The Forgotten Field - Chapter 225

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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 225
The leisurely flow of words gradually tapered into silence.
He dissected her delicate face, bathed in the fireplace’s glow, with a sharp, penetrating gaze. After a prolonged pause, she lifted her head once more to meet his eyes.
“Of course, you needn’t comply. I simply hoped you might consider it….”
“Stop circling around the matter and tell me the purpose of your visit.”
My excessively cautious demeanor seemed to irritate him, and he pressed me with a clipped tone. Her lips hardened.
Barcas thought that this time she might finally reveal her raw emotions. Yet within those dark, navy-tinted eyes, he could find no trace of feeling whatsoever.
After maintaining her silence for a while, she slowly opened her mouth.
“I heard that after Raina’s betrothal ceremony ends, you must depart for the Northern Region again. Is that true?”
Barcas, who had hesitated, slowly nodded.
“It is true. Once matters here are settled, I must return to the Border Region.”
In that instant, her complexion noticeably darkened.
Barcas felt his throat parched by an inexplicable thirst, and he moistened his drying lips.
“The position of Commander-in-Chief is not one that permits prolonged absence from the military encampment. I must remain in the conflict zone until the suppression of the rebels is entirely complete.”
“Then….”
She chose her words with care.
“When you depart this time, could you not take Edrick with you?”
Caught off guard by the unexpected request, Barcas narrowed his eyes.
The woman, observing his reaction, added carefully.
“If it does not greatly violate protocol, I would like for you to appoint him as your Attendant.”
“Why does Your Highness concern yourself with such a matter?”
“Well….”
Struck speechless by his sharp question, she lowered her lashes before continuing in an even tone.
“That man occasionally spars with the soldiers for training purposes, and they all say his skills are too exceptional to waste on merely serving as my Guard….”
“….”
“After all, he was assigned to me in the first place because I might cause trouble again. I have no intention of causing any problems now. I simply wish to live quietly, as I do now.”
As her words ended, a log in the fireplace crackled and split with a sharp snap.
Barcas, perched on the edge of the bed and quietly observing her face, let a thin, parched laugh escape his lips.
“You journeyed all this way merely to ask such a trivial favor?”
At his cutting tone, her fingers, resting upon her lap, trembled. Yet her eyes, fixed upon him, remained as still and fathomless as a depthless lake.
“If it is not a difficult matter, I would appreciate your reconsideration. After all, there is no reason for me, who remains only within the castle, to have a high-ranking Knight from the Roem Knights serving as my Guard.”
He erased the sneer from his lips and stared directly into her face.
The woman who had once sworn she could never forgive him now met his gaze with eyes utterly devoid of emotion. He could not fathom why that fact so deeply unsettled him.
Barcas rose from the bed and stepped toward her. He could see her stiffened fingers gripping her skirt hem with anxious intensity. A bitter laugh suddenly escaped between his lips.
“I had not previously realized that Your Highness possessed such thoughtfulness as to concern yourself with the future of a mere Guard Knight.”
At his blatantly sarcastic words, the knuckles of her fingers turned white.
She averted his gaze as she spoke.
“I am not concerned with that man’s future. I simply wish to be free from unnecessary surveillance.”
He scrutinized her eyes intently, as if to discern the truth of her words. Though there had always been aspects of her difficult to fathom, now he could not begin to guess what she was thinking.
He swallowed a sigh and straightened his bent frame.
“I did not employ Edrick Lubon merely for surveillance. That man….”
I had been about to say that I wanted to keep someone by her side whom she might find even slightly familiar, but I swallowed the words. I could not bring myself to admit aloud that he had actually become a source of comfort to her.
I turned toward the shelf and uncorked the wine bottle the servants had brought, then picked up the silver goblet that had been turned upside down on the tray and spoke tersely.
“Understood. I shall give it positive consideration.”
At my response, her shoulders, which had been rigid with tension, relaxed gently.
“…Thank you.”
The woman murmured the words in a calm voice and slowly rose from her seat.
Barcas watched her walk toward the door without hesitation, then let out a hollow laugh and poured red wine into his goblet.
Just then, a soft voice came from behind him.
“Listen….”
When I turned back, I caught sight of her standing awkwardly with one hand gripping the door handle. She struggled to continue.
“There’s one more thing I’d like to ask of you.”
Barcas narrowed his eyes and tilted his chin slightly, inviting her to speak.
The woman, who had been hesitantly toying with the door handle, finally broached the subject.
“It’s about Raina…. If it’s possible, could you allow her to remain in Kalmor even after the marriage?”
The hand bringing the goblet to my lips froze in mid-air.
Barcas furrowed his brow as if gauging her intentions and fixed her with a piercing gaze before speaking in a low voice.
“Has someone perhaps asked you to try to persuade me?”
“It’s not like that. It’s just that the girl… I felt a bit sorry for her, so I brought it up.”
Barcas set down his goblet with a sharp sound and stepped toward her. Her evasive demeanor only deepened his growing unease.
“It seems you’ve become a saint to all in mere months.”
She flinched and leaned her body against the door.
Barcas leaned closer toward her and pressed on with his questioning tone.
“Have you forgotten how disrespectfully Raina has treated you all this time?”
“…But she’s just a child after all. The worst of what Raina has done to me amounts to nothing more than spreading gossip.”
The woman averted her gaze to the floor and murmured in a subdued voice.
“And… I understand why she acts that way.”
What followed was almost a whisper.
“She’s a bit like me. So… I don’t want to hate her that much.”
I stood speechless, merely looking down at the crown of her head.
Silence stretched on for a moment. She grasped the door handle and carefully stepped out into the corridor.
“I’ve said all I came to say. I’ll leave you to rest now.”
As the woman walked toward the darkened corridor, Barcas instinctively reached out to stop her, but he let his hand fall. He could see the handmaidens waiting in the corridor quietly following after her.
Barcas watched the scene from a distance, then closed the door and settled into his chair.
Beyond the glass window, the deepening night was visible. Barcas moistened his throat, which felt as if it were burning away like wine left to evaporate, leaned his head against the back of the chair, and closed his eyes tightly.
A strong premonition came to him that tonight, too, he would face the morning after another long and tedious sleepless night.
* * *
Four days after the betrothal ceremony, the nobility who had remained at Laedgo Castle to maintain their exchanges departed for their respective territories.
In the meantime, Barcas searched for cities in the Southeastern Region suitable to entrust to Lucas and proceeded with the formalities of granting him a fief.
Thanks to the pretext of war, which allowed him to omit most of the tedious ceremonies, the administrative procedures regarding the bestowal of the territory were completed without difficulty.
Not long after Lucas departed Kalmor with his men, Barcas began preparing for his own departure.
There was no need to hasten his return, but having confirmed that she was thriving, he saw no reason to linger any further.
True to his word, she was living a quiet and peaceful life, and he had no desire to disturb that tranquility. It was time for the uninvited guest to vanish.
Barcas summoned his retainers and firmly declared that he would restore all authority to the Grand Duchess, then immediately led his cavalry toward the Border Region. Among the iron-clad procession that followed him was Edrick Lubon.
“You depart without even a farewell?”
Edrick, clad impeccably in the black iron armor that symbolized House Sierkan, approached and spoke.
Barcas answered by spurring his horse forward. The weighty hoofbeats shattered the silence of the slumbering earth.

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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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