My Husband Is Not the Magic Tower Master - Chapter 50

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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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50

At least this cooled my heated head. If anything, it felt refreshing.
And thinking of Elline, Lucas could have dunked me in that water a dozen more times and I wouldn’t have minded.
Property Division—whatever that meant, the shock of it had rendered him speechless ever since he went under.
I wrung out my wet hair while standing in water up to my waist, then glanced back at him sideways.
“I was joking.”
“….”
“I only said it because I like jewels.”
The bastard. So after breaking our engagement, he wasn’t planning to give me a single coin in alimony.
His unwavering ambition to make Elline the Crown Princess felt so palpable that his reaction was oddly satisfying.
Meanwhile, on either side of us, the wine bottles and sandwiches, macarons, and picnic mats that had been set up for today were all soaked through and drifting on the water like debris.
Even the wildest party had nothing on this catastrophe.
I could see Lucas’s golden hair now completely waterlogged, darkened to black like the murky lake itself.
With just his hair darkened, I realized once again—my childhood friend really did look like me.
At the sight, I let out a small laugh.
“Why didn’t you use magic, Your Highness?”
“…I was careless.”
One of us had deliberately refrained from using it, but Lucas’s reason was utterly deflating.
There was indeed a reason why the hero wasn’t a Great Mage.
“We’re both idiots. A so-called mage who can actually cast magic, and yet…”
So, what now?
What we needed at this moment was Cleansing Magic or Absorption Magic, both water-attribute spells.
But I’d been bedridden with a fever just half a day ago.
‘Cleansing would be fine, but Absorption demands too much energy.’
Which meant I lacked the mana reserves and physical stamina to pull it off.
And if I asked Lucas, a fire mage, the only spells he could manage were drying and heat—nothing useful here.
If we let ourselves dry naturally like this, it would be absolutely miserable.
And we couldn’t change clothes if we stayed wet.
“Tell me—where exactly are we?”
“…In the southern part of Keteron Territory.”
Right. Keteron Barony was the only place famous for its lake, renowned for boating.
Not far from the capital, and quite close to Stein—a neighboring town to the south.
“Hmm.”
I looked around, and after a moment’s thought, nodded to myself.
“All right. I like it.”
A good idea had come to me.
I turned around briskly and extended my hand to Lucas.
“Let’s just find somewhere to go inside and change clothes, both of us.”
“…Pardon?”
Lucas flinched at my shoulders.
Then he stammered, his face bewildered.
“Are you asking us to stay the night, right now?”
* * *
There was no way to continue our date soaking wet like this.
But we couldn’t go back to the Magic Tower in this state—I had no dry clothes waiting for me there.
And there were people there who wouldn’t welcome us like this.
For example, my friend Elline.
And…
‘Carlo.’
Now that I’d left, he must have retreated back to his laboratory.
‘How cowardly. Won’t even show me his face until the end?’
Here I am getting forced into an impromptu swim with the wrong person instead.
I regretted it too late, but had I known the water would be this cold, I shouldn’t have deliberately avoided Lucas.
Before I could even recite a spell, I brushed the water from my wet ornaments and laughed bitterly at myself.
‘I’m going to catch another cold.’
Summer had fully passed, and even a slight breeze made my body shiver uncomfortably.
Being soaked in water had been fine, but now that I looked like a drowned rat, the still-quiet Lucas felt suddenly awkward in a way he hadn’t before.
In any case, there was no real alternative in this state.
So my plan was to hurry him to the Stein Estate, which was close by.
It was a bit early since we weren’t even married yet.
‘Well, it shouldn’t matter.’
We were going to have a broken engagement the moment we married anyway.
I grasped Lucas’s hand and pulled him away from the water’s edge, then summoned Teleportation Magic before us.
“I’m not suggesting an overnight stay. I was thinking we’d go to the Stein Estate—would that be all right?”
I looked up at him absently as I spoke, but his face had been unnaturally flushed since before.
His complexion had turned red, the flush extending noticeably down his neck, and I narrowed my eyes for a moment.
What was wrong with him?
“Are you ill, perhaps?”
“I’m fine.”
“You don’t have a fever?”
“I’m just a bit warm.”
“I have to envy that. I’m freezing right now.”
