Translator: Nox

I Married the Dragon I Killed

Chapter 11

Chapter 11

There is a story about blind men and an elephant.

To summarize, three blind men were asked to touch specific parts of an elephant and describe what the creature was like, but each of them gave a completely different answer.

The lesson of the story is that one cannot judge the whole by its parts.

However, there are some things so clear that one can realize the whole even by seeing only a fraction.

In Ferda’s case, at this very moment, it was Valdrova’s beauty.

All he could see were her chin and lips.

A jawline as clean and clear as porcelain stole Ferda’s gaze.

The lips resting above were red and lustrous, like an apple kissed by morning dew.

Even by seeing only the lower half of her face, Ferda knew.

The person who would become his companion was a woman.

And she was a peerless beauty, the likes of whom he had never seen before.

As this information flooded in, Ferda didn’t know what emotion he was feeling.

Thus, he simply stared blankly at her lips.

The Engagement Wine flowed between Valdrova’s lips.

It trickled slowly through the narrow gap until she finally emptied the cup.

In that instant, Ferda felt an anomaly within his own body.

The fear of dragons that had been etched into Ferda’s very being was vanishing.

—Mortals shall become one by stepping out of the unknown and washing away their fear.

It was exactly as the phrase Ruri had recited.

The primal dread toward dragons was dissipating.

‘She really prepared so much for the sake of ordinary humans.’

Making it possible to face one another was the core of this engagement ceremony.

Because of that, Ferda could feel it once more.

The expectation she had harbored, and the pain she felt when it was thwarted.

As Ferda gazed intently, the helmet modeled after a dragon’s head shifted slightly toward him.

The eye slits glanced his way before she abruptly turned her head.

‘I stared too much.’

Ferda turned his head away and stood still.

“Next, we will proceed with the reading of the vows to one another.”

Ruri passed the baton to Ferda with a face that screamed her displeasure.

Valdrova waited quietly with her head bowed.

Ferda exhaled slowly, turning the vibration of his vocal cords into a clear voice.

“You do not know much about me.”

It had taken Ferda an entire day to write this sentence.

That was how difficult the first phrase to express his feelings had been.

“However, I know you.”

And the answer he arrived at was,

“You gave me your heart. Through your heart, I have glimpsed and learned of you.”

To express his everything to her with sincerity.

“I have seen you be betrayed and slandered countless times. They hated you incessantly.”

Clank.

The armor flinched every time Ferda recited a line of the vow.

“Yet, you fulfilled your duties with nobility. You did not turn your back on what you wished to love, and you loved until the very end. That nobility of yours has set me straight.”

He believed this was the best choice.

“Thus, I make this vow here. Just as you gave me your heart, this time, I shall offer my heart to you. My King, my everything.”

That was the end of what was written in Ferda’s vow.

“I didn’t write this in the vow, but…”

However, Ferda’s words were not over.

He raised his head and looked at Valdrova.

Meeting the eyes of the dragon head, she lowered her head deeply.

Clank, clank.

Clad in her armor, she was fidgeting with her hands politely clasped.

“It is a great honor to be engaged to such a beauty as you.”

The iron helmet jolted violently.

Ruri looked at Ferda expressionlessly.

However, her hands and feet were curling and twisting in sheer second-hand embarrassment.

“Now, the reading of the bride-to-be’s vows—”

Ruri was cut off.

Valdrova’s hand signaled for her to stop.

“What is the matter?”

—…….

Valdrova did not answer.

Instead, she turned around and began to walk away.

He watched her actions, wondering if she had prepared something special.

In that manner, Valdrova returned toward her Lair.

Thud—.

And she shut the door behind her.

“…….”

“…….”

Valdrova had left without a single word of her vow.

Ferda and Ruri stared at the firmly closed door.

“……The engagement ceremony has been consummated.”

The ceremony concluded just like that.

Though Valdrova’s vow wasn’t read, the essential parts had been completed, so there was no need to dwell on it.

“Then, let us return.”

Ruri called out to Ferda.

But no answer came back.

Faced with the abrupt ending, he simply gazed at the iron door with a serious expression.

“Ferda-nim?”

Ruri asked him once more.

Ferda, who had been deep in thought as if possessed by something, finally spoke.

“I’m sorry, but would it be alright if I went into seclusion for about three days?”

“Seclusion, you say?”

“Literally, it means I intend to spend time alone without eating or drinking. It means do not disturb me.”

A declaration to shut himself in his room and renounce food and drink.

To Ruri, it sounded like this:

‘The shock must have been quite significant.’

The reading of vows to one another.

Yet he had been the only one to read his, while the other party had retreated behind an iron door.

