Chapter 143
Translator: RaidenTL
Chapter 143
"Hey, are you seriously using these bastards as your standard? This place is full of lowlifes who live like there's no tomorrow because they have no idea if they'll die today or the next! Just because they smoke, you're going to smoke too? And do you think they're just smoking regular tobacco? Most of them are smoking what are basically drugs!"
The "lowlifes who lived like there was no tomorrow" stared at him, utterly dumbfounded.
"Did you even drink any water? Which bastard gave you that?"
That "bastard" glared fiercely at Abel. Abel glared right back with a menacing expression as he followed Seo-ah.
"Don't ever smoke again. It's really bad for you."
"Then you shouldn't smoke either, Abel."
"Fine."
*
Below the mountain cabin, a carriage similar to the one they had burned in the Rock Forest was waiting. Through the open door, she could see Oscar reviewing some documents, his long legs stretched all the way to the opposite seat.
Before boarding, she looked back. She had expected Simon to get in too, but he was standing some distance away, giving instructions to the Wolves.
"Get in."
A low command drifted out from inside the carriage.
As Seo-ah turned back, Abel offered her his hand. She glanced at him. He had been sporting a scruffy beard earlier, but at some point, he had returned to his usual clean-shaven self. He gestured with his eyes, a playful look prompting her to take his hand and climb up. His mischievous expression had a way of easing her tension. Seo-ah let out a soft chuckle, shook her head, and grabbed the handrail to climb the carriage steps herself.
Stepping inside, she was enveloped in deep shadow. The cool shade within the carriage brought back a familiar tension. If Abel possessed a quality that put people at ease, Oscar possessed one that wound it tight as a spring.
Though he had been looking at his documents the entire time, Oscar was now leaning back against the seat, staring directly at her.
As if drawn by an invisible force, her eyes met his.
His gaze was like a powerful magnet. It took a conscious effort to break away from his intense stare.
When she finally turned her head away, a lazy chuckle reached her ears.
Enduring the laugh that seemed to pierce right through her, Seo-ah looked around for a place to sit. The carriage was cramped and awkward, and Simon and Abel still had to fit inside. It would be best for her to sit in her original spot to keep things as smooth as possible.
Back when they had boarded the carriage at the manor, he had at least moved his legs out of the way. This time, he didn't budge an inch.
"Excuse me, Your Excellency. I need to get past."
Even after she spoke, he remained completely still. To avoid brushing against his legs, she had no choice but to crawl across the long bench seat on her knees.
Oscar, who had been staring intently at her as she crawled, finally spoke.
"Close it."
His firm tone carried an unyielding resolve that brooked no refusal.
At the command to close the carriage door, Seo-ah immediately looked back. Abel, who had been standing there the entire time, closed the door with a calm expression.
"Oh, Abel...!"
The door to the carriage, which still needed to accommodate two more people, clicked shut.
"What?"
At his low, heavy question, she turned her head to find him looking up at her. With his hair swept back, revealing his forehead, his irritation was even more palpable.
"Can't you live without him?"
"What do you mean?"
"Abel Sting. I'm asking if you can't bear to be without him."
"What? No, it's not that... I was just wondering how they would get back..."
Oscar let out a scoffing laugh and rubbed his smooth forehead.
"They'll make it back even if they have to crawl. Why do you care?"
"Then Simon von..."
"That bastard too."
His slow, drawling words, accompanied by a lazy smile, seemed laced with deep annoyance and anger.
Seo-ah fidgeted with her hands before clasping them tightly together and speaking cautiously.
"I'm sorry."
"For what?"
"...I feel like you're angry because of me."
"..."
Just then, the carriage jolted forward.
Fidgeting with her fingers, Seo-ah bit her lip and stared out the window.
Oscar glared coldly at her as she tried her absolute best to avoid touching him. It twisted his stomach to see her smiling at Abel Sting's cheap tricks while refusing to even meet his own eyes.
"...I like you."
He was still held captive by those weightless, fleeting words, yet she was desperate to escape his sight by any means necessary.
Finding his own state utterly pathetic, Oscar took a deep, steadying breath. He lowered his head to look at the work he needed to do, but in the end, he just looked back up and stared at the carriage ceiling.
The documents were piled high, but not a single word registered.
It was partly because of the woman sitting in front of him, and partly because of the absurd news Barbara had sent.
While he was holed up here, his mother had made a move in the capital.
Five hundred billion.
