Chapter 90. The Pain You’ve Given Me

2023.12.29.

Yuan Pelliese swallowed hard, staring at his unusually serious face, and finally decided to speak the words she had been holding back.

“When exactly will you use my ability?”

This had been her lingering question.

He already took excessive care of his own body—too much, in fact—for the reason to simply be “so I can take away his pain whenever he suffers.”

Just judging from the fact that he had summoned six royal physicians over a mere bruise, it was clear how obsessively he guarded his own health.

Even the scent of the ointment she had applied to him revealed ingredients so rare that Yuan had never smelled their like before.

And Yuan was someone who had handled nearly every medicinal herb available on the market.

Many of these substances were things even a pile of gold couldn’t easily buy.

Bollonico Euphris had rushed his carriage all the way to Roxenhardt, even at the risk of rumors spreading. There had to be more to his reason for bringing her here than merely Clade Euphris’s despair.

Clade Euphris was someone who already had plenty of reasons to despair—reasons scattered all around him—whether or not Yuan was involved.

Bollonico surely knew that.

“Don’t worry. Bollonico has a plan. He’s just waiting for the right moment to give you an order. You’ll be needed then.”

Bollonico answered with a slightly forceful tone.

The emphasis he placed on the word “order” clearly showed his intent to suppress her spirit.

“You must obey Bollonico’s commands well, if Bollonico is to become crown prince. Only then can you divorce that monster and start a new life, right? Seeking revenge for your sister isn’t the end of it. Isn’t that what you hoped for when you followed me? Did you think divorcing the imperial family would be as easy as running away and getting a stamp of approval?”

Seeing Yuan’s expression grow subtly strained, Bollonico added with a sweet smile, carefully gauging her reaction.

“This is Bollonico’s first plan. The moment you step out of this bedroom, rumors will begin to spread. Your portrait, leaving Bollonico’s bedroom, might even appear front-page in the newspapers. The imperial family will likely try to cover up such a scandal, but for a while, you’ll be the most famous person in all of Euphris, my dear sister-in-law.”

“You’re just going to let that happen? Your own reputation will be damaged too, Your Highness.”

“First, let’s make sure Clade Euphris completely loses his will. We strike before he even gets the chance to talk about granting or refusing divorce. This wasn’t done just to spread rumors among a few pitiful people from some backwater estate. Remember? You wanted this from the beginning, didn’t you? Have you forgotten?”

“That’s quite—”

At the mention of Clade Euphris’s name, Yuan felt her blood surge violently upward, but she forced herself to stay silent.

“How pleasant to hear. News that would shatter Clade Euphris’s pride into pieces.”

‘Bollonico, no matter how many scandals you create, he won’t feel despair or rage.’

Yuan Pelliese thought bitterly, smiling.

‘Because he doesn’t love me.’

Bollonico smiled, satisfied, and kissed the back of Yuan’s hand.

Yuan stared coldly at his smooth, flowing golden hair.

‘So your first plan will not break Clade’s heart—but will utterly shatter your own.’

While you laugh at him, I will identify, one by one, every person who joins your future schemes—and punish each and every one of them without exception.

***

Yuan looked down at the sleeping Bollonico, then curled her lips around the blanket he was biting in his sleep and let out a groan.

She had absorbed too much of his pain in order to put him to sleep.

After stiffening her back and sweating coldly for a while, Yuan waited until the pain eased slightly, then opened her eyes in the darkness.

The surroundings were silent, but Bollonico’s attendants were surely guarding every door leading from the bedroom to the outside.

As per Bollonico’s expectation, Yuan was supposed to leave the bedroom only after dawn.

Though perhaps not quite as obediently as he anticipated.

Slipping out from under the rustling blanket and placing her feet on the floor, the parrot Lorenzo, who had been dozing in a cage in the corner of the room, flapped over after opening the cage door.

—“Sleeping time! Sleeping time!”

Yuan brushed the bird away with an irritated hand and walked toward a chaise longue adorned with striking red velvet.

Laid upon it were the jacket and shirt stripped off by royal physicians for Bollonico’s treatment.

Yuan thoroughly searched every pocket.

What she was looking for was the key to the glass display case lined up along the “Path of Loyalty.”

She had assumed Bollonico would always carry it on his person.

But contrary to her expectations, among the perfectly preserved, high-end garments—free of even a single wrinkle—there wasn’t so much as a key, or anything resembling one.

—“Don’t do it! Don’t do it!”

