Translator: Nox

Chapter 36

“Yes. The Kingdom of Danguk has a particularly strict culture regarding names, to the point where they give children both a milk name and a formal name. Given those cultural characteristics, it’s unlikely a noble family would name a child with the meaning of ‘to forgive.’”

Oscar stared at the translated identification documents as he listened to Simon’s explanation.

Seo-ah. So, if you were to interpret that woman’s name… it meant something like ‘to forgive and to love’?

How peculiar.

Then again, was that the only peculiar thing about her?

“…Are you coming?”

Are you coming? What? To where?

She had asked that with eyes that looked as if they would spill tears at the slightest touch. He couldn’t truly know what lay beneath that expression, but to him, those eyes were a mystery.

That strange question—the likes of which he had never heard in his life—made him dwell on the past, which was unlike him.

“When are you coming?”

It was a question similar to one a person left behind might ask someone departing.

In those tearful eyes, he had seen a blind desperation, as if she were promising to wait for his return through her anxiety…

Perhaps he recognized it because he had experienced it before.

A moment from a past he thought he had erased, yet which remained indelible.

For some reason, he felt as if he could smell the rain.

Oscar shook his head with a cold smile. Yet, that trivial question remained like a tiny thorn caught in his throat, pricking at the edge of his nerves.

The train window, the half-drawn curtain, the way she had turned her head in surprise. Her rounded ear, and the sunlight reflecting off it.

Ignoring the afterimages that rose of their own accord, Oscar handed back the translation and put a cigarette to his lips.

“If her name is strange, it doesn’t matter as long as Pelfe Bank doesn’t take issue with it. And it matters even less once Abel Sting marries her.”

“Yes, I suppose that’s true.”

Simon gathered the translation and handed over a report from Abel.

As Oscar opened it, he recalled the typical reports he received from his operative.

It had been about five days since he’d left the woman with him. By now, the mission should be well underway. I seduced her this way, she fell for it that way, we’ll have sex around this time, or we already did. Therefore, the marriage plan is as follows.

He expected it to be filled with such long-winded details.

Would she look at him with those eyes even in bed? Suddenly, he remembered the night he had watched her from the shadows. Those eyes that had wept and prayed to some entity the whole time, yet failed to find the light.

As his thoughts of the woman began to spiral in an odd direction, Oscar turned the page of the report with a cold sneer.

However…

As he read, Oscar’s eyes instinctively narrowed.

Sightseeing at the market.

The details next to it were even more absurd.

…Pancakes: 5,200 Kerete.

It wasn’t just pancakes. Sausages, candy, coffee…

With the cigarette still in his mouth, Oscar flipped to the next page. It was the same. Her tracks were identical on the next page, and the page after that.

If there was a difference, it was that Abel’s rage, felt through the heavily pressed handwriting, was growing by the second.

Judging by this report, the woman had woken Abel up at the crack of dawn every single day for the past five days to wander the market, eating sausages, coffee, candy, and pancakes.

Oscar, who had unintentionally ended up reading a stranger’s travel log in the middle of a blood-soaked scene, muttered in disbelief.

“She asked how much 500 million Kerete a week was, and all she spent in a day was a few thousand or tens of thousands?”

He could vividly picture the woman who had walked in a timid circle when told to turn around, now wandering the market while cautiously watching Abel’s every move. A laugh escaped him like a dry cough.

“She goes to bed this early?”

At his muttered words, now laced with more laughter, Simon couldn’t contain his curiosity and surreptitiously took a page of Abel’s report. He tilted his head, took another page, and read. The cold, handsome face of the aide slightly crumpled.

“I don’t understand why he seems to be getting dragged around by the target.”

Behind them, the screams of those being slaughtered filled the air, and the floor beneath them was splattered with crimson blood and flesh. Even the laughter scraping up his throat felt fishy. Yet, Oscar couldn’t stop himself; he buried his face in Abel’s report and laughed for a long time.

Chuckle. As the laughter echoed through the blood-scented hallway, not only Simon but even the high-ranking Wolves—who had been ordering the disposal of the corpses—stopped what they were doing and looked back at their master. The sight of their master burying his face in a report with shaking shoulders was a foreign sight even to those who had served him for years. It was like seeing snow in the middle of summer.

---

However, there was one person who didn’t find the situation funny at all.

In the dim light of dawn before the sun had even risen.

“Senior.”

As soon as Abel opened his eyes, he had a thought like a fool who couldn’t get over an ex-girlfriend.

At this hour, I used to be sleeping. I used to get designer gifts when I was bored, and I used to have sex until I was tired of it with women who were crazy for my face and body…

“The target is awake.”

