The Monster Knight Wants Maternity Leave (Completed Main Story) - Chapter 3
Early dawn, a small harbor near the capital.
The sky was beginning to brighten, and sharp streaks of dawn light seeped through the labyrinthine alleys.
This was the very harbor where, on that fateful day, she had come to retrieve the Saintess.
Lucia, cloaked in a black infiltration mantle, stood in a narrow alley and scanned her surroundings.
‘…It must be one of these.’
Back then, she had come here without a shred of doubt, focused solely on her mission.
But now, looking again, experience told her that a place packed only with warehouses was highly likely to be a dark market where smugglers stored and traded contraband.
Seeing these warehouses filled with greed, she felt a headache coming on at the thought of searching each one for the child.
Yet she quickly shook her head as if to regain composure.
No matter how she thought about it, searching the warehouses now was far better than waiting until after the child became the Saintess candidate.
She moved silently, surveying every corner of the warehouse district.
Then,
‘Disgusting. At this point, I’d believe it if someone told me this was the rotting corpse of an animal.’
An old, decrepit warehouse—the oldest-looking one here—caught her eye. As she approached, a putrid stench stabbed her nostrils.
‘Surely not here. No one could possibly be in a place like this…’
Despite her thoughts, Lucia found her feet stubbornly refusing to turn away.
Moreover, the padlock on the warehouse looked brand new and tightly secured, as if guarding something precious.
‘An expensive lock on this rotten warehouse…’
Lucia reached out and touched the lock.
Her white gloves remained spotless, as expected.
Such pristine condition wouldn’t be possible unless handled daily.
The thick iron padlock appeared firmly sealed, as though no one could ever open it—but she was already a master craftsman.
An aura blade formed in Lucia’s hand silently sliced through the lock like pudding.
Then she pushed the door open.
Though no one was inside, the stench of filth and decay that rushed out made her grimace involuntarily.
‘…Worse than a battlefield.’
Which meant,
this was clearly no place where anything living—Saintess or otherwise—could possibly be.
Just as she turned to leave and reopened the door,
a sudden, chilling sound echoed through the air, prompting Lucia to swiftly shut the door again.
An alarm?
She suppressed all sound, and the noise soon faded.
Relieved that no one came to investigate, Lucia quietly lit the lantern she had brought.
“…!”
Vivid, exotic plumage and flamboyant, otherworldly appearances.
These were birds of such noble beauty that even the most pretentious nobles would lose their minds over them.
Wild birds she had never seen before filled the shabby warehouse, locked inside cages.
‘So the filth and waste are from them. I shouldn’t have underestimated this small harbor.’
The black-market value of these birds was undoubtedly beyond imagination.
Lucia slowly surveyed the warehouse.
Fortunately, the rare birds remained fairly quiet upon seeing her, as if they weren’t entirely unfamiliar with humans.
‘Only birds? Where…’
Lucia set the lantern on the floor and removed her hood.
Then, focusing intently, she activated Spatial Embodiment.
Spatial Embodiment was a technique unique to Grand Sword Masters, allowing her to synchronize with a designated space and scrutinize every detail within it.
As she closed her eyes and concentrated, her heightened senses meticulously mapped out the entire warehouse.
And then she detected an irregular, tiny heartbeat.
It wasn’t the steady rhythm of the calm birds hiding their presence.
Lucia withdrew the technique and approached the source.
An uneasy, intensely anxious feeling.
The faint, trembling breaths echoing in response made even her, usually bold and composed, tense up.
“…”
A small child huddled beneath a pile of feathers, clutching a tattered cloth.
What made her realize it was human was the strand of black hair spilling from beneath the ragged fabric.
The first proof of the Saintess: black hair, the same shade as Lucia’s.
The second proof: the child’s age—about five years old, just past infancy.
And if the third proof, divine power, were also present, then this little one was undoubtedly the Saintess.
But before she could verify that, Lucia’s eyes caught sight of the child’s hand peeking out from the cloth.
A small, pale hand.
It was exactly as she remembered—unchanged from that day she’d tried half her life to forget.
‘So it’s you.’
What bitter irony that the Saintess sent by the gods would be found in such a filthy place.
“…Ah.”
Just as she was about to speak to the Saintess she’d finally found, the child flinched at the sound.
And Lucia’s words caught in her throat.
‘…Have I ever even spoken to a child before? Or… has a child this age even spoken to me?’
She had no idea.
Lucia had never attended the wedding of her beloved comrade’s daughter, nor the birth of her hard-won granddaughter.
And the last young maid she’d lived with was already too old to be called a child.
In short, her life had never held any connection to children.
She’d rushed here determined to rescue the Saintess, yet had absolutely no idea how to deal with a child.
Frozen in thought, Lucia stood still, silently gazing down at the child.
A dirty, worn-out cloth stained with grime.
Feathers matted with filth clung to tangled hair.
The child trembled uncontrollably—whether from cold or fear, it was impossible to tell.
The pitiful sight struck Lucia as the most wretched she’d ever seen—so much so that she felt this child had more right than anyone to curse the gods.
Lucia looked down at the lantern in her hand.
The only light in this place.
When the lantern was set down before her, the child startled and burrowed deeper into the corner.
Lucia suddenly remembered a child she’d picked up on the battlefield at age seventeen.
The situation had been similar, but even that child had been older than this Saintess.
