He Who Covets the Abandoned Bride - Chapter 40
“Just take this back to Marquis Millay. You no longer have to bear the burden of obligation towards me.”
“……”
Bryan couldn’t bring himself to say anything and just silently looked down at her.
Layla keenly realized that he was wavering due to an internal conflict. So she got up and placed the pass in his hand.
“You saw just now. We were reported because there were two men with one woman. It might be safer for us to be apart.”
“……”
Unable to deny her words, Bryan could only lower his head. Layla gave a small smile so he wouldn’t feel guilty.
“Thank you for everything, sincerely.”
It was when she was about to turn and leave. Bryan blocked her path.
“Even so, I can’t let you go like this.”
“Lord Bryan.”
“Please listen to my requests before you go. They are necessary things to say.”
Layla stared at Bryan for a while before nodding her head.
Wrapped in a sense of responsibility for failing to carry out Millay’s orders, she couldn’t bring herself to stop him from making his final requests. It might actually help with her survival.
Seeing Layla’s consent, Bryan sat her back down. The first thing he requested was how to contact Millay.
“Her Highness Ottilie has a close friend’s house. You can send letters there.”
As he spoke, he took out a paper from his pocket and wrote down the address. Layla blinked seeing the name of a village near the port they had entered.
“It seems Lord Millay often stays abroad.”
She had thought it strange that he had a continental pass, but it seemed his reach was quite wide. The more she dug, the more fascinating he was.
“…I believe it was due to his father’s orders that he wandered.”
“I see.”
Even so, it seemed unlikely she would contact him through this in the future. So she glossed over this part, and Bryan gave most of the money he had to Layla.
Then putting a small explosive in a pouch, he handed it to her and explained how to use it. Like where to throw it for the best effect, and so on. Layla also half-listened to this part.
He also explained in detail what to be mindful of when planning her route, when choosing lodging, and such.
Layla felt sincere gratitude towards Bryan as she listened to it all. No matter if it was due to Millay’s orders, there likely wouldn’t be anyone in the future who would show such kindness to her who had nothing.
She wanted to cry while listening but held it in. And for his sake, as he couldn’t bring himself to leave, Laila stood up first.
“I won’t forget your requests, Lord Bryan. Thank you.”
“…Take care of yourself.”
Layla walked down the quiet moonlit alley. After wandering the winding, disorderly paths, she finally reached a main road and spent the night by a river that cut through the city.
When she came to her senses, it was around 7 in the morning as the sun slowly rose. It would have been the time when seven peaceful chimes rang out across the city.
‘I wonder if Bryan made it back safely.’
That was Layla’s first thought as she started her first day alone.
She idly wondered if he would go to Filmer, to Harkin, or to a third country.
She worried if he would be scolded by Millay upon returning, then shook her head.
No, no. Perhaps Millay had already lost interest in someone like her.
‘Seeing as he still hasn’t shown up.’
Layla reproached her foolish self.
If he had intended to come from Filmer to Ottilia, enough time had passed for him to come two or three times over.
His absence at the Filmer port may have been deliberate too. It was true his complexion wasn’t good, but for someone moving about fine to suddenly fall ill to the point he couldn’t even see her off at the nearby beach within a few hours in the morning, did it make sense?
Layla’s eyes grew hazy as she gazed at the river flowing leisurely before her. She blinked rapidly at that, but soon tears streamed from both eyes.
Teardrops gathered at her chin quickly fell, soaking her clothes.
People passing by occasionally turned to look at her crying, but fortunately, they all went on their way.
They say humans are ruminant animals. Strangely, as she wept sorrowfully, her childhood self came to mind.
She had cried like this once before.
It was when she parted ways with Adrian. As she betrayed him and left Harkin with her father, Layla had wept this sorrowfully.
“…I guess it’s the price for abandoning you.”
If she hadn’t abandoned Adrian then, would something like today have happened?
If she had been a bit more courageous and refused that deed that drove him into danger, Wessex would still be under Harkin. Then her father becoming king and her meeting such a miserable end wouldn’t have occurred.
Layla muttered to herself as she shed wretched tears.
“I regret it.”
But you will never forgive me.
At first, Layla refused due to an unpleasant premonition, but unable to endure her father’s harsh corporal punishment for finding fault with everything, she ended up going to Adrian and asking.
Seeing the wounds on Layla’s body, he said in anger that he would meet the duke himself, but at Layla’s desperate pleas, he couldn’t do so and ultimately agreed to what she demanded.
Until then, even Layla had no idea something so major would happen to Adrian.
