#2
Several decades ago, Count Milo of Tristan, who had been invaded by my father and nearly exterminated, allied with minor houses in the east and violated the west-east border. Alarmed by the scale of the enemy, Valdemar’s messenger rushed to the palace almost every day.
However, after the assassination of their niece, the royal family, who had secretly turned against us, seemed unwilling to take my father’s hand. They must have thought it was time for the already troublesome massive duke to die once and for all. They delayed for months and ultimately did not respond to us. Johannes was sent to the front lines.
We waged war like the returning seasons. Like the dry season after a long drought, and like the sudden storms that occasionally swept through, Johannes returned sometimes covered in blood, and other times not. As if he were a tree growing by feeding on human blood, he changed with each return, growing taller.
“You look at people as if you’re seeing monsters.”
Only his lifeless, dying smile remained the same each time.
And my father, who had been stern as if he had cut off the peak of power. His face was like an iron field as he continued to win victories in unfavorable situations without a single ally. As always, he was great and desolate. I should have either completely let go of that face or never let go at all. Regret is always too late.
Two years later, at twenty.
I received a portrait of my prospective groom. It was a summer day when even sporadic provocations had subsided in the heat. The man, who was close to seventy, looked more aged than my father’s father, and I was disgusted by the red pigment that the painter must have painstakingly applied, as if the smell of rotten blood was rising with each stroke.
How did he drive out his first wife and where did he cut and kill his second wife? I had already heard about the man’s cruel nature in passing.
“I can’t do this.”
I pleaded with my father first.
“That man, they say he’s as skinny as a scabby donkey. He’ll die soon even if left alone. The wealth that will come with this role is considerable, so go without further words.”
His sigh was fierce. I was disgusted. So that day, for the first time, I thought of the devil of Duicomeng and ran to the underground outer palace. There was no other way to save myself. In the palace, long untended and filled with the scent of damp earth, lay a stone coffin covered in dust like death.
I had heard that my ancestor, my maternal great-great-grandfather, had cut the devil’s body into nine pieces and sealed them in stone coffins by part. Five had been broken for years, and there were four coffins left until my generation.
My mother, who had become the sole heir after all the men in her family were killed in the war, had moved the stone coffins to her husband’s home.
After a long labor, she barely gave birth to me and Johannes as twins, and then two years later, she gave birth to her second son, Winfrid, after which she suffered from frequent illnesses. That woman only revealed the secret of the stone coffins on the night before my first wedding, just before she breathed her last.
“That power has not yet been exhausted. But it is not something to be used carelessly.”
She repeatedly urged me, sitting alone with her weakened voice. That woman, I didn’t take her seriously, thinking her insignificant and worthless. I was suddenly ashamed that this woman was my mother and only blushed. I sneered so that no one could hear.
What power could there be when God’s will, which took away immortality, was so severe…
I sometimes ask myself. Did I really have to use it? Couldn’t I have wished for something more constructive and more macroscopic? Why didn’t I think to wish for the end of the war? If, if I had wished differently…
Would anything have been different?
Looking back now, it’s all useless and futile. In any case, the screams of iron treading on dry sand, the horrific exchanges of cutting flesh and limbs under the summer sun that scorched horse manes were not a tragedy that touched me at the time, and the wet bed kept coming to mind incessantly. Like a demon eating away at my head.
You don’t need to tell me explicitly. I know full well that this is all just an excuse. I simply did not want to marry an old man reeking of blood who had already driven away or killed four previous wives. That was the only real danger existing in my narrow space.
How did the second wife who angered the old man die? I lifted the hammer. They say she died with her belly split open, spilling her entrails while standing. The stone coffin broke easily. Devil, I don’t want to marry that man, please stop this from happening. For some reason, there was only one stone coffin left, but I prayed like that.
And so, on ‘that night’ after breaking the stone coffin.
Trouble arose.
Kretzman.
From now on, hoping that you will feel all the debris of emotions I felt just as vividly, I will try to write in as much detail as possible about everything that happened after that night. However, because I couldn’t write due to my limited education, I’m not at all confident if I can do it as well as I hope.
To you with your high learning, the sentences may seem rough and overly emotional. Feel free to criticize the writing as much as you like, saying how poorly written it is. I have erased my shame. Because I curse you with endless feelings, like a well that never dries up no matter how much you scoop from it, more than you could ever insult me.
Do you know?
Today, too, I failed to deny the denial. I don’t know why the emotions I suppressed all day long come rushing in late at night. Now, I recall that day. I recall that night when I broke the stone coffin, broke human ethics, and was with the devil. I recall the fear, the excitement of that time.
This is a memory I carved with frozen nails into living flesh three years ago. Unfortunately, I do not know whether you are alive or dead. Are you already dead?
If so, I am very regretful. Because the narrow sulfur valley in the lower pit of hell is too unjust for you. That place is too cozy.
Are you perhaps still breathing? I hope you, a miserable life. The agony of being nailed alone in a stone chamber, starving for ten days and nights, longing for a single drop of water trembling on the tip of a branch that has penetrated through that window. A desperate life wishing to die just that much. I too had equally boiling years, are you resentful?
But you must keep in mind. There is not a shred of hesitation in my hatred for you. On this night, dark enough to deafen. I write this letter with evil swallowed into my insides. I dig up a long-rotted past.
