“Mom, I missed Shu Shu so much. I was so scared, afraid I’d forget Shu Shu forever… Mom, you must never abandon Shu Shu.”
Blanche cried for a long time, hugging my neck.
Most of it was inaudible due to her sobs, but one phrase stuck clearly in my ear.
The desperate plea not to abandon her.
‘How could I ever abandon you.’
Those words kept stinging in my heart. It felt like someone was pricking me with thorns.
Jade, who had been standing blankly near the entrance, approached.
“Larien.”
“…Yes.”
“Did your memories return?”
Before falling down the stairs, I had fought with Jade. I was disappointed in him for not giving any affection to Blanche, saying he didn’t love her.
So now I wasn’t sure how to treat Jade.
My memories had returned. Even the memories of the few months when I had lost everything were slowly seeping back.
However, it felt unfamiliar, as if they weren’t situations I had experienced as my current self. Like someone else’s memories.
Naturally, the emotional rift with Jade remained frozen on that day.
‘Don’t grab me!’
‘I told you. It’s because she resembles you. Why are you acting like this now all of a sudden? Didn’t you already know?’
‘Just because she resembles me, that’s not… She’s your daughter. Can’t you just love her as your own child? Is that so difficult?’
Fighting, hurting each other, unable to understand each other.
So it felt awkward to even make eye contact with Jade.
He seemed to feel the same, subtly avoiding my gaze as he gently stroked Blanche’s forehead.
“Mom, Mom! Dad was so cool today.”
Blanche exclaimed excitedly, enjoying Jade’s touch.
“…Dad?”
I was surprised by Blanche’s way of addressing Jade.
‘She used to say she was embarrassed to call him Dad, and couldn’t say it to anyone except me…’
Come to think of it, when did Blanche start speaking and calling Jade Dad?
In the recent memories surfacing in my mind, Blanche was afraid of him.
‘Even before that incident, there was a subtle distance between them… For Blanche to call him Dad now, he must have made a lot of effort.’
He had kept his promise to try.
‘There’s still much to resolve with Jade, but I don’t want to get angry.’
I knew Jade had blamed Blanche for my collapse.
That’s why it must have been even harder.
Until now, to win Blanche’s heart like this.
“Blanche. This is the Rowe Marquis’s residence, so you should only say ‘Dad’ when it’s just the three of us.”
“Okay…”
Blanche seemed to understand, though disappointed by my words.
In fact, I was nervous even about her calling Ayla aunt.
What if someone realized Blanche was Jade’s daughter?
‘No matter how tight-lipped the servants of the Rowe Marquis’s residence are, we need to be careful about this issue.’
Jade suddenly told Blanche to go play in Ayla’s room.
Telling a passing butler to follow and watch over Blanche.
That room was empty. Even its owner, Ayla, had returned to the Lumiere Viscount’s residence with her husband…
‘It should be safe, but why send Blanche to a room without Ayla?’
Blanche looked at me for a moment before climbing the stairs.
“I didn’t expect memories to return so suddenly like this. Usually it takes a strong shock.”
He broached the subject of my memories. Did he send Blanche up because it wasn’t good for her to hear?
“Maybe it’s because I almost lost Blanche. Seeing her return unharmed and walk towards me, it all came back gradually.”
I answered, feeling I needed to explain the earlier situation to Jade as well.
That strange sensation was hard to put into words.
“Blanche taking her first steps, calling me Mom for the first time…”
“…I see.”
Jade nodded with a darkened expression.
“Larien. Earlier, Blanche’s holy power went berserk.”
“H-holy power? Wait, then Blanche…!”
I knew it was dangerous if Blanche’s holy power went out of control.
Jade grabbed my arm as I was about to rush upstairs.
“Calm down. She’s fine now. I absorbed all of Blanche’s holy power.”
He pulled me close and held me in his arms.
I listened to his heartbeat, fast at first then slowing to a steady rhythm.
My mind gradually calmed.
“Blanche was in the attic of the Earl Hamel’s residence. As soon as I entered, I sensed her holy power going berserk.”
“…”
“I’ve confirmed she doesn’t have a fever, and now Blanche has no holy power left. You don’t need to worry about outbursts or depletion anymore.”
He added explanation as he pulled away from me.
‘Thank goodness…’
We had cut off donations to the Grand Temple, so relations with the Pope were at their worst.
The Pope had threatened that even if we came when Blanche’s holy power went berserk, the Grand Temple’s doors would not open.
‘Of course, we cut off donations because there was the method of Jade absorbing it, but…’
My insides churned at the thought of what could have happened if I hadn’t been there in that life-threatening situation, if Jade had been even a little late.
“Jade… Is Blanche really alright?”
“You saw her yourself. Running over just fine.”
Jade kept answering patiently, not seeming to mind my repeated questions.
“Jade. Thank you. For finding and bringing Blanche back.”
“You don’t need to thank me. It’s only natural. I’m also Blanche’s…”
…father.
Though he didn’t say it out loud, Jade was clearly implying it.
“Larien. I’m feeling a bit tired, can you take me to the bedroom? I’m a bit dizzy.”
“Ah, yes. Of course.”
I wanted to talk more about things we hadn’t been able to discuss until now, but I couldn’t keep holding onto someone who said they were tired.
