A Way to Confirm Your Husband’s True Feelings - Chapter 56

“……”

Yes, that was it. Just as Dillon said, Caesar’s sensitivity toward his wife had now gone beyond reason.

Even before their marriage, he had known there were more than enough men eyeing Beatrice to fill ten carriages.

So he thought that if he could bind her to himself through marriage—a system that conveniently favored people like him—everything would be alright.

But even after the wedding, Caesar couldn’t find any peace of mind.

It felt as though the entire world was hell-bent on stealing his wife from him. Regardless of whether her husband was glaring with both eyes wide open, there were countless vermin-like men, especially in the capital, reaching out with filthy hands of temptation.

That was why Caesar wanted to hide Beatrice from the world. It wasn’t just the attention directed at her, but even the slightest attention she gave to someone else that drove him on edge.

Had he gone half mad simply from loving his wife too much? Every external situation not involving the two of them felt like an obstacle or a threat. Naturally, everything became bothersome and exhausting.

“…Is that true?”

His superior, who was already infamously taciturn, gave no response. And now Dillon regretted needling him so hard. A commander blushing silently… it really wasn’t a sight he had wanted to see.

“Uhhh, o-okay, I get it. Let’s just head out now.”

Just a little while ago, he had genuinely been curious about his commander’s overflowing honeymoon life and love story with the lovely Lady Beatrice, but now he was fine not knowing.

The rumors that the couple was doing well appeared to be true… but this seemed like the kind of ‘devotion becomes an illness’ situation. Judging by his commander’s expression, it had to be a pretty severe case.

And perhaps not even in a good way. It looked a bit unhinged, if he had to be honest.

So Dillon Schultz firmly resolved to never again bring up the commander’s marriage.

After all, isn’t it common sense not to mess with a psycho?

Rubbing the goosebumps on his arm, Dillon followed behind Caesar, who was already mounted on his horse.

***

As the world knew, Caesar Valentin was of common birth.

Though to gloss it over as simply ‘common birth’ was a bit too kind. His childhood was painted entirely in scenes of severe misfortune and abject misery.

He had no parents from birth, and naturally had no given name or family name. Bounced around a small rural village like a rock on the roadside, by the time he was about five or six and could understand things, he found himself one of the hangers-on in a gang of beggars.

It was the gang’s leader who gave him the name ‘Caesar’. Giving such a noble-sounding name to a filthy urchin was nothing more than mockery.

The man had sticky fingers and a violent temper. Around age ten, unable to endure the beatings any longer, Caesar fled the group.

After that, he did everything and anything. Odd jobs at the smithy, mucking stables at inns, and when desperate, even stealing.

His chance came around age twelve, when his body had started to grow. A knight of a lower-ranking viscount household hired him to run errands.

It was there Caesar first picked up a sword, as a practice partner for the viscount’s young heir. At first, he was little more than a living training dummy, but over time, the swordsmanship he learned by watching soon surpassed the clumsy heir’s.

Within a few years, Caesar had grown in both body and skill. He left the viscount’s house and naturally joined a small mercenary band.

All he had was a healthy body and passable swordsmanship. The options were limited. Starting at the bottom, he threw himself into every battlefield imaginable.

From simple beast hunting to minor border skirmishes. Beyond that—assassinations, intelligence gathering, political espionage, even infiltration missions into kingdoms hostile to the Empire. If it paid, he did it.

After surviving such a grueling life, by the time he looked back, he had become something like the leader of his mercenary group, despite his young age.

He built up his own sizable mercenary corps and kept working much the same as before. There were no grand ambitions, no detailed plans. It was a life of living day by day, figuring out how not to die tomorrow.

Such a way of living naturally made one’s thinking simple. Some assumed Caesar had lofty ambitions, but honestly, there was nothing in his head.

A life already lived in utter chaos. He figured he’d just keep rolling along like this, and if he collapsed dead in a gutter someday, so be it.