Touch My Brother and You Die - Chapter 125

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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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My contributions were recognized, and the kingdom bestowed upon me the honorary title of Count. Within the Duke’s Household, I rose to the position of First-Class Administrator. With the exception of the Rocksburg Duke himself, no one could stand against me. I had truly become second only to one, superior to all others. It felt gratifying to achieve results without destroying everything in my path—a first for me.
I had secured employment at the Rocksburg Duke’s Estate, and my era of success had begun!
….
No. Wait a moment—that wasn’t my true purpose.
I hastily gathered a hundred roses and a proposal ring, then proposed to Eddie once more. He deliberated for quite some time before accepting, saying that what Rocksburg needed now was talent like me—someone with an awakened ideology and brilliant wit.
It was a triumph achieved after six years of courtship. I wept as I embraced Eddie fiercely, and a sharp cracking sound emanated from his body.
Eddie was diagnosed with complex fractures and dislocations of his upper body. A man named Macaon, dispatched from the Royal Palace, examined him. I had feared he might call off the wedding due to my excessive strength, but Eddie assured me not to worry, saying he couldn’t ask for more as long as I was healthy.
I sobbed and wailed, tears and snot streaming down my face. In all my years, Eddie was the first person to describe me as “healthy”—me, who could bare-handedly crush wild beasts in the countryside. I was already smitten, and now I fell even deeper. There was no one else for me. I would spend my entire life looking only at Eddie.
Thus I married Eddie and bore a daughter who looked identical to him. During this time, Eddie inherited the dukedom and became a Duke. I only learned later that when I first proposed to him, Eddie hadn’t even reached twenty years old. I had nearly become a criminal.
In any case, we lived happily like a ship with full sails before the wind. Occasionally, a brat named Laios and William would provoke me, but since neither of them were worth a single punch, I decided to let them be and simply shared beautiful love with Eddie.
Around the time I was thinking a second child would be nice, news arrived that the mad woman had escaped from the Teresia Facility.
….
Ah, that’s right! My real, true purpose was something entirely different from the start!
Upon hearing that the stalker woman who must have been waiting for my return had escaped, I went pale, seized Will Brown’s beloved sword, beloved song, and beloved horse, and bolted from the mansion.
That’s right—I had come to the Rocksburg Territory to scout land for that woman’s personal detention facility. But every single day had been so delightful, exhilarating, and pleasant, with such high job satisfaction and sense of achievement, that I had forgotten all about it. That I, who knew only destruction, possessed aptitude for administration—even the legendary Serena would never have imagined such a thing.
I hurried to find the Teresia Facility in Admé, the branch of the Magic Tower Cerepia Federation, but the situation was already concluded.
The facility was completely destroyed. All inmates and guards stationed there were dead. In the empty building where not even an ant could pass through, all I found was a message left by that accursed woman.

You made me wait seven years. I will take your entire remaining life in return.

I felt my skin crawl, and I kicked at the inscribed letters carved into the ruins with all my might. The fractured stone floor shattered into pieces, and the cracks spread all the way to the pillars. Before long, the entire structure collapsed.
That damned woman! My entire life! Every single thing! She can’t stand to see me happy!
I was born in an island nation far to the west of the Alein Kingdom—beyond even the True Magic Tower to the west, across the sea—a place where mechanical civilization powered by magic crystals had flourished.
By the way, when I was about two years old, Serena and that damned woman fought each other in our country, and the island sank.
Those who could use magic managed to relocate to what is now the True Magic Tower somehow, but my family, who had no such abilities, had no choice but to meet a dog’s death at the hands of those two monsters’ rampage.
I barely survived thanks to Serena’s hands, and I lived as a burden in the True Magic Tower.
That’s when it started. That damned woman pestered me relentlessly. She’d try to take me away and raise me, only to get beaten by Serena and leave; she’d try to take me when Serena wasn’t around, only to get beaten by the other True Magic Tower members; and when I grew older, she’d openly try to seduce me into living together, only to get slapped and leave.
When she demanded to know why I hated her so much, I told her it was because she looked unpleasant. After that, the woman put on a mask and never took it off.
Anyway, that creature did everything to draw my attention. She tormented innocent people, nearly destroyed the nation, and once even nearly brought human civilization itself to ruin—so Serena and I crossed all the way to the Largol Empire, defeated that woman, dragged her by the hair, and threw her into a facility.
According to Serena, this wasn’t the first time she’d nearly wiped out civilization, and she said it was troublesome because this insane woman seemed to grow stronger with each passing day.
The masked madwoman said she wouldn’t cause trouble as long as I played with her, so I took the woman around various facilities, keeping her under surveillance.
The facilities distributed at regular intervals across the world were called Magic Towers among ordinary people. In fact, nowadays they faithfully serve the role of cultivating and educating mages, so the name is accurate enough, but anyway, when Serena first built the towers in various places, the name of this large residential complex was supposedly “surveillance towers.”
Of course, the primary target of surveillance is the masked madwoman, but we also closely monitor mage-origin criminals who are beyond what civilians can handle.
Now, yes, some kind of utopian city for mages in a mixed-use complex has been constructed, but in any case, each Magic Tower has separate facilities equipped to imprison and monitor the madwoman.
And because I spent seven years infatuated with Eddie, I let one facility fall apart and lost the woman as well.
If Serena found out, I’d be done for. I might become a body that could neither live nor die. I decided to keep it secret from Serena, quietly recapture the woman, lock her up again, and clear my name.
And from that point on, the situation spiraled completely out of control.
The woman slipped through my grasp like water. More than that, she toyed with me by kidnapping Eddie and then returning him, and then she brought some baby, claiming it was a child born between Eddie and herself, and asked me to raise it well.
I was dumbfounded and furious, and I tried to kill the brat, but Eddie got angry and asked what fault the child had, saying he’d take it in and raise it.
Eddie is so kind. I was already smitten, and now I think I’m falling for him all over again. But that decision doesn’t seem right.
I tried to kill the child behind Eddie’s back, but that damned William found out, and I got scolded by Eddie and even told to leave the house.
Eddie is terrible. Eddie is really terrible, I thought as I left the house with young Rosie. And whenever I had the chance, I devoted myself to chasing after that woman.
How many years passed like that? Since she was my daughter, I wanted to raise her strong so that when she returned to Eddie, she could do her part. But at some point, Rosie began having seizures whenever she saw me, trembling uncontrollably, and frequently collapsed foaming at the mouth.
She was still so young—had she gotten sick from wandering around outside too much? Afraid, I left Rosie with Eddie and decided to chase after the woman alone.