As I supported him up to the bedroom, I noticed something strange.
“Jade. That’s not your bedroom. It’s the study.”
Jade, who should know this mansion better than anyone, mistaking the bedroom.
The way he kept frowning and pressing his eyes.
It was all related to his eyes.
‘Did something get in his eye and bother him? What’s going on?’
I had only made simple guesses until we entered the bedroom.
‘I should watch him take a sleeping pill and fall completely asleep before I go.’
Jade had somnambulism.
He would surely walk around again if he didn’t take a sleeping pill before bed.
“Jade. Where are the sleeping pills?”
“In the nightstand.”
Since it was late and I planned to leave after he fell asleep, I immediately looked for the sleeping pills.
“Wait. I’ll get you some water too.”
I handed him the sleeping pill along with a glass of water, but Jade reached out into empty air.
“Jade. What are you… doing?”
“…”
I felt strange and looked into his eyes.
He wasn’t looking at me straight, nor were his eyes focused.
“…Jade. What’s wrong with your eyes?”
I managed to ask in a trembling voice.
‘Can he not see…?’
I desperately hoped it wasn’t the worst I was thinking.
“It’s not that I can’t see at all. It’s just blurry. If I wore glasses…”
He trailed off, seemingly trying to divert my attention. As if confirming my suspicion.
As if he really had lost his sight.
“I’m asking what happened!”
“It’s the price for absorbing the holy power. It couldn’t be helped.”
“So you’re saying this happened because you absorbed Blanche’s holy power…?”
I collapsed, my legs giving out. If I had known this would happen, I would have prostrated myself before the Pope and given him whatever he wanted.
‘A price, he says…’
I had naively thought that since Jade was here, he could solve it.
“Larien. It’s better than Blanche being in danger.”
“…”
“It’s just eyesight, after all.”
Not knowing what consequences it would bring.
‘If I hadn’t antagonized the Pope…’
Then he wouldn’t have lost his eyesight.
It was all my fault.
My breath caught at the fact that this was the price for absorbing Blanche’s holy power.
A dizzying sense of guilt enveloped me.
“I’m sorry, Jade. I… I’ll bring a doctor to cure you. Or, well…”
In my confusion, impossible words kept spilling out.
It wasn’t an illness that could be cured like an injured leg or a troubled mind.
“I’m sorry… I’m sorry, Jade…”
I buried my face in his lap and cried like a child.
I felt too sorry to even have the courage to look at him.
“Larien.”
Yet his still gentle voice made me lift my head.
“You can take care of me.”
“…Huh?”
“Stay at this mansion and help me. So others don’t know I’ve lost my sight.”
Jade said.
‘Well, Ayla has to live at the Lumiere Viscount’s residence too, so she can’t stay here all the time.’
Since the loss of eyesight couldn’t be reversed anyway, we might as well hide it completely.
‘We absolutely can’t let others know about Jade’s condition.’
It was a weakness that must not be revealed to the Rowe Council of Elders.
“Then I’ll come visit every day.”
“No, Larien. Go to the Boston Earl’s residence and bring your luggage. Tell Mary to come too.”
“My luggage?”
“Stay here for a while and be by my side.”
He whispered softly in an even gentler voice than before.
Even though there was a butler, and I said I’d visit every day, he was telling me to come and stay.
“O-okay.”
Though I didn’t quite understand, somehow I found it hard to refuse.
Male lead is a Divorced Husband
She said to him: “Tell me, what makes you like me? I’ll change it!”
Liu Changning transmigrated into a female cannon fodder character in a female-dominant novel.
After reading the first half of the novel’s plot, the first thing she did upon transmigration was to divorce the Pan Jinlian-style male protagonist she had just married.
She indulged herself, pretending to be ugly and poor.
But as time passed, the way that man looked at her became more and more unusual…
Liu Changning was dumbfounded: Tell me, what makes you like me? I’ll change!
――
This lifetime, Pei Yuanshao was rejected by the same woman twice!
The first time, she drove him away. Forced by the situation, he endured the waves of anger in his heart, yielding and humbling himself.
That person lay slanted on a rocking chair, her sallow face emotionless: “If you don’t want a divorce, go cook!”
Pei Yuanshao’s face was dark and gloomy: “You!”
The second time, after the crisis in Jinling City was resolved, the new emperor sent someone to pick him up. He turned around, stammering: “I… I have to go. If you keep me…”
That person lay on the kang bed, her back to him, as if she had long anticipated this day, crisp and clear: “Goodbye!”
Pei Yuanshao was so angry his fingers trembled: “You… you!”
The mission of family and country made him restrain himself, averting his eyes and turning to leave this broken household.
Two years later, they met again. Seeing her ethereal face, his body shook like a sieve.
“She was originally a ‘she’!”
At the Qionglin Banquet, the top scholar of the imperial examination, a talented person with exceptional speech and conduct, all the unmarried young gentlemen from aristocratic families looked at her with shy and timid eyes.
The peerless imperial official Pei Yuanshao felt the anger in his heart erupt. He pointed at the woman surrounded by the crowd at the Qionglin Banquet, his thin lips slightly curled: “Little sister, I wants that person to be the wife-master of my Mingde Prince Manor.”
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