The Male Lead Is Trying To Tame Me With Money - Chapter 89

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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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89.

What the hell kind of crazy talk is this?

Casian reached out and grabbed my hair like a rope, rubbing it against his cheek.

“…Thank you.”

He even said words of gratitude so gently.

‘This isn’t like your personality at all…!’

I screamed inwardly.

At the same time, I realized again that whatever circumstances there might be, what the Emperor had done to Casian was wrong.

Without realizing it, the sympathy I had been building up for the Emperor over the past few days crumbled away.

Because it made no sense for a seven-year-old child to wish for death.

I hurriedly said.

“No, you’re going to live.”

“…Why?”

The child was rather puzzled by my words.

Does there need to be a reason to live?

Everyone has the right to wish for happiness, the right to dream of tomorrow, so why should a mere seven-year-old child have to question that?

I don’t really know.

Maybe it’s because I’m not a great philosopher, because I’m not a leader with grand political goals.

But no matter how great the goal, if it’s worth enough to make a child who hasn’t even lost all their baby teeth wish to die, should it really be realized?

I couldn’t help but think that way.

But my insight was too narrow, so only trite words came to mind.

I took out a handkerchief and carefully wiped around Casian’s sweat-soaked forehead and face as I cautiously spoke.

“…I need to meet with Your Highness.”

“…The grim reaper?”

After a demon, now a grim reaper?

But right now I was the older one and young Casian looked so pitiful, so I decided to be generous.

“I’m not a grim reaper.”

“…Then what?”

Each time he asked like that, curiosity and vitality began to settle over his previously forlorn young eyes.

If my fumbling, childish words could give him strength, I could say them as much as needed.

It’s not like being teased by Casian was a one or two day thing anyway.

“Your Highness and I need to become demons together later.”

Though I couldn’t give him very cool and hopeful words.

Come to think of it, telling a seven-year-old that he’d become a demon when he grew up might just bring despair.

“…When?”

As expected, my future boss had even brighter, more sparkling eyes.

I don’t know why he was happy about such words even then.

“When Your Highness grows up healthy and strong, much taller than me.”

“…After a hundred sleeps?”

Meeting my younger self was only 4 more years to endure, but being called the Winter Palace demons was still 14 years away….

Thinking that, I remembered Joel using 100 to mean something very big.

To a seven-year-old, even just a hundred nights would be a very, very long concept.

Prince Joel had cried asking if he could see Empress Trisha after ten sleeps.

I swallowed my pitiful feelings and, recognizing that the child before me was young Casian, decided to tell him the possibly cruel truth.

“After a hundred nights pass dozens of times.”

“….”

Casian stayed quietly for a moment while maintaining eye contact with me.

As if thinking hard about something even with his fevered head.

And soon he asked again.

“Really, truly you’ll see me?”

At that earnest question, I firmly grasped his small hand and nodded.

“Yes, really and truly.”

The moment I answered that way, his smile nearly made my heart drop in a different sense.

‘…You weren’t lying, Your Highness.’

It was a fatally lovely smile.

Even more so than Prince Joel.

At the same time, seeing the space distort, I thought ‘oh no’ and hurriedly got up.

‘…At this rate, I’ll suddenly appear in His Highness’s bedchamber!’

I’m telling you, that’s too harsh a condition for an ordinary person like me!

Please patch the difficulty!

*

To put it simply.

“…Rose?”

I failed to escape in time.

“…Even though we’re engaged, this is rather sudden.”

And became a shameless person.

The timing of my return happened to be right after Casian had spoken to the Palace Physicians and come out after washing.

Between failing to escape the room and being treated as shameless by Casian, or suddenly appearing in front of Casian’s door and confusing the Royal Guards, which would have been the better choice?

Of course, as an extremely ordinary person, I didn’t really have a choice and ended up trapped in Casian’s room.

“…Why are you coming out of the bathroom not fully dressed?”

Of course, the moment I saw the excellent curves and thickness I’d encountered after so long—well, anyway, his upper body—I immediately turned around.

I was definitely not a voluntary pervert.

“It’s not like I have servants attend my bath.”

“…I’m sorry, it wasn’t intentional anyway.”

Thank you so much for covering your lower half when you came out.

I almost had to submit my resignation.

The temperature difference was really too extreme.

Just moments ago I’d been looking at seven-year-old adorable angel-like Casian, and now I was facing 23-year-old Casian who had grown up sturdy, was cunning and demon-like but still pretty.

Really, this damn original story….

While I was glaring at the innocent scroll, he suddenly pulled me from behind.

“I’m fully dressed now.”

“…I’m sorry.”

Even at his nonchalant words, I apologized once more.

It must be unpleasant anyway—both someone suddenly appearing in his room and showing his naked body, even if just the upper half.

“It’s not the first time, so why be so formal now.”

“…That was because you showed me.”

“This time Rose saw me?”

“It wasn’t my intention.”

“It would be fine if it was your intention.”

It would be even better if it was, Casian muttered something strange.

If not for this situation, I almost would have asked if he’d developed exhibitionism too.

As I was still covering my face out of shame, Casian kissed my cheeks and chin just like that.

“Hmm, Rose being here means that thing happened?”

“…Yes.”

“So it wasn’t a dream.”

At that answer, Casian kissed my hair with an audible smack.

“…Yes?”

“You kept your promise very well.”

“Uh….”

I turned my head with surprised eyes to look at him at those words.

“This cleared up one of my curiosities too.”

Me too, I said inwardly, while my eyes widened endlessly.

So going back to that past wasn’t simply going back to the past?!

*

“You never told me.”

“Because I didn’t know you were Rose?”

After calming down somewhat and having a thorough conversation, I realized that Casian remembered.

For me it had been just moments ago, but for him it must have been something that happened dozens of times over hundreds of nights.

“I really thought it was a dream, I was happy thinking a very lovely grim reaper had come to take me away.”

“…But you were obsessed with the word ‘demons,’ Set.”

At my sulky words, Casian burst into quiet laughter.

“That was because I was happy that a childhood dream seemed to have come true, but wouldn’t Rose have done the same?”

I found myself agreeing with those words.

Even if you met someone as beautiful as the current Casian in childhood, especially if that person disappeared like a mirage in an instant.

Looking at me like that, Casian showed the same loving smile as back then.

“Thank you for not abandoning me.”

I’d heard similar words several times before.

But the resonance was completely different.

Just a few hours ago, at the moment of choice I was given, if I had made a different choice, what would the scene before my eyes be like now?

Could Rozelita Salice have lived peacefully in the Salice Barony?

I unconsciously reached my hand toward his face.

From the way he obediently entrusted himself to me, his trust in me was clearly conveyed.

He always says I saved him and expresses gratitude, but.

“You know, Ian.”

“Yeah.”

The name that still wasn’t completely familiar on my tongue came out quite naturally.

As if it belonged in this place.

“I’m not the only one who saved you.”

“Then?”

“You found me and came to me.”

Enduring and persevering in this Imperial Palace that was only difficult, lonely, and painful.

Making it so nine-year-old me could save you, and then you, who sustained that difficult life, found me again.

That’s how my current life could be in this place.

“So thank you for not giving up on finding me.”

Holding back and enduring words about facts that would have been too harsh for a seven-year-old child.

“Thank you for waiting through thousands of nights.”

*

That evening, Casian Artez showed an indescribable expression.

It was truly an indescribable face that I could only express as something I would probably never forget.

After finishing all our stories, we were a little embarrassed and covered it up with work talk out of habit.

Even so, it was a day when something seemed to suddenly pierce my heart.

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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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