The Isolated Marchioness Just Wants to Make a Living - Chapter 137

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Team. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Chapter 137

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Indeed, Borem remembered nothing.

His last memory was stuck at Bakahun Marquis Castle. In other words, right before he was cursed and disappeared into the mountains.

“Reina is… dead?”

Reina was his wife and Isabela’s mother. She had died during the civil war.

From Borem’s perspective, when he came to his senses, several years had passed, his wife was dead, and his daughter had turned dark.

It was Isabela’s job to comfort the shocked Borem.

“Deal with it on your own. Even if your heart is torn apart, keep your mouth shut. There’s no one here with enough emotional capacity to comfort Father.”

“You, why is your personality like this… You who were like sunshine in the fields, how did you…”

“Father turned into a monster, Mother died, and the territory became a wasteland, but if I continued being sunshine, wouldn’t that be the real personality disorder? If you don’t want to see your daughter go even more insane, pull yourself together.”

Isabela retorted sharply. It seemed she wouldn’t be able to get along intimately with her father like before.

However, the venom that had always been sharply honed in her eyes had slightly disappeared.

Thus, we arrived at Rudolph Village late in the evening.

Raul, who came running after discovering us, was startled.

“…D-D-Duke? You’re Duke Borem Bakahun, right?”

Because there was a middle-aged man mixed in among the party that had departed resolutely. And moreover…

“Um, do you have any spare pants?”

While desperately covering his body with two cloaks.

“Yes, yes! Come this way! Sh-shirts are available too.”

“Could I ask for one too?”

Harrison also spoke with difficulty.

“Actually, my pants tore too after riding such rough mountain paths without a cloak…”

Raul quickly took the suffering middle-aged man and Harrison inside the house.

That left just the four of us: Alpheus, me, Leopold, and Isabela.

I glanced at Alpheus.

Alpheus had been unconscious while conversing with the half-human, half-beast, but the loose-lipped Harrison had told him everything after he woke up, so everyone knew now.

In the end, everyone now knew that I, the only descendant of Riente, had to call the ‘true name’ to break the curse.

As soon as our eyes met, Alpheus smiled brightly at me.

“My sister is really amazing! Wow, to think you can do both Sears’ 【Taming】 and ‘calling true names’ that only descendants of Riente royalty can do! My goodness, that’s really incredible, isn’t it?”

He swung his fist with sparkling eyes.

“Now, only the Western and Eastern Regions remain, right? I’ll stick close to my sister’s journey and do my absolute best too! I’ll sweep away all those dark mages targeting my sister!”

I thought he might be somewhat shocked, but fortunately Alpheus was able to accept this serious situation energetically with his characteristic protagonist syndrome.

“Right.”

I said, relieved by Alpheus’s usual reaction.

“Then Leopold, would you like to come into my room and talk?”

Right now, I hadn’t told anyone about Leopold’s curse.

Leopold must be very curious about his own curse. So I needed to quickly tell him the detailed circumstances.

Then Leopold shrugged and said.

“That’s problematic, Brisa. Even if we’re minors, a man and woman can’t be alone together in one room.”

He insisted on etiquette even in this serious situation.

“There are no servants here and the garden is spacious, so just going to the garden should maintain privacy for our conversation.”

Leopold strode out first, and I also stood up to follow him.

“No talking for too long.”

Alpheus said with triangular eyes.

“If you talk for more than 30 minutes, I’ll come after you, so keep that in mind.”

When we left, only Alpheus and Isabela would remain alone together.

Well, it didn’t seem like they’d be together for long.

‘Once Alpheus starts babbling about his expectations for future adventures, Isabela will say she’s not feeling well and get up appropriately.’

I quickly headed toward the garden.

‘As expected, it’s better to treat their romance as non-existent.’

Having been overly concerned about the relationship between Isabela and Alpheus until the very end.

I failed to notice that as soon as I turned around, all the laughter completely disappeared from Alpheus’s face.

* * *

Brisa and Leopold moved away.

Alpheus kept chattering ‘It’s an adventure with my sister! How exciting!’ until Brisa’s figure disappeared from view.

‘Sigh, I should say I’m moderately tired and go inside.’

Isabela prepared herself mentally to listen to Alpheus’s chatter for about a minute.