Abel pressed his palms hard against his eyes.

How shitty was today going to be?

“Senior.”

“I know, you idiot. I know.”

After snapping at his innocent junior, Abel dragged himself up and headed to the bathroom. As he opened his closet, he smelled the market.

“…….”

The scent of a thousand miscellaneous things had seeped into his expensive cashmere and refused to leave. It felt like it never would. How much did this coat even cost?

Exactly six days until yesterday.

It wasn’t an exaggeration to say it was the longest six days of his life. It took less than twenty-four hours for the target he thought would be the easiest to become the greatest challenge of his life.

Over the past six days, Abel had exercised his professional spirit to the fullest, doing everything he could. And that woman had blocked every single move he made.

What made his pride rot rather than just hurt was the fact that the clumsy foreigner was blocking everything without even realizing it was a move.

It went without saying that his face, body, and soulful gazes were all deflected like a mirror reflection. Forget sex; she easily fended off even the subtle physical contact he attempted during moments of heavy crowds. Why was that “easy,” you ask? Because the woman was better at navigating the crowds than Abel himself. This was despite the fact that she looked pale as a ghost, as if she hated crowded places. She tore through the market with a desperate intensity.

“I’ll lead the way and clear the path now, so follow me closely.”

“…….”

If you hate it that much, just don’t go. I don’t know why she’s like this.

It was a given that she rendered all his efforts to lead her to places with good views and atmosphere completely moot. To name just one of his many attempts, he had even tried the cliché of buying her a bouquet.

“I bought these because I wondered what it would look like for a flower to hold flowers, and it’s exactly as I imagined.”

When a man who appeared once in a century offered flowers in the middle of a crowd, it caused a scene. But the woman who actually received those flowers…

“A flower to hold flowers…”

She mulled over the words she should have understood instantly, and after a moment, she made a realization and said something like this:

“So, the ‘flower’ used as the subject… was a metaphorical expression referring to me?”

She couldn’t take a hint, yet how did she know words like ‘subject’ and ‘metaphorical’ that even native speakers rarely used?

“You are very skilled at composing poetry.”

What was even funnier was that she said she had to give him something in return for the flowers, gifted him a cheap handkerchief, and said:

“I am not gifted in poetry… Thank you for your constant hard work.”

That incident was relayed from the backup team to the Wolves living in the mansion, making him a perpetual laughingstock.

“Abel Sting, the master poet, I hope you succeed today!”

“You know His Excellency is coming today, right?”

“Your stories are the most interesting thing to me lately.”

“Shut up before I rip your mouths open, you bastards.”

The refined speech and gentle attitude he had desperately mastered to mingle with noblewomen were crumbling like a sandcastle in less than a week.

Abel set out from the Annex, gritting his teeth.

And at the edge of the garden in the early morning, where the blue tint of dawn had not yet faded, he faced the target who had become his life’s greatest enigma.

She had definitely looked pretty at first, but now he wasn’t even sure.

The woman, who was clutching a cheap bag she’d bought at the market with both hands, looked back at him and smiled faintly. Her white face in the dawn light looked so incredibly innocent that he felt like an even bigger idiot.

“Good morning. …Did you sleep well?”

Seriously, what do I have to do to get through to you?

What is your problem with me? Huh?

---

Once, her grandfather had watched the peddlers traveling from place to place and said this: there is no animal in the world that adapts to its environment as well as a human. Migratory birds fly tens of thousands of miles following the seasons, and bears sleep to survive the winter, but humans fit themselves into whatever environment they face.

It had been about a week since she started living in Oscar’s mansion.

Seo-ah was slowly getting used to the place.

No one spoke to her or approached her except for Mrs. Barbara and Abel. Of course, Mrs. Barbara only said what was necessary and didn’t engage in personal conversation. She would give Seo-ah money without a word if she needed it and provide accurate answers if she had questions.

Mrs. Barbara seemed like a being standing at the very edge of the definition of ‘human,’ somewhere on the boundary between human and non-human. If one were to ask if that was difficult, it was actually quite the opposite—it was better.

The only slightly difficult part of her relationship with the woman was the food.

She had been eating breakfast and dinner at the mansion all week, and strangely, the amount of food kept increasing. Even so, after she forced herself to finish it all, the woman would always ask:

“Is it insufficient?”

Seo-ah had told her earnestly several times that it was a lot and that she was full, so it was definitely not insufficient. However, the woman, who used to bring food on a tray, had started bringing it on a cart since yesterday evening.

But if she had to name a hardship, that was it; there were no particular difficulties with Mrs. Barbara. The time they spent facing each other was short anyway.