The Male Lead Is Trying To Tame Me With Money - Chapter 78

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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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78.

 

I narrowed my eyes as I listened to Casian’s words.

 

‘Now I’ve been through this so much that even when he speaks so subtly like that, it’s not particularly flustering.’

 

Can’t help it, as a fragile subordinate employee, I have no choice but to appropriately accommodate my superior.

 

“That’s right, I’m also keeping it secret to spend good time with Your Highness.”

 

It wasn’t even a lie.

 

I also wanted to properly return that matter that had been in a suspended state for so long.

 

But then….

 

“…Your Highness?”

 

“Haah….”

 

At my sincere answer, Casian let out a deep sigh.

 

He even unfairly lowered his head and covered his face with his large hands, making it impossible to read his expression.

 

“You are….”

 

He opened his mouth while slightly mumbling with his face still covered.

 

“Really too cruel to me.”

 

“Pardon…?”

 

I asked back in bewilderment at the sudden accusation, but Casian exercised his right to remain silent.

 

*

 

Casian only recovered several minutes later.

 

During that time, I was idly looking out the window.

 

Thinking that it had been quite a while since I’d seen this scenery.

 

Forest and fields, and more fields.

 

Since it was the middle of winter and the ground had been plowed and turned over, honestly speaking it wasn’t a pretty landscape, but it was a familiar place.

 

After all, this was the road to the seaside village closest to the Salice Barony, so we went there to play often in summer.

 

It was a village with a cozy atmosphere that could be reached in about two hours by carriage from the Salice Barony.

 

While I was boredly looking out the window with such thoughts, Casian carefully took my hand.

 

“Are you hurt?”

 

“A little?”

 

“Sorry, I was just too surprised. My heart gets fragile sometimes, you know.”

 

I thought it was a word that really didn’t suit him.

 

But the moment I turned my head from the window to look at him, my breath caught.

 

He looked strangely desperate.

 

Just like in the old days….

 

‘Are you leaving?’

 

He was like that boy who couldn’t hold me back and could only ask when I said our family’s stay at the seaside village was over and we had to return.

 

Really, why does this person go to such lengths, even though he knows I’m not someone with such a tender heart.

 

I grasped Casian’s hand that held mine and smiled lightly.

 

Would there ever come a moment when I could be harsh to him?

 

He acts as if everything is false, yet at times like this he tries to show all his sincerity.

 

“I wasn’t that upset.”

 

At those words, he loosened his grip on our clasped hands slightly, then immediately intertwined our fingers and held them properly again.

 

“Thank you, if I had been hated during the first trip Rose prepared for me, I would never have forgiven myself for the rest of my life.”

 

“…That seems too extreme, Your Highness.”

 

“I’ll keep that in mind.”

 

For what?

 

I was curious, but knowing that Casian wouldn’t answer even if I asked, I turned my head toward the window again.

 

I could feel his violet gaze reaching my profile completely.

 

*

 

“This place is….”

 

The moment he got out of the carriage, Casian made a surprised face as if he hadn’t expected this at all.

 

I found that reaction even more puzzling.

 

“Why do you look like you had no idea?”

 

“Because I didn’t know…?”

 

That can’t be, it’s not like you didn’t look at the scenery outside the window at all.

 

You even said we should stop soon if we wanted to see the ocean, didn’t you?

 

“…Did you perhaps not know this cottage was in this village?”

 

“I knew that much.”

 

Meanwhile, the coachman left, saying he would come back to pick us up in time for dinner.

 

Since the cottage was located deep in the forest surrounding the seaside village, only the occasional sound of wind filled the silence.

 

Casian, who had been looking at me for a moment, made a deflated face and took my hand to lead me inside the cottage.

 

“You can’t catch a cold.”

 

While making such pointless worries.

 

The interior also hadn’t changed much in the ten years that had passed, bringing back vivid memories of that time.

 

The young boy who lay unconscious on the bed for days and the smell of medicine I had brought haphazardly to give him….

 

“Of course, it might not be a good memory for Your Highness-”

 

Thinking about it, I wondered if I had touched some childhood wound, so I awkwardly opened my mouth at that moment.

 

“How could it not be.”

 

Casian embraced me as if enveloping my entire body.

 

“-This is where I first met Rose, how could I not.”

 

His voice, which was always composed, sank low and resonated in my ear.

 

“What I didn’t know was.”

 

He tightened his embrace.