Surely, Ferda was dying of embarrassment.

“Understood.”

A crescent-moon smile lingered on Ruri’s lips, refusing to fade.

---

“As expected of my Master. With this, the initiative has passed to you.”

Ruri entered Valdrova’s Lair and gave her a round of applause.

Valdrova had returned to her dragon form.

She was coiled up, her head buried beneath her wing.

Valdrova had repeatedly ruined her own engagement ceremonies, but to Ruri, her decisive action this time held great meaning.

“I didn’t realize that was the strategy. A one-sided hit-and-run.”

—…….

“To make him read those cringeworthy words himself to embarrass him, and then to end it unilaterally. His momentum must have been completely broken.”

—…….

“……But it seems that wasn’t your intention.”

Ruri’s genuinely delighted expression gradually turned blank as the silence stretched.

Valdrova, who had hidden her face under her wing, raised her head.

—I… also wanted to read my vow. As one welcoming a companion…….

“……I think I understand.”

Ruri turned her gaze to where she had been trying to ignore.

There were traces that she, too, had made no small amount of preparation.

Ruri knew how many pages of paper Ferda had crumpled and thrown away to write his vow.

‘It was ten pages.’

The result was a single-page vow.

It wasn’t too much; it was just the right amount.

But the vow Valdrova had written…

‘A whopping twenty pages.’

And that was twenty pages packed tightly on both sides.

The number of papers sacrificed just to write that exceeded the length of three books.

A pure, maidenly sensibility that didn’t fit the notorious Duke at all.

It was the sort of thing that would be quite troublesome if anyone other than her fiancé saw it.

However, Ruri had been Valdrova’s attendant for hundreds of years.

This was something that could be settled with a single sigh.

“If you liked it that much, why didn’t you do it when it started?”

—That is…….

Valdrova’s mouth twitched.

—I could not look.

Ruri tilted her head.

“What do you mean, you couldn’t look?”

—Facing those eyes…… I did not have the confidence to speak.

She uttered the lines of a shy girl with the face and voice of a terrifying dragon.

—Grey hair, sharp eyes that seemed to pierce through me, and a soft voice…….

“…….”

—While looking at that…… my mind went blank, and I could do nothing.

“……This Ruri’s mind is also going blank.”

—Do you also understand my heart?

Ruri wanted to pierce her own eardrums and vomit blood right then and there.

“Anyway.”

Ruri changed the subject, fearing she might start scolding her again if she heard any more.

“From now on, the prospective consort will begin his role as the master of the house. He will manage this castle and the subordinate territories.”

—That…… is something I know well.

“And when humans seize power, they begin to change.”

—…….

Power.

At those words, the excited Valdrova also grew calm.

The Third Prince.

The Third Prince, who had died by her hand, was still haunting her.

Though it was an event from decades ago, to her, who had lived through eternity, it felt like yesterday.

“That is how mortals live as they flow with time. Be prepared to be disappointed at any moment. My Master, great ruler.”

—I understand…….

Valdrova’s gaze drifted toward the distance as she fell into deep thought.

The pure girl who had faced a human had returned to being an immortal.

Damping the spirits on a joyous day wasn’t particularly pleasant for Ruri either.

‘But it is necessary.’

Just as a war hero passing through a triumphal arch must realize he is but a mere man.

One must also know that what they cherish and love is destined to change or disappear one day.

That was the best advice Ruri, a dragon spawn and loyal subject of Valdrova, could give.

---

After finishing the engagement ceremony, Ferda immediately entered seclusion.

Unlike Ruri, who thought he was shut in his room out of shame and shock, Ferda needed time alone.

‘This emotion I felt while looking at her.’

When Ferda was actually writing the vow, he had simply written what came to mind.

But as he came to speak it aloud, Ferda felt something that had been submerged at the bottom of the water begin to surface.

To the point where he ended up adding an unscripted remark not in the vow.

‘Why did I do such a thing?’

Ferda knew.

That saying such a thing would surely fluster her.

That it could even ruin the ceremony.

‘But I had to.’

It was based on an irrational impulse.

He felt an urge that if he didn’t say it now, it would be too late, and Ferda had followed that impulse.

In the end, he had flustered Valdrova, and the ceremony didn’t go as planned.

‘Why?’

Ferda closed his eyes, holding that question.

He ruminated on his five senses, dredging up what he had seen and the emotions he had felt at that time.

Ferda repeated it dozens of times to ensure he didn’t bark up the wrong tree.

In doing so, he finally reached a conclusion.

‘It was definitely then.’

Ferda had been entranced by the sight of her when he saw her briefly to drink the Engagement Wine.

The emotion of that moment had briefly made him someone other than himself.

