The Fake Wife of the Strongest Husband Wants to Survive - Chapter 20

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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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Episode 20
“What do you mean?”
“The merchant just said it—the Emerald was mined near the Abyss, dug up alongside other stones.”
“Ah…….”
The Swamp lay at the eastern edge, bordering the Abyss—the land swallowed by Monsters.
Because the Swamp existed, the Empire could remain safe from the Abyss, yet in the eyes of its people, the Swamp was nothing but Monster territory, no different from the Abyss itself.
“Auction houses might tout particularly dark Emeralds as coming from the Abyss, but no nobleman actually believes it. I was one of the skeptics myself, until now—apparently Emeralds really do come from there.”
Emeralds from the Abyss were extraordinarily valuable, yet supply fell desperately short of demand. Few people had ever seen one, and most dismissed the stories as merchant fiction.
But now I’d learned they were real, and I was about to venture into that rumor-shrouded land myself.
The original work had offered only a brief mention—that the Abyss lay near the Swamp—so the very existence of these Emeralds caught me off guard.
I lingered in the Market a while longer, hoping to uncover something else of value, but nothing else caught my eye.
Meanwhile, dusk was settling slowly over the town.
“Shall we head back?”
“Yes, Miss.”
We turned and made our way back toward the Count’s Castle.
“Wounded! There’s a wounded man in the cart—clear the way!”
From the edge of the Market road, a Knight with a bleeding shoulder wound came racing toward us on a cart-drawn horse.
Pesha caught sight of an unconscious middle-aged man lying in the cart as it passed rapidly by.
Watching the cart disappear through the gates of the Count’s Castle, Pesha stood motionless until Bri grabbed her arm and checked on her.
“Miss! You nearly collided with the horse. Are you all right?”
“I’m fine. Let’s head back to the Castle at once.”
The Count’s Castle, which we reached by hiring a cart, looked far more chaotic than it had that morning.
While the patient was being hastily transferred indoors and treated by a Physician who had rushed out of the Castle, the Knight began explaining the situation to Owen.
“He’s a Miner. It seems he gathered people to mine Emeralds from the Abyss and ventured into the Border Region, but ten of them died. He’s the only survivor.”
“…….”
Even the field medical tent had been unable to help; the Knight had come to seek aid from the Castle’s physician instead.
After hearing the report, Owen turned to the Physician conducting the examination.
“What’s his condition? Can he be saved?”
“I’m sorry. The injuries are severe, and with the skin blackened like this—it indicates the internal organs have been completely contaminated…….”
The reason the Empire had maintained a stalemate with Monsters for centuries without clear victory was the Aura they emanated.
Monster Aura didn’t merely corrupt the land; it seeped into human wounds and caused the flesh to putrefy.
The injured Miner was indeed gripping his forearm, screaming in agony.
“Ahhhhh……! My arm, my arm…… Please, please do something! Anything, I’m begging you……!”
Owen’s brow twisted at the Miner’s pleas.
The Physician let out a heavy sigh, finally setting down his instruments and shaking his head.
If even the Count’s own Physician had given up, there was no cure short of leaving the Swamp altogether.
As he stood helpless, the Miner’s screams grew more anguished.
Then Owen, his face creased with evident conflict, at last let his massive hand close around the hilt of the sword at his waist.
Seeing this, Pesha ran to him without thinking and clung to his arm.
“Don’t do it!”
Even as Pesha suddenly rushed forward to stop him, Owen showed no surprise, only murmuring quietly.
“……It’s dangerous. Let go.”
Though he hadn’t drawn the blade yet, his hand gripped the hilt so hard that veins bulged across his knuckles.
Monster Aura inflicted excruciating pain on those it had poisoned.
The agony was said to be like burning alive from the inside.
Owen, who had walked battlefields without rest to drive back the Monsters, would have witnessed such scenes countless times.
Standing amid the storm of Monster attacks, watching comrades and subordinates writhe in such torment, he must have made that dreadful decision again and again.
To grant them a swift death and end their suffering.
For a man who had wielded a blade his whole life, it was likely the only mercy he could offer them.
Yet who would ever understand the profound despair of the one who strikes that blow?
“No one understands. People will never see the weight of your burden…….”
Few would truly grasp the heaviness of such a choice.
If only he wasn’t branded a heartless tyrant for coldly ending the life of a crippled subject who could no longer be of use.
And yet Owen couldn’t tear his gaze away from the Miner convulsing in agony.
In the years since their marriage, Pesha had observed Owen as a man consumed by his work.
He took inspection tours without rest, and when at the Castle, he lived in his study.
He labored so hard to make the Territory a place worth living in.
Yet in this very moment, he couldn’t save a single subject—the helplessness must be crushing.
Still, this lay beyond the reach of what any Lord could control.
“A Lord is not a god. You cannot command every danger that exists!”
“……I understand.”
“No, you understand nothing.”
When she refused to yield, pressing her point, Owen turned to face her in surprise.
His grip on the sword hilt loosened slightly just as he was about to draw, and Pesha seized the moment to call for her servant.
“Bri! Bring me that Iceberg Tea I made. Undiluted. The strongest concentrate you can find!”
“Yes!”
Owen watched the maid dash toward the castle entrance, then murmured quietly.
“A temporary measure. You said yourself it’s merely a painkiller, not a cure…….”
“That’s right! I don’t have the power to save a dying man! But I can ease his suffering, can’t I? I can help this person rest without pain—so please, stop hurting yourself in the name of helping others.”
“…….”
“The truth is, it’s unbearable.”
Soon after, Bri returned, thrusting the tea in its glass bottle toward her.
Pesha swallowed hard and poured the liquid into the Miner’s mouth.
The Miner, writhing against the pain, forced himself to swallow the tea with difficulty.
Within moments, his rapid, ragged breathing gradually steadied and slowed.
His anguished cries, which had torn the air, slowly subsided into silence.
“Hhhhh…….”
As the Miner felt his pain dulling, he slipped into unconsciousness.
Breathing evenly in sleep, his face and skin were rotted with decay and his body covered in wounds, yet at least his expression looked peaceful.
Once the Miner fell quiet, the Knight who had brought him spoke to Owen.
“My lord. I will make inquiries and locate his family. So that he might not face his final moments alone…….”
Owen nodded silently in acknowledgment.
As the cart departed the castle, the servants who had rushed out at the commotion scattered one by one to return to their duties.
Though the crisis had passed, Pesha’s heart remained unsettled.
‘If what I’d made had been a purifying medicine instead of a painkiller, would the outcome have been different? Perhaps he might have survived.’
Her chest felt heavy, as though weighted by stone.
She was staring at the empty glass bottle with a darkened expression when—
Someone spoke to her.
“The wounds were deep and the contamination too widespread. Even with treatment, he would not have lived much longer.”
Owen, whom she had assumed had left, was still standing beside her, his eyes on her face.

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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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