The Youngest Hides a Lot - Chapter 304

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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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Side Story Episode 30
It had been a year.
A full year of searching for her after she vanished so suddenly before my eyes.
I thought I could endure this as I had endured searching for you my entire life, that I could find you again. But I was wrong.
The despair that comes when something once held in your grasp is torn away surpasses any other pain imaginable.
“…I waited for you.”
Undisguised elation, longing, obsession, fury.
Every emotion deepened by the time apart crashed over me in a torrent.
“Rosetta.”
Leviathan extended his arm.
Is this figure approaching me my sweet lover, or the reaper come to steal my breath?
“I wish you would come to kill me.”
In truth, it mattered little.
Whatever you are… if I can press my lips to yours, then it makes no difference which.
* * *
Shhhhh—
The rain grew heavier with each passing moment.
‘Why does he look at me with such eyes?’
Rosetta swept her wet hair back from her face.
The man’s visage filled her emotionless gaze.
‘I must complete the mission. Otherwise, I’ll be sent back to the Punishment Room.’
She had been confined and punished in the Punishment Room all this time.
Partly because she had failed her mission.
Ultimately, because she had been exposed.
“Did you really think I wouldn’t notice you conspiring with those women to secretly release targets?”
All the schemes she had conducted behind the Commander’s back.
It was when a target she had smuggled abroad grew frightened and returned to the Empire of his own accord.
Though the operation had carried this risk from the start, she never expected the target to suddenly seek out the Commander and beg, “Let me tell you these women have betrayed you—give me more escape money in exchange.”
“How pitiful. Since you won’t obey, no one but me will ever love you… But be grateful. This time, I’ll forgive you with just a trip to the Punishment Room.”
“Ugh, no…!”
“No? Let’s see then. Who was involved? Hazel? Aina? Or all of your team members?”
“…No! No, it’s not! They knew nothing! It was all, my mistake. Please.”
The Commander knew Rosetta’s weaknesses all too well.
Meanwhile, the Crown Prince and Zebert began their pursuit.
The Commander immediately relocated the Mercenary Company Headquarters underground—to an Underground Bunker no one had ever known about.
In that labyrinth of tangled tunnels, they hid for a year.
Then one day.
“Rosetta. Retake the graduation exam you failed.”
“….”
The Commander said he would forgive Rosetta now.
To check Zebert, the Emperor’s covert operation to eliminate his successor has begun anew.
“I knew you’d come.”
Leviathan spoke softly.
“….”
“I can’t let myself be taken by some Demon Beast. Right?”
Of course not.
Only when I sever your neck with my own hands will this trial truly end.
“Rosetta.”
Hearing my name called made my stomach churn.
Rosetta swallowed hard, attributing it to the countless pills she’d consumed lately.
“How do you know my name?”
His voice was dry. Yet Leviathan smiled regardless.
“Baron Braum told me.”
I never expected Father’s name to surface so suddenly.
How had he found someone even the Commander believed to be dead?
“When your lover suddenly abandons you, you lose all sense of restraint. Well, thanks to that, I’ve made my decision.”
He tilted his chin lazily.
“I think it’s best we remove Baron Braum’s seat from our wedding. What do you think?”
Rosetta let out a wet laugh.
“Are you joking with me right now?”
“Joking?”
In that instant, before she could react, Leviathan drew close.
A scorching hand gripped her waist firmly as she reflexively tried to step back.
“I’d be disappointed if you think I’m joking now.”
His voice was low enough to raise goosebumps.
In those violet eyes meeting hers at close range, dark emotions writhed and churned.
Only then did Rosetta understand. Despite his composed facade, he was forcibly restraining something on the verge of eruption.
“Let go….”
“Listen to me.”
He gripped her hand firmly as she reflexively reached for her dagger.
“Even if you killed me here right now, the Crown Prince wouldn’t leave the Thunder Wall alone.”
“….”
