The Forgotten Field - Chapter 151

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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 151
Talia fixed her gaze on Barcas’s eyes as she bore down with all her strength.
A sensation as though a boulder were crushing her pelvis overwhelmed her. Every pore on her body opened, and cold sweat streamed down relentlessly.
She summoned every ounce of strength she possessed. Yet there was no sense of progress whatsoever.
A cry threatened to tear from her throat. How much longer could she endure this? Just as she felt ready to surrender to the unbearable agony, someone let out a sharp scream.
Talia forced open her eyelids, drenched in sweat and tears. The Priestess, positioned below her knees beneath the linen cloth, stared between her legs with a grave expression.
Talia forced her split lips apart.
“Why… why are you looking like that?”
“Blood… there’s blood…”
A Handmaiden standing beside the bed muttered in terror.
The Head Handmaiden seized the frightened Handmaiden with a sharp grip and shoved her backward.
Before Talia could even register what was happening, the contractions that had subsided resumed with renewed intensity.
Talia clung to Barcas’s neck once more.
How long did the agony persist—as if her bones were splitting and her organs and nerve bundles were being crushed? Her vision turned white, and something that had been blocking her passage suddenly tore free.
The sensation was so violent that her head snapped back and a sharp cry erupted from her throat.
Talia went limp in Barcas’s arms like a corpse, gasping for breath with a chill running down to her jaw. Her eardrums felt muffled as though she were submerged in water, and her vision blurred.
She felt as though something inside her had been torn severely. Yet the intense, searing pain that had burned through her mind was gone.
Was it finally over?
As she drifted in that thought, an odd unease suddenly crept over her. The chamber was unnaturally silent.
Talia struggled to lift her heavy eyelids.
In her unfocused vision, she caught sight of a neck with veins standing taut. With trembling hands, she grasped at the man’s garment, pulling weakly.
“Barcas… why…?”
Barcas finally looked at her.
Talia strained her eyes to see his expression clearly. But her focus would not sharpen.
Like a phantom shrouded in mist, she clung to his gaze and barely managed to speak.
“Why… the baby… isn’t crying?”
“…”
“Barcas, why isn’t the baby…?”
He did not answer.
Had her ears failed her?
She looked around the chamber in confusion. The Handmaidens had gathered in one corner, wrapping something in cloth.
As she tried to raise her upper body to see it more clearly, Barcas tightened his arms around her.
“You mustn’t move yet.”
It was a harsh voice she never expected to hear from him.
Talia blinked blankly.
Barcas, gripping her head firmly with a cold hand whose tendons stood prominent, as if to prevent her from turning, exhaled a voice so low it was terrifying.
“Has the bleeding stopped?”
“Not yet…”
“Then why aren’t you doing something about it?”
“…Unfortunately, there is nothing we can do.”
Talia felt the body enveloping her grow rigid as stone.
She could sense his fury burning with an intensity that bordered on madness, yet the reason eluded her understanding.
From the head of the bed, a voice sharp as steel rang out savagely.
“Where is the High Priest? What is he doing? Bring him here at once!”
“B-but, that’s an impossible request! Male priests can never enter the Birthing Chamber. It is strictly forbidden for them to witness women in their most primal state….”
In that moment, the sound of something shattering pierced the air.
Talia barely grasped at her consciousness as it threatened to slip away. A heartbeat too late, she realized he had hurled something.
“Go now and tell him: if he doesn’t come this instant to treat my wife, I will lock him in the Chapel and burn it to the ground with him inside.”
Only then did Talia comprehend the gravity of her condition—that she required treatment. Yet no fear gripped her. It was as though all sensation had been numbed.
In her daze, Talia’s gaze fixed upon Barcas’s rigid jawline, and seized by some overwhelming impulse, she tugged at his sleeve.
“Barcas… I’m… fine… our baby….”
Her lips moved laboriously, though she scarcely understood what she was saying.
“Our baby… help.”
Barcas did not answer.
She could sense his gaze upon her, yet could not discern his expression. Tears flowed without ceasing.
“You… you promised me….”
She glared at his motionless form in accusation, then turned her eyes back toward the baby. But Barcas held her head so firmly she could not move.
She wanted to push him away with all her strength, yet her arms hung limp as lead. Talia trembled, consumed by helplessness.
“It will be all right. Nothing will happen.”
The man holding her upper body in a painful embrace brought his cold lips to her temple and murmured.
A lie.
Talia whispered.
All of it was a lie. Nothing was all right. Nothing would ever be all right again.
She felt her body growing colder by degrees, as though she were slowly sinking into icy water. She was so very cold and so very tired.
Why had she been placed in such circumstances?
A faint question flickered through her emptying mind.
Just this morning, she had been happy. Yes, she had been. Though tormented and exhausted, she had been happy. Never in her life had she known such happiness.
She recalled what had brought her such joy. And squeezing forth her last reserves of strength, she pleaded.
“Barcas… the baby… give it to me.”
Even to her own ears, her voice sounded as faint as a dying candle.
Fearing he could not hear her properly, she lifted fingers heavy as lead and grasped at his cold coat.
“I… want to hold it. My baby….”
Barcas remained locked around her, unmoved.
In that moment, resentment flooded to her very marrow. If she could, she would have screamed.
You said you would grant me anything I desired. Why do you break the promise you made to me?
She uttered the words in a sob.
“I… I’m begging you like this. Please….”
Then she felt the commotion around her intensify. Yet all sound reached her muffled, as though thick walls surrounded her on all sides.
Barcas’s head turned sharply. She heard him cry out, but could not comprehend his words. Talia’s strength abandoned her entirely, and her limbs went limp.
Her vision darkened progressively. She could no longer discern whether her eyes were open or closed.
What if I never awaken again? If that were to be my fate, I wanted to see him one last time.
I strained desperately to open my eyes, yet all that greeted me was suffocating darkness.
Tears continued to flow, threatening to drown me in their endless tide.
I parted my lips to speak, but even that refused to obey. Only after swallowing my fractured breaths did I realize what I had failed to utter—his name.
With that sorrowful realization as my last anchor, I sank into the cold, lightless abyss.
* * *
The drizzle that had fallen since dawn finally began to ease as noon arrived.
Lucas, resting his upper body against the Castle Rampart while wetting his lips with wine, caught sight of several women laying flowers at a small grave that had appeared days prior, and he exhaled a heavy sigh.
The child, born from a mother left half-dead, never drew a proper first breath before being buried in the wet earth. Only after the Grand Duchess emerged from the brink of death did a modest funeral rite take place for the stillborn.

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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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