Not Ferda the Archmage, but Ferda the man.

‘But what should I call this?’

To find out, Ferda recalled only that peak moment of intensity.

He repeated and repeated it just to obtain that single answer.

At that moment, Ferda felt a twitch.

A sensation of violent rotation within the circle he had already formed below his dantian.

As that driving force grew larger and larger, his chest burned hotter and hotter.

‘The Red Circle is moving.’

It was a torrent flowing too fast to control.

At the same time, it was a wild surge capable of consuming him.

‘This could be dangerous…….’

Instead of searching for the answer, Ferda focused on the sensation.

He had two choices.

Think of something else to quell the movement of the Red Circle.

Or focus on that emotion to agitate it further.

‘Quelling it is the best course.’

Agitating it was a dangerous choice, no different from holding a knife to one’s own throat.

That was true even for Ferda, who had been an Archmage.

‘But to create a dignity worthy of Duke Valdrova…….’

He had to take the risk and venture forth.

That was the determination of Ferda, who had set foot in Valdrova’s territory.

‘Let’s do it.’

Ferda focused his mind on a single point.

Creating a second circle is similar to creating the first.

However, it is described as easier because the vague difficulty of making the first circle is gone.

‘The problem is I don’t have enough mana to build it up that much.’

Breaking through a circle is like breaking an egg.

To go to a new world, one must prove oneself by breaking the shell.

What is needed for that is a hard beak and strength.

Mana and mental power play that role.

Ferda was in a state where those two conditions were met.

‘First, focus…….’

Ferda closed his eyes and took his stance.

He let his consciousness drop deep within.

At the same time, his five senses faded.

The sound of his heartbeat and the flow of time felt through his skin disappeared.

Finally, there was nothing that could disturb Ferda.

All that remained was his pure consciousness.

Ferda drew a line in his mind.

That line became a guide, and the fluctuating mana moved along the line he drew.

He guided it naturally to a new place, without offending the mana’s temperament.

The stream created from the great river grew larger and larger, finally becoming a new circular shell.

‘And so, I overlay it.’

Another circle surrounding the one already made.

Slowly molding its shape, he clearly defined the form of the circle.

Through the long span of forty-eight hours, focusing only on the molding, Ferda made it perfect.

Two circles spinning within Ferda’s dantian.

Ferda had become a 2nd-circle mage, a Spell Blower.

“Hmm…….”

Though he had become a 2nd-circle mage in just a few days, Ferda was not satisfied.

‘The emotion has been resolved.’

Because as the new path opened and he reached the 2nd circle, Ferda’s emotion had been resolved.

That tickling sensation had become a part of Ferda, and the excitement he felt while recalling that memory had also vanished.

‘This is indeed the drawback of the Red Circle.’

One must desire greater stimulation, and if the stimulation disappears, one stagnates.

Thus, one must either become a monster consumed by emotion or become something that couldn’t even achieve that.

‘I just have to feel it again.’

Although it was a pity he couldn’t find the answer, he felt no rush.

The moment he faced her again, this emotion would swell once more.

He was certain of it.

Ferda smiled.

---

“When you said you’d shut yourself away, I expected as much…… but have you already become a 2nd-circle mage?”

“That’s how it turned out.”

A mage who reached the 2nd circle within three days.

It had probably been barely over a month since he arrived here, yet he had gone from an ordinary person to the 2nd circle in an instant.

‘Abnormally fast growth.’

Even though he was only a 2nd-circle pipsqueak, his growth rate alone was at a level to be revered.

“So, is this where I’ll be working now?”

“Yes. Though you only have authority as a regent.”

Ferda and Ruri were standing in the Duke’s office.

Decorated with brown ancient wood, everything was optimized for administrative work, while simultaneously being a space that exuded the dignity of its occupant.

When Ferda first stepped inside, he almost mistakenly thought a king would surely be there.

Taking in the atmosphere, Ferda asked Ruri.

“So, now that I’ve officially become the fiancé, what should I do?”

“As I mentioned before, it’s the recruitment of talent. Since the Duke is beginning her activities, those positions must be filled.”

“Yes, I heard. But can I decide that arbitrarily?”

“Of course, you cannot, Ferda-nim.”

Ruri spoke as she held up something resting on the table.

“But this can.”

It was the seal of Duke Valdrova.

A seal carries the same authority as the person themselves.

There is a reason for the saying that one should treat the seal as if they were seeing the King.

“Recruiting talent…….”

If asked to pick someone right now, most would ask for time.

At the very least, taking two days to think it over slowly would be the best course.

“……Right, there is someone.”

However, Ferda’s pen moved without hesitation.