Sharti silently snorted at the clear expression that help was not needed.
‘There’s no burst.’
Anyway, his upper body was originally bare, and his lower garment had become short like shorts, so she had already finished checking his wound areas.
The wounds on his abdomen and thighs that she was most concerned about were slightly open.
‘So quickly, and he even carried me while running, so it’s natural.’
Fortunately, there was no problem with soaking his body in Sharti’s special herbal decoction.
‘I wanted to help him wash because I’m grateful and sorry.’
She had said it thinking of him, in case he didn’t remember how to wash.
‘Look. He’s hesitating like that.’
Sharti shook her head at the man standing motionless without entering the bathtub.
He clearly needed her help.
Sharti rolled up her sleeves.
‘I’ll start by washing his back.’
It seemed good that he was showing his back. Sharti, who was about to approach the man, blinked for a moment.
The man’s earlobes were red.
‘…Huh? Huh?’
Only then did she notice the tense muscles of the man’s back.
Sharti rolled her eyes.
A bathroom full of warm steam. A naked person and a person ignoring refusal.
It was a situation perfect for misunderstanding by anyone. Sharti, her face flushed red, quickly turned her back and left a note.
Sharti decided to respect his wishes.
Thud. Sharti, who had closed the door and come out, cupped her burning cheeks.
In the hot summer, men often went topless in the village, and she had become immune from treating naked men, so she hadn’t been aware.
‘I was too insensitive! I should be careful.’
Sharti hurriedly left the front of the bathroom.
After a long silence, the sound of water was finally heard from inside the bathroom.
‘I should clean up the sleeping place in the meantime.’
The old log cabin where Sharti lived had a total of 3 rooms, large and small. Excluding the room used as an herb room and the bedroom, only the middle room, a multipurpose room, remained.
‘Even though there’s a lot of luggage, I can make space for him to lie down.’
She gathered blankets to make a place for the man to lie down in the multipurpose room.
‘He said the floor was comfortable.’
As Sharti came out after tidying up the multipurpose room, the man also came out of the bathroom. The man, with a towel draped over his head, looked at her with a face full of things to say.
“The clothes, only this… never mind.”
As if he couldn’t complain about clothes he was receiving, the man rubbed his hair with the towel.
The clothes Sharti had given him were women’s pajamas that were somewhat roomy. When he wore them, the length became short and his body shape stood out.
For no reason, the bathroom situation from earlier came to mind, and Sharti rolled her eyes around.
‘…Should I have given him different clothes?’
Even though he wasn’t naked, strangely, there seemed to be nowhere to look.
What was she being conscious of? Was she suddenly nervous because he was an unfamiliar stranger?
“I’m done washing.”
At his words, Sharti quickly gathered clothes to change into.
“I want to clean where I sat earlier. What should I use?”
The man asked, pointing to the dirty floor.
Unlike in the bathroom, he had returned to his calm face. Thanks to that, Sharti was also able to control her awkward feelings.
“…Alright.”
Leaving behind the man who was more interested in the broom than the ointment, Sharti entered the bathroom.
First, she took off her hood and felt relieved from the stuffiness.
While rubbing her mud-stained face with water, she untied the knot of her robe.
Knock knock.
“…!”
Startled by the knocking sound, Sharti immediately covered her face with her hood.
“Thank you.”
Sharti hesitated at the voice from outside the door.
The man’s voice continued from beyond the door that showed no signs of opening.
“For everything… thank you.”
And then footsteps faded away. Sharti looked towards the door with a slightly dazed face.
Her chest area felt ticklish.
‘He said thank you…’
Mulling over the man’s words heard through the door, Sharti finished undressing.
Starting with her right leg marked with hideous burn scars, she soaked her body in the bathtub.
‘It’s warm…’
The bath water, which she thought would be lukewarm, was still warm.
Feeling the temperature of the warm water, Sharti curled up.
‘Did he consider that I would bathe after him?’
She buried her face in her arms.
The man’s wet hair dripping water. And the droplets that had rolled down his collarbone. Sharti shook her head in surprise as she recalled these.
‘I need to get used to it!’
At the sudden thought, Sharti chewed her lips.
