Male Lead Is Obsessed With My Health - Chapter 139

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

Chapter 139

The border between Faital Southern Empire and Albrecht.
The Halbern Camp had spent weeks mobilizing all available forces, doing nothing but ratcheting up tension.
Jaren, who doubled as vice-commander of the Saren Knights, found himself at a loss for words upon hearing the operational outline.
“Um, my lord? Did I mishear the operation?”
“No.”
“So you’re really saying you’ll attempt an infiltration with just a handful of knights? All the way to Rock Castle?”
“That’s right.”
Valere’s expression remained unchanged, while Jaren’s darkened visibly.
Was this man truly suggesting he’d charge into enemy territory with nothing but his bare hands?
“I believe we have better odds than the mages.”
“Where did mages suddenly come from? Do we have to fight our own mages too?”
Jaren asked, looking alarmed, but Valere didn’t answer.
He was merely recalling the Rock Castle Infiltration and Abduction Operation that he’d happened to overhear from the mages when he visited the Sky Tower to meet the Grand Mage.
‘The objective was only ever to bring Arelin back.’
If this approach was faster than waging war to retrieve her, wasn’t it worth attempting?
Had Mehren heard this, he would have launched into a lament beginning with ‘So this is my lord…’ but unfortunately Mehren wasn’t present.
“An infiltration… you’re saying we infiltrate…….”
“I won’t force anyone. Only bring those willing to participate.”
Jaren thought no one in their right mind would be interested in such an operation.
“Oh, a lady abduction operation!”
“Me, me! Me me me! I’ll do it!”
“Me too! I’ve always dreamed of this! It was my romance! My lifelong dream!”
Watching the Saren Knights volunteer en masse, Jaren fell into despair.
Jaren pressed his forehead.
“I’m telling you, I’m the only sane one in this order.”

* * *

Rock Castle.
Hum—
“Ettel, quiet down.”
I was in the middle of an unexpected infiltration operation because the status window kept whining about needing a medium when I asked for information about Sione.
‘Wait, isn’t this the path to the Duchess’s Chamber?’
The route seemed familiar, and it truly was.
Is the target in the Duchess’s Chamber? What if I run into the regent again?
I was worried, but I reset my thoughts.
If I’m afraid and do nothing, nothing changes. Better to try and fail than never try at all.
I entered the Duchess’s Chamber with determination, but among all these items, I had no idea which one was the medium.
“Where exactly is this medium?”
Couldn’t it just tell me easily?
I was glaring at the status window for all its trouble when I sensed a presence from deeper within and quickly hid my body.
“Is the cleaning finished?”
“Yes, we finished it simply.”
“Let’s hurry and leave.”
“This place always puts me in a bad mood.”
“Mind your tongue.”
The footsteps faded. Once the presence disappeared, I found myself patting my chest unconsciously.
“I thought I was caught.”
After coming all this way, getting discovered would be a complete disaster.
It was a blessing that my small frame let me hide right among the dresses.
Being extra cautious, I stepped carefully deeper into the chamber.
“What’s this……?”
An ominous black dagger.
The dagger I’d almost been drawn to touch on my previous visit now gleamed with a different light.
[Contact with medium confirmed.]
[Loading information on Sione Sigria Halbern…….]
The status window responded.
[Would you like to read Sione Sigria Halbern’s past memories?]
[Yes / No]

* * *

Sione Sigria Halbern’s first misfortune was being born into House Halbern.
Her second misfortune was that she was far too sharp and clever.
Her third misfortune was that this overly brilliant child lacked the strength to overcome her own fate.

‘A beautiful and wise lady.’

Had it been merely that, everyone would have been content.
Sione herself most of all.
‘Something’s not right.’
Sione was so sharp that she awakened to the irrationality of the world around her at far too young an age, and so clever that she grasped the logic by which the world turned far too quickly.
A child who was not a child.
That was a different kind of misfortune.

‘Had you been a son, you’d have made quite an excellent heir. It’s a shame, daughter.’

She came to know, without wishing to know, certain ‘truths’ embedded in the careless remarks adults let slip.
For instance, that Morden, the tyrant of Halbern and her father, regarded his one and only daughter’s exceptional brilliance as no more than a parlor trick from a pet cat.

