the war you fear nor any other complication causes damage to the Plene Grand Duchy.”
He apparently thought I was despairing over fear of Joaquin’s retaliation.
I said nothing in return, simply watching him through wet eyes as he poured out his excuses.
“Contact Glay and inform him the situation has changed. Joaquin is confined to Plene for now—we’ll use the pretense of tending to his condition to restrict his movements, and in the meantime, I’ll have people sent to his domain to verify my identity. That way, the public will trust the Ducal Princess’s word more.”
After launching into this lengthy explanation, he pulled the corners of his lips into an awkward smile.
“You are a woman of integrity who earns trust from those around you, and Joaquin has always been a man of problems, hasn’t he? In the end, it is public opinion that moves hearts—I don’t believe many people will simply accept Joaquin’s claims.”
“…Even after understanding who you are, how will I explain keeping you at the Grand Ducal Castle?”
I asked deliberately.
Joaquin was the type to launch another arrow the moment he felt his voice wasn’t being heard.
I had no intention of sending Deyan to his fiefdom on the Adorif border just yet.
My plans for revenge had only just begun, and aside from successfully summoning Beval, I had accomplished nothing else.
Moreover, the ridiculous pantomime I’d attempted to provoke Joaquin was itself a cornerstone of that revenge.
To draw the gaze of powerful figures spread across the continent through romantic intrigue, and to make them approach me.
No matter how well I fulfilled my role as heir, society anxiously doubted me simply because I was a woman.
Even the Grand Ducal House’s most devoted retainers and other Plene nobles believed I could only find true stability through marriage.
I had endured their barely concealed anxiety and pretended to be strong.
But the truth was, I wasn’t strong at all.
I was just a person trying my hardest.
“As for that, I need only say my wounds haven’t healed enough for travel. Since it was Joaquin himself who attacked me, it will be convincing, won’t it?”
“Your wounds are already—”
“My wounds have not yet healed.”
Speaking with finality, Deyan picked up the sword he’d set down earlier.
Then, gripping the blade in reverse, he drove it without hesitation into his own abdomen.
“…!”
“There. That should do it.”
Unlike me, frozen in shock and unable to make a sound, Deyan remained calm.
The same as when he’d severed his adjutant’s neck—not a moment’s hesitation.
The only reaction was a brief furrowing of his brow as he withdrew the blade.
“Have you lost your mind?”
“Since I’ve confirmed that the pendant you gave me prevents me from berserking, I can fabricate any wound I need.”
“You’ve actually lost your mind.”
Did insanity rub off on people?
Had I infected him?
The shock drove my tears back inside.
“The longer my wounds take to heal, the weaker Joaquin and the Temple’s suspicion that I’ve made a Contract with a Demon becomes. It benefits me as well.”
Deyan spoke with complete composure.
Yet I noticed from the small physical response of his prominent Adam’s apple bobbing that he was in considerable pain.
The cord of the Pendant protruded slightly from his strong, extended neck.
Blood seeped thinly through his wet clothes.
“Why go so far? What are you expecting from me now?”
“I’m not expecting anything. Or rather, it’s not that I expect nothing—”
“Is this because you killed Lyle? If you’re trying to put me in your debt this way, I’m telling you now it’s pointless.”
“That’s not it.”
Deyan refuted my assumption.
“If you must connect it to that incident, then consider it a selfish attempt to atone and ease my guilt in this way. So the Ducal Princess need not forgive me.”
A man who’d been my enemy was coming to me of his own will, saying I could use him.
I closed my eyes and then opened them, turning over this situation so absurd it would feel like a dream.
The tears that had gathered unshed finally spilled over.
“Fine, then.”
A sudden unease rose within me.
“I’ll keep on thinking of you as my enemy with a clear conscience.”
“Yes.”
What if this man became genuinely useful to me going forward?
Such needless anxiety it was.
* * *
Under Giselle and the steward’s direction, the chaos was quickly brought to order.
Giselle summoned her subordinates to collect the adjutant’s body, while the steward swept the scattered corridor clean and firmly sealed the lips of everyone who’d witnessed the incident.
Leaving all the aftermath to them, I sat alone in the bath.
Drawing my knees close and hugging them, water pooled in the spaces of my body.
It felt almost like being held by someone, so I rested my cheek against my knees and closed my eyes.
It was quiet.
For some reason, my heart felt at ease.
Despite all the mountains I still had to cross, my head didn’t ache.
It was surprising that I felt all right even after witnessing one of my people’s senseless death, and even after learning the cause of that senseless death—news of my father and brother’s condition.
Perhaps it was because I’d finally broken through the dam of emotions I’d built up.
If anything, I felt almost lighter.
‘I should get out soon.’
After warming my body temperature, which the rain had stolen, sufficiently, I rose from the bath.
I dried myself without attendants and spent time combing and drying my wet hair alone.
I was considering just going to sleep when I remembered I hadn’t finished what I’d planned to do before Joaquin’s outburst.
‘I’ll handle just that and come back.’
As I moved to leave the room in my nightclothes topped with a thick robe and slippers instead of proper shoes, something caught against the door again.

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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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