Male Lead Is Obsessed With My Health - Chapter 143
—————
This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
—————
Chapter 143
“Let her go.”
The moment silence descended.
Valere felt the cool bite of the blade against his throat and smiled, white and mirthless.
‘There he is. I was wondering where he’d gone.’
He knew better than anyone that this man would never surrender Arelin easily.
“What?”
At the provoking tone.
“There’s only one thing you can put down right now, isn’t there?”
The answer came as expected.
Valere lowered his gaze only to glimpse Arelin sleeping restlessly in his arms, and a thin, bitter smile played at his lips.
“Why should I?”
“Eager to die?”
“You’re the one who wants me dead.”
“Isn’t it mutual?”
They had never truly faced each other, yet their entanglement was so thorough that only hatred remained.
Valere hated Ludvich.
Enough to genuinely want him dead.
“No.”
Yet even so.
“There’s something more important than killing someone like you.”
In dreams that fractured into ten thousand divergent paths, Valere had never truly faced this man.
Even without Valere’s touch, Ludvich had quietly destroyed himself each time.
Perhaps that was why he had never bothered to fuel his hatred with murder.
The man had always died before him anyway—rumors of death, rumors that he killed the Grand Duchess and took his own life, rumors of purges. He scattered countless stories as he died in advance.
“The medicine didn’t work on Arelin, did it? Not the magic, not even the High Priest’s Blessing Prayer?”
……
By merely twisting his body slightly, he could face Ludvich, who aimed at his throat from behind.
“If you leave things as they are, Arelin dies.”
Watching the green eyes waver, Valere let out a soft laugh.
So this man was the same after all.
The same as himself.
“Kill me if you want. Because if Arelin dies, I die too.”
Let them call it extreme. Valere had always made such choices.
Paradoxically, it was Arelin who kept him alive after losing his sister.
The reason for living. The purpose. Or everything.
There was no reason to survive alone in a world without Arelin.
……
Ludvich wavered.
Seeing the previously unwavering gaze falter brought simultaneous revulsion and discomfort.
As if he were facing himself, lost after losing Arelin.
Even though it had never been reality—something that occurred only in his dreams—Valere was disturbed by it as though he had lived it himself.
“You’re a madman after all.”
At Ludvich’s pronouncement, Valere laughed.
“You’re only noticing now?”
“No, I knew. But seeing it directly leaves a new impression.”
“You’re hardly one to talk about in-laws.”
The gazes of two people who would never be on good terms collided in empty air.
It was Ludvich who retreated first.
“Fine. I’ll let her go.”
“……Let her go?”
Valere had expected them both to insist on dying together, so this surprised him somewhat.
‘Why is this man suddenly being reasonable?’
“But.”
Light kindled in Ludvich’s green eyes.
“I’m coming with you.”
Into enemy territory, on his own feet?
Valere’s head tilted at a choice so dubious it raised questions about the man’s sanity. Though he had no intention of retreating from his favorable position.
“Do as you wish.”
* * *
Halbern Manor was in chaos.
The unexpected return of the Grand Duke of Halbern, followed by the return of the kidnapped Arelin.
There was a bonus attached, but……
Mehren could hardly believe that a situation he’d thought would only resolve after at least one nation was half-destroyed had unraveled so easily.
‘What was all my worry for?’
His stomach felt like it might dissolve from the stress he’d accumulated. Was this really how it should be?
Mehren sighed as he reflected on his own conflicted emotions—relief he ought to feel, yet found entirely unwelcome.
“How is Arelin?”
The moment Arelin returned to the manor, she had taken prepared medicine and barely found stability with the aid of her seasoned physician, skilled Healing Art practitioners, and temple priests.
“She’s sleeping.”
Valere had watched every moment of the process without blinking once.
“Did you stay up all night?”
Mehren, pressing hard around his eyes, asked in a weary voice.
Mehren himself had managed only a few hours of sleep before returning, as his body could not sustain more.