Yuan gave the parrot, pecking at her hand, a sharp glare, then began searching through the sleeping Bollonico’s clothes.

He was dressed in soft pajamas.

She checked his pants pockets and even the area around his undergarments, but found nothing.

Yuan looked down at Bollonico’s pale, angelically sleeping face and muttered one word.

“Useless.”

Her voice was icy.

—“Don’t do it! Don’t do it!”

The parrot, as thick as a child’s arm, finally bit down hard on Yuan’s finger.

With a short gasp, Yuan stared straight at the bird that had been irritating her all along.

The bird’s head, shrieking “don’t do it,” looked oddly familiar.

“We’ve met before.”

—“Don’t do it! don’t do it!”

Yuan recalled the horrifying night at the black mansion. The servants rushing into Clade’s room with the emperor and Bollonico leading them—and she remembered this parrot.

And the voice—neither fully male nor female—that had mimicked its master’s words and laughed throughout the night, turning Clade’s endless suffering into a grotesque performance.

Yuan looked alternately at the bite mark on her fingertip and at Lorenzo. Then she smiled.

“I’ve been short on practice partners since I put your master to sleep. How convenient.”

The parrot, stumbling awkwardly on the bed while repeating only “Sleep! Sleep!”, was caught by Yuan’s hand.

Lorenzo flailed, claws sharpened and spread, unable to spread its wings, then cried out briefly.

—“Ouch! Ouch! Ouch!”

A sound similar to the one its master made when ointment was applied.

“That’s the pain you’ve just given me.”

Yuan felt the pain on her fingertip vanish instantly and released the bird.

Lorenzo fled in terror, flying to perch atop the canopy bedpost, screeching “Kii-kii-kii!”

The bird, which had pretended to be human, had finally let out its true animal cry.

Yuan looked up at Lorenzo with a blank face and whispered.

“Bird. If you don’t behave, I’ll make sure you share in the punishment your master receives.”

Instead of answering, Lorenzo flew away somewhere.

Yuan followed its trail with her eyes, then froze momentarily as the bird vanished in the blink of an eye.

“Bird.”

The place Lorenzo disappeared into was a bookshelf placed at one end of the vast bedroom.

Made of mahogany and lacquered, the grand bookshelf stood proudly, filled with thick books—clearly decorative, judging by their untouched appearance.

They were completely different from Noel Euphris’s books, which bore the distinct marks of having been read many times.

She pulled out Lorenzo, who was hiding with its head buried between the back of the bookshelf and the wall, trembling its tail feathers.

Still screeching “Squeak! Squeak!”, Lorenzo pecked Yuan’s hand again and flew off in the opposite direction.

Like bewitched by the spot where the bird had buried its head, Yuan reached in.

The heavy bookshelf moved with absurd ease.

It rotated like a revolving door, and the books previously placed on the opposite side now densely filled her vision, arranged as if they had always been there.

Glancing cautiously at the side where Bollonico lay sleeping, Yuan stepped closer—and her pupils widened dramatically.

Pelliese Genealogy, Pelliese Medical Ethics, Pelliese Medical Fundamentals, Pelliese Pharmacology Basics, Pelliese Ophthalmology Research Volume 1, Volume 2……

An entire wall of the high-ceilinged bedroom was completely covered with bookshelves packed with texts related to the Pelliese family.

Excluding the upper sections she’d need a ladder to reach, Yuan felt her legs weaken each time she scanned another shelf.

Almost none of the books were unrelated to the Pelliese.

At least, not within her entire field of view.

Yuan pulled out a random book and flipped through it.

Then her body stiffened completely.

Pale as someone who had just lost blood, she frantically flipped through several more books from different shelves like a madwoman.

This continued until dawn broke.

After returning the bookshelf to its original position, she finally turned and walked past the attendants who now allowed her to leave, heading toward the villa.

All the way back, Yuan was half-dazed.

And only after entering her room on the top floor of the empress’s villa

did she finally gasp for air like someone emerging from a long dive to the surface.

Cold sweat seeped from her clenched fist—the fist she hadn’t even realized she had been tightly gripping since leaving Bollonico’s bedroom.

“What in the world is he doing?”

That hidden bookshelf, filled exclusively with materials obsessively collected about the Pelliese.

The books, documents, and notes—filled with evidence of research into the Pelliese—and within them, the traces of Noel Euphris, the young prince who had lent her books and newspapers all this time.