From now on, she would see various aspects of the man. As long as she was hiding him, that is.
‘…I never thought I’d end up living with someone.’
And with an amnesiac man, no less. She never dreamed of it.
Submerging half her face in the water, Sharti rubbed her left hand. The scarred areas stung and hurt, but strangely, her heart felt at ease.
‘I’m too careless. Grandmother would scold me if she knew.’
Sharti chuckled softly.
Even after being chased by soldiers, she felt more responsibility than caution at the man’s brief words of thanks.
Sharti spread her palm. The man’s large palm seemed to overlap with hers.
‘I too…’
Thank you.
Bubble bubble. The frog-like sound that she couldn’t let the man hear spread and disappeared in the water.
Sharti only came out of the herbal bath after diligently loosening the muscles of her right leg.
‘Hmm, it’s still a bit numb.’
Her left hand with spider web-like burn scars trembled slightly, but it was tolerable.
Even after 5 years, the memory left in her body refused to fade.
Unlike the man, back then she had neither a skilled doctor nor treatment.
‘I tried various things later, but they were ineffective.’
Famous doctors or treatments skilled enough to remove scars of this degree were all in the imperial palace. Or she could have sought a magician who used magic-related healing techniques.
But Sharti was neither of high status nor had the enormous money needed for treatment. Even for scars, gold coins were needed by the chest, so she had to give up hope for her voice altogether.
‘Come to think of it, I’ll have to wear a hood even at home from now on.’
She had already shown her face to the man once, but it was just for a moment, so she needed to be even more cautious.
‘I have to live as if hiding even at home.’
Feeling gloomy, Sharti pressed her cheek firmly with the back of her hand.
[Royalty has duties from birth. You’re the same, Sharti.]In the end, that so-called duty always choked Sharti’s breath.
It was because the shackles filled by her half-sister, whom she had met only once, were entangling her like a spider’s web.
‘No… It’s better to be careful.’
Sharti shook her head to clear away her idle thoughts.
Lastly, she put on a long cloak hood to cover her body and face.
‘First, sleep! Think about tomorrow.’
Sharti resolutely grabbed the bathroom doorknob and took a deep breath as she opened the door.
“…Ah.”
And there was the man. More precisely, it was the sight of the man whose pajama buttons had come undone, revealing his front.
A button that had fallen from his chest rolled to Sharti’s feet.
At Sharti’s gaze, the man quickly turned his head away.
“Um, I just sat down and then got up…”
Sharti picked up the button.
The man’s earlobes were red, as if embarrassed.
Sharti quietly bit her lip.
‘I guess… I’ll have to sew first.’
Holding back her laughter and postponing thoughts of tomorrow, Sharti sat on the sofa and began sewing.
The man, who had draped a spare robe over his lower body, was sitting far away for some reason.
He silently applied ointment, trying not to look at Sharti who had just come out of the bath.
“…I’ve just created more work for you.”
Hearing Sharti’s small yawn, the man muttered with his head bowed low.
Glancing at his drooping broad shoulders, Sharti gave the man thread, spare needles, and remaining fabric.
“…Why are you giving me this?”
“Hm?”
Sharti taught the man how to sew.
With large hands and thick fingers, the man was clumsy even holding the needle.
“Is this… the right way?”
He diligently followed Sharti’s sewing with awkward hand movements. The man who had been sewing crookedly gradually became more focused.
Sharti praised him with a small smile. Then, as if petting Tein, she unconsciously stroked his head.
“…!”
The startled man slowly raised his head to look up at Sharti. The moment she saw his slightly widened blue-green eyes, Sharti was surprised and quickly turned away.
Her cheeks burned with embarrassment.
“…It’s nothing.”
The man showed no reaction and focused on sewing again. However, his hands seemed stiff as he kept making mistakes.
The herbal scent from her hand that had come close lingered on the tip of his nose.
“…”
The small gaps Sharti occasionally showed, her innocent actions, shook him. As if enchanted by her, his eyes, head, and body seemed helplessly drawn only to her.
He kept pricking his finger with the needle while berating himself for being stupid, but he felt nothing.
