The Abandoned and Terminally Ill Lady Married a Monster - Chapter 3

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Chapter 3

The sudden appearance of a stranger, a child, jolted me upright. But the tension drained away the moment I got a good look at his face. It was as red and tear-stained as my own.

He was thin, almost a head shorter than me, with blood smeared on his cheek—whose blood, I couldn’t tell.

He looked like he hadn’t bathed in days, his fine white shirt and brown trousers rumpled and torn. The fabric seemed expensive, but its condition was anything but.

Amidst the overall impression of dirt and neglect, his blue eyes shone startlingly bright. Cleaned up and fed, he’d be quite handsome.

We stared at each other for a long moment. I spoke first. “…How did you get in here?”

His clear eyes held me captive for a moment. I shook my head, trying to regain my focus. He still didn’t answer, just continued to cry silently, tears streaming down his face.

‘Why won’t he answer? He just keeps crying.’

Unable to start a conversation, I stared at the steady flow of his tears. Seeing him cry brought my own situation back into sharp focus.

‘It’s my birthday. And I’ve been kicked out again, without even a single ‘happy birthday’.’

My lower lip trembled, a small, quivering lump forming and disappearing.

“Why, why are you crying?” My voice trembled, and I couldn’t stop my own lip from quivering. I tried to hold back the tears. Crying in front of a stranger felt shameful.

But my eyes began to flutter, and tears spilled down my cheeks once more.

“I….” The boy’s voice cracked. I tried to stop crying, wanting to hear what he had to say. But the tears, once started, wouldn’t stop, only intensified by a fresh wave of sorrow. In the end, we both just cried.

* * *

Fifteen-year-old Daykin had come to the countryside near the Lizziana estate due to his father’s illness. He’d arrived as soon as his father’s health took a turn for the worse, his mind in a whirl. But the physician’s grim words were even more disorienting.

Daykin peeked into the room through a slightly open door. His father lay there, his body frail, while his mother watched the physician with a grave expression.

“…If this continues, there’s a high probability he’ll experience a mana overload-induced surge. If that happens, not only His Lordship but everyone within this radius could be injured.”

From a distance, Daykin looked at his father, the Duke of Blashur, Dale, with a fearful heart. His father’s skin still held a healthy glow, his blond hair and golden lashes catching the light. He looked as though he might wake up any moment.

He looked like he would wake up any second and act his usual boisterous, even impertinent self. But he didn’t. Only stillness clung to his features.

Despair filled Daykin’s face.

“Then what can we do?”

“…You must prepare yourselves. You know there’s only one way to extinguish the flame before the surge reaches its peak.”

‘Father…’ Daykin replayed the physician’s words in his mind. ‘Mana overload-induced surge…’

A surge of mana. It occurred when the level of one’s power far exceeded the body’s capacity to contain it.

It wasn’t a common occurrence. But for the Duke of Blashur, it was different. Anyone who inherited the Blashur blood couldn’t escape the possibility of a surge.

The power passed down through the Blashur line was explosion. Even a small explosion was a fearsome thing, but the Blashur explosions were notoriously powerful, making them even more dangerous.

There was a joke circulating that if the Blashur power found a suitable vessel, it could obliterate an entire country. It was half-true.

Daykin, having overheard the physician’s words, stumbled out of the hallway, his face on the verge of tears. He slumped against the wall, the ground around him littered with dry leaves as autumn approached.

“Pretending to be sick again.” Daykin didn’t hesitate to downplay his father’s illness.

He glanced up at the high wall. His father lay in the largest of the windows visible above.

Daykin spoke to himself in a louder voice. “I told you to stop pretending to be sick for attention…”

He stared at the barely visible window, but the voice he longed for didn’t come.

Normally, his father would have replied flippantly, “But this father is truly ill, my dear boy. Not pretending. Boo-hoo.” But the expected response never came. Instead, an unnerving silence settled around him.

Daykin decided to be patient for his father’s sake. Normally, he would have told his father to get up, scolding him playfully.

‘But Father is sick. I’ll let it slide this time.’ He decided to let it go without any teasing. He was gloomily kicking at the ground, lost in thought, when…

“Ugh…” A sudden, splitting headache struck him. It felt like someone was mercilessly bludgeoning his head with a blunt weapon. The pain, like a woodpecker hammering thousands of times, drilling into his brain, made him clutch his head.

Daykin knew the pain would subside soon. But even though he’d experienced this pain before, this time, fear gripped him. He felt like he might never open his eyes again, just like the physician had warned. The pain felt eternal.

“Ah…”

Fortunately, that didn’t happen.

Not yet. Not yet.