The Villainess is on a Quest - Chapter 38

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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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Episode 38
But hope shattered against the dead end that rose before her almost at once.
Trapped like a rat in a poison chamber, Aine saw the Masked Assailant.
The Masked Assailant, watching Aine cornered at the dead end, licked his lips. He embraced the hope that he would finally be able to kill her.
Aine stared at the gloomy sky for a moment, then spoke.
“Who are you?”
“So you’ve grown curious about me?”
“Yes. More precisely, I’m curious about Letaria—the organization you belong to.”
The Masked Assailant’s expression hardened in an instant. Yet he smiled bitterly and spoke.
“I didn’t expect you to know about us. But why should I tell you that?”
“Even for someone about to die, you could show a little mercy, couldn’t you?”
“Did the Orion Kingdom show mercy to my dead brother!”
The Masked Assailant’s face turned fierce, and he swung his sword. Aine barely dodged and staggered backward.
“If it weren’t for you people of the Orion Kingdom, my brother would still be alive! If it weren’t for you!”
She could not deny the Masked Assailant’s words.
It was true that countless people had died because of war. So many had perished for their homeland, their family, their honor—for so many different things.
“So I’ll kill you and punish the people of the Orion Kingdom thoroughly.”
But Aine could not accept Letaria’s course of action.
“That’s sophistry.”
“What?”
“If you truly wanted to prevent a second victim like your brother, you’d end the war—not continue it.”
At her mockery, the Masked Assailant’s face flushed crimson. His contorted expression had become positively monstrous.
He dropped the sword in his hand to the ground and moved toward Aine.
“Don’t mock me. Don’t you dare! Someone like you deserves to die in agony!”
Again, as before, he came at her throat.
As her breath was cut off and her vision blurred, Aine found herself recalling the faces of those who had stood beside her, one by one.
And in the moment when Rayshe’s face—the one who had died before her—appeared last of all, a single thought formed.
‘I suppose I won’t see you. Too much blood stains these hands of mine.’
I’m sorry, Wilhelm. I couldn’t protect you to the end.
As she prepared to depart with that regret alone, her eyes slowly closing, one presence came to mind. A man who had always treated her with kindness.
“Aine!!”
Had her ears already begun to fail her, or was she imagining it in her desperate longing to hear it? Amid her doubt, a warmth touched her skin.
“Come back! Aine!”
It was Cled, calling out to her with tears streaming down his face.
‘So it was real.’
She wanted to call his name, but Aine lost consciousness.
* * *
‘Where am I?’
No matter how she looked around, everything was pitch-black darkness. She could not tell where she was.
When she called out, all that answered was silence.
In this place where she felt no presence at all, Aine recalled the last scene she had witnessed.
‘Am I dead?’
She had been chased by the Masked Assailant, strangled, until Cled appeared and cut him down with his blade. But by Aine’s reckoning, he had come too late.
Her breath had already been nearly severed. Even if it weren’t, could she truly say her neck was still intact?
She must have died wretchedly. As that thought took hold, the idea came to her that perhaps this place was Hell.
Someone like her, who had driven so many to their deaths, could never hope for Heaven.
“Why do you think that way?”
“…Rayshe?”
But it was different. A voice she thought she would never hear again reached her ears.
Five years had passed since they last spoke. The final time they had met, Rayshe was already gone—only her corpse remained.
The voice and warmth were long forgotten, yet that voice was unmistakably Rayshe’s.
Startled, Aine looked around, but still only darkness surrounded her.
“I missed you. Aine.”
“Where are you? Rayshe. Show yourself to me.”
With trembling hands, she reached desperately for Rayshe, but could not touch anything. All that came was her voice.
“Aine. You are not evil.”
She wanted to speak with Rayshe at all costs, but suddenly her throat closed. Unable to utter any words, she sank to the ground.
“That person doesn’t wish for us to speak, it seems.”
Who did she mean? Who had stolen every sound from her throat?
The cruelty of it was overwhelming, and a tear slipped down her cheek. But then something warm touched her face.
“Don’t cry. Aine. I don’t want to see you cry.”
The warmth radiating from inches away—it had to be Rayshe’s. In that gentle heat, Aine felt both comfort and a deep, aching longing.
If only she could stay like this forever. But all too soon, the warmth faded from her cheek, withdrawing slowly into nothing.
“You shouldn’t be here yet. So go back. Aine.”
What was she saying? The words were hard to grasp. But as Rayshe’s voice reached her, sleep crashed down like a wave.
Aine wanted to stay with her, wanted to keep talking—wanted it desperately.
Yet she had no strength to resist the tide pulling her under.
“Never forget me. Aine. But that man—I’ll allow it. From what I’ve seen, he passes.”
Her eyes were shutting, consciousness slipping away, when that voice reached her one last time.
“Please watch over this child. She is no longer the person you once knew.”
* * *
When Aine’s eyes opened, it was the dead of night. She gasped for breath, her chest heaving, and looked around. She was in the same room she’d stayed in before—here at the Chesher Mansion.
‘Was it all just a dream?’
The memories were too vivid to be mere dreams, yet the sound of movement beside the bed made her turn her head.
“Your Highness?”
There, slumped against the headboard, was Cled asleep. Aine wondered if she was still dreaming.
He was neither doctor nor nurse—so why was he keeping vigil here? She tried to sit up, but her wrist was suddenly caught.
“It’s still the middle of the night.”
More than the tangible sensation of his grip, what startled Aine was the warmth. It was the same gentle heat she’d felt on her cheek moments before.
Cled’s eyes were not yet fully awake, his gaze still drowsy. She found herself staring at him, uncertain.
Dressed in comfortable indoor robes, he somehow stirred something in her—a sudden, inexplicable thirst.
“Sleep a little longer. Your body still hasn’t fully recovered.”
“Ah.”
Cled pressed her back down. She meant to protest that she’d slept enough, that she was fine—but her body refused to obey her will.
Aine drifted back into sleep. She heard someone exhale in relief beside her.
In her last glimpse of his face before sleep claimed her again, she thought she saw sorrow etched there.
* * *
“Really, you gave us such a fright!”
“Why on earth didn’t you just run away then and there!”
“I’m sorry, Mane. Forgive me, Emilia.”
The moment Aine woke, two visitors arrived as if they’d been waiting, and she was subjected to a difficult hour.
Mane, tears streaming down her face as though she might weep at any moment, and Emilia, her jaw set with anger, scolded her in perfect unison.
Mane had been affected by the Legtret Incense like the other servants, while Emilia had noticed Aine standing motionless even as she fled.
“If it weren’t for me sending Wilhelm after you, what would’ve happened if you’d just stood there like a fool!”
“Emilia.”
Emilia stood with arms crossed, her expression stern as she stared at Aine.
“Did you think I’d thank you? Did you think I’d be grateful that we barely survived because you threw yourself away?”
Aine braced herself for a blow across the cheek—but instead, Emilia pulled her into a fierce embrace.
“Don’t ever do something like that again.”
“I’m sorry, Emilia.”
“Don’t apologize. It’s not you who should be sorry—it’s me.”
After holding her tightly for a moment, Emilia pulled back, her face flushed red.
Aine wore a bitter smile, biting back the words that nearly escaped her lips—that if such a situation arose again, she would make the same choice.
“Could everyone please step outside for a moment?”
“Your Highness. But—”
“Just for a brief moment. I have something urgent to discuss with her alone.”

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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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