Thought It Was ‘The End’, Only to Return to a Changed Genre - Chapter 43

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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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Chapter 8. Find the Real Villain (5)

 

“Lady Edelaine, you’ve come?”

 

Genevieve, who had been drinking hot tea wrapped in a blanket, welcomed Edelaine as soon as she saw her. Edelaine approached her with large strides.

 

“Um… are you angry?”

 

Instead of answering, Edelaine looked Genevieve up and down with an expressionless face.

 

Fortunately, she didn’t seem to be injured anywhere.

 

Genevieve had suffered the fourth attack while taking a walk with her husband at the winter lakeside.

 

Rather than being attacked, it would be more accurate to say she had lured them out. Thanks to being fully prepared, she did get soaked from falling into the winter lakeside, but they were able to capture the hidden culprit thanks to the efforts of the Imperial Guard who had been lying in wait and Shane.

 

“No. I’m just glad you’re safe.”

 

She wanted to scold her for acting as bait when she was the most important Saint in this world, but she held back.

 

Genevieve wasn’t the type to step forward and do dangerous things either. She just considered it her mission to fulfill the role given to her and die, knowing well how great and precious the ‘Saint’ was to humanity.

 

However, that didn’t mean she could force her to just stay locked up in a safe place. Genevieve was a person before being a Saint. She had the freedom to do what she wanted.

 

She hadn’t stepped forward recklessly and irresponsibly, but because she judged she could do it. That had to be respected.

 

Edelaine swallowed her worries and said.

 

“I was worried. Thank you for being safe.”

 

“…Hehe.”

 

Genevieve widened her eyes for a moment, then bit her lips and smiled. She lowered her face to hide the tears that welled up from the complex emotions surging through her.

 

Edelaine hugged Genevieve and patted her shoulder, saying.

 

“Where’s your husband? I heard he was attacked with you.”

 

“Harrison returned to the Imperial Guard. That’s too bad. I wanted to introduce him to you.”

 

“He wasn’t hurt, was he?”

 

“Of course not. My husband is tough, if nothing else.”

 

Genevieve naturally bragged about her husband.

 

She had planned to make them break up if he was a strange person, but it was fortunate that he seemed to be a good person.

 

Shane approached and saw the two people hugging, then pulled Edelaine’s waist into his arms and said.

 

“We’ll have to investigate in detail to know for sure, but the culprit confessed that he received a request from someone inside the Church. He’s a mage who can control people, and after two failures, he became impatient and made the reckless move of summoning a monster at the party venue.”

 

“Is he at least an Imperial citizen?”

 

“I’m not sure about that. If you want me to find out, I can go find out now.”

 

“No, never mind…”

 

Go away… Edelaine pushed Shane away a little. Shane raised his eyebrows as if displeased.

 

“Why on earth would someone inside the Church try to kill the Saint?!”

 

“The situation here is quite complicated too… Probably they didn’t like that His Holiness the Pope was particularly fond of me. Since His Holiness doesn’t have much time left, they were probably anxious that he might give me more. There are far more people who hate the Saint wielding real power.”

 

“While using her as much as they want…”

 

“The Church would have a lot to say about that too. Since the Imperial Court and the Blancarde Family hold the initiative, they can’t manipulate things as they please.”

 

It was pitiful that Genevieve was explaining this herself.

 

“They probably didn’t really intend to kill me. It was probably just a threat.”

 

“What did they hope to gain by threatening you?”

 

“They probably hoped I would get scared and reduce my external activities. Rather than taking His Holiness the Pope’s place.”

 

“How selfish, those bad guys.”

 

“Lady Edelaine…”

 

“We need to thoroughly expose everyone behind this and make them taste hell, those bastards.”

 

Shane hugged Edelaine’s waist from behind again, resting his chin on the top of her head as he spoke.

 

“His Highness Edwin will do that, Edelaine.”

 

“Right…”

 

When she recalled Edwin’s smiling face, goosebumps rose on her skin.

 

The angel-faced Crown Prince was a man who smiled most happily when tormenting people.

 

Even if not as much as in the novel, he seemed to care for Genevieve, and though his standards and methods were arbitrary, he seemed to take good care of his people, so he would surely get proper revenge.

 

So she didn’t need to worry about dealing with the culprit.

 

Edelaine gave up trying to detach the persistently clinging Shane.

 

Instead, she sat down on the sofa with him attached. She ended up sitting on Shane’s thighs rather than the sofa, but it was comfortable so it was fine. He adjusted his position so Edelaine could lean completely against him and tucked her fallen hair behind her ear to tidy it up.

 

Edelaine let out a long breath. The assumption she had harbored throughout the time when she tried to find the mage but couldn’t even catch a tail.

 

What if the mage’s life had also changed completely from the story, like Shane or Genevieve?

 

The expectation that perhaps everything had already ended long ago. She had suspected and suspected again that it was too favorable a hope for her. She didn’t believe it, saying such good results couldn’t possibly come about.

 

But.

 

If the summoned ogre targeting only Genevieve and charging at her was just coincidence or a mistake, then everything would be resolved without any lingering concerns.

 

‘Is it really over?’

 

She thought that even if the male and female protagonists had walked such different paths, if the mage existed, she couldn’t feel at ease, but this much evidence had gathered.