However…

‘Huh?’

After Brisa and Leopold disappeared, Alpheus shut his mouth as if by magic.

Isabela glanced at Alpheus surreptitiously.

‘What’s this?’

Alpheus remained standing, quietly staring only at the ground.

‘Alpheus… keeping his mouth shut?’

Isabela swallowed dry saliva.

‘This is an emergency.’

Alpheus must have been affected by dark magic.

Of course, this village was protected from dark magic. But what if Harrison had wandered around and broken something?

She needed to inform Raul immediately. No, first she should deal with Alpheus…

She gripped tightly the poison-coated dagger in her bosom that she had brought to kill monsters.

Then, she carefully approached Alpheus and asked.

“H-hey. A-are you okay?”

She was so nervous that her old way of speaking to mercenary customers came out unconsciously.

“There’s no way… I’m not okay at all.”

Alpheus answered slowly.

“But I’m still in my right mind, so you can take your hand off the dagger. I know there’s no point in taking out frustrations on the world…”

The assassination plan was immediately discovered.

Alpheus’s voice trembled as he swallowed a sigh.

“What should I do…”

It was worlds apart from the voice that had been laughing ‘My sister is amazing! Uhaha!’ beside Brisa earlier.

“My sister… what should I really do… She’s a child who just turned thirteen not long ago, why does such a scary and heavy duty fall on this child…”

Alpheus buried his face in both hands.

“Why can’t I do it instead… Why can that damn thing called a true name only be called by Riente bloodline…”

Isabela answered awkwardly.

“Well, but… you just have to call a name. It’s not like you’re fighting, so it should be okay.”

“She has to face them. She has to confront them directly.”

Alpheus said in a devastated voice.

“I want our Bri-bri to live safely and peacefully, raising cattle and digging potatoes… such a fun and ordinary life.”

Isabela wanted to say ‘raising cattle and potatoes isn’t exactly an ordinary noble lady’s life to begin with,’ but she had tact, so she held back.

“I’ll save the world and overcome all hardships and adversity… I just want my sister to be absolutely safe.”

The war hero who knew no hesitation even on life-and-death battlefields.

He was breathing heavily and trembling with fear.

“Things like dark mages aren’t actually scary. I could win even if a hundred of them came at me. But… but ‘they’ are different.”

“You defeated both the cursed monsters of the Eastern and Southern Regions. That’s the rumor I heard.”

“That’s different from the facts.”

Alpheus slowly shook his head.

“One escaped, and one—I don’t know what happened to it either, but I wasn’t in good shape myself. Honestly, I have no confidence I could win if I faced the same kind of being again.”

Isabela was seeing Alpheus acknowledge his ‘helplessness’ for the first time, when he had always been so positive.

“Moreover, this time I literally lost consciousness miserably. I… far from protecting Brisa, I was the first to collapse.”

He muttered in a daze.

“What if… what if something goes wrong… and I can’t protect that child like this time? There are still… still two left.”

Seeing him like this, Isabela became exasperated and scolded him.

“Are you kidding me? Just a moment ago you were jumping around like a brainless fool, excited about saving the world? If you were going to be like this, why did you act all excited and cocky earlier?”

The princess who had crawled up from the bottom became foul-mouthed when flustered.

“You should have just told me to ignore those crazy monsters, told that wet-behind-the-ears brat to just grow weeds in her territory? Who threatened you to call out Jinmyeong or whatever?”

Then Alpheus answered slowly.

“Bri-bri is a child who already watches my reactions a lot.”

“What?”

She didn’t seem like that at all.

However, Alpheus wasn’t joking.

“She’s a child who couldn’t tell me for a long time that Dark Mages were targeting her. A child who habitually worries whether I might find her bothersome, whether I might think she’s a nuisance…”

At these unexpected words, Isabela found herself at a loss for words.

“If I show that I’m struggling, that child will keep her mouth shut. So all I can do… is pretend I’m okay.”

It was a deep inner feeling she had never expected from him.

“That kid clearly seemed like she wanted to break all the remaining Half-Human, Half-Beast curses.”

That was true.

“Isabela, can you promise me something?”

Alpheus slowly raised his head.

“If I die, please take care of our Bri-bri.”

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Team. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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