Chapter 146

Chapter 146

Translator: yun

‘I’ took half a step forward and turned slightly to face Hernan. The me from the past looked confused before gradually distancing herself from him. Looking at them from afar, I wondered why she bothered to try and cover her unkempt appearance. No one would see her anyway. 

-Hurry and go. Princess! 

Then, it seemed like the 10-year-old me had resolved herself before firmly turning around. 

-I’m sorry. 

Chasing after the past me, when I looked back, I spotted Hernan blocking Castor’s way. The difference in their powers was ridiculously huge. Then, I spotted it. His back then gradually fell by the heartless sword. 

–Pant, pant.

As I chased the 13-year-old me who was running away desperately, I recalled Hernan’s character in the original novel. 

The man who loved Rusbella but still eventually brought her to Castor. In fact, I had wondered if he had really been born just for Castor. He was willing to go far for the tyrant and only cared about his master.

But why?

The 13-year-old me and the current me were thinking the same thing. We were confused, perplexed and absurdly furious. And the never ending sadness continued to fluctuate within.

As I chased myself from the past, I was left frustratingly out of breath. The diary was getting hotter. 

I had repeated death countless of times and my memories were all tangled and messed up. There were moments where I could not exactly recall but I could remember how I died. 

I could vividly remember the time when I first killed myself so I could not have possibly forgotten the memories of Hernan protecting me. That meant my escape now would face an unfortunate end. I had a gut feeling that I would be seeing him soon. 

‘If Hernan had successfully helped me and I ended up surviving, I wouldn’t have repeated this life.’

I was confident and clear in my intuition but the mere fact that I was made me sad. 

I was going to die again. 

And finally, my intuition became reality. The young me quickly took a step back and it looked like she was going to cry. 

-So this was where you were hiding. 

That face of despair made me think that her tears could fall with just one tap. As I stood in front of the man who seemed so big and huge I could not possibly get past him…

Castor smiled at me gently. 

-It’ll be better to just forget anything. 

My collapsing back was already stained with blood. At my last moments, I closed my eyes as well. 

How much blood would it take to coat that huge sword? 

***

“Are you awake now? Ahn.”

Someone whispered in a soft and friendly voice. I woke up from my dream that felt like an afterimage. 

A bright fire blinked through the darkness. 

‘That’s probably because of Hernan right?’

Closing my eyes, I touched my forehead. Both my hands and my forehead were trembling. 

“Ahn. Are you alright?”

He asked if I was alright. 

I had covered my ears but his voice had already attacked my vulnerability right after the afterimage and it affected me greatly. 

What did I just see?

“Ahn.”

At the sound of Hernan calling my name, memories came swarming back to me. A terrible headache began hitting me. And it was bothering me immensely. 

“Ahn, look at me. Do you see me?”

He looked like a real mess. How much blood did he bleed for even his smile to be stained in red?

“Ahn.”

I felt like I was going to drown in my thoughts that were pouring down like heavy rain.

“Ahn! Get it together. You’re fever’s really high.”

“…..”

“Damn it. Where does it hurt?”

The red fire blazed across Hernan’s face as the flames crackled. The gaze that captured the flames was as thick and clear as a lake reflecting the moon. And within his blue and opened eyes was confusion.

“I-I…”

The woman in his eyes kept frowning and frowning till her face became unfamiliar to me. 

“I….”

My gaze began wandering in the air aimlessly. 

I swallowed the stale breath in my mouth before taking in a hot gulp of air. Even if I forced my lungs to move and push against it, the space I could not reach between my stomach and my chest continued to ache numbingly. Even though I was trying to apply pressure on it and endure the pain, all it did was suppress my screams.

“… Ahn?”

I could admit that my eyes were hurting. 

“… Why…”

I was breathing like a drowning man panting for breath. 

The hand that was holding onto the diary was trembling. I had tried not to tremble in the midst of all this. Even though my efforts were apparently useless. 

“… Why did you save me? You died.”

“Ahn?”

“Why now? Now?”

“Ahn!”

The diary which was getting crumpled by the grip of my hand continued to tremble. 

“You didn’t have to. You. Why did you? You…”

I looked up and stared back at the eyes directed towards me. His eyes looked like a calm and warm body of water swaying. 

“Ahn. You look like you’re in a lot of pain.”

He tried to get me out of there but was soon at a loss for words.

“… Are you… crying?”

He paused for a moment and blinked silently. 

“Who’s crying?”

“… I guess I was mistaken.”

“Yes. You were.”

My surroundings were surprisingly filled with blood, flesh and if I could have a bird’s eye view, there was a bunch of debris as well. 

The landscape was littered with corpses and stained with blood but not a sword was in sight. As he lowered his head, I lifted mine. I remembered everything, 

“Just as you said, I’m in pain. So, this is just me rambling because it hurts.”

