My Body Has Been Possessed By Someone - Chapter 154
—————
This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
—————
Chapter 154
Kanna Adis turned to face him with an indifferent expression.
He was undoubtedly about to mention her departure to Rivensum tomorrow for recuperation.
“Yes. You’ll be leaving for the Grand Temple soon as well?”
You.
She hadn’t called him father since that day. It was a title that would have sounded uncomfortable to someone who had raised her as a daughter her entire life, yet Alexandro Adis nodded without hesitation.
Alexandro Adis nodded without hesitation, even though it must have been an uncomfortable title to hear from someone who had raised him as a daughter.
“I may well see your biological father there.”
“….”
“Do you have any message for him?”
Kanna Adis narrowed her brows.
“Are you speaking in earnest?”
“I’ll listen and decide.”
“Tell him that his precious daughter is being held captive by madmen and to come rescue me?”
For a moment, something flickered across Alexandro’s eyes. Kanna Adis was startled by that shift in emotion.
Had he just laughed?
“That’s an amusing jest, Kanna.”
No, it wasn’t.
It was merely a misunderstanding after all.
His face remained as barren and parched as always.
“That’s strange. Why would you take it as a joke?”
“If it’s not a joke, then you’re being sincere?”
Kanna Adis didn’t answer. She merely pressed her lips together, letting her displeasure show.
It wasn’t a joke, but neither was it sincere.
She had no intention of going to the Divine Spirit.
She lacked the confidence to endure the suffocating regulations of the Grand Temple, and above all, she simply couldn’t trust that man who was supposedly her biological father.
The Divine Spirit. Merely thinking of him sent chills down her spine as though she’d glimpsed a ghost.
He had lived for more than five hundred years, or so they said.
What lay dormant within that mind, Kanna Adis could scarcely fathom.
‘So this man will become like the Divine Spirit too?’
Kanna Adis gazed intently at Alexandro Adis’s face.
In her memories, he had always been a beautiful youth. He would shine eternally like a brilliant gemstone.
Perhaps eternity was something like this.
Was eternal life a blessing to him, or a curse?
Just as their gazes became deeply entangled, he moved his lips first.
“How strange.”
Alexandro Adis stepped closer. Suddenly, an overwhelming pressure bore down, and Kanna Adis instinctively retreated.
“Why are you being so docile?”
“…What do you mean by that?”
“You’ve suddenly become quiet lately.”
Kanna cursed inwardly at his perceptiveness.
“Don’t misunderstand. I’m not as docile as you think.”
She deliberately provoked him to redirect his attention elsewhere.
“Your wife is simply too aggressive, isn’t she? She wagered the family’s safety just to harm me.”
As she spoke, irritation bubbled up inside her. Why did she need to make excuses for herself?
“Still, you must have regretted this situation, didn’t you? It doesn’t matter what happens to me, but your precious family nearly fell into crisis.”
He didn’t answer.
Looking closer, he seemed to have little interest in this conversation.
Perhaps he was already bored.
‘Why did he stop a passing stranger and start talking if he has no interest?’
If that’s the case, he shouldn’t have spoken to me in the first place! Kanna’s fists clenched so hard her knuckles cracked.
This wasn’t the first or second time this had happened.
He was rarely generous, and occasionally he would act as though he cared for me.
But I had never trusted his whims, not for a single moment.
It was indeed a wise judgment. If I had harbored even the slightest hope in him, I would be tasting the sorrow of the ground crumbling beneath my feet right now.
With that thought, I despised the man before me. I despised him so much I could barely endure it.
“I really hate you.”
The words spilled out impulsively.
“I wish you were dead.”
I had crossed the line.
I thought perhaps he would become angry.
But that was all. Alexandro Adis stepped back once more.
He stared at her with an emotionless face, then passed by without even a farewell. His footsteps echoed as he walked away.
And so he departed.
Kanna, who had been watching his retreating figure, turned as well. She moved away from him.
‘It’s over now.’
But unlike Alexandro Adis, I was an ordinary human, and all manner of emotions swirled within me.
Not long ago, I had believed him to be my father.
And before that—much, much before that—
I think I had loved that man.
The day I succeeded in alchemy for the first time.
I still vividly remembered the thrill of that moment, clutching my research and rushing toward his room.
But now it was all nothing but long-dead refuse.
Kanna let out a bitter laugh.
It was all finished. Since it was finished, I needed to clean it up.
Before it rotted away completely and reeked of decay.
* * *
Kalen had been in a foul mood the entire time.
Actually, it was an absolute mess.
“Raphael!”
She had barely survived the fire, and the moment she opened her eyes, she called out that name.
Raphael. The defrocked priest who had always grated on my nerves.
And that night, I heard that Raphael had visited Kanna’s Room.
Kalen experienced for the first time what it felt like to see red.
He paced anxiously around the room in circles.
Damn it all—he had no right to drive the man away.
Raphael was a man granted free access under the authority of Alexandro Adis.
‘I must endure this.’
If he burst into his sister’s room and interrogated the nature of their relationship, he would only earn her wrath.
‘Yes, this is a moment I must bear.’
He waited for time to pass, waited to hear that Raphael had left the Valentino Estate.
It was a hellish stretch of time.
He couldn’t remember how he’d endured those hours.
But ever since that day, the memory would surface often, and without fail, fury would ignite within him.
Crack. While reviewing documents, Kalen glanced down at his hand.
His fountain pen was snapped in half.
Kalen stared at his hand with an expressionless face. As the pen broke, sharp fragments embedded themselves in his palm. Blood dripped steadily.
Even now, days later, Kalen couldn’t escape that memory.
