My Body Has Been Possessed By Someone - Chapter 173
—————
This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
—————
Chapter 173
* * *
When I returned, Kanna Adis was asleep.
‘She’s sleeping?’
Seeing her like that, fury surged through me like a tidal wave.
I had just endured an utterly humiliating experience, yet the woman who caused it was sleeping soundly.
‘I’ve been completely played with.’
I had received countless seductions throughout my life.
Yet never once had I been the one to whine first or lose my composure.
So why had I just now?
It felt as though my insides were burning in a scorching inferno—a dizzying sensation I had never experienced before.
And there was something else.
‘Why did I obey so meekly?’
That woman had toyed with me. Yet I hadn’t even protested, simply complying without resistance.
I couldn’t fathom my own behavior from moments ago.
I regarded the sleeping woman with cold eyes.
With her eyes gently closed, not even the sound of her breathing reached me.
Not a single restless movement—it was as if….
‘She looked like a corpse.’
Lying in a coffin, eternally asleep.
A corpse.
That was when it happened.
Thump, thump, thump, thump.
My heart suddenly began racing. I was startled by my own reaction.
Abruptly, why was my heart….
“Gasp.”
My breath caught sharply in my throat.
A suffocating pressure, like chains tightening, crushed my neck.
Why was this happening suddenly?
Even as confusion gripped me, I reached out with trembling hands, placing them beneath her nose.
I had to confirm it.
Whether she was alive or dead.
The moment her breath finally touched my fingertips.
‘She’s alive.’
I exhaled in relief and shook my head sharply.
Thank goodness. She was breathing.
She hadn’t died.
‘What was that just now?’
I stared at the woman, utterly drained.
Why had I imagined her dead? Why had I felt that suffocating anguish?
“Damn it.”
This sensation, this woman—she was unbearable.
What on earth was she?
Moments ago, her touch alone had driven him to the brink of madness, yet now, watching her sleep, she filled him with a desperate, gnawing despair.
He recognized it instinctively.
This woman was dangerous.
She could become a grave threat to him. There was no doubt she would be a corrupting influence.
He trusted his instincts implicitly. In all his years, they had never once deceived him.
He exhaled sharply and ran his fingers through his disheveled hair.
What infuriated him most was that even as he wrestled with turmoil, she slept soundly without a care.
“Hell.”
He cursed aloud, then fished a cigarette from his pack and lit it.
He’d decided to smoke one off and call it a night—chalk it up to bad luck.
Yet even after five cigarette butts had accumulated, sleep eluded him.
It wasn’t the irritation keeping him awake.
The sensation of her body pressing against his lingered persistently in his mind.
The weight of her settling upon him, the softness of her skin, her hand brushing across his chest—
His body ignited with heat once more.
He raised a sixth cigarette to his lips and stared up at the sky.
“I’m losing my mind.”
* * *
After that, Kalen treated Kanna Adis with near-total indifference. There was no conversation between them whatsoever.
He spoke only when absolutely necessary and refused to meet her gaze. Kanna Adis, in turn, observed him covertly and remained vigilant.
‘Has the mark on his chest disappeared?’
Though rare, there were occasional cases where birthmarks faded naturally. Perhaps this was one of them.
‘So I can’t be certain he isn’t Kalen just because the mark is gone.’
Danger.
The word stirred something unsettling within her.
Perhaps three years of perfect peace had made her forget. The word felt strangely foreign now.
One thing was certain: he was not acting. Of that, she was absolutely sure.
If this man were Kalen, he would have lost his memory completely.
‘Then what should I do?’
What indeed. Kanna Adis decided coldly.
‘I’ll do nothing.’
Restoring Kalen Adis’s life could cost her own. She had neither the loyalty nor the obligation to bear such a burden.
It was then that Kalen, preparing his bedding, suddenly hurled his sleeping bag aside and strode toward her.
“Why are you staring at me like that?”
“What do you mean?”
“You’ve been watching me this entire time, haven’t you?”
Kanna Adis responded with shameless composure.
“Then who else would I look at here besides you? We’re in the same space, so my gaze might naturally drift. Isn’t that just excessive self-consciousness on your part?”
“Excessive self-consciousness?”
Kalen burst into laughter as if flabbergasted, then abruptly grew serious. In the next moment, he seized her by the collar and yanked her forward.
“Don’t talk nonsense, client. Did you think I wouldn’t notice that you’ve been observing me all this time?”
His face drew dangerously close. His threatening voice brushed against her cheek as he spoke.
“Or perhaps you’re planning to bewitch me with your eyes this time?”
She had been observing him, true enough, but with no such intention whatsoever. This time, it was Kanna Adis who felt displeased.
“That’s you being overly conscious of me, not the other way around. Did my gaze feel seductive to you?”
Then, with a deep, mocking smile, she taunted him.
“It’s hardly my fault that you disappeared at dawn.”
“…What?”
“I could hear it from a distance. I was worried you might be in heat.”
At those words, Kalen’s face flushed crimson.
Not from anger. From shame.
