The Villainess is on a Quest - Chapter 40

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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 39
If Wilhelm suffered from Amnesia, why did he call her mother? The Imperial Physician explained it this way.
“Given his young age, the trauma from the Eternal Nightmare may have caused shock to his brain.”
“Is such a thing possible?”
“Our brains are remarkably fragile, you see.”
Even minor pain can damage the brain severely. This meant that stored information within it had suffered a critical error.
Aine felt lost.
‘One mountain after another.’
She had only just escaped the Eternal Nightmare, and now he had lost his memories. Standing apart at a distance, she watched Wilhelm beside Kleid.
Wilhelm smiled brightly as befitted his age, waving cheerfully toward Aine.
Watching him, Aine found herself thinking that perhaps this situation wasn’t entirely terrible.
‘At least those dreadful memories would be gone too.’
Everything that had happened in the Royal Palace during those five years without her.
The deaths of precious people like Leicy, the betrayal of her uncle Binet, and her own situation dying within the Eternal Nightmare.
All too cruel for a five-year-old child to endure. If his memories had truly vanished, it seemed better to tell him the truth later, or perhaps to act as if it had never happened at all. Aine asked the Imperial Physician.
“Is it possible to recover lost memories?”
Recovering memories—the Imperial Physician took a sip of tea before answering.
“There are quite a few people around us who lose their memories. They often recover them suddenly at some point.”
The Imperial Physician gazed at Aine and smiled faintly at the corners of his mouth.
“It seems to me, Lady Aine Kleine, that you would prefer he did not recover them. But I must warn you.”
“A warning?”
The Imperial Physician then turned his gaze toward Wilhelm, regarding the boy with eyes like those of a grandfather observing his grandson.
“Do not confuse the child. His brain requires even greater care. Should his memories become tangled, his brain could be damaged irreparably.”
With only those words left behind, the Imperial Physician withdrew from the room. Did that warning about not letting memories become tangled mean she should not destroy the world the child inhabited?
Lost in thought, she hadn’t noticed Wilhelm approaching until he wrapped his arms around her.
“Mother? Are you all right?”
When Aine heard him call her that, just as she had the first time, she still didn’t know how to respond.
This child’s mother was Leicy, not herself. Because of that, Aine found it difficult to answer his words.
Unable to move forward or back, Wilhelm’s expression grew dark.
“Did I do something wrong?”
At his question, Aine bit her lip.
“M-Mother?”
“You haven’t done anything wrong, little one.”
She held Wilhelm close. How could she ever hate this child?
Since he was not Matthias but bore Leicy’s features, Aine found it impossible to push him away coldly.
Since she had failed to protect Leicy, she had resolved to protect this child instead. And so she told herself that Leicy would understand, and she made a vow.
To be this child’s mother, even if only for a brief moment. But the problem didn’t end there.
“Can I play with Father today too?”
Father?
* * *
If there was a mother, there would naturally be a father. That was how he could have been born in the first place.
But Aine was confused as to who this “father” the boy was referring to could possibly be.
Wilhelm’s father, Matthias, was already dead.
Since the boy already thought of her as his mother, surely he must be mistaken about who his father was as well. If that were the case, then who on earth could this “father” be that Wilhelm was speaking of?
“Who do you mean by father?”

Then Wilhelm’s expression became serious. For a moment, she wondered if she’d made a mistake, but shortly after, he puffed out his cheeks and took her hand.
“He’s right next to you! Father will feel hurt!”
“Wh—”
“Ah.”
He had taken both Aine’s and Kleid’s hands. Because the boy had called someone Aine had never imagined as his father, her mind went completely blank.
Even so, her gaze turned toward Kleid. She was curious to see how he would react to this unexpected situation.
‘What if Kleid corrects him and says it’s not true?’
The Imperial Physician had just warned her. Don’t do anything that would confuse the child’s memories.
As she watched Kleid with an anxious gaze, he showed her a completely unexpected response.
“So that’s how it is. I suppose that would make me sad too.”
With a playful smile, he embraced Wilhelm.
Aine was bewildered. Whether it was this situation where Kleid had become the father and she had become the mother, or the way Kleid accepted it so calmly—
both left her utterly confounded.
Above all, the sight of Kleid responding so gently—he who had been utterly frigid on the battlefield—struck her as profoundly strange.
“Might I have a word with your mother alone for a moment, Wilhelm?”
“Can’t I stay with you?”
“No. There’s something we need to discuss.”
Even as Wilhelm muttered something about it being unfair, he extracted a promise that Kleid would play with him later, then withdrew.
Left alone together, Aine regarded Kleid carefully.
“I confess, this surprises me. I never imagined you would treat me with such kindness.”
The situation was delicate enough—an enemy prince calling him father—and surely Kleid himself found it distasteful. Yet he merely scoffed and shook his head.
“War or no war, a child bears no fault. And that boy has suffered no less than I have.”
Aine’s eyes widened as she studied him.
Though Kleid no longer wore the cruelty he once had, she had not expected such gentleness from him.
“Besides, did the Imperial Physician not say that confusion must not be introduced into his memory?”
“He was quite far away. How did you hear him?”
“I didn’t hear him directly. I read his lips.”
An Imperial Prince truly is different, Aine thought, even as she bowed her head to Kleid.
“I scarcely know how to repay such kindness.”
“Lift your head, Aine.”
When she recalled all the grace he had shown her, she felt that a lifetime of repayment would scarcely suffice.
Kleid was her savior—twice over, no less.
Not once, but twice.
“Consider it offset against my attempt to take your life on the battlefield.”
How could he possibly frame it that way? They had both been soldiers. Soldiers killed their enemies—it was the natural order of things.
Yet Kleid, clearly unwilling to hear any further objections, shifted the subject.
“But tell me, Aine—are you truly comfortable with me taking on the role of the prince’s father?”
Though the sudden change of topic unsettled her, Aine grasped what lay beneath his words.
Only moments before, she too had wrestled with doubt about whether she herself possessed the right to that role.
“I may have no claim to such a right, but if I had to choose someone to serve as the young prince’s father, I would choose you without hesitation.”
Had she been given a choice, she would have chosen him without reservation.
She trusted Kleid that deeply, and she believed he would cherish Wilhelm as his own.
Kleid’s heart eased at her answer, yet something troubled him.
‘Does she realize what this means—that we’ll have to play husband and wife?’
Whether she realized it or not hardly mattered.
‘Father, might we all sleep together tonight?’
‘Wilhelm?’
She would likely discover the truth soon enough regardless.
* * *
“That’s how it came to be.”
“How did it *come to be*?”
After Aine relayed all the details, Mane stared at her in disbelief.
It was almost the same reaction she’d had when she learned she would have to pose as Kleid’s lover.
“Commander, surely you grasp how serious this situation is?”
The seriousness of it. How could one take lightly the fact that Wilhelm had lost his memory? Yet Aine responded with composure.
“But Mane, there’s nothing I can do about it now.”
That was true. What was done was done. No amount of further protest would change anything.
All they could do now was adjust their responses to Wilhelm’s condition as best they could.
Mane acknowledged that much. But there was something else that troubled her deeply.
“Why must it be the Imperial Prince who plays the father?”
“Mane.”
“A false lover, and now a false husband—I can’t accept this.”
The false lover had been unavoidable under their contract, but now they found themselves in a situation where they would indeed have to play a false married couple.

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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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