From the 11th attempt onwards, we no longer met each other. Perhaps it was Castor’s way of joking around. Actually, I was not even sure if Hernan was considered to have been fortunate. He no longer had to be hurt after meeting me. 

“From the first time we met…”

Nevertheless, I could feel something hot in my eyes as if something was going to burst. 

“Why did you act so cold to me? Why did you look at me like that? You tried to save me, you did…”

Castor made me forget everything. When I woke up from my dream I was groggy and out of it but afterwards, all the memories of him trying to save me were crashing into me like waves. We met, I ran away before eventually dying. And he was always the one who died first. 

There was a fresh gust of wind. It was something that only my heart could feel but my mind could not see. But the storm within was so strong that it was messing up everything in me. 

“I hated it. The fact that you were cold to me at first and suddenly nice to me the next moment.”

I smacked my lips once again. 

“So I hated being swayed by your kindness.”

“If you’re referring to the first time we met… I thought you were an assassin.”

The man who desperately tried to protect me saved me. 

“I’m sorry for shocking you.”

I felt like I was going to cry but I was not sure. This feeling of crying must have somehow welled up within me after seeing my younger self cry like that. 

“Let’s first get out of here. Now that your body has gotten better to a certain extent.”

He had helped me. So did that mean that my memories of him saving me managed to disappear leaving memories of only 30 or so attempts? 

Was it already too late to once again believe in the eyes that were so painfully cold and indifferent, and that ultimately turned away from me? What would get better even though I found out? 

I held onto him with the hand that was free. When he raised his head, our eyes met. 

“Hernan, I’m sorry.”

His cold and calm expression softened before a strange one replaced it.

“Thank you.”

Those were the words that I had held off and delayed from saying. Perhaps starting from the moment I stood against Castor’s sword till I woke up and saw him. I finally talked about what I had been paying close attention to this whole time. 

He slowly tilted his head, exhaled and rested his cheek against my hand. 

“You. I don’t think you’re in your right mind because of your high fever.”

The days I could not remember were the days that I met you. Castor had removed me from you. 

“… Don’t cry. Because your fever would only rise.”

I was crying? I was? Tears continued to blur my vision. No. I was not. Why… I could not tell if he was crying. 

“Are you alright? Your wound.”

“I’m alright. Have you stopped crying.”

“I’m not crying. It’s just sweat.”

As he gathered his cheeks together, I frowned. 

“… I see.”

“Let’s leave. Please. I want to go home.”

Hernan supported me and helped me walk. He had surprisingly recovered from the mess his body was in before I fainted. Just as he said, he seemed to have the ability to heal himself. However, perhaps he could not heal his body completely as he would occasionally grimace and let out a low groan. 

“Ahn, does it hurt a lot?”

“It’s alright. You look like you’re in more pain.”

This was the fifth time he asked. I had replied calmly but I stopped talking because I was confused as to how I should reply his voice filled with worries. 

I should not have remembered them. It was already too late to find out that he had been there back when I had been the loneliest. 

“Let me down!”

On the other hand, I was already running out of strength and stamina by just walking. Eventually, he was forced to pull me who was refusing him into an embrace. 

“I told you to let me go!”

I frowned and pushed against his shoulders. When I tried to tell him off more, Hernan cut in firmly. 

“How noisy. I’m not doing this for you… It’s for me.”

He embraced the struggling me before saying. 

“Walking like this is faster than walking separately. Don’t you think so?”

He walked along the spaces between the debris. 

“If we walk this way, we can make it out. Hang in there a little more.”

It was Hernan who got crushed by a piece of the ceiling and destroyed a part of the pillar for me. There was no way he was alright. So he did not have the strength to carry me right now. He was just holding in the pain. 

It was the fact that he had protected me before and was doing it again that made me uncomfortable.

‘Why was he sacrificing himself again? Why?’

I wanted to be a strong and selfish person. To go against Castor’s never-ending madness. I had to be someone who could stare back into the abyss even though it was not actually an abyss. 

“You’re pretending to be alright on purpose, right? I know everything. Your arms were shaking.”

“You’re mistaken.”

So, I closed my eyes and covered my ears from the gaze he directed towards me and ignored it. I pretended not to notice. 

“… How can you act like this is nothing?”

“Don’t be a know-it-all and stay out of it.”

He was someone who worshipped and served Castor with sincerity. The duke in the original novel wanted to protect Castor and hence abandoned his love. 

This man who devoted himself foolishly because of his loyalty had died by blocking a sword Castor failed to notice on the battlefield. 

But even then, Castor had eventually died. Hernandez lost his friendships, lost his country, lost the woman he loved before finally losing his life. In such a story, I believed in him. No matter what side of him he showed, the moment the female lead appeared, he would only change. 

But I did not know anymore. Would things really change?