My Husband Was Clearly a Paladin
Chapter 6
Irene opened her eyes, feeling the texture of the plush duvet covering her.
For a moment, she couldn’t quite recall where she was, who she was, or what time it was.
Soon, however, her final memories began to resurface one by one. She let out an involuntary groan and squeezed her eyes shut again.
‘How did this happen?’
She remembered clearly what had transpired before she lost consciousness.
The Night of the Contract, Michael appearing drenched in blood, Princess Cecilia, the Light of Purification, and… the pair.
The Night of the Contract, which had begun entirely differently from her previous life, had ended exactly the same way: by forming a pair with him.
“Why on earth…?”
“Oh, you’re awake!”
The maids entering the room just then saw that Irene had regained consciousness and immediately rushed out to fetch others.
Most were people from the Kingdom Alliance, but there was a priest among them as well.
They made a request of Irene.
“It seems your current level of purification power differs from what was reported to us, so we need to verify it.”
The method for checking purification power was simple: bring the blood of a monster and apply the power of purification to it.
The grade of purification power was determined by how transparent—how close to water—the monster’s blood became.
From the highest rank to the lowest.
To make the levels easier for others to understand, the power was divided into stages from 1 to 10.
The highest grade was Rank 1, and the lowest was Rank 10. Naturally, in her past life, Irene’s rank had been 10.
And in this life, as soon as she had opened her eyes, the Count had shouted about what a mere Rank 10 could possibly do.
So she should still have been Rank 10. That was what she had written on the documents she registered before coming to the fortress.
However, since she had suddenly displayed the Light of Purification—something only a Rank 1 purifier could achieve—it was only natural that everyone was in an uproar.
“We know you’ve just woken up and must be tired, but the fortress is in quite a stir because of that Light of Purification…”
The Alliance officials nervously watched Irene’s reaction as they presented the monster’s blood.
She considered refusing, but Irene herself was suspicious of the Light of Purification she had seen. Moreover, she was troubled by the purification that had occurred as naturally as if they were a long-standing pair.
Irene sat up and purified the monster’s blood brought by the Alliance members.
The result was clear almost immediately.
“Rank 9…?”
Both Irene and the Alliance officials were bewildered by the result measured by the priests.
It was one level higher than in the past. But it was still a power that fell into the lowest category.
Unable to believe it, the people asked her to attempt the purification several more times, but the result remained the same no matter how often she repeated it.
Ultimately, because she had exerted her power so soon after waking, Irene fainted once again.
When she opened her eyes for the second time, the room was empty.
‘It seems everyone left since they have no more business with me.’
With that thought, Irene slowly pushed herself up. She then wiped her face with both hands.
“This isn’t right…”
All throughout her journey from the Count’s estate to the fortress, she had thought about how she would live this life.
There was no need for deep contemplation.
Form a pair with a decent knight and quickly secure 100,000 gold. Then, once this dungeon subjugation period ended, become a free woman and move far away to live quietly. And never again live a life involved with dungeons or purifiers.
That was Irene’s goal.
Wasn’t that why she had intentionally made such an enticing offer to a knight who seemed easy to read?
She had told him she didn’t care if he took all the rewards from every dungeon, as long as he gave her just one specific reward from a lowest-rank dungeon.
Everyone would think it was a proposal where Irene was at a disadvantage. But it was by no means a loss.
‘Because a rare artifact is going to appear in a lowest-rank dungeon that will open nearby in a few days.’
Irene remembered it vividly.
Five days after the Night of the Contract, a lowest-rank dungeon with an entrance so small a single person could barely fit through would appear near the fortress.
Identification number 181, assigned by the Kingdom Alliance.
That dungeon later became a legend.
‘Who would have guessed that an artifact—and the Ring of Invisibility at that—would come out of a place where people expected nothing more than scrap metal?’
At the time, the knight and the Rank 6 purifier who had entered merely for practice instantly earned a staggering amount of money.
That Ring of Invisibility was sold at the Kingdom Alliance’s official auction house for the third-highest price in history.
‘If I can just get that, I can not only pay back my ransom to the Count but also have enough money to live on for the rest of my life.’
That was why Irene had intentionally sought a pair with a low-quality knight while offering overwhelmingly unfavorable terms.
That way, she could have collected her payment and left this place immediately without having to spend the night with him under some excuse.
But she had ended up paired with Michael, not that knight.
She let out a sigh because the mistake she had tried hardest to correct had gone awry, but she had to accept it. The others would have already formed their pairs, and since the rumor that she had purified Michael had already spread, there was no way out.
’Now that I think about it, I’ll have to talk to Michael about the distribution of rewards, too.’
With anyone else, negotiating the split would be the first order of business.