‘What did they do that night?’
In the dead of night, the two of them alone, in the Bedroom.
‘This shouldn’t be happening, sister.’
You’ve left me like this. It shouldn’t be this way.
Suddenly, he thought of Rivensum.
The island he’d purchased to keep Kanna far removed from the Capital. He’d planned to remove her from the House of Adis’s registry.
He no longer considered her family, yet their relationship remained bound within that familial framework.
Kalen intended to destroy that first.
He’d meant to hide her away during that turbulent period. There was no other intention whatsoever.
That was all there was to it.
Truly, that was all it was meant to be….
Kalen stared at the handkerchief stained with blood.
His thoughts had changed.
* * *
At last, dawn broke.
As Kanna was preparing to leave the Adis Mansion early in the morning, Lucy came rushing over.
“Sister, just a moment!”
Kanna greeted her with a reluctant smile.
“Lucy.”
It had been quite some time since she’d kept her distance from Lucy. She’d deliberately avoided meeting her, lest she grow too attached.
So this time too, she’d planned to leave without a word….
“Sister, please be careful on your way. This is a gift for you.”
Lucy Adis held out a handkerchief trimmed with lace. It was delicately embroidered with a small bear.
‘A bear.’
Now that I thought about it, I had once torn open Lucy’s bear plush and stuffed it with a self-defense drug.
“Did you use it?”
“Pardon?”
“The self-defense drug I gave you.”
“Oh, no. I haven’t had occasion to need it yet. But whenever I see the bear, it makes me feel safe! It’s like you’re protecting me, sister.”
She was adorable. I almost reached out to stroke her hair, but I stopped myself. It was an affection I couldn’t afford to nurture.
“Sister, please be careful out there!”
“I will.”
A promise I wouldn’t keep.
I smiled bitterly and turned to leave. Then—
“Wait, just a moment.”
Another voice stopped me. This time it was Isabel.
“What is it, Isabel?”
“Well… it’s…”
I tilted my head. Strangely, Isabel’s cheeks were flushed, and she seemed hesitant.
“Um, where’s Orsini lately?”
“What?”
“I haven’t seen Orsini around recently.”
“Why are you asking me?”
“…Right.”
Isabel laughed self-deprecatingly. She seemed to want to say something more, but I didn’t want to waste any more time, so I simply turned away.
‘What’s wrong with her?’
It seemed she couldn’t say what she really wanted to and had just blurted out something random—a conversation utterly devoid of context.
‘Now that I think about it, I haven’t seen Orsini recently.’
After that incident when I rescued Isabel from the bandits, Orsini had vanished without a trace.
‘That man’s wandering off isn’t anything new.’
Suddenly, I seemed to hear the sound of rain from days past.
The firm sensation of the thigh I’d trampled with all my strength. And those feverish eyes looking up at me as he knelt.
A deeply uncomfortable memory. One I’d erase if I could.
‘That man’s unlucky face—I’m better off not seeing it before I leave.’
I walked forward with purpose. And I departed without hesitation.
From Adis, my personal hell.
* * *
“How do you find the Island? Does it please you?”
That evening, upon arriving at the Island, I dined with Kalen Adis.
“When did you say you’d return?”
“At most, three days.”
Kalen Adis said he had matters to attend to on the Island.
‘Four days. I won’t be here by then.’
Kanna Adis decided that Kalen’s company wasn’t entirely unwelcome.
Soon enough, she would escape this Island. The more witnesses there were to see her disappearance, the better it served her interests.
For that reason, Kanna had brought Claude along as her escort.
‘Claude is Alexandro Adis’s eyes, after all.’
He would observe everything that happened on this Island and report it to Alexandro. The very moment she vanished.
“Do you wish me to depart quickly?”
Kalen laughed as though joking.
“Surely you don’t intend to summon someone once I’m gone?”
“What?”
“Isn’t there a man you call upon frequently, Sister?”
Kanna’s brow furrowed. Whether it was her imagination or not, his tone sounded decidedly aggressive.
“That man in the black priest’s robes.”
He spoke calmly, cutting his steak with a knife.
“What is your relationship with that priest?”
“It’s none of your concern.”
“It concerns me. I love you, Sister.”
There was that revolting phrase again.
“What is your connection to that man?”
She would ignore him. Kanna pretended not to hear.
“It seems that priest shares a special bond with the Duke of Valentino. A close friend of your ex-husband, no less—morally reprehensible, wouldn’t you say?”
She couldn’t bear to listen any longer. Kanna set down her wine glass with a sharp clink.
“Kalen Adis, don’t you dare insult Raphael. Raphael is not that kind of person….”
Clang!
In that instant, something shattered with a piercing sound.
Kanna flinched in surprise. That crack had come from Kalen’s knife.
His blade had sliced through the meat and shattered the ceramic plate beneath it.
“Raphael.”
Kalen murmured the name in a voice as small as a candle flame.
“Raphael, Raphael.”
“….”
“You’ve been calling his name quite intimately for some time now.”
Then he sneered openly.
“Of course, inviting a man to your bedroom in the dead of night—naturally you’d be familiar. Does that man call your name as well?”
Her appetite vanished entirely. Kanna scraped her chair back and rose abruptly.
“Sister.”
She ignored his call. She turned away, intending to leave the Dining Hall.
“Sister.”
She heard Kalen’s footsteps pursuing her from behind, but she had no intention of responding further.
The moment Kanna grasped the door handle.
Kalen muttered low.
“Lock the door.”
Click! The metallic sound of a lock engaging echoed through the air.
The door was locked from outside.
—————
This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
—————