Chapter 75
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The Male and Female Leads Broke Up - Episode 75
I fastened the collar of the thick robe draped over my shoulders and fell into contemplation.
Though countless thoughts crowded my mind these days, they ultimately converged into one.
Could I truly survive without dying, to the very end?
Could I survive this subjugation?
Even if I survived this subjugation, could I escape the grip of the original narrative?
The thought that no matter how desperately I struggled, my fate would inevitably be death weighed heavily on my heart.
It felt as though everything had twisted because I refused to die.
These days, I found myself wondering if my death—the only villain in the original story—might be the very mechanism that would lead this novel toward a happy ending.
'That would be utterly unfair.'
If that were true, it would be absolutely unjust.
So I have to die for the novel's happy ending?
'Now that I think about it, I'm furious.'
"Hah."
Suddenly seized by heat, I took a deep breath to calm myself.
The cold weather quickly extinguished the fire within me.
Then, methodically and rationally, I gathered my thoughts once more.
So what should I do moving forward?
To survive, must I take the initiative?
Must I strike at them first—
"Belita?"
The chain of thoughts that had been linking one after another was severed in an instant by a voice calling to me from behind.
I recognized the voice's owner immediately upon hearing it.
I hardened my expression and turned around slowly.
"I believe I mentioned that you should no longer address me that way, Prince of the Byon Family."
"I'm... sorry."
With two moons hanging in the sky above and below, everything around us was brightly illuminated.
Thus, I could see very clearly how his lips pressed into a rigid line as he apologized.
There was much I wanted to ask him, yet I could not ask anything at all.
I wished to converse with him, yet I had no confidence in hearing whatever he might say.
First, I needed to determine what I should do going forward.
I had to organize my thoughts and settle my mind.
'No, there's nothing to organize in my heart.'
I simply needed to restore the affection I had felt for him to its original state.
As though nothing had ever existed between us in the first place....
Yes, that was all there was to it.
"It seems you came out for some fresh air. I'll get out of your way."
As I said this and tried to quickly slip past him, his voice came from beside me.
"Belita, why are you avoiding me?"
At his question of why I was avoiding him, I stopped in my tracks and looked up at him with an incredulous expression.
"...Are you going to say you don't know anything this time too?"
When I returned from my travels and saw Aiden Byon at the Imperial Palace, he was the same way then.
He was the one who asked if he made me uncomfortable when he saw that I wasn't happy to see him.
Yes, I thought he might not have known back then.
After all, he wasn't someone who stayed in the Capital very often.
In fact, he seemed extremely busy.
His claim that he was rarely in the Capital was true.
But this time was different.
Because of the carriage incident, he had been in the Capital all along.
And hadn't I witnessed Adela crying and driving me away from him at the banquet the night before the expedition?
Therefore, his claim that he didn't know why I was acting this way made no sense.
"I was just..."
"I just want to ask one thing."
I had tried not to engage with him, but I was too flabbergasted not to ask.
So I threw at him the one question I had been most curious about.
"Do you happen to know who the culprit behind the carriage incident is?"
"..."
There was no answer.
But that was enough.
"Since when did you know? Could it be you knew from the beginning?"
If that were the case, if it truly were, then I...
Anger threatened to consume my reason, but I clenched my fists tightly and barely managed to exercise patience.
"...I didn't know from the beginning. If I had, if I had known, I would never have joined the Investigation Team."
At his resolute words, why...
Why did I feel such relief?
"Sister, it's just that you, why, sigh..."
Meanwhile, he seemed frustrated and let out a deep sigh, unable to speak easily.
"Do you remember when we captured Owen Est?"
"Yes, I remember."
Ah, now that I think about it, back then...
After days of fruitless searching for Owen Est outside the city, we decided to search within the Capital instead.
It was because of Aiden Byon's suggestion.
That he probably hadn't gone far.
That he was surely nearby.
"So you said that knowing the truth?"
"...Yes, that's correct."
"How did you know? How could you possibly know?"
"Do you remember the day your sister awakened?"
"Yes."
Though my head nodded slowly, my thoughts raced at a frantic pace.
Could he have been following me?
If so, why?
Had Aiden Byon suspected his own sister from the very beginning?
I couldn't fathom how everything connected, but I had to hear every word that came from his lips.
"That day, after your sister awakened, she left the house without even properly composing herself. A normal person wouldn't do such a thing. Especially given how frail she is, she should have refrained from going out altogether. Yet despite the servants' objections, she went out and returned without yielding to their concerns."
Ah, so he hadn't been following me after all.
"That's when I concluded she must have had urgent business to attend to. I wondered where she could have gone, whether she'd met someone. Following that line of reasoning, I arrived at the conclusion: Owen Est."
I remained silent, listening until he finished speaking.
Then I posed a single question to him.
"But wouldn't such deduction require you to have already suspected that Adela was behind the carriage incident?"
"That's true. However, Belita—ah, forgive me...."
He began to call my name but stopped, his expression turning bitter as he corrected himself.
"Just as you must have, I found myself with no choice but to grow suspicious the more I investigated. The culprit could only be one of two people."
Aiden Byon was right.
As I investigated the carriage incident, I felt as though I were grasping at an unsolved mystery.
All the circumstances pointed toward me, though I was innocent.
But if it wasn't me, then there was only one person capable of committing such an act.
Someone who would cast themselves as a victim to ensnare another in peril.
And Aiden Byon had already seen through it.
"I couldn't even be certain of the culprit, despite knowing I hadn't done it."
But why did you exclude me from suspicion?
If he had to choose between trusting either me or Adela, he should have chosen Adela.
Yet why? How could he....
"You said you didn't do it."
"What?"
"You told me you didn't do it. And from what I've experienced of you directly, you're not that kind of person. I simply chose to believe that."
"But for me to deserve such trust, then... what?"
I tried to respond, but the words caught in my throat at his declaration—that he believed in me, that he trusts me.
While he saw me for who I truly am, I....
I had never tried to see him properly.
Bound by the original story, I had carelessly judged the living, breathing person before me as nothing more than a puppet trapped within that narrative, moving without will or agency.
I hadn't separated Adela from him; I had vented my grievances against her onto him instead.
I was so ashamed of myself for being such a shallow human being.
Unable to meet his gaze directly, I lowered my head.
I had no right to face this man.
"Do you still find the sight of me so distasteful?"
Misinterpreting my gesture, Aiden Byon asked me in a subdued voice.
"No! I—I didn't mean it that way toward you—!"
Startled, I lifted my head to protest, but the words caught in my throat. I lowered my gaze again, biting my lip firmly.
I had told him not to presume familiarity, yet here I was, calling his name first.
"I'm sorry. I'm sorry."
I continued murmuring the words, hoping my sincerity would reach him, hoping he would understand my remorse.
Then I heard a soft laugh from above my head.
Without thinking, I looked up to see his face.
'What?'
Contrary to my expectation that he would be regarding me with a hardened expression, his face was suffused with a smile.
"Does that mean I'm permitted to call you Belita again?"
At his question, my head nodded of its own accord.
Then he offered me a smile even brighter than before.
'Ah....'
It was breathtakingly beautiful.
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