The Beast Returns
Malena pressed hard on the bleeding wound with one hand to staunch the flow, then quickly opened the medicine box and pulled out a bandage. She bunched up the cloth soaked in medicine and began shoving it deep into the torn flesh. Though she knew it was necessary for hemostasis, the sensation of foreign material digging into raw, ripped meat was both revolting and agonizing.
Odeliana curled her body into a tight ball and let out a low groan. Her mind grew hazy, and cold sweat soaked her entire frame. Whether from the heavy blood loss or the dropping temperature brought by the rain, her body trembled violently in the bone-chilling cold.
“My lady, you mustn’t lose consciousness! My lady!”
Malena’s urgent cries began to fade into the distance.
Amid surging rage, the mental shock of her own weakness, and unbearable pain, Odeliana completely lost her grip on reality.
The moment the light flickered out, darkness swallowed everything.
Odeliana suffered for three full days. She repeatedly drifted in and out of consciousness, tormented by high fever as she hovered on the brink of death.
Blair, upon hearing the news, stayed by her side from morning till night. Adela had been dragged away by the guards who had been waiting outside the annex. No one knew what punishment had been inflicted upon her afterward.
The Duke had ordered the servants to keep their mouths tightly shut and summoned every medic working at the ducal estate to pour all their efforts into treating Odeliana.
If one didn’t know the truth, they might have held the hopeful thought that the Duke still harbored some affection for his daughter. But knowing the full story as she did, the lavish care only made Odeliana want to laugh.
They were clearly terrified that their precious sacrifice—the one meant to offer her heart to Orledet—might die. The fact that he hadn’t shown his face even once after she regained consciousness proved that whatever meager affection he once held had completely run dry.
“To think something like this would happen the moment I took my eyes off you… I have no excuse, my lady.”
“Where is Brother Blair?”
“He left just a short while ago.”
“…You said he stayed by my side all day.”
“…Yes. His worry was beyond measure. Young Master Blair truly took the most devoted care of you.”
The burning pain in her leg remained unchanged.
Though they had slathered the wound thickly with pain-relieving medicine, the tearing agony refused to subside easily.
“Should I have slit her throat instead of just her mouth?”
“……”
“Or should I have simply left her alone? Was my choice wrong?”
Should she have cut somewhere that wouldn’t show? Would things have been better if she had made the woman a cripple in the same leg? Or should she have killed her outright? Would that have been the best option? She didn’t know. What had been the right choice?
She was anxious. What if her remaining leg also became crippled? She was already a useless human being who could do nothing. If she lost the other leg as well? If she could never stand on her own two feet for the rest of her life, what then?
“Your leg will be fine.”
“…For the time being, don’t let anyone but you come near my room.”
“Understood.”
After that day, Odeliana’s room remained firmly locked.
Rumors spread among the servants—from claims that she had stopped eating and drinking entirely, to whispers that the shock had worsened her madness and driven her completely insane. Only Malena, the doctor, and Blair were permitted entry. Because both the doctor and Malena kept their lips sealed, no one dared ask questions and could only suppress their curiosity.
Blair behaved as if he had truly lost his mind. He stormed into the Duke and Duchess’s presence, demanding that Adela be immediately arrested and put on trial since she had directly harmed his sister. Yet once again, the ducal couple hid Adela away.
Perhaps that became the spark of change. Blair began leaving the estate every single day. The true reason was to accelerate his preparations for independence, but society whispered that the second son had finally given up on his insane younger sister.
The mansion was noisy for a while, but as always, the residents quickly lost interest in the unwanted princess locked away in the annex. Adela’s whereabouts remained a mystery, and no one knew where she had gone.
Amid that calm routine, the estate’s daily life was suddenly thrown into chaos by unexpected news.
“Remember that beggar the eldest young lady kept around?”
“That tall fellow she picked up from the slums?”
“Yes! That pretty-looking kid. The one the young lady supposedly clung to every night! Well… it turns out he passed the test and became a knight.”
“…That beggar came back as a knight?”
The servants who learned that Mathias had passed the final knight examination and was now on the verge of becoming a squire were utterly shocked.
The owner of the beauty that had softened the hostile attitudes of the maids—who had treated him like a walking disease due to his origins—had returned as a knight.
“Good heavens, a dragon rising from a ditch!”
“Exactly. They call it the knight examination, but isn’t it an impenetrable wall of lamentation that no commoner can breach?”
“A beggar from the slums broke through it? Just how monstrous must his skills be?”
“Who knows. Still, he’s only a squire for now. But can a knight of lowly birth even find a knight order willing to take him?”
A few of them cackled mockingly. For a knight of common birth, simply finding an order to join was an ordeal. Many ended up never receiving formal appointment despite earning the title and fell into lives as mercenaries instead.
If the knight examination was a wall of lamentation, joining a knight order was a wall of despair. Within orders mostly comprised of nobles, even those from wealthy merchant families were openly discriminated against. There was no way someone with nothing to his name would be treated like a human being.
“And on top of that, his only backer is a half-baked princess whose legs are crippled, who’s a madwoman, and whose very birth was concealed so no one even knows she exists?”
“His path to success is doomed. He’ll just keep living off that handsome face like before.”
“Even if he can’t be a knight, don’t you think he’d do well as a male concubine? After all, his face is exceptionally striking… And since he’s good with a sword too, he’s the perfect talent to become some noblewoman’s favored lover.”
“He has the face and body to succeed as a high-class courtesan.”
They jeered that Mathias would become nothing more than a plaything for noblewomen rather than a true knight. This noisy rumor eventually reached Orledet’s ears as she went about her busy days.
“Just how handsome is he that everyone’s making such a fuss?”
“I don’t know about anything else, but his face is truly outstanding. He was a bit gaunt from not eating properly, but his bone structure was excellent. If he built up some muscle, he’d have the makings of a truly magnificent body.”
Even though her older sister had been attacked by an assailant and stabbed, Orledet remained utterly indifferent. Instead, she grew excited at the thought of seeing Mathias, whose face was apparently worth its weight in gold.
“Finally, the chance to see that overly conspicuous face has come. So when will he arrive?”
“I believe he should be here by evening.”
To Orledet, a common-born squire was far from an interesting prospect compared to the countless men who courted her. However, since she always kept attendants around to relieve her desires without causing scandal, a handsome and strong one naturally caught her interest.
The fact that he followed her foolish older sister proved he was an idiot, which only made him more appealing. She liked handsome men with empty heads. They were simple and easy to control.
“Let’s go greet him and see just how impressive this fellow is.”
Orledet had no intention of quietly sending Mathias to Odeliana. Such a prize would be wasted on a worm who couldn’t even move on her own.
Since he seemed like a boy who still didn’t understand the ways of the world, she planned to personally bestow her mercy upon him. She had no doubt that once he opened his eyes to a new world, he would realize just how insignificant and worthless that cripple truly was.
And so, as she waited at the main gate of the Gruisevald ducal residence with her precious self, a dignified figure gradually came into view.
The boy, who had grown a full handspan taller than when he left, had returned wearing the plate armor and sword issued to squires. The only problem was that he wasn’t empty-handed. He carried something enormous over his shoulder.
It was the corpse of a beast several times larger than his own body.