 

As if he thought I would disappear somewhere if he didn’t, it was a pitiful movement.

 

“Since Rose didn’t want to talk about it, you….”

 

Casian’s voice gradually became choked.

 

Not like the twenty-three-year-old Prince who seemed capable of handling anything, but like an eleven-year-old boy who had nowhere to rely on except a nine-year-old child.

 

“Both then and now, you wanted me not to recognize you.”

 

It wasn’t resentment, but more like a complaint.

 

“So I held back.”

 

“…You didn’t hold back completely though.”

 

When I countered as the atmosphere became too heavy, a slight hint of laughter mixed into his voice that had been endlessly sinking.

 

“It was confirmation, I might have wanted to receive compensation for saving me.”

 

“You really make people shameless.”

 

“Sorry, that was a lie.”

 

Then Casian kissed my chin and whispered while burying his lips between my neck.

 

“Actually, it was greed, wanting you to recognize me.”

 

Slowly, Casian released me from his embrace, then looked at my face and spoke with the face of an innocent boy.

 

“I hoped that the memory precious to me would have some meaning to you too.”

 

Facing that expression, unlike the original Rozelita, it seemed as if Casian’s teenage years that I hadn’t seen filled my mind.

 

The him I knew was just an eleven-year-old wounded boy and the cunning him from age twenty-one onward.

 

When I reached out my hand, he willingly offered his face.

 

Like a beast of prey disguising its sharpness as lovability, asking to be cherished, unaware of its own edge.

 

That’s why my childhood self was wary of him upon seeing him directly.

 

I wasn’t unaware that even a beast cub was ready to bite my throat at any time.

 

But had the time spent by his side deceived me?

 

Now even when he looked like a beast of prey, I found him cute, so my life was really in trouble.

 

‘Wouldn’t it be okay to stay by his side a little longer, such thoughts come to mind.’

 

Finding a way to survive in this twisted and terrifying original story should come first.

 

Nevertheless.

 

‘If I could rescue him, even briefly, from the loneliness and fear that constantly torments him.’

 

An uncharacteristic desperate emotion that must surely be a mistake had settled within me.

 

*

 

Since the cottage was honestly quite poor for winter protection, when I shivered slightly, Casian immediately lit the fireplace.

 

There weren’t even many logs prepared, but he solved that problem within minutes after wrapping me tightly in blankets and even his own outer coat.

 

“You’re really wasting your power as a Master recklessly.”

 

When I spoke while looking at the pile of neatly cut logs, Casian made a puzzled face.

 

“Is there anything more important than my precious aide not catching a cold?”

 

“…Your Highness not catching a cold?”

 

If that happened, I’d obviously have way too much work to do.

 

Then Casian smiled and placed two cups of brewed tea on the table in front of the fireplace, then sat down close beside me.

 

Soon, as if even that wasn’t enough, he undid the wrapping of his outer coat and blankets that had me bundled up, then pulled me into a tight embrace and covered us both with the blanket.

 

“You’re cold.”

 

“I was outside, wasn’t I?”

 

“You said it would be terrible if I caught a cold.”

 

“I’ll be warm soon, being next to Rose.”

 

Somehow that feels like a very suggestive comment, Your Highness.

 

Of course, I wasn’t the type to embarrass myself, so I only responded inwardly.

 

The serious atmosphere from moments ago seemed like a lie as Casian appeared to be in a very good mood.

 

Was it because I finally revealed my secret, relieving his frustration?

 

“You know what, Rose?”

 

“Yes?”

 

“Even as a child, I never once called you Wilma to deceive you.”

 

“You did call me that.”

 

“When?”

 

“Before Wilma returned, when you were trying to surprise me.”

 

“That wasn’t me calling you, though?”

 

So this is how you’re going to play it…

 

“Can’t you just let me win? I’m your life savior.”

 

So I decided to use underhanded tactics.

 

“Rose really doesn’t know.”

 

“What?”

 

“I’m always letting you win.”

 

Where exactly?!

 

When I turned my head to look at him in bewilderment, Casian also turned his body slightly toward me and smiled brightly.

 

“That’s why you’re sitting in my arms so casually right now.”

 

Somehow I felt a sudden sense of crisis and my neck grew cold.

 

When I made a shocked expression, Casian smiled and pulled me into a tight embrace again so I couldn’t see his face.

 

“I’ll keep letting you win, so don’t run away, Rose.”

 

He whispered languidly and tenderly.

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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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