The Nerd Next Door Turned Out To Be The Magic Tower Master - Chapter 36

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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 36
The diary entries did not continue long after that. Several months passed, the year itself changed, and on one ordinary day, Cecilia left behind a brief entry.

Cecilia traced the final sentence with her fingertip—it rose unevenly, as if stained with tears. The smudged handwriting looked less like writing than like sobbing itself.
She turned the page with an unsettled heart, but the diary ended there.
Cecilia closed the diary, her brow furrowing.
The strange dream Cecilia had dreamed. Herself, waking in Cecilia’s body. And the contents of that final entry.
Had Cecilia truly been murdered? Had she seized this vacant body because the original owner was already dead?
If so, then the person who killed her and the one now hunting her own life were likely the same. Seeing “Cecilia” walking about unharmed, the killer might believe their crime had failed—and now be attempting it again.
If her reasoning was correct, only one question remained.
“Who killed Cecilia?”
She murmured the question aloud—one she knew would never be answered—while stroking Charles, or rather Resti, who had climbed into her lap.
* * *
The shocking diary, carefully hidden for good reason, was tucked back into its place.
She’d thought this was some romantic fantasy where she could simply choose a male lead and fall in love. Instead, it was a brutal survival thriller where assassination could strike at any moment.
The reality was horrifying, but she forced herself to focus on recovery. She couldn’t hunt down the killer or make plans if her body remained weak.
According to Melanie, she’d lost consciousness and been ill for a full two days.
Cecilia forced down thin broth, endured the bitter medicines Nox brought, and most importantly, bathed in the Divine Power of the healing priests. Within four days, she’d recovered well enough to move about.
“You should be able to manage light walks now.”
And now, a week after the accident.
The physician, his face noticeably brighter, completed his final examination.
Cecilia nodded calmly at the good news. Normally she’d have bolted to the Garden like a puppy released from confinement. Instead, she locked herself away in the Study.
An isolated space.
Sitting before blank paper, Cecilia tapped the pen nib against the desk.
Everything she’d planned before the drowning had shifted in priority.
First, she had to find who was behind the attack. Then, as quickly as possible, figure out how to return to the original world.
For a moment, those violet eyes watching only her from beneath the great old tree flickered in her mind, as did those white fingers desperately clinging to a brief confession. She shook her head.
‘Romance is the last thing I need right now.’
As long as she might be murdered at any moment, escaping this world had to come first.
‘But who could have orchestrated the accident…?’
Based on the diary and what she’d directly experienced, there was definitely someone after Cecilia’s life.
But who could the killer be?
‘Cecilia’s family? Or someone from the Webadin Mansion staff?’
But none of them had motive to kill her.
It was painfully obvious how genuinely concerned they all were for her.
‘Then the Temple people?’
Novels often cast clergy as hidden masterminds behind the scenes, trading on their reputation for integrity—but they too lacked motive. So long as Cecilia bore the title of Saint, the Temple had no reason to harm her.
That left only one suspect.
Someone who would find the Saint—the Temple’s very face—an eyesore. A group that stood to gain from her disappearance.
‘It has to be the Imperial Court.’
It might be Dilanshe’s doing, the Court’s instrument, as the Marquis suspected. Or perhaps the Court itself had sent someone.
Either way, there had to be “someone” taking orders and carrying them out.
That “someone” likely already knew Cecilia had visited the Temple on the day of the glass window accident, and also knew about her secret departure.
…There was only one person who fit.
‘Lien.’
Ridiculous how that beautiful face troubled her mind again, despite all her efforts to push it away.
[Please, once more. Just once more, tell me.]
That image of him, ears flushed red with pleading, was still so vivid.
Cecilia forced herself to set aside his expression, his voice, everything about him. She examined his actions with as much objectivity as she could muster.
Looking back, suspiciously, Lien had been present at every accident. When her head nearly shattered against the glass window. When the axeman appeared before her as if on cue. Even when she fell into the water.
