I Regret The Kindness I Gave You - Chapter 61

Even though he had already buttoned up the mismatched buttons, the moment he asked himself a question that held no value to him, he knew the answer.

Merche would have done the same.

If he had just tamed his temper a little and not acted so harshly. If he had shown her that “respect”. Perhaps Merche would have placed the shoddy laurel wreath, one that even a child would scoff at, upon her own head.

So. Because of that. He hastily avoided the belated truth he had finally realized.

Burying it in a deep, dark pit, he desperately piled dirt over it so that it could never be dug up again.

What could he possibly do to turn back what he had already destroyed with his own hands?

There was no way to undo the damage he had done. Knowing this, he desperately turned a blind eye and thoroughly buried it.

“But I…… know how stupid this sounds… damn it. If I had known…”

It was unfair. It’s not that he didn’t know because he wanted to. He couldn’t have known because he had no choice but to not know.

“I’m a slave bastard. Unlike you, who walked high and mighty on a red carpet from the moment you were born, I was a vulgar and filthy slave.”

Fighting other slaves with a knife or being locked up in an iron cage, wasting time. That’s all there is to a life like that.

All a slave like him had seen throughout his life was the way those rich bastards who came to that place would “purchase” and “own” what they wanted.

If there was something they wanted, they would buy it with gold and make it theirs. If something rebelled, they would beat it into submission, even if it took forever.

Violence and threats. That was the world where such things were accepted as a matter of course.

So the slave “Rude”, who had lived in that world for most of his life, only learned violence and threats. Solely. Only that and nothing else.

“I couldn’t learn anything proper. Because there was nothing in my head. Because I was filthy, stupid, and filthily lacking. Compared to you, I was trash, more tattered than rags.”

“…Rude.”

The woman called out to him.

With a voice so beautiful it drove him crazy, a voice that, just by listening to it, evoked the dizzying pleasure of that moment when he was once forced to take a potent drug.

He knelt down.

“Rude…!”

The woman exclaimed in surprise and stretched out her slender arm. Her small, pale hand tried several times with all its strength to lift him up.

It was a ridiculous amount of strength.

With that measly strength, weaker than the teeth of a young wolf, it was impossible to pull up the body of a slave who had struggled to survive for over twenty years.

“Merche.”

Kneeling down in a messy manner, he crawled on the sandy ground in a pathetic posture. Crawling, he finally grasped her pale ankles.

“I was wrong. So just once, just this once.”

Please. I wish I looked so miserable in your eyes that you would pity me to death. I wish I looked so pitiful that you absolutely couldn’t just pass me by. I hope for that, Merche.

“Give me a chance.”

“……”

“I’ll do as you say. If you tell me to crawl, I’ll crawl. If you tell me to lie down, I’ll lie down. If you tell me to shut up, I’ll shut up like a corpse and just stand by your side.”

“……”

“Please.”

It was a terrible silence. A silence where he didn’t know when it would end or what answer would come.

Just when all his nerves were on edge and his stomach was churning with nausea, only then did Merche open her mouth.

“…Ha.”

What escaped through those lips, pale and red like dried flower petals, was a sound close to a sneer.

Merche slowly lifted her lowered face.

Their eyes met. It was strange. Even though it wasn’t the time for the sunset, it was as if the sunset had seeped into her blue eyes.

Her eyes, which should have been only blue, gleamed with a suspicious light.

It captured him like a swamp and slowly dragged him into it.

“Do you love me?”

Why are you asking such a thing? Something so obvious. Without a moment’s hesitation, he affirmed it.

Then Merche asked again.

“Do you love only me? Uniquely. Only me and no one else, until you die?”

“Is your head broken? I told you, I’m imprinted on you. Where would you find a Lupinus who loves someone other than their mate?”

“……”

The wind blew. A rather strong wind shook and fluttered the trailing hem of her dress.

The ankles he grasped, the slender calves, the reddish knees. His eyes followed, not missing a single part.

Finally, their eyes meet.

“I’ll give you a chance.”

A soft hand approached his chin, which was raised to look up at her while he knelt.

It felt the coarsely shaped bones, then continued up along his cheek.

“As you said, try to change, differently from before.”

Don’t resort to violence, don’t push threats.

Don’t try to grab and shake me as you please.

“If you do that…”

Merche trailed off without finishing her sentence. Instead, she lowered her hand that had been caressing his cheek and lightly brushed Rude’s lips.

Exactly at that spot where her hand touched. On Merche’s lips, which looked just like that spot, a bright smile slowly and gracefully rose.

