My Husband Lives in a Painting - Chapter 39

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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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My Husband Lives in a Painting 039
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Claude and I returned to the Mansion, and I made straight for the Studio.
I left him standing before the door, then shut it firmly behind me and issued a warning.
“Under no circumstances are you to enter this room. Do you understand?”
“……Yes, I understand.”
Though I’d issued the warning, truthfully there was no need. Claude was not a man to betray trust for the sake of idle curiosity.
A moment later, when I emerged from the Studio with Anne Marie’s hand in mine, he jolted upright from where he’d been leaning against the wall.
“How on earth did you……?”
“…….”
But my expression remained heavy.
In the painting, there was no trace of any child save Anne Marie.
“Why would you assume that simply because there were two hundred children, there must also be two hundred clients?”
“Half of those transactions were conducted by a single person, madam.”
Half handled by one person.
Could that person have been someone other than Pagoda himself?
Or perhaps……
I caught my lower lip between my teeth, unthinking.
‘Have I come too late?’
As my anxiety deepened, Johen suddenly burst forth from behind Claude.
“Sister!”
“Johen!”
He threw himself into Anne Marie’s arms, and tears came pouring down his small face.
“Where have you been? Do you know how worried I was……?!”
“Johen, Johen…….”
“Sob, sob——!”
Watching their small frames cling to each other as though fused together, tears streaming down, the tangle of doubts that had been clouding my mind evaporated in an instant.
To allow them time to compose themselves, Claude and I stepped back and continued our conversation.
“……Did you use Magic?”
“Something like that.”
“You really are…… remarkable.”
The truth was that it was Camille’s ability that was extraordinary, not my own, but I offered a smile without bothering to correct him.
Claude’s persistent gaze, which had been studying me, soon shifted toward the Studio door.
His curiosity about what lay beyond that firmly closed threshold was evident.
After my lips trembled slightly, I moved to block his line of sight and shook my head slowly.
“Claude, I’m sorry, but this is something I can’t show you.”
“I understand. I have no intention of pressing you, so please don’t worry.”
“…….”
“Don’t make that face. Trust need not rest upon the sharing of every truth, does it?”
He drew a line decisively, assuring me he would not peer beyond that threshold again, and in doing so offered me a kindness for which I could only be grateful.
His deliberate gesture of restraint touched me more than I could express.
“Anne Marie has been safely rescued. Do you intend to report this to the Imperial Court?”
“A report……? I’m not certain.”
“Surely you’re not thinking of covering this up? That man deserves to rot in prison for life.”
The truth was that the subject of such a report would soon vanish entirely, but I saw no reason to burden Claude with that knowledge.
Before long, word of his disappearance would spread everywhere anyway.
“……Well then, show me the evidence first. I’ll decide after I’ve seen it.”
We left the children temporarily in Romaine and Hope’s care, and Claude and I seated ourselves across from each other in his Reception Room.
Claude laid out the evidence he’d collected from the Appreciation Room, piece by piece across the desk.
What he had brought were Recorded Mana Orbs.
But the quantity seemed woefully insufficient.
“Is this everything? From what I can see, there aren’t even ten of them.”
“That is all I was able to locate.”
Recorded Mana Orbs.
They were the clearest physical evidence of the number of women who had been sacrificed.
‘Yet there are only this many?’
It wasn’t a small number, of course. But there should have been far more Orbs.
“Perhaps he selected only those he favored and kept them on display, while hiding the rest elsewhere.”
“……No, that can’t be it.”
Pagoda was a man arrogant enough to openly maintain an Appreciation Room within his own Mansion.
Why would he, the absolute master of the Mansion, need to hide away part of the Recorded Mana Orbs separately?
“But… wasn’t the purpose from the start to save Anne Marie?”
……
“Tell me. What’s the problem?”
After a long silence, Claude asked in an affectionate voice, as though indifferent.
But I shook my head.
“…It’s nothing.”
“Ob.”
“I need some air. I’ll be back in a moment.”