There were too many strange coincidences. The accidents only began after she met him.
And wasn’t it more plausible that a Mage Tower Master had come to the Marquis’s house to eliminate a prospective Saint, rather than to inquire about Divine Power?
Cecilia set down the pen and picked up the necklace sitting in the corner of the table. The amber pendant was shattered, hanging by only a thread.
It was the necklace Lien had given her.
‘The trace of magic that the Archbishop and higher noticed—it might be connected to this pendant.’
Her memory wasn’t clear from the chaos of it all, but at the moment the pendant shattered, her Divine Power returned, and her feet found purchase on solid ground.
‘That’ Lien was her would-be murderer.
Yet there remained too many inconsistencies to accept such a conclusion outright.
Lien had even resorted to Time Magic to save her. When threatened by ruffians, he’d come running with desperate urgency.
And if Lien had approached her deliberately, it made no sense—she was the one who’d burst into his home uninvited, the one who’d proposed friendship first.
Moreover, Lien only descended to Webadin Territory months after her possession had already taken hold.
The timing didn’t align with when the real Cecilia had faced threats to her life.
And most of all…….
[Cecilia.]
A voice always trembling with anticipation.
[Your hand—you’ve hurt it!]
Warm skin pressing close with genuine concern.
[This time, I swear I’ll protect you.]
A gaze so single-minded it ached.
[You mustn’t worry about anything. Nothing at all.]
The curve of his lips, the flush creeping across his cheeks—those couldn’t have been false. They couldn’t be.
No. She wanted to believe they weren’t false.
She was exhaling the weight of her mounting anguish when the knock came.
Tap, tap.
The sound shattered the silence. It was Melanie.
“Excuse me, Miss. Your tutor is here to visit you. What shall I do?”
“My tutor?”
“Your etiquette instructor, ma’am.”
Cecilia’s entire body went rigid. Of all times to call. She still didn’t have the courage to face him.
She was about to refuse, but Melanie spoke first.
“He’s actually been coming every day since you collapsed, Miss. The Marquis just wouldn’t allow him in, so he’d leave empty-handed each time.”
‘Was he trying to confirm I was still alive? To check on my condition?’
The sudden thought made her bite her lip hard.
Even hearing that he’d been so steadfast in his visits, suspicion crept in unbidden—did she deserve to see Lien at all?
After a long moment of deliberation, Cecilia reluctantly nodded.
“Take him to the Reception Room, would you? I’ll be right down.”
A momentary escape couldn’t be the answer. Better to examine him with her own eyes.
Resolved, Cecilia rose from her bed.
She arrived at the Reception Room entrance.
In the center of the sun-drenched space stood a man in a familiar robe, perfectly still.
“Cecilia!”
Spotting her in the doorway, Lien strode forward eagerly.
He gently grasped her fingertips and tumbled out a rush of questions.
“Are you—are you well? Is there anywhere that still pains you? Your temperature seems a touch lower than before. You don’t have lingering complications, do you?”
Now, seeing his face clearly for the first time, Lien looked far too pale—as though it were he who’d been lying ill in bed, not her.
The sight left Cecilia momentarily stunned.
Those trembling hands, those eyes ready to spill tears at any moment.
‘Could it all be a lie?’
In that instant, the emotion that flooded through her was impossible to name—was it betrayal, rage, or sorrow?
But what remained unmistakable was discomfort.
Cecilia quietly withdrew her hand from his grasp. She forced a smile to mask her turmoil.
“The Temple sent many healing priests to me, so I’m nearly recovered now. I heard you’ve been visiting so faithfully—you must have worried quite a bit.”
“I was terrified you might not wake. Even knowing it was impossible to think such things, the anxiety consumed me. I came here without permission, even knowing you need rest. I apologize.”
Lien closed his empty hands into tight fists as he offered his apology.
His muted voice carried nothing but urgency and dread.
So much so that it was impossible to believe he was being false.
‘Is he sincere?’
Had she misunderstood an innocent person? The truth was, her only evidence that he was connected to the Imperial Court or that he was the one who’d tried to harm her was circumstantial suspicion.
And yet…….
Lien remained the most compelling suspect she’d narrowed down from an objective standpoint.
As her confusion deepened, Lien reached into his robe and withdrew something.

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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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