His mother had reportedly proceeded with a marriage he knew nothing about and received five hundred billion as a dowry—notarized by none other than the King himself. The supporting documents would bear the seals of Margaret Rose von Franz, Charlotte von Reinhardt, and Leopold von Hilbert. Therefore, whether the money had actually changed hands was irrelevant.
It seemed his mother was conducting a very lucrative transaction using the commodity known as Oscar von Reinhardt, as if to personally demonstrate that a single manor was not enough to repay her for giving birth to him.
He felt a throbbing ache in his temples.
In the game Charlotte had set up, the choices presented to him were simple.
Either cough up five hundred billion in cold, hard cash, or marry a woman named Abigail von Franz.
Since there was no reason to pay such an astronomical sum over something like this, his usual self would have naturally chosen the latter. What was a mere marriage anyway? He could just marry her first, find a way to annul it later, and hold them accountable for pulling such a stunt.
That was the most sensible path.
Oscar looked at Seo-ah. The shadows of the trees passing by the window cast flickering patterns across her face.
Even if he told her he was marrying another woman, Oscar could easily picture her simply nodding with that innocent face of hers.
'Ah, I see.'
Then, parting her lips and rolling her eyes as if unsure of what to say, she would add:
'Um... congratulations, Your Excellency.'
The imaginary scenario made his stomach churn.
"Ha."
Yes. That is exactly what you would do.
She would wear an expression of utter ignorance about what she had done, even after completely derailing the most sensible choice he was supposed to make.
Come to think of it, he was the one who had been acting like a fool all this time. Mating like a beast blinded by lust, all while insulting her.
"If you're so desperate to give me your body, at least do it properly."
Yet even after hearing such insults, she acted as if nothing had happened the very next day.
And during the time she had lain here as if dead, he had completely lost his mind, abandoning all his duties. But not her. The woman he had encountered in the Pelfe brothel and the woman standing before him now were one and the same—entirely unchanged.
In other words, her heart did not flutter for him, and therefore, she felt no disappointment either.
Having spent his entire life building walls against others, Oscar knew the reason why.
To her, Oscar von Reinhardt held absolutely no "meaning."
His grip tightened around the documents he was holding.
One who finds no meaning in anything remains solitary and lofty, like a tree standing atop a seaside cliff. Even if it struggles under torrential rain, fierce winds, and a scorching sun, the next day it stands firm in its place as if nothing had happened.
Looking at her brought such a tree to mind.
"Han Seo-ah."
"...Yes?"
The woman, who had been pressing herself against the carriage wall while stubbornly staring outside, turned her head toward him.
In that fleeting moment, her eyes drifted up, met his, and then cast down again.
Oscar felt a strange fluttering near his ribs.
The tickling, pounding beat was not something he could control. The sensation of smelling a fresh, green scent that couldn't possibly be there, and the way he grew breathless at a single timid glance—all of it was beyond his control.
He had to admit it.
He was the one being shaken, stirred by a woman who found no meaning in him.
Usually, a deficiency is felt when something that was once there disappears. Sometimes, however, one doesn't even realize they are lacking something until they happen to obtain it, only then recognizing it had been missing all along. There are deficiencies that are only recognized after they are filled.
And once you realize a deficiency in that manner, you can never return to the time when you were ignorant of it.
Seo-ah's face tilted slightly downward.
"Raise your head."
"..."
"I told you. That doesn't look like humility at all."
"...I'm not trying to be humble."
"Then is it because you can't even stand the sight of my face?"
Seo-ah's eyes widened, and she hurriedly waved her hands in denial.
"Oh, no, Your Excellency."
"If not, then what? Did people say something to you when you raised your head where you used to live?"
"...It's nothing like that."
The strength in her voice vanished abruptly. So that was it.
Even as he made his guess, Oscar pressed her further.
"Then why on earth are you so desperate to keep your head down?"
"Well..."
As he watched to see what kind of excuse she would concoct, Seo-ah parted her lips and rolled her eyes. She seemed to turn the words over in her mouth several times before finally squeezing them out.
"Because I'm ugly..."
Oscar, whose nerves had been slowly fraying, burst into a sudden, coughing laugh the moment he heard her mumbled excuse.
As the woman, whose voice had trailed off, stared at him in bewilderment, his laughter only deepened. The veins that had been bulging on his forehead receded. He covered his face with his hand to rub away the laughter, but the chuckle, triggered by something so trivial, would not easily subside.
Seo-ah stared blankly at the man, who was laughing with his hand over his face, his broad chest shaking.