My plan was to get to the mansion as quickly as possible, change out of my soiled clothes, and thaw out my chilled body.
For Lucas, it would be nothing but an unfamiliar place where he knew no one.
‘What do I know.’
What I’d told him was that we were just stopping by the Stein Estate for a moment, not that he should stay the night.
Besides, why would he and I stay there together.
‘Carlo’s been here for a few days, so that would be different.’
And I wasn’t even certain whether my parents would truly welcome Lucas with open arms.
My sole reason for bringing him to the Stein Estate was that spare clothes Carlo had left behind were still at the mansion.
“When we arrive, I’ll give you something to change into.”
“…There’s no need.”
“I’m not comfortable with it. Fortunately, there are clothes here that should fit someone of similar build to my own.”
The owner of those clothes was so tall and broad-shouldered that they would likely hang loosely on Lucas.
In any case, it would be far better than an awkward stay in a stranger’s place, so I immediately cast the spell before us.
Somehow, his coat—the one he’d been wearing—had been draped over my shoulders.
Had he really reacted to my saying I was cold?
‘…You’re embarrassing me.’
Never mind what I said about not knowing anything.
I closed my smirking mouth and added gently to Lucas.
“Don’t be uncomfortable—I’ll explain things to my parents beforehand. They’ll surely welcome you warmly.”
“…Is that so.”
Not knowing what expression he wore, I murmured as the swirling mana engulfed us.
“Yes, of course.”
…
“We’re going to be married soon, after all.”
And this would be the first and last greeting.
* * *
And so, the Stein Family.
“Is it…?”
“Hush. Dear.”
“Oh. The Crown Prince… Your Highness?”
Mother and Father, meeting Lucas for the first time, regarded him with stiff expressions at first.
But as time passed, they gradually relaxed, soon greeting their guest with surprising ease.
Mother, who would normally have been terrified at the mention of the Crown Prince, composed her eyes and smiled brightly as if she’d never felt otherwise.
“It is an honor to receive the Little Sun. The Stein Family is delighted to have Your Highness grace our home?”
“Welcome. We very nearly committed a grave breach against Your Highness. What a close call! Ha ha ha!”
Father greeted Lucas with his usual bright and hearty manner.
Later they told me they’d mistaken him briefly when they saw his silhouette descending the stairs from the guest room—he resembled someone greatly.
They were apparently reminded of Carlo, who had stayed here a few days before.
The clothes Lucas had changed into were, after all, Carlo’s own.
I understood my parents’ words right away.
‘There is a resemblance in bearing.’
Even I had found Carlo’s face overlapping with the Crown Prince’s when I first began dealing with him, more than once.
Once I deliberately became aware of that part, the déjà vu faded considerably, though it wasn’t entirely gone.
No matter how close Lucas and Carlo were as friends, they differed in every visible detail from head to toe.
And while they shared a similar aura, their temperaments were fundamentally opposite.
So I no longer felt that confusion in my heart when I sat across from Lucas.
My emotions had never wavered the way they did in Carlo’s presence.
In fact, there were no emotions to speak of at all.
‘We only have two and a half days left together anyway. What feelings matter now?’
What remained between us was nothing but a permanent goodbye.
Finding peace in that reality, I hadn’t the heart to refuse the tea time my parents suggested.
Lucas and I sat side by side in the garden, and I sipped quietly at my cup without much to say.
We had no particular conversation between us, yet my parents seemed inexplicably pleased by the sight.
“There’s such grace in your manner of tea, Your Highness. Truly befitting the Crown Prince.”
“Though it’s such a shame that dairy products don’t agree with you. My heart aches for it.”
This was excessive praise, surely.
‘Really, you two…’
How could their tastes change so swiftly depending on which man their daughter brought home?
Just before, they were saying Carlo’s hand looked graceful holding a teacup, and then lamenting—nearly mourning—that his constitution couldn’t tolerate dairy and he couldn’t drink a latte, and now this.
We hadn’t even shared any entertaining conversation, yet here were my parents delighting in each other’s company, and I began to grow puzzled.
Could they have noticed something?

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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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