I Regret The Kindness I Gave You - Chapter 55

“… Not even once, not for a single moment. I’ve never hated you.”

Profanities were about to spill out. Not because he felt dirty, but because he was so overwhelmed with joy.

If he had blurted them out as they were, Merche would have been shocked and her round rabbit eyes would have widened. He meekly swallowed down the curses that were about to overflow from his throat.

“Then what was that about. When you said I was harmful to you. What did you mean by that?”

For some reason, Merche adjusted her posture at those words.

Her eyes, which had been wavering in shock, were now clear and firm, shining with certainty.

This is pretty too.

Damn him, damn his eyes. At some point, everything Merche did looked pretty to him.

As if he had no taste of his own.

No, it was as if his taste was perfectly tailored to Merche alone. How else could this be?

“I meant that it’s not your love itself that’s harmful, but the way you express it.”

“The way? What’s so harmful and bad about my way?”

“Because you always try to do everything your way. It’s harmful in the sense that you drag me along as you please without even asking for my opinion.”

“That’s…”

Right. The words he tried to say in response closed back up.

Rude couldn’t deny it either. The fact that the way he had been expressing his love to Merche was essentially pushing and forcing it on her.

“Threats and coercion. That was all there was. The way you treated me.”

Merche spoke, firmly trapping Rude’s wavering eyes.

She had wanted to say this properly at least once.

Last time when she talked to him… she had also witnessed him fighting with Fabio before, and above all, even then he had only tried to sway her as he pleased, so her words came out colder.

So it seemed Rude hadn’t fully understood her words then either.

Thinking this was her chance, her words flowed more eloquently than usual.

She deliberately sent a more blatant gaze so he couldn’t avert his eyes from her.

“Falsely accusing me before, and purposely proposing marriage after coming here, wasn’t it all in the same vein? To tie me by your side. You never gave me any will or choice, it was always just coercion.”

“…That’s. Because I thought that was the only way to keep you by my side, and I…”

“I don’t know any other way.”

“……”

“The only options you had were coercion and threats. Because that was all you knew, you made your choice in your own way.”

The more she looked back, the clearer Rude’s inner thoughts became.

What he wanted was for her to be by his side. The false accusation, the twisted actions, the hurtful words were all for that.

“At one point, I thought your feelings were not love but possessiveness. Because that seemed more trustworthy and relatable.”

“No. Absolutely not. It’s not that kind of thing.”

“I know. If it was just possessiveness, you wouldn’t have cared if I got hurt or broken. Rather, you might have thought that would be better for possessing me.”

She gained even more certainty from their conversation just now.

The thought and decision that she could never understand – that if she found him too terrible, he’d rather die for her.

He loved her.

Enough to die for her, so terribly.

“…When I see the way you treat me, it’s as if I’ve become a helpless doll. Like a puppet, dancing without will or opinion according to the strings you hold…”

Perhaps Rude is someone special to her.

He was the one who made her, who had never known what it was like to dislike something, realize what she disliked for the first time.

“I don’t want to be a doll. I’m a person, not a doll. A person who can think, choose, and act for myself.”

She hated being manipulated by others. She didn’t want to live like that anymore.

Living according to the fate others decided for her, struggling against it. She was truly sick and tired of it.

At a glance, Rude sometimes reminded her of Genovefa.

The way they both had values and methods of pushing through with their own will without even considering others’ thoughts was surprisingly similar for blood relatives who had lived without knowing of each other’s existence. That’s what she thought.

…However, in the end, at a crucial point, Rude was different from Genovefa.

He chose coercion simply because that was all he knew, and he didn’t know any other way.

But Genovefa was someone who lived oppressing and suppressing others despite knowing there were other ways.

So she didn’t hate or despise Rude.

If she could understand the reason, she could forgive him. Merche was that kind of person.

However…

“The way you know is threats and coercion, and I don’t want to be swayed by that way.”

“…Don’t.”

“So, Rude.”

“I said don’t. Whatever you’re trying to say now, don’t.”

Rude desperately tried to stop her. His glaring eyes looked more pitiful than scary.