But because they had suddenly become a pair and she had collapsed, she hadn’t said a single word about the distribution.
‘It’ll be trouble if it’s the same as in the past.’
Irene recalled the terms between Michael and herself from the past.
‘It was nine to one.’
After she had begged him to take her as his pair and they were finally alone, Michael had sighed and spoken.
「I send everything I obtain from the dungeons to the Temple. Only then can more people receive warm meals and a place to sleep. If you wouldn’t mind, Miss Irene, could you also provide help for them?」
Irene had no choice but to nod at his words. Had she not been the one to cling to him and form the pair?
If she refused Michael’s request, he might have given up on this year’s subjugation, ended the pair, and simply returned.
If that happened, Irene would be the one in trouble.
Even so, she hadn’t been able to agree to the distribution he had in mind.
「I understand. B-but, I would like to receive at least a small portion for myself. About 5%… I’d like to receive…」
Her voice had trailed off even as she spoke.
She felt she had to beg for a share despite being someone who was of no help to Michael at all.
But this life was different. She didn’t care if the terms were practically 100 to 0, just as he had originally wanted.
‘I should demand the same terms from Michael as I did from that other knight.’
As she thought, the confusion in her head slowly cleared.
Unexpected things had happened, but what she had to do remained the same.
Get her hands on the artifact, sell it, end the pair, and leave this place.
‘It’s a bit of a waste of information, though.’
Irene saw her bag sitting in a corner and stood up. It seemed the fortress maids had brought it here.
Inside the bag was the paper she had organized back at the Count’s estate.
‘With this, I could earn so much more money.’
Records detailing which dungeons would appear and what would come out of them.
She didn’t remember everything perfectly, but knowing even this much would make becoming one of the wealthiest people on the continent no problem at all.
Furthermore, if her pair was Michael, there would be no issue at all in subjugating these dungeons.
‘And if it’s Michael, he won’t demand my body.’
Other knights would want to spend all day entangled with their purifier, but Michael wasn’t like that.
In that case, couldn’t she stay longer even after gathering her ransom and conquer dungeons that would yield money?
After a moment of deliberation, Irene shook her head.
‘Don’t have foolish thoughts; let’s just leave quickly.’
The more money she gathered, the better. But if Michael were to be severely injured again like in the past, the same life would only repeat itself.
The unwanted nights, and the contempt. She did not want to see Michael’s face looking at her with that cold, hardened expression twice.
It was for Irene’s own sake, but it was also for Michael’s. If the pair period grew longer, she might become a nuisance to him just as she had in her previous life.
‘As I thought, I should just get that one thing and leave immediately.’
Just as Irene was steeling her resolve again, there was a knock at the door.
‘Are the maids back?’
Was it because she was paired with Michael, or because of the commotion caused by her purification rank?
Unlike in the past, Irene had been assigned a quite luxurious room.
It was likely a room given in expectation that she would be a high-ranking purifier.
‘Since I’ve been judged as Rank 9, I’ll probably be moved to a place similar to where I stayed in my past life.’
The Alliance fortress provided rooms for the purifiers to stay in.
A purifier’s room was an extremely important place.
This was because knights could only head out for subjugation again after returning from a dungeon and spending a comfortable time with their purifier.
Naturally, the higher the purifier’s rank, the better the room they were assigned. From spacious, comfortable bedrooms to private bathrooms where hot water was available at any time.
If one wanted to use a place better than what was assigned, the purifier or the knight had to pay for it.
For that reason, knights tried even harder to obtain high-ranking purifiers as their pairs.
Because of that, the Irene of the past hadn’t even dreamed of such a lodging.
‘Back then, it was the smallest, plainest room.’
The Alliance official, muttering that it had been so long since they’d seen a Rank 10 purifier that they didn’t even know where to put her, had given her the room at the very edge of the fortress.
A room with a single crude wooden bed and one tiny bathroom.
Even so, to her, it had been a room that looked like heaven, simply because she didn’t have to worry about being sold off immediately and could use it alone.
Knock, knock.
The sound of knocking came again.
At that sound, Irene realized she hadn’t told them to come in. She quickly folded the paper away, stood up from the bed, and spoke toward the door.
“Come in.”
She turned around, expecting a maid to enter, but Michael stood there, dressed in the formal uniform of the Holy Knight Order.
“Oh…”
Irene, who hadn’t expected him to come, stood there blankly staring at him, unable to even offer a greeting.
He walked inside quite naturally, took a look around the room, and spoke to her.
「Do you like the room?」
“…Pardon?”
For a moment, Irene didn’t understand his question. She blinked a few times and asked back in a surprised voice.
“Is this my room?”
