The Obsessive Male Leads Want to Eat Me Alive - Chapter 74

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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 74
I could feel how long she had carried those words in her heart.
It was a confession of utmost sincerity.
We gazed at each other for a moment.
I smiled slowly.
At the ten-year-old Kyle. And perhaps at the shy Baby Squirrel mask who had hoped I would remember him.
Somehow, I felt I hadn’t smiled enough for those boys.
Kyle smiled back at me. The time we spent looking at each other and smiling was warm, and strangely, a little ticklish.
Watching that man smile with dimples, someone came to mind unexpectedly.
“…How is Marquis Winston doing?”
My patron, the one who made me feel unconditional affection from an adult for the first time.
I thought of him from time to time.
When I struggled alone, when loneliness for family overwhelmed me, I thought of Kyle and Bijae Winston.
Those kind people who had tried to welcome me as ‘family’.
That alone warmed my heart.
It became a source of strength in my solitary life.
Though our meeting was but a fleeting moment, it remained warmth within me still.
“Father is….”
Kyle hesitated slightly, gauging my reaction. He recalled what Bijae Winston had said.
“Son, don’t tell my story to our future daughter-in-law.”
“Why shouldn’t I tell her?”
“She might feel burdened. A man who makes a lady feel burdened is the worst.”
Bijae Winston had said.
“I dream of being a wonderful father-in-law.”
―I wasn’t sure why he dreamed of such a thing (usually the dream stops at being a wonderful husband).
“Kyle.”
“Yes?”
Just as Kyle fell into thought, Anette called to him.
Her jade-green eyes shone as she spoke.
―She read Kyle’s hesitant expression with keen perception.
“The reason I came here is because I wanted to hear everything honestly.”
“….”
“I want to know everything. What happened during the time I didn’t know.”
“My father operated an information broker called Kirke.”
“…!”
“The boy who wore a phantom mask and helped with the escape from the Forest, the one who operated Kirke—that is my father.”
“What?”
That Phantom Boy was Bijae Winston?!
I asked in surprise.
“But he seemed like such a young boy, probably not even fifteen…?”
‘Isn’t this rejuvenation far too dramatic?’
No matter how youthful he appears, how many years has he shed, Father?
‘And his hair was black….’
He had been a boy of modest stature.
Of course, I’d assumed he was in disguise, but I never dreamed in a million years that the two were the same person.
Kyle smiled at my shock and politely extended his hand.
“Shall we walk together for a moment?”
“I’d like that.”
The story seemed intriguing enough to warrant hearing it while strolling.
We began walking together.
Along the Lakeside, where the flowers of the clear afternoon bloomed brilliantly.
Kyle began by speaking of the Winston Family.
“Since the previous generation, the Winston Family has engaged in two pursuits. In the light, we’ve served as the Empire’s sword, conducting the work of the Demon Subjugation Corps.”
“….”
“In the shadows, we operated as information brokers for the Guild.”
Oh my, this isn’t in the original work at all.
It felt precisely like reading an entertaining side story, so I focused intently on his words, my eyes gleaming with interest.
“My father is the twenty-seventh Family Head and the leader of the twenty-seventh Guild, Kirke, operating under the alias ‘Balrok.'”
“….”
“To conceal our identity in the shadows, we utilized masks. Masks that transform one’s appearance.”
“Ah, that Phantom Boy mask!”
“Indeed.”
A Phantom Boy mask that changes one’s appearance, no less.
Moreover, it was a Guild with the expertise to sever Gerard’s pursuit for over a decade.
Certainly, I could feel the remarkable accomplishments of the Winston ancestors who had operated for so many years while concealing their true identities.
Following Kyle, I crossed through clusters of flowers and walked around the perimeter of the Lakeside.
Several squirrels followed behind us in quick little steps.
It was like a scene from a fairy tale.
I spoke.
“So that’s why the Phantom Boy mask is Marquis Biije….”
He had given me tremendous help that defied all reason, and yet he had never asked for anything in return.
Suddenly, words he’d once spoken to me came to mind.
Long ago, when I first settled on Bayonere Island, he had said.
“Just use the name Anette.”
“…But wouldn’t it be easier to evade pursuit by changing my name?”
“Living in hiding by changing your name is like living the life of a criminal. Every time others call you by a different name, you’d be reminded of your fugitive existence, and your heart would grow unhappy.”
Looking back now, it was such thoughtful consideration.
―Warmth blooming in my chest.
“I’ll ensure your pursuers are cut off for good. So start a happy new life here. Understood?”
“Yes!”
“Anette is a common name in these parts, so don’t worry about it.”
Of course, changing my name would have made it easier to break the trail of pursuit.
…He truly cherished me.
