#15
Even before I could ask, a terrible premonition overwhelmed me. Perhaps Johannes when transformed into a devil should be seen as something new that cannot be perfectly separated from it.
So perhaps the true nature of the devil is not its repulsive appearance, but rather the demonic nature that burrows deep into a person and compels their darkest corners to manifest as an outer shell.
“Ah, my woman who I long for so deeply in this heart is truly selfish…”
A disgusting memory suddenly rose up my back. Selfish? Why? That, was it just words spoken to torment me? Guilt washed away like sand. The venom spewed by the devil and the things this body had to endure were more intense than my own mistakes.
At the same time, I recalled Johannes’ self-reproach that he “thought it was a nightmare.” It was you…. Though unlike you, but not entirely different… it was you. What remained intact to the end was anger. No, it was fear disguised as anger. Oh, what should I do. You hated me. My fingertips and toes trembled slightly.
“Jo… han. Johannes.”
At my call, Johannes slowly raised himself and twisted his waist to look at me. His blue eyes, so melancholic they seemed almost black. The light settling on his platinum eyelashes glimmered faintly in the darkness. I tried to calm my unbearably chattering heart by carefully counting them.
Soon Johannes turned completely and moved to a spot closer to me. He quietly waited for me like that.
“…Do you dislike me that much?”
“What?”
The light I had been counting crumbled away. Johannes’ eyes widened.
“Did I… do something wrong?”
Unconsciously, I grasped the back of his hand. I could feel his hand tense.
“…That’s not it.”
After hesitating for a moment, he answered briefly. That momentary gap felt like it was scraping at me.
“What did I do to you?”
“No, Inette.”
There was not even a slight delay in that answer. I ended up grabbing Johannes’ wrist entirely. Lest he try to run away without answering.
“Really, you didn’t hate me?”
“Hate you? That’s impossible. Why would you suddenly think that… If anything, you…”
“Then why did you say… say such things?”
Johannes, who had been fidgeting with a mixture of pity and bewilderment, suddenly fell silent.
I couldn’t lie still. I tried to put strength into my sore back, but Johannes silently pressed down on my shoulder as I tried to raise my body.
My head, which had been slightly lifted, fell back onto the pillow. My tangled hair irritated my ears and cheeks. But I had no leisure to fix my hair.
I didn’t wait any longer and fumbled to pour out my twisted feelings.
“At first, I couldn’t tell who that… thing was. It wasn’t your appearance, Johannes… but it was saying things only you would know…. But just now, you said you thought it was a nightmare…”
“……”
“Do you remember what kind of things you said to me when you changed like that?”
From then on, Johannes was completely silent. His eyes, looking down at me as if he had received some kind of shock, were visibly distraught.
I didn’t want to push him further when he was already struggling with guilt, but I couldn’t bear not asking. I checked more desperately.
“How much do you remember? What was it like in the dream?”
“……”
“To the point of doing such… things to me, did I…”
“……”
“Make you hate me?”
There was neither denial nor affirmation. Johannes just remained completely frozen, not moving at all.
Finally, tears overflowed from a heart that had swallowed a fistful of dirt. It really was you. The words caught on the tip of my tongue. My throat was so choked up that I couldn’t say anything.
Instead, I grabbed his forearm and pulled hard. Johannes was dragged down in front of me. Hesitant, hesitant. Those movements like livestock heading to the slaughterhouse. Only after his body leaned enough to pour over me did he support his upper body by pressing on the bed.
“What… is it…? Why, why do you hate me.”
“…It’s not your fault, Inette.”
Johannes opened his mouth with difficulty, right in front of me as I sobbed. But it wasn’t the answer I wanted. It felt as if a rock had been placed on my chest, making it unbearably sore throughout.
“That, you did hate me, right? Yet you say it’s not my fault? Does that make any sense? Do you not remember what you said to me earlier? …Do you know what you, that thing, said? …I, I. Ah, I…”
My voice leaked out from deep in my throat as if pressed by the rock placed on it. The more I spoke, the more rapidly tears welled up and flowed everywhere.
I felt like my insides were turning over. If I had a bit more strength, I might have screamed out loud. That I had done nothing wrong. That I wasn’t someone who deserved to have such things done to me. That you shouldn’t hate me. So.
So Johannes.
Please don’t push me away.
“I… I’m sorry.”
As if he had understood, Johannes reached his arm over my forehead to press on the bed. Half-lying down like that, he rubbed my face with his other hand.
“Please. Don’t try to remember forcibly.”
Johannes’ arm came over my forehead. Draping his upper body, he pressed one hand on my headboard and began to rub my face with his free hand. He wiped below my eyes and covered my eyelids.
If you hate me, then don’t be so kind. Feel indignant and angry like last time. Why are you doing this? Why are you pouring out affection like this to someone you hate? Is it because you feel sorry? Is it because you feel guilty?