Claude seemed about to say something more, but I slipped out of the Reception Room without hearing him.
My footsteps quickened as I crossed the corridor. The number of spheres wouldn’t leave my mind.
Too few. Far too few.
If Anne Marie was the only survivor, then the number of those sacrificed should have been overwhelmingly greater.
‘Where are the rest? Should I raid the Marquis Estate again right now?’
As I stood gnawing at my nails, I suddenly stopped in my tracks.
……
A chill wind swept through the corridor.
Staring blankly at my hair dancing in the breeze, I let out a hollow laugh.
“…Here it goes again.”
My insides twisted into knots. I leaned my back against the cold wall and closed my eyes.
Find the remaining victims. Rescue women I don’t even know are alive or dead. And then what?
‘What are you trying to do, Ob?’
I slowly dragged my hand across my face.
Perhaps I had been mistaken from the very beginning.
That I could atone for the murders I had committed by saving Anne Marie and the others.
But a human life cannot be balanced against another life.
That simple truth—I had been ignoring it all along.
“Ob. You made a Demonic Contract. The end of a contract is death.”
That’s right. I am no saint.
I cannot save everyone in this world, nor do I have any reason to.
What matters now is only one thing—Camille’s revenge.
I clenched my fists.
‘…I can’t drag Claude into this any further.’
He doesn’t know what I’m carrying.
So I had no intention whatsoever of making him bear my guilt as well.
……
I slowly pushed myself away from the wall. Resolved not to look back anymore.
Chapter 7. Fireworks Like a Painting
For some time, Camille did not appear in the Flower Field.
I knocked on the Cottage door to meet him, but there was no sound from within.
Only after checking a note left on the door one day did I understand that he needed more time.
I’ll be back soon. Get some rest, okay dear♡
“…What on earth is he doing?”
What’s with the heart?
Though it displeased me, as long as the revenge was certain, there was no reason to meddle in whatever he was doing.
So I lived on quietly in reality outside the Painting, as he had asked.
It had already been a week since returning from the Buteur Marquis Estate. The servants must have noticed Pagoda’s disappearance, but no one had yet set foot toward Ortega.
‘They must be deliberating how to handle this incident.’
Even if they were to report me, the blame would never fall on me. There was no evidence.
Yet an uncomfortable feeling lingered nonetheless.
‘This makes the second one. I hope the Marquis is truly the culprit.’
As I sipped the Black Tea with steam rising from it and gazed out the window, Romaine suddenly spoke up.
“Miss, the festival starts today. Would you like to go out and enjoy the fresh air for a bit?”
“A festival? What festival?”
“The Spring Flower Festival!”
Only then did the brilliant colors dancing outside the window catch my eye.
In the Empire, after the Spring Welcome Ceremony, the Capital holds a grand Spring Flower Festival.
I had never been myself, so I didn’t know the precise atmosphere, but I had heard from others that it was lavish enough to captivate even the nobility.
But I was in no mood to enjoy a festival now.
“Romaine. I’m not really the type to—”
I should refuse.
But in that instant, I caught sight of Romaine’s eyes shining with hope, and the words died on my lips.
“…Actually, I do want to go. Let’s definitely go.”
“I knew it! You’re the best, ma’am!”
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Somehow our party had become quite the motley crew. Johen and Anne Marie, who’d made their nest at the Duke’s Residence; Romaine and Hope, who never strayed far from her side. And lastly,
“…Sigh.”
Claude, whom Hope had practically dragged along against his will.
“Ma’am, they’re about to start a puppet show at the Plaza! Should we head over there?”
“Miss Romaine, I concur! Might we gather some refreshments on the way?”
“Not a bad idea. You two—is there anything you’d like to eat?”
“W-we’re fine, really…”
“Sister, sister! I want to eat those chicken skewers!”
“J-Johen!”
The heightened atmosphere of the festival seemed to set everything ablaze in a way I couldn’t quite explain.
The children, more animated than usual, naturally paired off and played well together without needing supervision, while Claude and I followed slowly in their wake.

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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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