While her father and husband argued in the drawing room, Adelheid stood trembling at the door.
Her pale face, drained from a sleepless night, looked especially unbecoming today, reflected in the cold glass of the corridor window.
It was then that the sound of the table being slammed echoed through the hall. This was followed by the enraged voice of Grand Duke Ansgar, penetrating the thick wooden door and filling the corridor.
“Are you mocking me now?”
“Your Grace, I promised a daughter, not specifically Charlotte. Here, the contract you signed yourself,” said Count Raihenau, steadfastly holding up the contract and marriage vow containing signatures from both parties.
“This is absurd. You’re saying there was another daughter in Raihenau besides Charlotte? And you’ve been hiding her? Bringing some illegitimate wench to…”
“Adelheid was registered on the stone tablet seventeen years ago. Doubting her lineage is an insult to Raihenau.”
“Registered on the stone tablet?”
The process of registering a name on the family’s stone tablet was rigorous and complex. It required three witnesses to attest that a woman, who had not been with a man for over a year, conceived by the head of the family, and ultimately needed the high priest’s endorsement. Grand Duke Ansgar’s plan to invalidate the marriage based on unclear lineage was completely thwarted.
As Valentin’s face turned ashen, the count continued wearily.
“Even if it was before signing the marriage vow… Your Grace, did you not enter the bridal chamber yesterday?”
It was a preposterous claim. The Grand Duke had not even faced the bride for five minutes in the bridal chamber, and there were witnesses from Raihenau behind a thin screen, who knew there was no contact between them.
Yet, the count remained shamelessly defiant.
“Last night in the bridal chamber, it’s not what happened that matters, but what the witnesses claim they saw.”
Indeed, that was true. If Raihenau’s witnesses spread false rumors that he spent the night with the bride, Ansgar’s reputation would plummet. Regardless of the truth.
‘Which lord would tarnish his daughter’s honor with such lies?’
Yet, seeing the count’s greedy eyes, Valentin realized he might well do so. He finally understood that he had fallen into a dreadful trap.
It was a meticulously planned fraudulent marriage, exploiting the loophole that the bride’s face couldn’t be seen until entering the bridal chamber. He had been careless, assuming Raihenau only had one publicly known daughter, Charlotte.
“In the end, the contract only specified receiving a daughter of Raihenau.”
Frustration choked Valentin’s words as Count Raihenau triumphantly continued.
“We have fulfilled all terms of the marriage contract. Filing for divorce without a significant fault is equivalent to excommunication, as you well know, Your Grace.”
Valentin clenched his teeth. The count was right. A marriage vow made before Morrig, the god, couldn’t be broken without a major fault. Even if there was an issue with the bride’s lineage, it was a futile struggle from the start.
Valentin stood up irritably, pushing past the door, and came face-to-face with the small, pale woman who had become his wife through deception.
“…….”
He was about to pass Adelheid, deeming her unworthy of his attention, but then he paused, looking down at her. Her hair, disheveled from being suddenly dragged out, her fatigued face with sunken eyes, her plain body devoid of any charm.
The Grand Duke’s disdainful gaze swept over her from head to toe. Disgusted, he spat out his words.
“A half-grown thing like this is a daughter, a woman? They’ve done well to attach such a thing.”
Before such demeaning words, all Adelheid could do was bow her head and pray for her husband’s anger to pass. Valentin snorted dismissively and finally moved past her.
The door was flung open roughly and then slammed shut with a bang. Valentin then departed for the battlefield.
It was three years ago, when Adelheid had just turned seventeen.
“Were you here again?”
Adelheid opened her eyes at the sound of the voice calling her. She had been kneeling at the altar of Morrig in the damp underground chapel. The hem of her dress was soaked with the moisture of the cellar.
A middle-aged woman hurried over and draped a thin cloak over Adelheid’s shoulders.
“It’s good to pray, but you must also take care of your health. Especially with the storm raging so fiercely today.”
“I’m fine, Grita.”
Grita was Adel’s nanny and chambermaid, the only person who had come with her from the Raihenau estate.
She was one of the few who remembered Adelheid’s deceased mother and had been the only support for Adelheid in the harsh, cold Ansgar region.
Although, sometimes she looked at Adelheid with a chillingly cold gaze.
“Oh my…”
Grita sighed longingly as she glanced at the half-burned talisman on the altar.
“Were you praying for the Grand Duke’s safe return again?”
“…”
“What’s so good about it that you pray every day like this?”
“I feel a bit at ease when I do this…”
Male lead says he’s pregnant — and it’s female lead’s child
Something seems a bit off about this world.
Wang Zhao thought as she watched a pregnant man walking towards her…
Intro
Female lead finds herself in a world where the men who possess the ability to bear children.
As she navigates this unfamiliar reality, she is caught off guard by the sudden appearance of her boyfriend, who reveals that he is pregnant.
Is this truly her boyfriend?
Why can’t she recall any details about their time together?
She begins to doubt whether the child her boyfriend is carrying is even hers.
Is there a hidden reason behind her amnesia, or could it be a side effect of her sudden arrival in this strange new world?
Just when it seems the protagonist’s life couldn’t become any more entangled, her ex-boyfriend makes an unexpected appearance, raising questions about the protagonist’s past.
__________
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