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Translator: Vine
Chapter: 7
Chapter Title: A Familiar Touch
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“Khk!”

As I choked and sputtered, Leonhart whispered.

“Duchess Ivrante, aren't you curious why I despise you?”

“Th-this… please… l-let… go… ugh!”

“Frankly, I couldn't care less about the Crown Prince. It makes no difference to me whether you're secretly backing the First Prince or the Second.”

“Hahh! W-wait…”

“Of course, dealing with the assassins you sent is quite a nuisance, but I don't loathe you for such a trivial reason.”

Now I was certain.

The one who had made Leonhart so hostile was none other than Adrian.

‘Ha, this is insane! But now *I'm* Adrian!’

Leonhart's voice dropped to an extreme low.

His eyes, which had been empty until now, flashed with a cold, blue light.

It was a look that went beyond anger, hinting even at hatred.

“So think about it. Spend every waking hour trembling in anxiety, wondering what you did to make me this way. Preferably while you're holed up in your mansion.”

My vision began to blacken. I was on the verge of fainting.

‘This won't do!’

Unable to bear it any longer, just as I was about to summon my magic to call a spirit, I remembered something I had momentarily forgotten.

I can't reveal my identity.

‘Damn it!’

No matter which spirit I summoned, Leonhart, my former comrade, would surely recognize them.

Besides, spirits have such loose lips. The moment they saw Leonhart, they'd spill everything about my possession.

‘I can't summon a spirit until I've made them swear to secrecy.’

Blood rushed to my face, and my eyes throbbed. The threat of death loomed right behind me.

“Hahh…”

I desperately grabbed Leonhart's hand. I laid my hand over his large one, slid my fingertips between his fingers, and gently rubbed them.

‘Please, please…!’

Did my desperate plea get through? The hand tightening around my neck suddenly released. My body collapsed limply.

*Thump.*

Lying on the ground, I looked up to see Leonhart staring down at me, his eyes wide.

My lips trembled.

“You son of a…”

If he was going to take out his anger, he should have done it before I possessed this body.

But the words wouldn't come out. I lost consciousness.

It was the third time I had fainted.

***

Just six years ago, Leonhart had been a novice swordsman.

No one in the expedition party was weaker than him.

That was true even excluding Adela the Spirit Swordsman, Owen the cleric with his powerful divine magic, and Luspell, whose magical power rivaled that of an archmage.

That was why Leonhart had to risk his life even when fighting trivial, low-level demonic beasts.

There was never a day when his body was unscathed. New wounds would appear before the old ones could even begin to heal.

Every day was a struggle, ending only when he was gasping for his last breath.

Enduring such extreme conditions, Leonhart grew faster than anyone else.

And now.

Having earned the title of Sword Master, he was now, in name and in reality, the strongest in the empire.

The nobles who had once looked down on him could no longer even meet his gaze.

Even though his once-gentle personality had turned cold and ruthless, no one dared to show their disapproval.

They were all too busy scurrying away to avoid him.

All of this was possible because of Adela.

She was the one who had saved him every time he faced death.

When he was injured or suffering from a fever caused by a demonic beast's poisonous blood, it was Adela who had stayed by his side all night.

‘She always used to hold my hand just like this.’

To this day, Leonhart remembered every detail of that touch.

The warm palm covering the back of his hand, the fingers weaving tightly through his, the fingertips rubbing gently, soothingly…

Even when his fever rose so high that he couldn't tell dream from reality, the sensation of her hand was always vivid.

Though he thrashed in terrible pain, he never let go of her hand.

But that was all impossible now.

He could no longer be saved by her, nor could he fall asleep, reassured by her warm touch.

Because Adela was no longer in this world.

‘That's what I thought until just a moment ago…’

Why was it that the moment Adrian's fingers slid between his, he couldn't breathe?

For an instant, it felt as if Adela, not Adrian, was the one in pain.

‘Why in the world?’

Adrian's touch was far too similar to the one he could never forget, not even in his dreams. It was impossible.

Leonhart knelt on one knee before the unconscious Adrian.

He picked up her hand, which lay carelessly on the dirt ground, and examined it closely.

A fair, delicate hand without a single hangnail.

Her fingers were as slender as reeds. It felt as if they would break with the slightest pressure.

She had probably never lifted anything heavier than silverware.

The hand of a meticulously cared-for noble.

The only thing it had in common with Adela's rough, scarred hands was that it had five fingers.

‘Then what was that just now? Why did her touch remind me of Adela?’

Leonhart irritably suppressed the turbulent feelings in his heart.

‘Was I mistaken?’

Thinking back, Adrian had only been struggling to survive.

He was the one who had read too much into it.

“…Damn it.”

It was absurd.

How could he possibly be reminded of Adela by a woman like this?

‘Have I gone mad from missing her so much?’

Leonhart dropped Adrian's wrist as if he had touched something filthy.

Then he took out a cigarette and put it to his lips.

“They say smoking for a long time can cause asthma, so I quit. Isn't asthma a terribly painful illness?”

*Hoo—*

As he exhaled a long stream of hazy smoke, the corner of Leonhart's mouth twitched up for a moment.

It was the most ridiculous nonsense he had heard in recent memory.

He had even let out a dry laugh when he'd sensed concern for his childhood asthma in her cold tone.

“What kind of trick is this now?”

Adrian was the very person who had ruined Leonhart's childhood.

She had tormented him to a sickening degree.

At the academy, she had tormented any child who got close to him, forcing him into isolation. After he left the academy, she began to isolate him in earnest.

The times she had manipulated the other princes into being violent toward him or publicly humiliated him were too numerous to count.

If any noble tried to approach him, she would dig up dirt on them, find a weakness, and blackmail them.

Any woman who so much as made eye contact with him was hunted down and retaliated against.

She even spread rumors that he was on the verge of death from his asthma.

She was also the one who had eliminated his already small base of support that way.

There was no one left around Leonhart.

He couldn't even get out of bed because of his asthma, yet no one came to check on him.

All of his servants and maids had been bribed by Adrian.

After Leonhart was completely isolated, she came to him and, absurdly, proposed marriage.

“In your position, Your Highness, you can't even dream of becoming Crown Prince. Wouldn't it be better to become the Ivrante family's son-in-law? I'll speak to His Majesty, so you just stay put.”

At the time, Leonhart knew that Adrian was behind everything that had happened to him.

He found it disgusting how she shamelessly talked about him becoming her son-in-law, as if he didn't know.

To her, Leonhart wasn't an equal. He was just a suitable stud to continue the ducal family's line.

Leonhart loathed Adrian to the point of utter disgust.

Just hearing her voice was enough to give him hives and make him want to vomit.

And she wanted to *marry* him!

That's why he volunteered for the Demon King expedition. He figured dying would be better than marrying her.

But in the end, he survived.

He was no longer the weak Third Prince, fit only to be a live-in son-in-law.

And yet, Adrian didn't stop her evil machinations.

Now, Leonhart had to deal with the assassins she sent.

The reason was that he was an obstacle to the First Prince—the one Adrian supported—becoming the Crown Prince.

Leonhart looked down at Adrian.

His contemptuous gaze fixed on her pale face.

‘Should I just kill her?’

He pressed his tongue against the inside of his cheek, making it bulge, then cracked his neck from side to side.

*Crack, pop.*

Hearing the dull sounds, he quietly suppressed his killing intent.

‘Not yet.’

Leonhart left Adrian lying there and turned away coldly.