His thick thumb traced her fingers one by one, unfurling them.
She realized only later that he was checking her fingertip wounds.
“The Crown Prince is already aware of the Thunder Wall’s existence. And that the Emperor stands behind it. Soon, the Crown Prince will ascend to the throne.”
“What are you trying to say?”
“Before the Crown Prince puts the Commander on the scaffold, sever his neck with your own hands.”
“…What?”
“Take your revenge. And come to me.”
Rosetta asked flatly.
“You’re telling me to destroy the Mercenary Company right now?”
“Wouldn’t that set your mind at ease?”
He spoke as though he knew Rosetta intimately. She gazed at him with hollow eyes.
“Nonsense. I will never go against my teacher’s wishes.”
“Why? Because of that curse?”
“….”
“You defied the Commander’s orders and let so many targets slip away?”
“How did you….”
Leviathan didn’t even blink.
“Those who once stood against the Emperor and suddenly vanished from sight. I listed their names one by one and investigated all their movements. Finding one of your targets from the Casalia Kingdom was nothing short of fortune.”
Rosetta found herself at a loss for words. She couldn’t fathom how far his investigation had reached over the past year.
“I told you. I had no restraint.”
He laughed like a broken man.
“But isn’t something odd about this?”
“….”
“If the ‘curse’ were truly omnipotent, why wasn’t ‘punishment’ inflicted when you let your targets go?”
“That’s because… my teacher didn’t find out.”
He smiled coldly.
“So in the end, if the Commander doesn’t know, there’s no punishment.”
“….”
“Besides, he’s not even a Mage—I don’t understand how he manipulates the curse. How does he inscribe it? Is the sorcerer who cooperates with him some kind of rogue Mage….”
His gaze felt piercing, as though it would see right through her.
Rosetta hesitated and stepped backward.
“…My teacher is just… capable of anything.”
My teacher is omnipotent.
My teacher is absolute.
My teacher saved us. But he can kill us in an instant. So don’t betray him. Don’t defy him.
The words that had been drilled into her mind in the Punishment Room swirled dizzily in her head.
Leviathan whispered low to her.
“Tell me the location of the Mercenary Company, Rose. I’ll raid that place and capture the Commander.”
“….”
“Then you can take his head.”
“That’s… impossible.”
“Then I will.”
“….”
Her insides twisted once more. Rosetta stepped back again.
Something forcibly suppressed kept trying to rear its head.
“Damn it. Please, don’t distance yourself further.”
“…Why would you go so far?”
Rosetta asked with an expressionless face.
“What on earth for?”
At that, Leviathan clenched his fist tightly.
“I didn’t realize you still didn’t know.”
Thump.
“Because I want you.”
“….”
“I wish for you to be wholly by my side.”
Leviathan grasped her hand again, then carefully pressed his lips against it.
“Weren’t you feeling something similar?”
“I wasn’t.”
“No? Then why didn’t you pierce my heart the moment you slew the Demon Beast?”
Thump.
“With your beloved Barzen Mountain dual-blade—or whatever you call it, the dagger you’re most comfortable with—right there in front of you, why are you accepting my kiss?”
Thump.
“Why.”
Ah… so that was my heartbeat.
An unfamiliar pulse awakened me.
Light flickered in eyes that had been dead and hollow.
I… that is to say.
…That’s right.
There’s no way I could kill you.
That strange young master from the Garbage Dump.
That false lover from the Summer Villa.
In the end, the emotions that had been trickling out all along burst forth at once.
‘I also… you.’
I’ve wanted you all along….
“I… ugh.”
“Rosetta?”
Leviathan furrowed his brow and grasped her chin.
“What’s wrong with you?”
Rosetta, her face drained of color, suddenly covered her mouth and collapsed to the floor. Cough, cough! She retched, spilling gastric fluid.
“Rosetta!”
Rumble!
It was then.
“…!”
Leviathan sensed an unfamiliar presence and lifted his head sharply.

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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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