Ugly… ugly, Kretzman.
01. The Coffin
Deep in the night.
“Griselda!”
“Young lady.”
I encountered my nanny while going downstairs. Griselda, who looked visibly flustered, embraced my body and blocked the middle of the stairs where torches were sparsely placed. Because of that, the damp sensation of my sweat-soaked nightgown clung to my limbs.
“I heard the sound of metal. You heard it too, didn’t you?”
“Return to your bedroom.”
“Is this a siege? A night raid?”
“No, young lady.”
“Then what is it? What’s that sound?”
Griselda tried to turn my shoulders around. I stood firm against her strength, struggling to go down even a little further. I was completely out of my mind. I was anxious.
Tapping my feet impatiently, I tried to peek at the lower floor, but my view was blocked by the wall and I couldn’t see anything properly. Only the hallway lying across was as dark as the boundary between this world and the next. As if I could see beyond it if I just strained my eyelids, I asked while fixing my gaze. You saw it, didn’t you?
“It might be dangerous, so please return to your bedroom…”
“I’m asking you.”
“Please, young lady.”
“Answer me.”
“It’s nothing serious.”
“This is…”
I couldn’t finish my words. We both froze at the same time.
Again, the sound of something breaking echoed throughout the corridor. From the other side of the stairs, where there had been murmuring all along, a flood of men’s long and short sighs poured out, and soon returned to their previous shouts.
“Th… is…”
My lips, which had unconsciously clenched together, wouldn’t part easily. Griselda was still embracing me, and that worried restraint rather made my insides boil. Shallow anger swallowed my anxiety.
“Catch it!”
“Stop it!”
The horrified voices that came along the stone walls felt like they were striking the back of my head. As if reacting to that shock, I pushed Griselda away.
“If this is nothing serious! Why can’t you answer! You!”
After glancing at her pale, gaunt face, I ran out, and a voice like an iron skewer called out “Young lady!” chasing after me. I ran down the corridor, almost falling. I remember the light that quickly approached and then receded behind me, and the murmuring that came mixed with the stuffy air. As I turned left, keeping the wall to my side, a place lit as bright as day suddenly appeared.
That place was Johannes’ bedroom.
The servants who had already rushed there were stationed outside the door like a group of scarecrows. And for some reason, only they were silent as the grave. A silence that seemed out of place in the situation, as if it had been set apart.
It was ominous. I pushed my way through the crowd of people to get inside. They were pushed aside like statues without will. They all seemed so stunned that they didn’t even think to stop me from bursting out of the women’s quarters on my own.
Even the elderly head butler, who never allowed even the slightest flaw, was standing helplessly just the same. Young lord. He muttered with his wrinkled lips. As I stood next to his thin side, my view suddenly cleared and the entire interior came into view. I was rooted to the spot. There was no bloodbath as I had expected.
However, that place was, truly, a mess.
The noise that had driven me to terror in the middle of the night was not due to a night raid. All the broken furniture was Johannes’, and the shouts were those of the retainer knights. Sword sheaths with locked swords rolled on the floor like useless antiques. Those symbols of knighthood could not have looked more pathetic.
Beyond those useless things, fragments of fallen and broken furniture, and the bed that had somehow collapsed halfway, at the center of the group of knights was Johannes. Ah, that appearance. There was a reason for the unusual silence.
It was noisy and chaotic all around as if the fortress itself was wailing. Johannes, who was actually the cause of the commotion, was terribly quiet in his mess. Johannes. I must have unconsciously let his name slip.
Is that person ‘raging’ in there really the brother I know?
“Don’t look.”
Griselda, who had followed me without me noticing, grabbed my arm. With all strength gone from my limbs, I stumbled backward as she led me until the inner room was no longer visible.
No, I retreated until Johannes was no longer visible. I saw the muddy-looking figure filling in the empty space. Griselda, Griselda. I painfully gripped Griselda’s hand and asked. Why is he like that? Something’s wrong with Johannes.
Male lead is reincarnated to save his wife
I’ve also read this one twice already. The female lead is kinda soft and gets embarrassed easily—not really my type, but the plot is definitely worth reading. Hurry up and read it, y’all!
Intro
When Shen Yuan encountered Su Jin again in his previous life, she had already become the Prime Minister of the current dynasty. As for him, the former top young master of the capital, he had long since fallen into the abyss, becoming a singer on a pleasure boat.
After a song ended, he was redeemed and sent to the Su Residence.
Su Jin respected and cherished him, gave him a roof over his head, and bestowed him with warmth. Shen Yuan fell deeper and deeper, but before he could express his feelings, Su Jin passed away.
Shen Yuan died to follow her in death, but instead, he returned to when he was fifteen years old.
At that time, he was not yet engaged, and Su Jin was just a poor scholar.
Shen Yuan gritted his teeth, casting aside all his pride, and thought of ways to coax and entice her every day.
The colder and more indifferent Su Jin was towards him, the more proactive Shen Yuan became.
He was not afraid of being mocked by the world, only wanting to marry his Wife-master early, to hold her hand and never let go for a lifetime.
[Note: This story will not specifically point out the male lead’s reincarnation time point; it’s all in the details. Whenever you feel that the male lead is acting strangely, he has most likely been reincarnated.]
[Touch the gear icon in the bottom right corner of the screen to move to the next chapter if you want.]