Years passed. Countless years. It felt like more than a decade had gone by since I last locked wills with That Woman. I was exhausted. I wanted to abandon everything, hand over my responsibilities to Serena, and live a quiet life with Eddie, perhaps even causing him some trouble now and then.
What did I care if humanity perished or civilization crumbled? I just wanted to stand beside Eddie and watch the world end together.
As despair consumed me and I finally gave up the chase, I dropped to my knees and planted my hands on the ground. That Woman, who had been fleeing so effortlessly, approached me and spoke.
“Will you surrender, Maria? Abandon everything and give me the rest of your life, and I won’t torment Eddie or your daughter. They’ll live out their natural years in peace.”
“No. You’re hideous. I’m going to live with Eddie and Rosie.”
“What?! What is it about me that you hate so much!”
“Your ugliness!”
“That’s why I’m wearing a mask!”
“Your personality is rotten too! You’re a moral disaster! A vicious criminal! And you’re ancient! Do you have any conscience at all, you thief!”
“Listen here, you brat! I’ve been at this for over half a century! Can’t you just pretend to lose and give in! Please!”
“I’d rather kill myself!”
“Wahhhhh! You wretched creature!”
As That Woman collapsed to the ground and wept bitterly, my own rage and sorrow overwhelmed me, and I too broke down in tears.
After thrashing about and writhing in agony for some time, the masked woman slowly picked herself up, left me with the words “I’ll destroy your life,” and vanished without a trace.
That Woman, who had acted as though she’d never see me again, reappeared not long after as if nothing had happened. She said she was tired of explaining from the beginning, then told me that Eddie would lose all affection for me, my daughter had already been consumed entirely as magical energy with not a shred of her soul remaining, and the substitute I’d inadvertently summoned would soon become a vegetable.
….
To be honest, I’m not intelligent enough to have understood what she was saying.
When I admitted I didn’t understand, she grew angry and explained it very simply. My daughter is already gone. A fake is pretending to be my daughter. That fake will soon be exposed, and Eddie will harbor fear and rage toward me for allowing things to reach this point.
You’ll be betrayed no matter what, so give up everything and live with me.
The last part wasn’t worth listening to, so I ignored it and hurried toward Rocksburg Mansion.
Thinking the household would be in chaos with Rosie suddenly becoming a different person overnight, I nervously observed the people around me.
….
…It was exactly the same.
I’d been secretly watching Eddie and Rosie from time to time because I missed them, so I was well aware of their current situation.
Both Eddie and Rosie were doing their work well, dancing with joy, and living happily together.
Even Will Brown, who would normally be the busiest if something went wrong at the Duke’s Mansion, had spotted me during his leisurely patrol and come to greet me.
When I asked if anything was wrong at the estate, Will answered that there was nothing amiss—only that the Duchess would be returning soon.
….
Really, nothing had changed.
Watching them enjoy themselves so well without me made me jealous enough to cry. I wanted to be part of that. I wanted to go home, Eddie.
But if I returned home, I had no idea what That Woman might do next. I’d only hesitated for a moment about giving up the chase, yet she’d already done something sinister—claiming my daughter was gone, that a fake was taking her place.
Whether Eddie was kidnapped or released depended entirely on That Woman’s whims, and there was nothing I could do about it. Even if I told Serena now, it was uncertain whether she could stop That Woman.
Serena had grown too old, and That Woman had become far too powerful. That cursed Dark Mage had expanded her domain while fleeing from me all this time, and now she could apply her magic to everything that exists on this world.
She was already skilled at manipulating memories, but now her range extended to all living and non-living things alike—making her a calamity not just for humanity, but for everything that walked this earth.
Using such overwhelming dark magic should consume one’s lifespan quickly and lead to death, so why hasn’t That Woman died yet?
I wanted to beg anyone at all for help, but no matter how hard I thought, I couldn’t imagine who could possibly aid me. I was even worried whether Serena could properly straighten her back and walk around anymore, given her age.

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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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