Seething with resentment against nobles, Dylan wanted to mock Idel openly, but refrained for fear of jeopardizing the trade.
In response to Dylan’s words, Idel shook her head.
“Does that make them happy? A life lived under someone else’s protection, without their own will. Moreover, by imperial law, noblewomen can’t even earn money unless they divorce. They can’t live independently.”
Dylan was taken aback; he hadn’t known that noblewomen couldn’t be economically independent without a special reason like divorce. His pupils dilated momentarily before narrowing again.
“Hmph! Even if noblewomen aren’t free, at least they don’t starve to death.”
Dylan disdainfully threw the bread he was holding against the wall, aiming his scorn at Idel.
“The freedom you speak of is a right you can only consider when your belly is full! It means nothing to those struggling to survive!”
“True, one must have basic human rights to contemplate a better life. But do you realize that what you’re doing strips even the barest dignity from people?”
Idel’s voice, hitherto steady, now penetrated Dylan’s ears with a piercing intensity.
“Even if they don’t starve… can you say the lives of those sold as slaves are better than when they were hungry?”
Faced with Idel’s pointed question, Dylan fell silent. Images from his own past, a time when he’d lived like livestock without being treated as human, began to resurface.
Moreover, the lives of female slaves were more miserable than those of male slaves. Exploited relentlessly, both day and night.
Observing the agonized distortion of Dylan’s face, Idel faintly sensed that she had similar experiences in her past. It was something she had suspected, given his mannish attire and disdain for nobility.
“You’d know if you were a woman. Life is hard for the powerless, but it’s even more brutal if you’re female.”
Idel repeated what she had said earlier. The image of girls who would become slaves naturally formed in Dylan’s mind.
The image was like an afterimage that flowed from a crosssection of his own past. Dylan’s entire body trembled.
“So… please, at least release those girls.”
Avoiding the earnest emerald eyes staring back at him, Dylan shook his head as if trying to shake off the gaze that held him.
“…Do not attempt to persuade me. Your fate, as well as theirs, is already decided.”
“No, if you help, it can be changed.”
“Nonsense! If you continue to be noisy, I will have no choice.”
Dylan took out a glass bottle and a cloth handkerchief from his pocket. Opening the bottle, a sour smell wafted up. Idel flinched upon realizing what liquid was soaking the handkerchief.
“We need to move again, so if you’re not eating, keep quiet and sleep. Your Grace, Duchess.”
“…Mm!”
The familiar smell of the inhalation anesthetic entered through her nose and mouth again. Idel’s eyelids flickered momentarily before closing weakly.
.
.
.
Idel regained consciousness due to someone’s voice.
“…Your Grace, Duchess!”
‘Who is it…?’
An urgent and desperate voice pierced through her confused consciousness. Idel laboriously lifted her eyelids.
“Are you conscious?”
Blinking her hazy eyes, Idel shifted her gaze toward the voice. She met eyes with a worriedlooking young girl.
‘I’ve seen her somewhere…’
As if trying to remember, Idel slightly furrowed her brows. Sensing this, the girl spoke her name first.
“I’m Joy! Do you remember me?”
“…Joy?”
“Yes! I gave you a wreath at Maris Port.”
“Ah…!”
Idel recalled her honeymoon visit to Maris Port. Before boarding the ship, the nuns and children from the Maris church orphanage had given her gifts in gratitude.
“[Dash] What’s your name?”
“[Dash] JJoy.”
“[Dash] A name that brings joy just by hearing it. Will you personally place the wreath you made on me?”
She remembered the face of the shy child who had put the wreath on her with small hands stained from flower sap.
“Joy… But why are you…”
Idel, in a moment of joyful realization, attempted to sit up, but then realized why Joy was here and her face hardened.
“You didn’t get captured here, did you?”
“Um… yes…”
“My God… How could this…”
As Joy’s face blurred with tears, Idel let out a sigh steeped in sorrow.
Ex-husband Wants Reconciliation
One-line summary: Chasing the wife to the crematorium (making an effort to attract someone who has become indifferent), the female lead doesn’t look back, the second male lead takes the position.
Intro:
To repay the kindness of the older generation, Su Mu crossed into a female-dominated world and became a live-in daughter-in-law of the Yan family, single-handedly saving the Yan family from fire and water.
But her husband, Yan Jiyue, the eldest son of the Yan family, treated her with sarcasm and never showed her a good face.
It wasn’t until after Su Mu’s death that this pampered and arrogant young master shed a few fake tears and pretended to want to die for love.
This life’s kindness was enough. If there was a next life, she would definitely kick Yan Jiyue away.
Who knew that the heavens would be so kind as to allow her to be reborn, returning to the time when she had just married into the Yan family.
Su Mu glanced at the Yan eldest son, who still spoke coldly to her, and threw a divorce letter in front of him.
“Let’s divorce!”
***
Yan Jiyue never imagined that he would be reborn. He happily went to find Su Mu, wanting to make up for the mistakes he had made in his ignorant youth.
Wasn’t the reason the heavens allowed him to be reborn to let him reconcile with Su Mu?
But when he pushed open the door to Su Mu’s room, the person lying on the bed was another man.
Su Mu’s personal attendant, Xie Yi.
Yan Jiyue hated him so much that his teeth itched. In front of Su Mu, Xie Yi was a gentle and considerate whisperer of sweet nothings, but in reality, he was vicious-hearted and deliberately sabotaged their husband and wife relationship.
In the previous life, it was he who secretly hid in Su Mu’s coffin and committed suicide, stealing a step ahead of him to be buried with Su Mu.
Yan Jiyue’s eyes were filled with hatred as he cursed, “What kind of thing are you? Your background is lowly, what right do you have to occupy Su Mu?”
Xie Yi looked at the sleeping Su Mu and no longer pretended to be a whisperer of sweet nothings.
He proudly stuck out his belly, “I have the right because my belly is capable of giving the Wife-master a daughter.”
***
Yan Jiyue was consumed with jealousy. He spread rumors that Xie Yi had once been branded with the mark of a “harlot” on his chest.
But on the night Xie Yi cut off the flesh bearing that mark, Su Mu suddenly realized something was amiss.
“How did you know the exact moment I was poisoned? And why did you show up a month early?”
Xie Yi remained silent, blood from his wound soaking through his robes. His sapphire eyes brimmed with anguish – or was it just a flawless act?
Between a once-arrogant husband now seeking redemption, and a gentle soul willing to die for her – who truly held the darkest secrets? And could it be that Su Mu and Yan Jiyue weren’t the only ones given a second chance at life…?
[Reading Guide]
1. True divorce, chasing the wife to the crematorium, the female lead doesn’t look back, the male lead is Xie Yi.
2. The ex-husband did not cheat, he just realized too late and didn’t realize that he liked the female lead.
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