On Official Duty with My Tower Master Ex-Boyfriend - Chapter 61

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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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Chapter 61
I heard Lana calling me from behind, but there was no time to turn around.
My mind suddenly went quiet—not empty, but like standing in the eye of a storm, suspended and still.
Not knowing what I was running from, I fled toward my room.
On the landing one floor below, I caught fragments of wizards talking.
“Tch. I never knew the Tower Master had that side to him.”
“It’s pitiful, really—he couldn’t even ask about his fiancée’s ring and just left it as it was.”
I stopped as if entranced by the words “Tower Master” and “ring,” straining to listen.
The storm gathering at the edge of my awareness drew closer, yet my feet wouldn’t move.
“To be honest, I thought he’d lost his mind when he replaced the broken conduit of the Central Barrier with some random ring.”
“Everyone thought so, right? The original conduit was a Crystal Whale Crystal.”
But after learning it was his dead fiancée’s ring, I saw him differently.”
“How tender their bond must have been, for him to do that with her ring……”
In that moment, I crossed from quiet confusion into the center of the storm.
I didn’t wait to hear more—I bolted for my room.
As I ran, every foolish thing I’d done since meeting Cade replayed in my mind—all those moments of awkward distance between us.
Days I’d spent grumbling about his inexplicable kindness as mere caprice, yet riding on that kindness all the same.
Even entertaining some ridiculous fantasy that his kindness might not be caprice at all, but genuine.
‘And the ring he gave me—I sold it in secret, took the money and ran.’
Cold water seemed to pour over my head. My thoughts snapped into focus.
‘What am I doing here right now?’
Me, resenting a ring given to me, having it torn from my hands. And him, the ring’s true owner, one who couldn’t bear to bury it in the ground, keeping it as something precious.
From the start, Cade’s feelings were different from mine.
“I’ve never seen the Tower Master struggling because of his fiancée. He seems to have overcome it well, moved past it quickly.”
Even if those were Lana’s words, spoken from observing a Cade I didn’t know, they were only a child’s perspective.
Yet I’d let that remark plant some impossible hope in me, hadn’t I?
His kindness was not genuine—it was caprice.
The moment the door closed behind me, I buried my flushed face in the bed.
My grand promises to deal with him only on professional terms now lay in ruins—I’d nearly made the same mistake again.
He stayed constant, while I alone cycled through anger and forgiveness, hatred and hope, disappointment and more……
‘What kind of ridiculous one-woman play is this?’
A shame with no one to blame cut through me like broken glass.
True to my meager pride, I flinched and turned my resentment on Cade instead.
‘What is he thinking, pulling this? What kind of caprice is this supposed to be?’
He never held a trace of sincerity toward me, yet he made me believe I was being treated specially.
Better if he were coldly distant, the way he’d been when we first met in the Magic Tower.
I longed for his caprice to flare up soon, for his kindness toward me to grow tiresome.
That way I could rationalize it all—just a brief confusion caused by Cade’s arbitrary, selfish moods.
***
But contrary to my hopes, Cade’s demeanor didn’t change.
“When can I leave Melgote? We’re wasting so much time.”
“It’s a first for me too, so I’m at a loss.”
“Can’t you lower the Barrier for just a moment? Just when I’m leaving?”
“No. There’s no telling what might happen.”
……
“Is there anything else you need?”
“Nothing.”
“If Tris visiting every night bothers you, I can stop him.”
“Don’t bother.”
No matter how coldly I treated him, nothing changed.
“You went to the Harbor. Did you run into a Crystal Whale?”
“What?”
“You look troubled. I’ll have the kitchen prepare some sweets for you.”
“What are we to each other that you should worry about my mood? I said don’t bother!”
Instead, he only grew more attentive, checking whether I was unwell or in pain.
If there was anything I wanted to eat, I should tell the kitchen chef.
If I needed anything to get by as a non-mage in the Magic Tower, he’d prepare it.
If the bedding didn’t suit me, he’d change it.
Each time he fussed over some trivial detail, my mood only sank deeper.
Even Benn, who’d once been wary of Cade’s kindness, seemed to grow resigned one day and slowly started treating me warmly again.