Adrian allowed a private meeting with a figure Layla mentioned, but was betrayed. And the emperor of Harkin had to agree to an unfair negotiation to save the cherished crown prince.
It was also the impetus for Harkin, who had ambitions for continental unification, to be unable to stop Wessex’s independence.
In the end, Adrian returned and purged those involved, solidifying his position as the heir, but the fact that Wessex had betrayed him did not disappear.
If Layla had to pick one thing she most wanted to change in her life, it would be that.
The root of all these calamities.
So everything now was her just desserts. The price was to be paid by the one who had committed the wrongs.
Layla, who had wept for a long time, only got up from her spot after her tears ran dry. And she slowly walked along the city’s main road.
The city’s law enforcement building started to appear in the distance.
She had no idea what her fate would be from now on, but she felt this was the only method left for her.
Ottilia. A good country, but she neither wanted to live here all her life nor wait for her unfortunate fate while trembling in fear of when she would be captured as a prisoner and become a slave.
Rather than that, she would prefer to face the wind blowing towards her and collapse.
Even if it tore her body to shreds.
[This is the timeline separator]
After turning herself in like that at the law enforcement agency, Layla found herself boarding a ship surrounded by the city’s lawmen a few hours later.
It was a ship headed for Fitzroy.
Fortunately or unfortunately, Isabella Fitzroy had instructed them to immediately send Layla Wessex to Fitzroy if found.
Accordingly, Ottilia decided to directly hand Layla over to Fitzroy.
Layla’s entire body was tightly bound with ropes. The thought that it was a treatment befitting her fate of falling to become Isabella’s slave in a few days filled her with despair.
However, she had no regrets. Her younger brother Cedric had become Isabella’s slave. If she also went to her, she might get to meet the child.
If by chance they ended up living together, she might be able to help Cedric have it less hard. They could be each other’s support rather than being alone. There was the possibility she could take the punishments Cedric would receive in his stead.
Imagining all sorts of things, Layla was led by the lawmen and crossed the port.
The port was packed with people who had come to see the spectacle of the captured Wessex princess heading to Fitzroy after several days.
Sounds of clicking tongues could be heard here and there, and stories gossiping about Wessex’s miserable fate stabbed at her from all directions.
Pushed roughly on the back, Layla boarded the ship.
The ship seemed to be a simple merchant ship belonging to Fitzroy. Goods were loaded in the hold, and Layla too was gagged and immobilized, her whole body tied up like cargo.
“Stay put, miss. We’ll feed you bread. You’ll have to take care of the toilet yourself though.”
Someone said that and even covered Layla’s eyes before closing the hold.
In the darkness without a single ray of light, Layla slowly felt terror. She wished the ship would hurry and depart.
It would take a little over 2 weeks from Ottilia to Fitzroy. Layla couldn’t even imagine yet how hellish that time would be.
But the ship was slow to depart.
Was it because she was too tense that time wasn’t passing?
“……”
Layla trembled bit by bit in the suffocating fear.
And it was right then that the clamor from outside started rushing in.
“……?”
She wondered what it was about, but with only her ears open, she couldn’t properly grasp the situation. But the next moment, she couldn’t help but be startled no matter what.
Kaboom!
A destructive boom resounded with a tremendous vibration.
Male lead is a Love-Obsessed Merman
When he discovers she has gone, he risks everything to pursue her on land, enduring agonizing pain to transform his tail into human legs…
One-line summary: Male lead chases female lead. The male lead’s love is a bit sick, an invincible love brain.
Synopsis
During a voyage at sea, Jiang Yang accidentally captures a merman.
Servant: I heard that mermen are fierce and brutal.
Jiang Yang looks at the merman obediently rubbing her palm like a puppy: “You call this fierce and brutal?”
Servant: I heard that mermen have no human nature.
Jiang Yang looks at the merman with wet puppy eyes, obsessively calling her ‘A Yang’ like a childish infant: “You call this having no human nature?”
With great difficulty, she releases the merman back into the sea and returns to shore.
Who would have thought that in less than half a month, the merman, who should have been freely wandering in the South China Sea, would shed his scales, endure the pain of losing his tail, transform into human legs, and come ashore to find her?
He kneels at her feet, rubbing her palm, with merman tears rolling down: “A Yang, don’t abandon me.”
_____
Please help me, I want to bring you the best possible things.
If you find any chapter or novel with poor translation and editing quality, let me know by commenting directly under that novel or chapter. I will retranslate it as soon as possible.
[Touch the gear icon in the bottom right corner of the screen to move to the next chapter if you want.]
YOU MAY ALSO LIKE