“What wrong could you have done? It really isn’t your fault. I’m sorry. I’m sorry…”
At that time, his self-reproach seemed rather spiteful and disappointing, driving me crazy. My whole cheek throbbed at his touch and gaze that seemed almost habitual. I blurted out whatever came to mind.
“Or… what is it.”
“……”
“You want me to just stay like this without knowing anything…? Isn’t that too much?”
“……”
“Johannes,”
“You don’t understand.”
His hand fell away. The warmth left no trace, as if it had never been there in the first place.
“Why can’t I? How would you know that.”
My voice rose that much higher because of the emptiness left by the departing warmth.
“…You, never…”
“Try explaining it to me.”
“……”
“…Johannes.”
“That.”
As I was about to urge him again, Johannes’ voice cut in, interrupting my call. I heard the sound of the pillowcase crumpling near my forehead. And then I heard his voice, forcefully pushed inward even more than that sunken pillowcase, speaking deliberately without gaps.
“It wasn’t me. It couldn’t have been me.”
That face.
It was no ordinary expression. His profile, tilted diagonally, was all disheveled. As if someone had arbitrarily poured mud all over Johannes’ face, like a horizon devoured by twilight, a silent wreck.
Although I couldn’t believe his words that it wasn’t himself, I was left speechless.
“Let’s talk tomorrow.”
Johannes said in a low voice.
“Go to sleep now.”
His tone, which had quickly feigned calmness, was even a bit forceful. The corners of my mouth tensed. It was a manner of speech I had come to hear often lately, but that day it sounded especially harsh.
Johannes’ gaze, which had been avoiding me, jumped briefly. The guilt and pity that had already erased the mire filled his face in an instant, so persistent and cruel. He blushed.
In fact, Johannes should have shouted at me that day. Not to push himself. That it had nothing to do with liking or hating me. That I had nothing to do with his loathing or disgust towards life itself. So don’t misunderstand, I just wanted to live properly… he should have said. I still don’t fully understand the sorrow or despair Johannes must have felt.
“…I’m sorry.”
But Johannes apologized as if lamenting.
“It would be good to talk now, but more than anything else, your complexion… it looks very bad. Really very bad. You’re so pale, not even like a sheet of white paper…. Are you trying to kill me with worry now because you hate me? Please get some sleep. Don’t make me more anxious…. I’m begging you.”
Sincere concern dripped from his voice. There was nothing I could say to such a Johannes. I squeezed my eyes shut, which had swollen enough to crease the skin, and pulled the blanket over my head. Although I had clearly gotten an answer, I felt a sense of helplessness as if no knots had been untied. Added to this, I didn’t want to look at him at all because of the lingering feelings of resentment and sorrow.
Hoo… A soft sigh came from below. The bed rose abruptly. There was a brief rustling sound as if Johannes, who had gotten up from his seat, was arranging the blanket I had covered myself with, followed by the sound of careful footsteps and the breath of blowing out candles. Johannes soon returned.
I curled up tightly under the blanket. My whole body ached as if I had gone through a bout of illness. The bones that had endured the vicious night throbbed entirely, and my heart felt like it would burst on its own. I felt stifled.
***
Quite a long time seemed to have passed after that. It was around the time when the emotions that had overflowed in a mess had subsided, settling in the bedroom like the remnants of the night.
Unable to sleep, I gently lifted the blanket. Without even a handful of moonlight seeping in, the room was just pitch-dark. However, I could sense Johannes’ presence on the floor at the edge of the bed. It wasn’t too far. Just a distance where I could reach his neck if I stretched out my hand.
Surely he wasn’t planning to sleep like that. It must be hard.
“…Are you going to sleep like that?”
“Yeah. When the sun rises, I’ll leave when it seems appropriate.”
As if he already knew I wasn’t asleep, Johannes answered nonchalantly. That casual tone strangely put me at ease. I turned to face the direction where Johannes was.
“Griselda will come in the morning…”
“I’ll hide in a clothes chest or something beforehand.”
“Chest?”
“Which one do you not use often?”
Johannes suddenly asked, looking at me as if he had just thought of it. I was a bit taken aback. Even though there wasn’t much to see clearly, I alternately looked at the clothes chest that would be somewhere in the distance and towards Johannes.
“You in there? …With your body?”
I was dumbfounded.
In fact, knights who seemed to be made entirely of muscle without a single bit of flesh were abundant in the fortress, and compared to them, Johannes gave an almost lanky impression.
Nevertheless, he too was a knight who wielded swords weighing several pounds and used spears. Unlike me, he was tall and large-boned, and on top of that, he was firm from years of training and living abroad. It was hard to imagine him folded tightly into a chest that barely held my clothes.
“If I squeeze in, wouldn’t it work somehow?”
Johannes laughed softly. It was a laugh I hadn’t seen or heard for several years.
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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