While no clear answer came from Valere, it was as good as hearing one. From the way he sat, it appeared he had not moved a single step since his arrival.
‘That man too……’
Suddenly, the “that man” in Mehren’s thoughts was Ludvich, Regent Duke of the Southern Empire.
Halbern’s new uninvited guest.
Ludvich, the Regent Duke, occupied a chaise opposite Valere, who clung beside Arelin’s sleeping bed, and regarded them both with an unreadable, expressionless face.
‘Why is that man so quiet?’
It was hard to fathom why he’d so readily returned the girl when moments ago he’d been taking her without hesitation.
He should be grateful, but there was something suspicious about it.
Mehren’s head ached because he couldn’t quite understand what situation this actually was.
‘Would men like these really come to their senses just because the girl is ill?’
No.
Yet here they sit, quiet as mice.
‘Could it really be the Arelin effect……?’
Mehren made an odd expression as he watched Arelin sleep like an angel in the bed, breathing softly.
If the reason these two hardest-to-manage men in the world were being quiet was truly Arelin,
then perhaps she was the one protecting the world’s peace.
‘My heart swells with pride.’
She is my daughter, after all.
Mehren swallowed his satisfied smile and approached Arelin’s side.
“Don’t worry too much. This degree of recovery is quite good.”
“This degree?”
“Yes, in truly severe cases, she’s suffered high fevers for entire months. Was exercise really so effective……?”
Even Mehren, who had half-doubted the physician’s words, now believed that Arelin had become somewhat healthier than before.
Valere, however, seemed deeply dissatisfied with something, his face scrunching repeatedly.
“It’s all thanks to you.”
“Thanks to me?”
“Without the medicine you sent, it would have been impossible.”
……
“What exactly is that medicine made from, to work against Arelin’s inexplicable illness?”
“Immortal’s Blood.”
……
Mehren blinked for a moment.
Had he misheard because of exhaustion?
“Just a single drop.”
Valere replied matter-of-factly, seeing Mehren’s confusion.
“More precisely, it’s the Immortal’s Blessing contained within it that’s been keeping Arelin alive.”
……
Some things were better left unquestioned. Mehren quickly gathered his wits and returned to essentials.
“Valere, do you know exactly what disease Arelin is suffering from?”
“No.”
Valere grasped at his own fragmented memory for a moment. A distant memory. One left as shards……
‘The World Line where Valere did nothing but raise Arelin.’
“I only know that if nothing is done, she could die within a week.”
……
Hope drained from Mehren’s face.
“Is there truly no way to cure her illness……?”
“Then we must find one.”
Against all odds, Valere did not despair.
He merely recalled the Grand Mage of the Mage Tower.
A new person he had never directly faced in any of his dreams.
Someone impossible to find even if sought, yet for some reason this “great personage” had revealed themselves so easily. The reason eluded him, but……
‘I cannot lose Arelin so easily, like a dream.’
Knowledge and wisdom that could explain what the Singularity was—was that not worth hoping for?
Of course, there was something to settle first.
Ludvich, who had suddenly become that “something,” felt his eyebrows twitch beneath Valere’s sharp gaze.
* * *
Roc Fortress, where Valere and Ludvich had disappeared.
Light flashed at the edges of the now-empty Roc Fortress, and dozens of figures suddenly materialized.
Mages in jet-black robes murmured eagerly.
“Finally.”
“Let’s infiltrate!”
The kidnapping of Arelin—an operation that had been forbidden by Grand Mage Mercedes!
While the Grand Mage was away, impatient Star-rank Mages had gone rogue.
“Hehehehe, we finally welcome her. Our treasure.”
“A miracle.”
“A light.”
The mages, dreaming of kidnapping Arelin.
But when they stormed into Roc Fortress, Arelin was not there.
“Huh?”
What…… was going on?
While the mages struggled to process reality, the garrison knights responsible for Roc Fortress’s security spotted them and rushed forward.
“Intruders!”
“Damn it, run!”
—————
This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
—————