IELNDMH - Chapter 138 < My Woman, My Child >

Rebecca left her mansion without any delay.

Before she left, Mina heard her situation in detail and immediately told it to the other mixed-race demon users in the mansion in detail.

It was something that could be trusted and done because mixed-blood demons could never reveal their master's secrets.

At the same time, she said that she should not kill Lobelia yet, and gave instructions to behave as usual until Rebecca escaped safely.

The employees followed Mina's instructions and acted as usual.

But sometimes life flashed in their eyes.

Rebecca is the owner they have served with loyalty and has been reborn as the respectable Grand Duchess of the Twins family.

She left the mansion as if she was running away due to someone's threats.

Moreover, that ‘someone’ is the original Rebecca... So, she is the spirit of that wicked woman who has been abusing mixed-blood demons for a long time.

Not only had she tormented them for a long time, but now even their owner, whom they loved, could not forgive her for her threats.

While carrying on with business as usual, the harsh eyes of the mixed-race demons often flashed brightly, and thick blood vessels appeared on their foreheads.

Lobelia Bart.

They all felt like tearing the woman to pieces right now if they could.

***

Same time.

People were looking inside through the windows of the mansion from the outside. Her endless patience came from only one place: Lillian's heart. 

The old woman exhaled softly, recalling it over and over again as if reciting a spell. 

“... Lady, the more you do it, the better you must go inside. They still don’t know Lady’s identity, so you need to quickly lure her away and finish the job.” 

Her tone was kind as if she was talking to a child. But Lobelia laughed openly at the old woman and snorted. 

"Do not be ridiculous. And what if I get caught? Are you going to take responsibility?” 

“Like I said, they took Lady’s life...” 

“...What if Cedric finds out and locks me up like he did in my past life?” 

Lobelia's voice as she asked that question was chilling. She pushed her face right in front of the old woman who was sitting across from her and blinked her eyes. 

“He can’t kill me, but he can trap me.” 

“...” 

“Then you will be trapped in that dark tower with me for the rest of your life... huh?" 

The old woman had no answer. 

Sigh. 

Lobelia's face was distorted grotesquely with laughter. The tower where the ceremony of ‘self-sacrifice’ was held. That tower of hers was nothing short of hell to her. In that tower, where it was difficult for even a ray of light to come in, she held out for several years until the day she died, performing the last rites. 

It was a strange time not to go crazy. If she had to go back to that time, she could bite her tongue and die right here and now. 

'How did I get here... I can't be dragged there without meaning.' 

Lobelia, who was worried, eventually firmly ordered her to leave.

It was Lobelia and the old woman who helped her.

They parked the carriage near Rebecca's mansion and watched the movements of the mansion for a long time.

“Seeing everyone acting as usual, it doesn’t seem like anything special has happened yet...”

The old woman stretched out her words and looked at Lobelia's expression.

But for some reason, she looked strange.

For a moment, she kept tilting her head with a disapproving expression.

Her lips slowly parted.

“Yeah, it’s definitely no different than usual...”

“...”

“Why do I keep feeling so uncomfortable?”

Even as Lobelia said that she kept her eyes fixed outside the window.

“Is there any reason for that? There’s no way those stupid things would have already figured out Lady’s identity, right?”

The old woman continued speaking leisurely.

“Excessive caution only delays things. You have to go in quickly and lure Lady's body. Wouldn’t that help you get your body back as soon as possible?”

“...Then you can take Lillian’s heart as soon as possible, right?”

Lobelia's words were full of thorns.

The old woman cleared her throat slightly as she saw Lobelia glaring at her.

“Anyway, even if she discovered Lady’s identity, she can’t harm you. As I said, Lady’s body and soul are connected, so if you kill her soul carelessly, ‘her body’ will die as well.”

“...”

“Don’t you respect ‘that body’ more than anyone else now?”

‘The body’ she wants to save.

It was hers and her own.

They used to hate her behind her back when she was inside, but now they can't help but respect and love her body...

"Ha?"

A new, angry sneer flowed from Lobelia's lips.

Whether she was in this body or that body, was she ultimately wrong to be loved?

At that time, the 'sinless soul' also seemed to be the same evil entity as 'Lobelia', who had taken Cedric away in her previous life.

She thought it was just a poor soul who would be used as her sacrificial lamb...

'Did she do all sorts of crazy things inside my body?'

When she first found out that the soul had obtained Cedric's imprint, she was not very happy.

That would mean that she coveted the body of her man, Cedric.

But when she thought about it, the situation wasn't that bad for her.

Moreover, isn't that sinless soul destined to disappear soon?

With that thought in mind, Lobelia suppressed her anger toward that soul, but it ended up bursting out in the wrong place.

“That was originally my body! But you’re actually trying to kill me to save my body?!”

The old woman had never said anything like that.

However, due to her long-standing sense of victimization, Lobelia interpreted her words however she wanted, and went berserk, stamping her feet and screaming.