 

Now she could believe it, couldn’t she?

 

The ‘story’ determined by the author would end in failure, and each character would branch off from the story to walk their own paths.

 

Edelaine as Edelaine, Shane as Shane, Genevieve as Genevieve.

 

Finally breaking free from any force that tried to lead their lives by force.

 

Like everyone’s life where they live their own lives. Like anyone who is a complete human being not manipulated by a story.

 

That was the wish Edelaine had most desired since she was 9 years old.

 

‘Finally.’

 

Edelaine’s green eyes swelled round with moisture.

 

A different kind of liberation from when she gritted her teeth and ran away, saying she wouldn’t get entangled with the protagonists, washed over her. It was also different from when she saw Genevieve’s marriage news in the newspaper.

 

Back then, she could only gain freedom by abandoning her life.

 

Everything she had left behind was pretty and precious things she couldn’t help but love, so even while repeating that they weren’t hers, she couldn’t completely abandon her lingering attachment.

 

Even while thinking that staying away from the protagonists was indeed the right answer because daily life free from nightmares was so comfortable.

 

Stubbornly closing her eyes and covering her ears to news from Delmez.

 

Why did she have to abandon everything just to live…

 

She lived gnawing away at the sense of loss that she couldn’t endure without trying to brush it off lightly.

 

“Ugh…”

 

When Edelaine started crying, Shane took a breath and hugged her entirely.

 

She could feel the thick arms wrapped around her shoulders and back tense with strength. Even so, without constricting her, Shane only enveloped her with his solid embrace.

 

She was at the ‘end’ she had desperately wished for.

 

Edelaine cried for a long time.

 

Held in Shane’s arms, holding Genevieve’s hand.

 

***

 

“No, Keith!”

 

A woman rushed to the man who collapsed, coughing up blood.

 

The hot blood that gushed out stained the woman’s chest and stomach. The man called Keith trembled in all his limbs with his eyes rolled back, constantly coughing up blood.

 

“No, no… No, don’t die!”

 

“Gurgle, cough.”

 

Keith was moving but his life had already ended.

 

The woman knew it too.

 

Keith, her twin brother, was no longer of this world.

 

Her brother had died.

 

Her other half, who had been with her since before birth, had been killed by the Saint. The woman panted and hugged her brother’s corpse. This couldn’t be happening. This was wrong.

 

“Step away, Miss. There’s no more time. It’s time for the master to return, so you must go back now.”

 

“You’re telling me to leave my brother like this?”

 

“He is no longer your brother, Miss. He’s nothing but a lump of meat.”

 

“Shut up!”

 

“Didn’t you also say that there’s no need to pity the end of an unskilled practitioner, Miss? Keith was unskilled, and that’s why he died. I’ll handle the cleanup, so please step away.”

 

“I told you to shut up! Keith is my other half, know that no one can touch him!”

 

The woman’s blood-stained face was washed with tears. She glared fiercely at the people trying to approach her and growled.

 

Keith alone would have been enough to kill that woman.

 

This couldn’t be happening.

 

‘Five years ago, it wasn’t like this. That woman didn’t have the power to save people, there’s no way she could have had the power to defeat Keith.’

 

From the moment the Saint candidate first appeared in the world, the twins had been watching her.

 

With abilities woefully inadequate compared to previous Saints, this half-baked Saint who possessed only purification and healing powers posed no threat to them whatsoever. That’s why they decided to let her live. The reason they didn’t attempt a second assassination after the first failure was due to this judgment.

 

But recently, news came that the Saint had saved someone’s life.

 

The twins decided to test the Saint’s abilities. If she proved to be a threat, they would eliminate her even now.

 

A Saint’s abilities are at their peak right after awakening.

 

As time passes, the abilities degenerate, and eventually they lose even their purification power before ending their lives—this was the norm.

 

Keith was a mage skilled at controlling people to attack targets. Even if the medium was caught, no harm should have reached the caster hiding behind them.

 

But the Saint had managed to harm even Keith, who was hiding behind the person who became the medium. The backlash of curses always returns to the caster.

 

Keith couldn’t overcome the backlash and died coughing up blood before the woman’s eyes.

 

I should have done it. I should have. If it had been me, I wouldn’t have died. If it had been me.

 

However, Keith hadn’t let the woman do things like casting curses. Saying he would handle such things himself, he took on all the difficult and unpleasant tasks. The woman had been protected by her other half her entire life.

 

“This isn’t something you should be doing.”

 

“How can you say that? I’m better than you.”

 

“That’s exactly why I should do it. You can accomplish greater things.”

 

But if he was going to die like this, it would have been better if I had done it.

 

The woman clutched at her chest. Her heart was constricting and aching so much she couldn’t bear it. It was agony as if someone was tearing out and twisting her internal organs with their hands.

 

“My other half, my brother…”

 

The woman stroked Keith’s cheek, now cold as ice.

 

How agonizing it must have been—all the blood vessels in his extremities had burst, leaving them mottled with color. His eyes remained wide open, unable to close. The woman could not forgive the culprit who had caused her brother’s death.

 

“I will definitely get revenge for you…”

 

That woman who caused your death—I’ll kill her in the most agonizing way possible.

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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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