The Nymph Wants to be Plundered - Chapter 84

He approached the bed, took her limp wrist, and pressed his palm fully against it, pouring his warm vital energy into her without reserve. It was already the twentieth meaningless act of the day. Despite the energy he gave, Evelyn remained unconscious; her body was so saturated with his vital energy that it could not absorb any more and was rejecting it all.

Though he knew it was futile, he felt he would go mad if he didn’t at least do this. He still couldn’t believe that a fight, which would be considered trivial skirmishing to elves, could plunge Evelyn’s consciousness into such an abyss.

The overwhelming despair he felt when he saw her collapse without putting up any significant resistance seemed to wash over him again. Cassis erased the illusion of his fingernails turning dark and whispered once more.

“Evelyn…”

A name called countless times, a powerless invocation that served no purpose. Even to his own ears, his voice sounded terribly hoarse as he called her name. He thought that if he were Evelyn lying there, he probably wouldn’t have bothered to turn around either.

Why hadn’t he realized sooner? That someone harboring violent intentions had been prowling around the castle.

That Evelyn… would want to see the tree he had carelessly planted in the sanctuary.

Though he hadn’t launched a formal investigation into the incident, Cassis had a general understanding. She wouldn’t have gone near that area without Ruba’s escort for no reason. She knew the jasmine tree was planted there, and since she had been there with him before, she would know the way. She must have followed her empty heart and met with trouble.

“Mmm…”

Just then, a small moan escaped Evelyn’s lips, followed by a slight twitch of her eyelashes.

“Evelyn!”

When he called her with a choked voice, her lips, which had moved slightly, closed again. Extreme disappointment threatened to overwhelm him, but he kept his eyes narrowed, absorbed in watching for any change in Evelyn’s face. All the while, he inwardly mocked himself for having been so startled.

Of course, after all the worry she had caused him, she wouldn’t wake up so easily. Nevertheless, a thread of hope kept his blue eyes fixed on her. If she would miraculously wake up…

“…Evelyn?”

She really did open her eyes. Not fully, not even halfway, but tantalizingly just a little.

But he could see it. In that face, made even paler from lack of sunlight, those beautiful green eyes—the only thing shining—were gazing blankly at something. Though not entirely clear, there was focus. They weren’t just open. She was… alive.

“Evelyn.”

He knelt beside his bed, calling only her name. He wanted to touch her limp arms, to rub between her fingers and knuckles, urging her to wake up properly, but he couldn’t.

His instinct knew better. She was terribly fragile, and even though she had barely opened her eyes, making a commotion might not be wise. Someone like her might be startled and lose consciousness again.

“……”

He waited patiently, and finally earned Evelyn’s attention. Her eyes, which had opened with difficulty, widened just slightly, ever so slightly, as her lips moved.

“Hmm?”

What was she trying to say? As he leaned in closer to read her lips, a faint voice reached him.

“…the festival.”

“What?”

Her lips moved excruciatingly slowly, barely forming human words.

“Aika… Festi…val… Is it… already… over…?”

Ah, of all things, that festival.

Cassis shook his head as if he had completely forgotten his directive to his knights and the council to prepare well without him.

“It hasn’t started yet, Evelyn. Did you want to go to the festival?”

He knew. The Aika Festival was, to most elves, just another name for an excessive orgy of madness. No matter how sexually charged elves might be, they couldn’t write that in official documents, so everyone spoke in euphemisms.

Evelyn’s lips moved laboriously, and perhaps because her strength was already fading, she answered in a voice so faint it was almost a whisper.

“How… could I… show my face? Not… me… Your… Majesty… should… attend…”

Suddenly calling me “Your Majesty,” when you used to call me Cassis just fine.

He wanted to correct her speech back to her former impertinent way, but he didn’t want to waste her rapidly declining energy on a trivial argument. Eventually, his voice, softened so as not to ring in Evelyn’s ears, settled carefully like a feather.

“You don’t need to worry about the festival’s progress. It’s set up to run well even without me.”

“You… must… attend. You… absolutely… must.”

“Worry about yourself.”

Cassis momentarily wondered what was going on in Evelyn’s mind. If her body was in such a difficult and burdensome state, she should at least be complaining. Why suddenly bring up the festival?