“We can’t love each other.”

His amethyst-like eyes clouded. To Merche, his eyes, murky without tears, seemed to be sobbing.

His reflexively outstretched hand grabbed Merche’s wrist. There was no strength in it.

She was still sitting in front of him, but he looked desperate as if she would leave at any moment.

“You said you desire me. That means you want to have me too.”

“…Rather, I meant I don’t dislike the love you give me.”

“If you don’t dislike it, that’s enough. It means you like me, right?”

“Rude.”

“…You.”

Rude faltered, then narrowed his eyes.

“…You’re lying.”

“…What do you think is a lie?”

“That you don’t dislike me.”

A laugh erupted from under his shadowed face.

“You dislike me. It’s all over your face.”

“…No. I don’t dislike you.”

“Then what is it? Do you hate me?”

“I don’t understand why we keep going in the same loop. I don’t dislike you, and I don’t hate you either.”

“Why do you only look at me like that?”

He seemed to completely brush off Merche’s words.

It was then that strength entered the hand gripping her wrist.

“The way you look at other guys is different from how you look at me. Your eyes are sharp only for me. You didn’t even look at that crazy old man like this. But you don’t dislike me?”

What is he saying? What about my eyes?

Her thoughts were getting tangled. Rude kept his head down, laughing lowly as if talking to himself.

“Since you lied to me, I’ll do as I please for once too. My way was wrong and harmful to you?”

He pulled the hand he was holding to his cheek. Her will-less hand stroked his tanned skin once, twice as he gently led it.

“Fine. Now that I know it was wrong, I can fix it. I’ll try to change my damn way, so you try to change those eyes too, even just once.”

[This is the timeline separator]

The large body moved away before she could grab it. On the way, Rude didn’t look back even once.

His long, slipping legs matched his wide strides and disappeared from her sight in the blink of an eye.

-Why do you only look at me like that?

Her head was dizzy. Those eyes. How had she looked at him? She had looked at him differently from others?

“……”

He said her eyes were sharp only for him. She couldn’t empathize.

She had never been sharp to Rude… Had she really…?

Suddenly, fragments of a forgotten past came to mind.

-I regret being kind to you.

Was that her resenting herself, or resenting Rude?

…She looked back on the memories of the past that abruptly surfaced.

In the past, she had wanted to be loved, so she had scattered kindness.

Starved for affection, she had bestowed kindness indiscriminately.

Thinking that if anyone received this, they would give her the same in return. At least one person would reciprocate her feelings.

While harboring that delusion, that almost fantasy-like misunderstanding.

But when none of them gave her the love she wanted. Even then, she had been nonchalant.

Even to Elizabeth and Genovefa, who had objectively done wrong by Merche.

When Elizabeth first offered her an apology, she was a little surprised but not greatly shaken or moved.

…Come to think of it, that was true.

She had easily brushed off Elizabeth’s apology, but couldn’t let go of Rude’s apologies or pleas so readily.

Why?

‘Because you saved him, you gave him unwavering kindness, and he brought you hardship.’

He’s not the only one who brought me hardship. The lord, Lord Komeo also…

‘He’s special. He’s different from them.’

What is? What’s the difference between Rude and them? The reason she had no choice but to treat the two differently.

‘He was the first to give you love.’

Merche shook her head as if denying it.

No. That love was wrong. I know righteous love that benefits me.

The love the people here in Venenum gave me is the love I wanted.

‘That’s not enough. You can’t be satisfied with that. What you truly want isn’t their love.’

She raised both hands to cover her ears. Even though no one was speaking to her, she did so, not knowing what else to do.

As if mocking Merche, the voice echoing in her head asked,

‘Is it okay if that man loves someone other than you?’

Abruptly, her thoughts ceased. A shockingly intense wave surged up inside Merche, sweeping her away.

Rude loving someone else? As blindly as he loves me?

The wave soon became a tsunami that shattered and destroyed everything inside her.

In that fiercely rushing tsunami, Merche saw someone’s figure.

It was herself with a different face.