He wished only for my happiness.
My patron did.
I understood that sentiment well enough.
‘Because I felt the same way.’
There were times when I too yearned desperately for the happiness of certain boys, and nothing else.
Though it was a love I hadn’t consciously recognized, the realization that I’d been receiving it abundantly all this time warmed my chest.
“If I’d known such a thing, I should have treated the Phantom Boy far better.”
I spoke with a touch of remorse.
“I was always so stingy, like some miserly old codger, trying to save even a single gold coin.”
The flame-wielding self-employed worker was perpetually obsessed with cost-cutting, forever hoarding coins in pursuit of the “cost-effective Phantom Boy”—and indeed, five years later, I’d become the “half-price boy.”
―No, now I’ve turned into quite the ungrateful wretch, haven’t I?
Kyle chuckled softly.
Then he gazed at me with those familiar emerald eyes, so tender and warm.
“You treated me more than well enough.”
“….”
“Once or twice a year, on the days I met you, you smiled brightly the entire time.”
He stood with his hands clasped behind his back, smiling gently.
“You’d say you’d met such a lovely and endearing lady today.”
…Now I feel even worse, sob.
To think he smiled so radiantly even while being exploited at half price like some fool.
‘I’m sorry for being an ungrateful beneficiary, my patron.’
“Next time we meet, I must offer you my sincere gratitude.”
My conscience is absolutely screaming at me.
“Especially since you saved me from Gerard. I was truly grateful when we escaped―”
At that moment, Kyle, who had been listening, covered his handsome face with his hand and smiled faintly.
“Ah, that was me. Master.”
“Pardon?”
“It was I who came to your aid that day.”
My eyes widened in shock.
What, the ten-year-old little Bamtoli helped me?
He even shot a magic gun so skillfully and looked incredibly cool doing it.
‘The Winston Family truly is remarkable.’
Earlier, while discussing how I’d drifted into the Forest, I’d already heard the explanation that he’d been deployed to Demon Subjugation Corps sites since he was eight years old.
―Now it finally made sense.
A shy ten-year-old boy who wielded a magic gun with lethal precision and boldly rescued a girl from a prince—the very same person as the Phantom Boy.
This pure-hearted, strikingly handsome young man wearing square-framed glasses, so remarkably bashful―
The same person as the head of Larva, bearing the epithet of a cruel murderer.
‘That’s certainly possible.’
This man seemed to have many different facets to him.
“But I’m curious about something.”
“Anything at all.”
“What happened to Kirke after that?”
After saving me, more than ten years had passed, and Kirke and Balrok had vanished.
In their place, a new Larva and Kine had emerged.
I was curious about what had transpired in between.
Kyle’s answer was somewhat shocking to me.
“Kirke was disbanded. My father and I spent over ten years with the Demon Subjugation Corps, evading Gerard’s pursuit.”
“….”
Without realizing it, I stopped walking.
Kyle turned to face me slowly and spoke.
“We cut off Gerard’s pursuit of a certain girl, and fought demons on the outskirts.”
“….”
“And six months ago, I established Larva and returned to Bayonere.”
“What did you just say?”
Because of me―
An entire family’s fate had been altered?
Of course, I had suspected that clashing with Gerard, who was known for his persistence, would make it difficult for a family of imperial merit to remain unscathed.
But to disband entirely and hide on the outskirts.
‘A father and son spending over ten years on the battlefield….’
All for me alone.
A boy barely into his teens would have found the battlefield far from gentle as he grew.
If he came to Bayonere six months ago, he must have bloodied himself in his coming-of-age ceremony on that very battlefield.
My chest grew heavy.
I bit my lip before managing to ask.
“Why did you help me to such an extent?”
“….”
Kyle fell silent.
With those deep green eyes I once thought resembled a marsh, he gazed at me quietly.
His gaze held a profound thirst.
He cradled my hands with both of his and pressed his face against them.
Lowering his brows, he whispered.
“Because it’s you. There exists no reason more absolute than that.”
―His breath was warm.
“My master.”
It was a reason I couldn’t believe.
“What am I, exactly….”
Kyle Winston slowly knelt on one knee at the Lakeside, where the sunset was descending.
Before I knew it, we had circled round and round, only to arrive at that place once more.
―A lilac grove so fragrant it stole one’s breath away.
Kyle withdrew a small box from his embrace and opened it toward Anette.
It was a ring.
When she asked what he truly was, he simply answered her thus.
“I am everything that belongs to you.”
In that moment when her heart grew strangely warm, his full lips moved.
―With eyes as deep and fathomless as a swamp, eyes that had yearned for her alone.
“Anette.”
Her throat trembled as she swallowed.
“Will you marry me?”

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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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