But Kanna Adis showed no mercy and continued relentlessly.
“Yet I was considerate enough to pretend I heard nothing, and you resort to grabbing my collar just because I looked at you a few times.”
Kalen quickly regained his composure. His face turned icy cold as the corners of his mouth lifted into a smile.
“If it was bothersome, I apologize. It seems my youthful vigor is simply beyond my control.”
Kalen answered slowly.
Her words were correct. Kalen had shuddered countless times under the weight of defeat, self-reproach, and humiliation.
This had never happened before, but ever since meeting that woman, his body refused to obey him.
It was extraordinarily difficult to suppress the restless vigor that surged within him. He was nearly going mad.
It was likely due to that intimate contact on the first night.
It was absurd. Over mere days, he’d been burning with desire like an inexperienced adolescent boy from just that brief contact.
Kalen lifted his sleeping bag and began packing his belongings.
“Since I seem to be a nuisance, I’ll remove myself.”
Kanna Adis clicked her tongue.
‘Well, having heard that…’
This was rather harsh of her.
When she had given Lorenzo sex education, hadn’t she taught him that this was a perfectly healthy and natural instinct, and that he should never feel shame about it?
Yet here she was, using it as ammunition to attack him.
Because of this, Kanna Adis was overwhelmed with self-loathing for doing something unbecoming of a Physician.
‘I should have just cursed at him instead.’
Moreover, she had inadvertently provoked him on that first night as well.
Kanna Adis watched Kalen’s back as he stood up, packing his things.
She had intended to at least give him a map before he left.
“Ren.”
But the moment she called that name, a realization washed over her.
The reason she had just scrutinized her own actions and felt self-reproach.
And the reason she had just called out his name to stop him.
‘That man is not Kalen.’
I could never feel guilt toward Kalen.
Only now did the reality of it all truly sink in.
Whether he was Kalen or not.
Kalen Adis had vanished.
By losing everything he possessed, he had ceased to exist in this world.
Kalen had lost his wealth, his knowledge, his emotions, his status, his honor, his power, his connections, his family, his future, his past, his memories, his name and surname—everything.
All of it. Every last thing.
He had even desired to lose his own life forever. The moment he chose death, Kalen Adis ceased to exist.
He vanished from this world eternally, clinging to painful memories and guilt.
‘The Kalen Adis I despised no longer exists anywhere.’
Having lost even himself, he was no longer Kalen.
“…If you called for me, then speak.”
Ren.
At those words, he stopped. He paused mid-stride on the bridge he was about to leave and waited.
Kanna Adis remained silent for a moment, then spoke.
“You grabbed me by the collar first.”
“…”
“I’m your client.”
Ren could offer no response.
A moment later, a brief curse escaped his lips. Then he turned back and unrolled his sleeping bag.
“It’s not that you’ve kept me here.”
He spoke harshly, his words stubborn and cutting.
“I’m simply completing the contract as you’ve stated. So don’t misunderstand.”
* * *
“Medicine!”
The Emperor cried out.
“Bring me medicine, medicine!”
He breathed heavily and glared at Silvien Valentino.
“Duke, am I not begging you thus?”
“Your Majesty.”
Please, obtain the medicine from that Physician for me. I cannot endure without it!”
The Emperor’s cries reverberated through the Audience Chamber.
His thrashing was almost manic, yet Silvien Valentino, facing him, remained composed without the slightest disturbance.
“That Physician belongs to the Imperial Palace. I do not understand why you command me.”
“Only the Duke can help me!”
The Emperor slammed the desk and rose from his seat, spraying spittle as he shouted.
“That Physician refuses to make the medicine! Even under imperial decree, he refuses!”
In a sense, it was a Physician of remarkable conviction. To defy even an imperial edict. He withheld the medicine out of concern that the Emperor was losing his mind.
“It is medicine from the Eastern Continent! Only that Physician from the Eastern Continent can make it!”
“I shall take my leave now.”
“No, you mustn’t!”
The Emperor came rushing over frantically, seizing Silvien Valentino’s arm with both hands.
Silvien Valentino’s brow furrowed. The grip clawing at him trembled violently, convulsing with desperation.
Moreover, upon closer inspection, the Emperor’s condition was dire.
His lips were parched and cracked, and beneath his eyes lay several layers of dark shadows. White foam, like sea spray, gathered at the corners of his mouth.
“Please! Please, Duke Adis! I’ll give you anything you desire! Please!”
The Emperor pleaded with bloodshot eyes—the eyes of a madman.
“Please, Duke Adis!”
How had it come to this?
“That Physician won’t listen to anyone but you! Please, Duke Adis, just say one word!”
Silvien Valentino gazed down at the Emperor in silence.
Once a sovereign who, despite his hot-blooded stubbornness, had never surrendered his dignity—the ruler of an empire.
“Medicine… without medicine, I cannot… I cannot endure… I cannot live. I simply cannot.”
Now he had become nothing more than an addict enslaved to drugs, so dependent that he could no longer maintain coherent thought without them.
“…Very well. I shall make the request of her.”
—————
This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
—————