‘I hate father.’

She despised the way he looked at her as if she were an object, and resented how he treated those beside him as tools beneath human dignity.
The tyrant showed no warmth toward a daughter who made no effort to hide her hostile gaze.
Yet it mattered little to her.
Sione was a child who knew how to make full use of the Halbern name that clung to her.

‘I must escape.’

She was certain that if she remained trapped in this household, she would go mad.
In her father’s kingdom, she couldn’t breathe properly. Everything he gave her repulsed her. Most of all, his intense obsession with her mother—even that.
Sione understood all too well that the reason Morden tolerated her, no matter how insolently she behaved, was rooted in a vile possessiveness and possessive instinct: ‘a bloodline of the woman he loved’ and he himself.

‘Mother is so pitiful.’

Sione genuinely sympathized with her mother.

‘How did she end up with such a man?’
‘Indeed. How did your mother end up catching my eye?’
‘Did you love mother?’
‘Of course.’

A matter-of-fact, steady confession: from the moment he fell at first sight until now, and probably until death, even beyond death, his soul would remain ensnared by one person.
Sione came to know the love story between her parents.
Even the ugly truth hidden behind its pretty wrapping.
For Halbern’s Secret Library, which any direct descendant who manifested a Supernatural Ability could enter, held all the secrets.
Morden’s words were only half true.
He did fall at first sight and propose to mother after she had lost everything, and he did marry and bring her here—but it was also Morden who made her lose everything in the first place.

‘How could he do such a thing?’

To his daughter, who spared no criticism, her father offered his lessons like a great truth of life.

‘If I hadn’t done so, would your mother have married me?’

The intended purpose of erasing everyone—her fiancé, parents, friends, even her neighborhood—when marriage was mentioned, was singular.
To eliminate any refuge.
To ensure she saw only him.

‘If I hadn’t done so, you wouldn’t have been born either. So you’re an accomplice too, daughter.’
‘An accomplice?’
‘You only have to look the other way. Such an easy thing, yet why must you be this way? Hmm?’

At that time, Morden had still found his daughter, who resembled him so, rather endearing.

‘Your mother is happy, isn’t she? That’s all that matters.’
‘Is that what love is?’
‘Daughter, do you know what love is?’

She didn’t.
But Sione was certain of one thing.

‘That’s not love.’

It was selfishness dressed up as love, nothing but cruel possession and possessive instinct.

‘Something so filthy and vile couldn’t possibly be love.’

Young Sione decided she couldn’t keep this truth to herself alone. So she told her pitiful, victimized mother, and her shocked mother collapsed.

‘She miscarried!’

Because of that, the sibling in her mother’s womb died, but Sione harbored no regret.
When Morden’s rage turned toward her, she felt no remorse.

‘That’s not love.’

Mother deserved to know the truth.
Yet there was one regret…….

‘Mother, father, brother, sob…….’

It was about her mother, withering in guilt, believing that all the misfortunes that had come so suddenly were in fact her own doing.
Sione learned in the most unfortunate way that ‘certain truths’ can kill a person.

‘Mother, I’m sorry.’
‘No, my child.’

Mother pulled Sione close and comforted her, saying it wasn’t her fault.

‘It’s not your fault. Our daughter.’

Though the daughter of a man full of resentment, mother ‘loved’ her.

‘Mother, do you hate me?’
‘I don’t hate you. I’m grateful.’

For just a moment, Sione wondered if living in the comfortable lie Morden spoke of might not have been better for her mother, but her mother shook her head. There was no eternal secret in the world; had she learned the truth later, she would have despised herself even more, her mother said.

‘Don’t worry about me, mother. I worry about you, Sione.’

In the end, mother, having given birth to Valere, never rose again.
And for years afterward, Sione couldn’t so much as see her mother’s face.
But…….
Sione was not alone.

‘Valere.’

She had her brother.
Her mother, collapsed and drawing her father’s attention to himself; she and her newborn brother left neglected in between.

‘My precious little brother.’

When the baby looked up at her and smiled, Sione had a premonition.
For this small child, she could do anything.
Even if it meant opposing her father.

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