…I’ll have you.

In the end, she didn’t verbally spit out that blatant feeling. She just swallowed the cut-off words into her mouth.

That alone was enough.

It took three days for the parties from the four families to arrive at the Fondo’s main residence.

Five out of the six families gathered. However, Sano never sent anyone until the end.

That one sentence. That clear letter they wrote and sent was accepted as their intention.

Excluding Sano, who declared neutrality, the heads and heirs of the five families gathered in one place.

“Before we start the meeting, there is one thing I would like to discuss.”

The one who opened the discussion was the owner of the land where the meeting was held.

Werner Fondo, the head of the Fondo family, stroked his bushy beard and wore a good-natured smile.

“Before we bring up complicated matters in earnest, how about we start with a competition among the heirs to clear our heads?”

In fact, the conversations that would take place at the meeting were obvious.

First, they would verify if the information they had gathered by sending their informants to each other was correct and if the expected lineup was certain. Next, they would confirm the tedious factions of the families, and only after that would they get to the main point.

So Werner Fondo was now proposing to shorten that long and boring process.

“I am most curious to see how excellent the successors who will inherit each family are and how well the family heads have raised them.”

After all, the struggle for the throne is soon to be a struggle among the heirs.

The prophecy of Widentia states that a new king will be born among the six families.

Of course, the possibility is not completely nonexistent, but in reality, there is little chance of a king being born among the current family heads who are already quite old.

In the end, the candidates to become king are the heirs of the six families.

Among them, Sano’s heir has been physically weak since childhood, and there are even rumors of infertility, so excluding him, there are five left.

Among the heirs of the five families, there is the protagonist of the prophecy.

The eyes of the family heads who shared the same thought busily went back and forth across the round table.

“I like it. Let’s be honest. Is there a faster and more efficient way than this?”

Breaking the suffocating silence, Lena Aquila was the first to express her agreement.

She glanced at the other family heads with her eyes crinkled so much that they were barely visible.

“Let’s see who gains the upper hand. A child is a mirror of the parent. We’ll know which family head is truly strong by seeing the results of the competition. Don’t tell me… you’re all afraid of losing?”

“No way!”

Oh my. Mariette, who was watching, swallowed her saliva.

Someone from her faction had fallen for Lena’s provocation.

Giselle Ardor, who seemed to have revealed her agitated emotions by raising her eyebrows fiercely, glared at Lena and let out a loud snort.

“Let’s see. Who will indeed gain the upper hand!”

“Alright. I knew I liked the head of the Ardor family for being so fiery. Then, what about the head of the Venenum family?”

The arrowhead was aimed at Mariette.

Mariette’s face was expressionless, but her hands hidden under the table were clenched into fists, trembling.

Now that the conversation had come this far, it was difficult to refuse.

No, she couldn’t back down no matter what.

In her heart, she wanted to swear to remain neutral like Sano, but Venenum was not like Sano.

Sano’s family nature itself was originally peace-oriented, and there was no precedent for them to get involved in the power struggles between families.

If Sano declared neutrality, other families would accept it as it was, but it was different for Venenum.

No matter how much Venenum cried out for neutrality, the Fondo and Aquila factions would not accept it.

If a king really emerged from among them, it would be the end of Venenum that very day.

Mariette gritted her teeth. There was no other way, no other way…

−Grandmother, what if I lose in that competition…?

The face of Carla, who had been fidgeting her feet, saying she lacked confidence, flashed by, but Mariette erased her concern for her granddaughter by closing her eyes tightly.

“…I agree with the intentions of Fondo and Aquila.”

Clap! A lively sound of clapping hands rang out as soon as her words ended.

“Excellent. Then, considering that the family heads have all reached an agreement…”

“Hey. It’s not like you’re outright excluding me, but why do you sound so greatly disappointed? Am I not a family head?”

Werner Fondo awkwardly lowered his hands that he had brought together for clapping. He apologized as if he had truly forgotten.

“Oh my. I seemed to have forgotten about the Lupinus family head. I’m sorry. I must have been unfamiliar with the face that changed while I wasn’t looking.”

“The familiar face, who? Perhaps the old man of my dying castle?”

“…Haha. Well, I was referring to Lord Genovefa.”

“I should have just killed that guy. I’m sorry for making it confusing.”

Rude laughed coldly.

Regardless of whether Werner was looking at him with a stiff face or cursing viciously in his head, Rude didn’t care.

He tapped the cold table with his fingers, thinking deeply.