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Translator: Vine
Chapter: 15
Chapter Title: A Desperate Treatment
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“To someone as delicate as the Duke! A man who won't even lift a sword unless it's a masterpiece crafted by an artisan! This is too much!”
“…Damn it.”
*What fresh nonsense is this?* As I was thinking this and watching the intruding nobles, a low curse startled me, and I turned to look at Enoch.
“Your Majesty, don't tell me… did he touch you?”
I thought he had twisted away just before the hand made contact, but that must not have been the case, as Enoch’s face was set like stone.
“…It grazed me.”
“Are you, are you all right?”
Only a few minutes had passed since I’d worried about Enoch losing control before his power could recover.
Now that my fears had become reality, I bit my lip hard.
“I am fine. It was truly just a graze. Nothing will happen.”
But his words that nothing would happen were a mockery, as his body trembled, trying to suppress the rampage within.
“What is the meaning of this! No matter how agitated you were, how dare you try to lay a hand on His Majesty!”
“Ahem, ahem. No, we were merely… since His Majesty would not grant us an audience…”
Clearing their throats at the White Elder’s roar, the nobles shifted the target of their censure from Enoch to me.
“Just look at her. Sticking right by His Majesty's side even in this chaos. Tsk, tsk.”
“Honestly. The rumors about her were ill, and now we see why. With conduct like that, it's no wonder the Duke raised his hand to her.”
“The Duke is the only one who has been wronged. How will he manage in this cold without a proper fur coat?”
“I'm also worried if the food will suit his palate. I was planning to send my family's chef with him on the day of his departure, but he left so suddenly. I am worried sick.”
Enoch twisted his lips at the sound of their quiet murmurs, all while glancing warily at the Emperor.
“Quite the collection of nannies. If you're so worried, why don't you follow the Duke to the battlefield?”
They had seemed ready to pack their bags and run to the Duke at a moment's notice.
Yet, at Enoch's offer to open a portal for them, the nobles fell silent, staring into space.
“H-ahem! Your Majesty, my constitution is weak…”
“I-I have documents that must be dealt with by the end of today…”
Enoch, who had been watching the nobles' attitudes change as easily as flipping a palm, suddenly snapped his head back.
“Your Majesty…!”
Startled by the sight, I, who had been shielding Enoch with my voluminous dress, looked at him with worried eyes.
Ice crystals, blooming from his heart and spreading through his body, began to slowly appear through his shirt.
And even a chill mist flowed from Enoch's lips.
The situation was not good.
“Are you all right?”
“I'm fine…, ugh.”
Trying to steady his faltering body, Enoch staggered violently.
His eyes began to lose focus, and his skin started to freeze rapidly.
I placed a hand on his skin, which was whitening with frost, but as if something was truly wrong with him, Enoch's body didn't warm up at all.
“Wh-what do I do?”
There were so many eyes watching, and Enoch was clutching his heart in agony. There was nothing I could do.
No matter where I touched him, his body only grew colder, and now the ice crystals were intertwining like vines, clearly visible on the surface of his skin.
If this continued, the nobles standing behind us would surely notice his condition…
Biting my lip in helplessness at being unable to help in such an urgent situation, something flapping caught the corner of my eye.
“Little Marquess! Little Marquess!”
At the desperate call, I turned my gaze and saw the Black Elder, pinned under the ripped-off door, flailing his arm.
But the way he was acting…
“…His mouth?”
Wasn't he repeatedly slapping his own lips?
I narrowed my eyes, wondering what he was doing, and the Elder, looking frustrated, pointed alternately at my lips and Enoch's.
Following his hand, my eyes, shifting back and forth, widened to an unprecedented size.
*What… surely he doesn't mean we should kiss?*
Horrified at the thought that popped into my head, I looked at the Elder, and he nodded his head frantically as if to confirm my guess was correct.
*…No way. It can't be.*
Even if I had volunteered to act as Enoch's treatment, lips were a bit…
But in that moment.
“Hnngh…, Ri… ana…”
Just as Enoch called my name pitifully, I remembered what the Black Elder had been about to say.
[“I know. In times like these, the lips—!”]
*'Lips'.* Yes, just before he was crushed by the door, the Black Elder had definitely said the word 'lips'.
If the answer to my question of what to do if Enoch went berserk before his power recovered was 'lips', then surely…
My trembling eyes shifted, and upon seeing the Black Elder's grotesquely puckered lips, I whipped my head away.
*Ah, damn. This is crazy.*
No matter how I looked at it, this seemed to be exactly what I was thinking…
Unable to do anything in my predicament, I watched the Elder continue to slap his lips until they were probably swollen, then squeezed my eyes shut.
*R-right. This is just a treatment.*
Even in this brief moment of flustered hesitation, Enoch's breath was freezing over.
When you thought about it, the reason Enoch was suffering like this was because he had helped me yesterday. Shouldn't I at least try whatever I could?