‘Heath… He must be about eighteen now.’
The oddly talented brat who’d joined her unit thanks to his natural gifts flashed through her mind.
As she sat wordlessly before the child, lost in thought, a rustling sound broke the silence.
Probably because Lucia had simply watched for so long, the hidden child cautiously pulled back the covering cloth a little to assess the situation.
And finally, one clear eye, previously hidden behind long hair, met hers.
“…Mama?”
Lucia’s body froze instantly.
Memories surged—the clear golden eyes, and the last words that child had spoken before letting go of her hand.
*
Imperial Year 4.
Gerarchi Province, a small rural orphanage.
Late at night, all lights extinguished.
Moonlight filtered through the old window, illuminating the rows of bunk beds filling the room.
And from somewhere near the edge of those beds came a faint whimper.
On the lower bunk where the sound originated, a small girl with rare black hair lay sweating coldly on her forehead, caught in a nightmare.
-Creak
The sound came from the upper bunk above the black-haired girl.
The rickety bed shifted slightly, and a girl who looked about ten years old nimbly climbed down and approached the smaller child.
“Annie, wake up. Annie.”
The girl, surprisingly neat for someone raised in an orphanage, whispered gently into the dreaming child’s ear to rouse her carefully.
“…Huh, hwaang!”
“Shh.”
“…Sis?”
“Yes. It’s me. Sister Mia. Another nightmare?”
The child, jolted awake from her dream, still trembling with cold sweat, was calmly soothed by Mia, who seemed accustomed to this.
“…”
Though too young to pronounce words clearly, Annie understood the word “nightmare.”
But since she couldn’t tell if it was a good dream or a bad one, she remained silent.
Because her dream had been of her mother arriving in a splendid carriage.
A nightmare that felt like the happiest dream.
“Here.”
Mia held out her hand.
The girl naturally reached out—because after every dream, the child would desperately clutch her small hand.
Having wandered through many orphanages, Mia had met many children with this habit.
From what she’d observed, it often developed when a child’s last memory of being abandoned was the warmth of their mother’s hand slipping away.
But oddly, Annie had been abandoned at birth and had lived her whole life here.
“…You’ll get scolded.”
Annie spoke worriedly to Mia lying beside her.
The orphanage had a rule—even in this cramped, shabby space—each child must sleep in their own bed.
It was a harsh rule, meant to prevent the children from forming attachments, since they’d eventually leave the orphanage.
“Don’t worry. I’ll go back to my bed once you fall asleep again.”
“…Oook.”
Exhausted, the child nodded weakly.
“Annie, was today’s work really that hard?”
Sensing Annie fidgeting with her hand, unable to fall back asleep, Mia spoke softly.
“…That despicable, trash of a warden. Saying she’d fill my spot with a little kid like you just because I’m getting adopted by the baroness.”
Mia’s harsh words revealed her guilt—likely because Annie had to take over her duties now that she was leaving tomorrow.
“When I succeed someday, I’ll come back for you. I’ll work hard so it won’t take long—just hang on until then. We’ll definitely meet again.”
At Mia’s vow, mixed with apology and anger, Annie gave a tiny nod.
“And remember what I told you? When those arrogant village kids tease you, throw the shovel at them. Got it? They’re really nothing special.”
‘Filthy Annie! Smelly Annie!’
At Mia’s words, the village children’s taunts echoed vividly in Annie’s mind, and she squeezed her eyes shut tightly.
Ever since Baron Gerarchi reduced his support, the orphanage had forced the children to do the village’s menial chores.
The task assigned was cleaning the communal latrine—a job so repulsive even adults avoided it—but deemed perfectly suitable for poor, parentless orphans.
The village children, mirroring their parents’ cruelty, always went there to torment the orphanage kids.
“Ugh. With your overly kind nature, you’ll never do it. Just sleep already.”
Mia closed her eyes demonstratively, pretending to sleep.
Once Annie, still holding her hand, finally closed her eyes, Mia—who had been cursing under her breath—quietly opened her eyes again and gazed at the child with deep worry.
Even with her eyes shut, Annie knew Mia was worried about her.
But more than that, what made Annie feel lonely was knowing that soon, no one would hold her empty hand again.
Yet Annie believed.
She remembered what Mia—the smartest person she knew—had once told her: dreams are the opposite.
Though in her dreams her mother let go of her hand again and again, Annie believed that when her mother finally appeared before her, she would firmly hold her hand and stay with her.
So even though she always felt sorrowful longing, this was no nightmare.
Male lead says he’s pregnant — and it’s female lead’s child
Something seems a bit off about this world.
Wang Zhao thought as she watched a pregnant man walking towards her…
Intro
Female lead finds herself in a world where the men who possess the ability to bear children.
As she navigates this unfamiliar reality, she is caught off guard by the sudden appearance of her boyfriend, who reveals that he is pregnant.
Is this truly her boyfriend?
Why can’t she recall any details about their time together?
She begins to doubt whether the child her boyfriend is carrying is even hers.
Is there a hidden reason behind her amnesia, or could it be a side effect of her sudden arrival in this strange new world?
Just when it seems the protagonist’s life couldn’t become any more entangled, her ex-boyfriend makes an unexpected appearance, raising questions about the protagonist’s past.
__________
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they’re so cute i’m gonna cry 😭😭 i adore them sm