The Obsessive Male Lead Is Obsessed With Me! - Chapter 72
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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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Episode 72
How much time had passed?
“…Chirp?”
Before Cecilia, Ruda regained consciousness.
“Chirp chirp? …Chirp!”
After confirming that Cecilia was still asleep, Ruda looked around, searching for Lionel.
But he had already left. Only after circling Cecilia’s bedroom four times did Ruda realize this fact, and he puffed up his tail feathers while floating in the air.
“Chiiirp!”
How dare you leave without me!
Ruda chirped with that feeling and flew to Cecilia, who was still lying in bed. Then he pressed his head against her forehead.
Through their touching foreheads, magical power flowed from Ruda into Cecilia’s body.
Because they had received a name and were perfectly connected, Ruda could now transfer his magical vessel to Cecilia.
“Chirp….”
But Ruda, or more precisely Cecilia’s instinct, didn’t want that.
If he was going to chase after Lionel all the way to the northern region to help with monster subjugation, it would be better for Ruda to have the magical vessel.
But how could he help with monster subjugation?
“Chirp, chirp…. Chirp!”
As if a good idea had occurred to him, Ruda spread both wings wide and flew high into the air.
Before leaving the bedroom, Ruda descended to Cecilia and rubbed his head against her forehead.
I’ll be back!
After leaving a farewell to his other half, the blue bird flew away without hesitation.
Toward the high peaks of Heitensan.
* * *
Was it because my body was too exhausted? My vision flickered as if I were dreaming.
Evening, when the western sky was stained blood red. The countless screams that had been heard from outside the window of the Imperial Prince’s Palace had long since turned into cheers.
The mysterious sounds from the next room—whether they were shouts, screams, laughter, or crying—gradually subsided.
Then I heard the sound of the bedroom door opening. But I stubbornly kept my gaze fixed outside the window while sitting in my chair.
After a moment, I heard a voice calling me.
“I greet Your Highness the Crown Princess.”
It was a dry voice without any emotion.
I turned around to look at the woman who was giving me a simple bow. Her face was as parched as the voice she had just used.
“Is that mockery?”
“I don’t understand what you mean.”
“The Crown Prince is no longer the Crown Prince, so why do you call me that?”
In today’s rebellion, the Emperor and Empress died, and my husband, the First Prince, lost his position.
Seeing that the sounds from the next room had completely stopped, there was a high probability that he too had met his death. It was probably a death with the same content as the oracle.
What ultimately drove him to death? His shattered dream of becoming the next emperor? The humiliation of having everything he possessed taken away by someone who had been stealing from him his whole life? The realization that if he endured like this, all that would be given to him would be shame and mockery?
Anyway, since he had lost everything, I was no longer the Crown Princess either.
Archbishop Nicole also seemed to belatedly realize this fact. She looked at me for a moment and then spoke quietly.
“Lady Cecilia Roheim. Would it be appropriate to address you this way?”
“Just call me Cecilia.”
It had been three years since the Roheim surname fell away from my name. Now the word Roheim felt quite unfamiliar.
“Lady Cecilia.”
Come to think of it, it had been quite a long time since I was called that.
After entering the Imperial Palace, no one called my name.
I suddenly realized. Among the things I had lost, my name was included too.
“What happens to me now? The guillotine? Hanging? …Ah, you can’t do that, can you? Since my fate hasn’t been completed yet.”
A sneer escaped my lips, but Archbishop Nicole showed no reaction.
She simply moved her lips quietly with her gaze lowered.
“I feel sorry for you.”
“What are you sorry about?”
“….”
Archbishop Nicole didn’t answer.
I didn’t care about the nature of the guilt she felt toward me at this point. So I asked a different question.
“If you harbored enough ill feelings toward the Imperial Family to plot rebellion, why did you treat the First Prince?”
“….”
“Did you do it on purpose for that person’s despair? Because the higher you lift someone, the greater the shock when they fall?”
“Because I didn’t know then.”
Archbishop Nicole finally looked me straight in the eye. As if she could be confident about this issue alone.
“I didn’t know then that what I had to do was revenge, not atonement.”
-Aaaaah!
Just then, a terrible scream came from outside the window. It was a chilling scream that made one imagine death.
While I unconsciously rubbed my shoulders, Archbishop Nicole, who had likewise been looking outside the window, looked at me and said.
“The Roheim family owes me a debt. I will send you back home.”
“Home?”
Even though I had reached the climax of tragedy, I laughed. It was such an absurd word.
Was there still a place I could call home now?
“You won’t be able to appear in public places, and you won’t be able to use your name anymore either….”
“Can I really do that?”
I raised my left hand high toward the air.
The ring with a gem so large it seemed burdensome for my finger was like shackles.
It truly was, in that I hadn’t put it on by my own will and couldn’t take it off.
“This is your fate, you can’t help it…. Because of those words, I had to take the hand of a man I despised and enter this place. But since that fate hasn’t been completed, I can’t even die.”
Even though I knew it was meaningless, I removed the ring that had been on my left ring finger and dropped it on the floor.
Clang, clang. The gem was so large that the ring couldn’t even roll, just bounced a few times before stopping, and it shone brilliantly even on the floor thick with blood and dust.
“Now you tell me to go home? No, I’ll stay here. Because that’s my fate.”
“But….”
Archbishop Nicole, who had opened her mouth as if to persuade me, suddenly showed an expression as if she had realized something belatedly.
“Don’t tell me you…!”
Seeming to know what thought had occurred to her, I simply smiled sweetly.
Just then, the half-closed door opened with a creaking sound as if announcing someone’s presence.
Beyond it stood Lionel, the main character of this rebellion, holding a sword dripping with blood in one hand.
“Lio….”
Did he know that the word I unconsciously uttered was his name?
The violet eyes staring this way had no reason in them, just like the other Holy Knights.
I never knew that the fate of rising to a lofty position regardless of one’s own will would be fulfilled in this way.
If I had known that your fate was to be caught up in someone else’s revenge and reduced to a tool. If I had known that your will would completely disappear from this world….
Tears I couldn’t hold back flowed down my cheeks. Through my wet vision, he was approaching me with his sword drawn.
“Lio.”
When I called you that, you used to call my name as if answering, and you’re still as vivid as a dream. But now I’ll never hear my name from you until the day I die.
Do you know this feeling of wanting to rather die by being stabbed with that sword?
I stood looking straight at him.
Whatever you give me, I’ll like it.
Pushing away the last tear hanging on my eyelid, I closed my eyes.
Heavy footsteps stopped right in front of me. I held my breath to feel his presence.
But what I heard next wasn’t his breathing, but the sound of his sword falling to the floor.
Then thick arms like iron chains wrapped around my waist.
Blood-stained hands gripped my back hard as if to leave scars. I was trapped in his embrace like that.
Tears gushed forth incomparably more than before.
Now I have neither the right to be held in your arms nor the right to cling to you.
“Lionel, I am….”
My vision became a mess from the tears that wouldn’t stop, and I couldn’t see anything.
But there was one thing I could feel.
The hot, rough breath of a man like flames touching my lips.
* * *
“Cecil!”
The moment I opened my eyes wide, I could feel tears flowing down the corners of my eyes.
The lingering emotions from the dream pressed hard against my tear ducts.
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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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