Then, as if distressed by the voice in her head, she opened her eyes in the air.

“Shut up, Lobelia! I told you to stop whining and shut up!”

The old woman looked calm even in the shaking carriage as if she was familiar with the sight.

But she was actually sick of Lobelia, who was behaving like a rabid dog.

“...Turn the carriage around.”

“Lady, isn’t this different from the promise you made to me!”

As she expected, the old woman protested, but Lobelia looked at her and raised the corner of her mouth leisurely.

“I’ve waited so long, wait some more. I need to take a closer look at the dynamics. Otherwise, I will be in danger.”

"Ha....”

“Even if she finds out my identity and runs away, she's never run away while pregnant within this empire. Moreover, if she gives birth to a child, she will appear in front of Cedric just to show him that child, right?”

“...”

“All we have to do is observe the movements of my wonderful husband, Cedric, until then, and then attack that body that appears at the right moment. By then, the lump she had placed on my stomach will have disappeared, so she is good in many ways.”

Lobelia pointed to her body with her index finger.

“Then her soul dies here, in Lobelia’s body, bearing all my sins.”

A satisfied smile spread across the corners of her lips.

“By the hands of Cedric, who cared for her so much.”

***

That night, in front of Rebecca’s bedroom.

‘By now...I hope you arrived safely at the hideout.'

Mina sighed softly as she stood in front of the empty door that had lost her owner.

She usually held a tray with Rebecca's tea on it before she went to sleep.

“...Rebecca, I’m going in.”

Even though she knew there was no voice coming back beyond the door, she acted like she always did.

Because it had to be that way.

Suddenly, she felt sad and angry, and her lips were tightly pressed together.

Finally, it was time to enter Rebecca's bedroom.

"...Your Highness?"

Mina knew implicitly that the Grand Duke visited his lover's bedroom every night, but she never thought she would encounter him like this.

Unlike Mina, who was confused, Cedric came striding towards her as soon as he spotted her.

“What about Rebecca?”

Since everyone was completely silent, Cedric would not have heard today's story yet.

Still, he seemed like a person who had a hard time enduring even Rebecca's brief absence.

What will happen when Cedric faces the fact that she has left him forever?

Mina let out a long breath to relieve some of her frustration.

“...Your Highness,”

She paused for a moment, unable to continue her words.

Mina took out an envelope from her apron pocket and handed it to Cedric.

Cedric blinked slowly at that unexpected action.

“She left this letter addressed to Your Highness the Grand Duke. If you read it, you will know everything.”

After saying that, Mina placed the teacup on the table and slightly lowered her head towards Cedric.

“It almost became an unclaimed teacup... The Grand Duke happened to be there. Then I’ll leave.”

Then she calmly walked out the bedroom door.

Cedric, who didn't know why, stood there staring at the closed door for a while.

Then his eyes immediately landed on the envelope of the letter that Mina had handed him.

“Where did you go to get the letter..."

Cedric, who was softly smiling and muttering, opened the envelope.

Soon, as he slowly read what was written in the letter, his beautiful forehead gradually became distorted.

"You .. Leave me?”

He said those words without realizing it.

The sentences that his lover had calmly written down took away his vitality in an instant.

Her sentences about the evil spirit of the former Rebecca hiding in Lobelia's body and that she would threaten the current Rebecca to get her own body back did not attract his attention.

Cedric looked at the letter again, thinking that her hiding place was written somewhere, something he hadn't seen yet.

However, there was no sentence anywhere announcing Rebecca's whereabouts.

The letter that was being held in Cedric's hand shook helplessly and soon fell to the floor.

Just like how he feels now that he has collapsed.

“Please just know that it was an unavoidable choice to protect our child, Cedric.”

Among the many sentences, that phrase kept squeezing his heart painfully.

The child of the two of them, that precious thing. While holding on to that hope, his lovely lover disappeared.

Cedric unconsciously grabbed his chest.

He was out of breath.

Before he knew it, tears were streaming down his red face.

He felt devastated as if the whole world he knew was in ruins.

His woman, his child.

Cedric, who had lost everything in an instant, was at a loss as if he were on fire from the excruciating, unfamiliar pain.

His breathing was excessive, and blood vessels appeared on his reddened forehead.

It wasn't the familiar feelings of jealousy, anger, or resentment toward someone coveting or threatening what was mine.

Those things were put on hold for a while.

It was just so sad that it took his breath away.

It hurt and bitter that everything he was was gone in an instant.

He knelt down in the space where he and his lover had whispered their love.

And he sobbed helplessly amidst the cruelly beautiful memories.

'I said something because I was embarrassed, honestly... I also like it when you come to visit me every day.'

‘What should I name the baby? Hmm? Hey, I don't think that's a good idea.'

A series of newly moist noises came out of his lips.

'...I love you, Cedric.'

That's how his world began to fall apart.

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