The subtle atmosphere that had continued silently for a while ended along with Sharti’s sewing.
“Alright.”
“Okay.”
Sharti watched the man put on his clothes and then checked the bandages he had wrapped.
Unlike in the cave, the bandages wrapped around his abdomen were perfect.
‘Did he practice in the meantime?’
Putting aside the brief question, the two went to their respective rooms.
Thud. Sharti, still wearing her robe, wriggled into the bed covers and lay down. A deep sigh escaped from deep within her chest.
‘Ah, I need to feed him dinner…’
But her body had already become one with the cozy bed, making it impossible to leave. Her eyelids were already coming down heavily, ignoring her will.
Lingering and hugging the blanket tightly, Sharti pulled it all the way up to her head.
‘A patient shouldn’t… skip… meals…’
As she kept mulling over the man’s meal rather than her own hungry stomach, drowsiness washed over her like waves.
Finally, Sharti’s consciousness faded away in the warm blanket.
[This is the timeline separator]At the time Sharti fell into a deep sleep, the man sitting on the bedding prepared in the multipurpose room was lost in thought.
It wasn’t because his sleeping place had changed.
“I just can’t get a grasp on it.”
More precisely, he couldn’t easily fall asleep because his mind was complicated due to Sharti.
“One moment she’s guarded like an iron wall… The next, when she lets her guard down, she acts unpredictably.”
The man grumbled with his chin propped up, mulling over each of Sharti’s actions throughout the day.
She seemed innocent at times but was bold, and though she appeared delicate, she was also daring and uninhibited.
It was difficult to act according to predictions when her reactions couldn’t be easily anticipated.
The nape of his neck was red as he recalled the moments he had lost himself in front of Sharti several times.
“She seems to have a personality that can’t ignore pitiful things.”
But even that standard was vague.
At first, she had hesitated to even take him along, hadn’t she?
“Haa…”
He had barely gained Sharti’s sympathy and was able to continue receiving her help.
‘For a while.’
Though she hadn’t given an exact date, he could guess that the period Sharti had set would be short.
The day his body recovered, or the day he found even part of his lost memories.
Needless to say, he planned to extend that period somehow.
“I’ll have to stay here as long as possible, even if I have to be tied up.”
Sharti was living alone in the mountains.
Just seeing that she lived with her face hidden, he could roughly guess.
She was living in hiding.
‘I don’t know why though.’
He had no intention of digging into it.
It would be troublesome if she took it as a threat.
‘…I don’t want to see her scared face again.’
However, realistically, it was better to have Sharti’s weakness in hand.
The man clicked his tongue and flopped down.
“If I show a submissive attitude, at least she won’t secretly hand me over to the soldiers.”
Having roughly come to a conclusion, the man closed his eyes and forced himself to try to sleep.
However, the contours of Sharti’s face seen under the moonlight kept lingering, so in the end, he had to spend the night with his eyes open.
[This is the timeline separator]Thump! Thump thump! Thump thump!!
Awakened by the loud noise, Sharti reflexively frowned at the morning sunlight illuminating the bedroom. As she was lingering, pulling her robe hood down deeply, it happened.
Bang!! Bang! Bang bang!! Startled by the continuous loud noises, Sharti sat up abruptly.
__________
Male Lead, The Black-Hearted Lotus (Female-dominant)
Short intro by Yuushi L:
At first, the male lead despised the female lead. Later, he misunderstood that she liked him, so he condescendingly and reluctantly reciprocated her feelings.
Then, he suddenly discovered that she was kind to everyone in the same way, and there was already someone she cherished in her heart, and that person was not him.
The male lead couldn’t believe it, he became angry and crazy. He was determined to capture her body and heart by any means necessary.
Synopsis:
Want to see how a green tea bitch male lead falls in love with the female lead?
Want to see how he flirtatiously pursues the female lead?
Want to see how he gets slapped in the face repeatedly?
The male lead is a green tea bitch, a poisonous lotus, jealous, ruthless, unscrupulous, with a venomous heart, and he’s also a delusional maniac.
The female lead is righteous, positive energy-filled, kind, a holy mother.
Let’s see how two people with extreme personalities come together~
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