Taking a deep breath to steady my trembling heart, I cupped Enoch's cheeks with my palms, trying to meet his eyes.
“Your Majesty. They say we have to kiss to stop the rampage.”
But Enoch, whose eyes had already lost focus, didn't seem to hear me, only letting out a pained groan.
I moved closer to him, leaving only a feather's breadth of distance between us, and lowered my eyes.
“There are absolutely no ulterior motives here. This is just a treatment.”
And then, press. With my eyes squeezed shut, I pressed my lips against his as if stamping a seal, then slowly opened them, but Enoch's condition hadn't improved.
I had hoped, but it seemed this was nowhere near enough. I gently tapped on Enoch's firmly closed lips.
“Your Majesty.”
“…?”
“Your mouth. Open it.”
I met his dazed eyes for a moment before slowly pressing my lips over his cold ones, and a gap opened.
As my fingertips, which were cupping his cheek, brushed against his earlobe, the small gap widened a little more.
Seizing that moment, I pushed my tongue inside, and a freezing chill shot up my tongue and down my throat.
“Hngh…”
I flinched, my shoulders hunching from the pain that was so cold it felt like being cut, and carefully breathed into his mouth.
As I slowly traced the inside of his mouth, which was filled with an unrelenting chill, as if melting ice, a warm heat began to spread.
*…It's working!*
I had worried what I would do if even this didn't work. Thankfully, it seemed the Elder hadn't given me false information.
Enoch's body, which had been as cold as a snowy field in midwinter, began to slowly warm, starting from their entangled tongues.
“Hah…”
And then, the breath that had stopped in his mouth burst forth. I instinctively placed a palm on his firm chest and could feel the faint thump-thump of his heartbeat.
As I kissed him a little deeper, the chaotic snowflake patterns that had been visible over his clothes quickly vanished.
“Ngh…!”
*Flinch.*
As Enoch's body jolted, I lifted my lowered gaze and saw his gray eyes, which had regained their focus, shaking rapidly.
Seeing the clear astonishment filling his eyes, it seemed he had come to his senses…
Seeing that Enoch truly seemed all right now, I slowly pulled my lips away. A silvery thread stretched between our lips before vanishing.
“Wh-what is this…!”
I observed Enoch's pupils, which were trembling so violently I wondered if he could even see straight, then took out a handkerchief to wipe his red, swollen lips.
“Are you all right now?”
“N-no, my lips, my lips are…”
“Ah. The kiss?”
“Ki—!”
Enoch, who had inadvertently raised his voice, felt the skin under his eyes and the tips of his ears turn fiery red.
Watching him, I felt my own face heat up in response. I cleared my throat unnecessarily and pretended to be nonchalant, touching various parts of his now-warm body.
“Ahem. Y-you're not cold anymore, are you? It's a relief that kissing was effective.”
At my words, Enoch, his eyes wavering wildly, raised a hand to cover the lower half of his face.
Watching him, I had the strange feeling that I'd done something wrong. The frozen silence in the air was shattered by someone's shout.
“D-did those two just… Hey. Are my eyes deceiving me?”
“No! I saw it too. What in the world is going on?”
“Don't tell me the Little Marquess just pounced on His Majesty?”
The whispers that had erupted at the shocking sight gradually grew into a loud murmur.
“This is… what should we do?”
A moment ago, Enoch's situation had been so urgent that I had just kissed him first and thought later.
Now that the immediate fire was put out and I could see my surroundings, my face also turned fiery red.
Not a hug, but a kiss.
And a kiss while so many people were watching…!
My face burned with half-panic and half-embarrassment as I wondered how on earth to handle this situation, and Enoch's face grew a shade redder.
“Your Majesty, why are you blushing! Cool down, quickly! It just makes it look stranger.”
“This is because you keep…”
Far from resolving the situation, the atmosphere only grew stranger, and the crowd's murmuring intensified. Then, someone stepped in front of us.
“Little Marquess, leave the cleanup to us.”
I don't know when he got out from under the door, but the Black Elder, covered head to toe in dust, stood with the White Elder and gave a wink as if to say, "Trust us."
“Now, now. Everyone, please calm down.”
Waving his hand at the confused nobles, the two Elders' wrinkled eyes curved into a bright smile.
*What is this? I have a bad feeling about this.*
Feeling uneasy for some reason at the sight, I was about to speak when a man with a brown beard at the forefront raised his hand.
“Elder! What is the meaning of this? Why would His Majesty and the Little Marquess… What on earth is the relationship between them that they would do such a thing?”
“Come to think of it, they were holding hands at the banquet yesterday, too. Don't tell me…”
“Yes. Your 'don't tell me' is correct. The two of them are…”
*Gulp.*
In the tense silence, the sound of someone swallowing could be heard.
“Promised to each other in marriage!”
…Excuse me? Sir… Grandpa? What are you talking about!
With the exception of the Elders, who looked strangely pleased, every jaw in the room dropped open as if it would fall off.