That struck me as suspicious.
“Oh, Investigator. Are you heading to see the Tower Master?”
“Yes. It looks like you’re going to his office too?”
“I can go later. Please, the two of you take some time together first.”
“No, it’s fine—we can go in together……”
Starting then, Benn kept making excuses for me to be alone with Cade in his office, engineering moments for just the two of us.
Lana’s schemes had been cute enough, but this was too blatant, too much pressure, too uncomfortable.
‘Why is he suddenly doing this? Did Cade give him some kind of instruction?’
Was Cade, having lost the woman he’d been intimate with, now seeing me as fresh entertainment since I’d conveniently walked back into his life?
The longer Cade’s caprice persisted, the more my suspicions swelled beyond my control.
And then today……
“What do you want to do?”
“Let’s have dinner together. Outside the Magic Tower.”
Cade had finally proposed that we dine alone together.
“Why?”
“Since we’ve been back, we haven’t had a single meal together.”
“There’s no reason for that. We’re nothing to each other.”
Cade didn’t deny it—just shrugged.
Yet his hand remained extended. If I took it, we’d vanish somewhere inside Melgote in an instant.
“I’ve never seen you leave the Magic Tower for reasons like that.”
“I’m trying it now. Doesn’t being cooped up in the Magic Tower feel suffocating?”
……
Since I only stared at his hand, he let out a laugh-tinged sigh.
“Then let’s check on the forest used for Harbor reconstruction. Magical beasts are trying to establish themselves on the cleared stumps.”
……
Probably rodent-type magical beasts that gnaw at bark for nuts inside.
One of the Investigator’s rules was never to artificially interfere with a magical beast’s territorial migration.
A problem like that left me no excuse to refuse.
Since I’d been trapped in Melgote, no new civil servants had been admitted to this place.
‘It’s just going to work. All I’m doing is persuading the gathered beasts to leave peacefully for somewhere else.’
Still hesitating, I lightly took his hand.
His grip closed firmly around my fingertips.
Just before my vision shifted, I glimpsed Cade’s mouth curving into a soft smile.
***
We arrived at a Coniferous Forest owned by the Magic Tower, inland in Melgote.
“……What is this?”
I was thrown off by the scene before me, nothing like I’d expected.
The place was indeed a stump-dotted clearing, but beneath a tent in the center sat gleaming lanterns and a small table.
Cade snapped his fingers once, and food appeared in an instant.
Steam rose gently from the dishes, beautifully plated on elegant plates.
“All of Melgote’s restaurants with good views overlook the sea. They’re well-known places, but not somewhere you’d enjoy.”
It sounded as though he’d arranged this setting precisely because I disliked the sea.
“You didn’t say you’d have dinner with me. You tricked me, didn’t you?”
“I had the kitchen chef prepare the food separately. Is the menu not to your taste?”
“That’s not what I mean.”
Talking to a wall would have felt less suffocating.
Even standing in the middle of the forest, the damp cold couldn’t penetrate—his magic wrapped the space in warmth instead.
Days of worry, compounded by his behavior today, had transformed my vague suspicions into certainty.
“You’re being unusually kind to me lately.”
“I’ve always been kind to you, it seems.”
“But we’re nothing to each other right now.”
My accusatory words made Cade’s brow furrow.
“Can you stop saying we’re nothing? At least while you’re staying in the Magic Tower, wouldn’t it be nice if we got along?”
“Got along?”
A filthy thought took shape in my mind.
‘Is he really……?’
A year has passed since his fiancée’s death—was he now trying to resume his romantic games without guilt?
Did he need a foolish woman who loved him without knowing he was two-timing her?
Once I left Melgote, he could simply discard me again.
‘Did Lana push us together on his orders too?’
By now, I could no longer call this suspicion.
“Cade. You need to stop this.”
“Stop what?”
“Did you really think I’d fall for you again like this? Even if you’re not two-timing me, I’m done with you. I have no intention whatsoever of being your plaything again!”
Cade stood there bewildered, as if he’d never expected to hear such words, before speaking.
“Did I mislead you? I have no intention of being in a relationship with you.”

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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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