Chapter 37: The Fall
Translator: RaidenTL
Chapter 37: The Fall
“You… you tricked me!”
Sophia pointed an accusing finger at the prostrate Mari. Mari ignored her as if she wasn’t worth a response. Instead, she slyly glanced up at me.
The freckles were still there, but her face, now with a healthy bit of weight on it, was like a wildflower in full bloom. Her body, once like a withered branch, had filled out voluptuously, just to my liking.
Her eyes shimmered with a strange, fervent desire. When I gave a nod, Mari’s body trembled.
“Excuse me.”
Mari carefully lowered my breeches. My cock, limp from the cold, was revealed.
“Hah…”
Without hesitation, Mari buried her face in my groin, her eyes glazing over as if she were smelling perfume. Licking her lips as if parched, she looked up at me again.
Her gaze was asking for permission. I answered by grabbing her head and pulling it toward me. Mari’s mouth slowly began to swallow my cock.
Enveloped in her warmth, my cock slowly began to stir. Mari’s tongue, relentlessly prodding at my weak spots, helped it along.
I leisurely savored the pleasure and stared at Sophia.
“Mari is a realistic and shrewd woman. The moment she realized her fiancé-to-be had died before her very eyes, and that she had unwittingly played a part in his death, she knew her relationship with his family would become uncomfortable.”
Slurp, slurp, slurp.
The sound of Mari greedily sucking my cock served as a kind of punctuation. I stroked her head. Emboldened, her tongue moved more aggressively.
“In truth, I should be the one to blame, but how could mere commoners dare to fault me?”
They needed someone to hold responsible for the family’s death, someone to blame instead of me. Mari knew that person would be her.
After all, aren’t humans cowardly creatures who, when the object of their resentment is of untouchable status, simply give up and shift the blame to an easy target—a mere subordinate who was only following orders?
“Guessing that her in-laws would blame her, Mari struck first. She used my name to pressure them. She instilled a fear in them that made them not even think of revenge against me.”
Of course, on the surface, she pretended to be worried and offered comfort. As a result, her in-laws, who had been prosperous enough for the father to serve as the village chief, couldn’t bear it and ended up fleeing in the middle of the night.
It was only natural that in the process, Mari snapped up their property, like land that took time to dispose of, for a cheap price.
Because of this, Mari’s father became the new village chief, and Mari, as my mistress, became the new power broker in the village.
“Hah… it’s all thanks to you, Lord Allen.”
Letting go of my cock for a moment, Mari licked it from base to tip and then smiled sweetly. It was a pathetic attempt at charm.
“Take it again. Deeper.”
Mari gulped and took my cock back into her mouth. This time, she opened her throat wide and took me in deep.
My cock, which had grown thick and long as a club inside her mouth, was taken in as she fought back tears, struggling to accept it deep into her throat.
She knew full well that everything she now enjoyed would crumble in an instant without my tacit approval.
Mari was a shrewd woman.
“It looked like she was using me, but in the end, it wasn't bad, as it increased my influence over the village. And since I was able to extract false testimony from the chief and the villagers, it was worth forgiving.”
Of course, the fact that she had been presumptuous was annoying, so I did punish Mari the day before we entered the ancient ruins. With my body.
“You… you…!”
Sophia, her face a mask of horror, pointed her finger again.
“What’s the matter? Shouldn’t you have figured it out by now? The fact that Roland died at my hands.”
“You…!”
Sophia trembled, glaring at me as if she wanted to kill me. But that was all she could do.
“I don’t know why you’re so angry. Last time, you begged me to put my cock inside you, saying you couldn’t even remember Roland anymore. Didn’t you say I was many times better than him?”
Mari, who hadn’t known about my relationship with Sophia, widened her eyes. But only for a moment. With my cock still in her mouth, she slowly turned her head to look at Sophia and smirked.
It was a sneer.
“Eek…!”
Sophia glared at Mari as if to kill her. If looks could kill, this would be it.
“Hmph.”
Mari snorted and, as if to show off, devoured my cock. Sophia’s face turned so red it looked like it would explode at any moment.
Regardless, I enjoyed the pleasure and broke the seal on the letter. To deal with the Baron later, I needed to confirm how much he knew. That was why I had gone through this whole charade.
The hastily scrawled handwriting greeted me. Half of the content was excuses, the other half was pleading.
In short, it was a warning that if he didn't help her soon, he would never be able to recover the territory.
“No, is this a threat?”
After reading it all, it was closer to a threat. It subtly included the Baron’s plan.
She probably intended to warn him that such a secret might be exposed to me, but if I were the Baron, I would have taken it as a threat and dealt with her first.
‘Thanks to her, though, I was able to learn the whole story.’
The Baron was extremely wary of giving up land. The problem was that my father’s contributions had been too great. If he didn’t grant land as a reward, it seemed even the other knights were ready to turn their backs on him.
Indeed, few knights would follow a lord without the bait of land. In any case, the Baron, forced to grant the land, couldn’t let go of his greed.
He had used Roland, who handled the family’s dirty work, and Sophia, a distant relative, to devise a plan to reclaim the territory the moment my father was no longer useful.
It was a classic case of sacrificing the greater good for a small gain.
Seeing that, a thought suddenly occurred to me.
‘I wonder, was our family the only one he did this to?’
This was the Baron who had schemed against even his right-hand man, my father. Wouldn’t he have done worse to vassals less capable than my father?
If my guess was right and the same plan was in motion for other vassals, this letter would become a dagger I could press to the Baron’s throat.
With my encounter with the Baron not far off, I had managed to secure a trump card. It was all thanks to Sophia.
“Lord Allen. The madam has escaped.”
Mari, having released my cock, spoke while watching my expression. The window, which had been closed just moments ago, was wide open. Sophia had escaped while I was focused on the letter.
“I know.”
I pushed my cock toward her again. There was no need to worry. I had taken her horse, so she wouldn't get far even if she ran. Only after filling Mari's throat with my semen did I resume the chase.
Now, only one question remained.
Why had Sophia, who I thought had become mine, changed her mind? It was time to find out why.
#
“Hah. Hah. Hah.”
Sophia ran blindly. The only thought in her head was that she had to get away from the manor as quickly as possible.
With the Baron’s plan exposed, she couldn’t go to him now either. She just wanted to forget everything and live in hiding somewhere no one would recognize her.
Was this decision, so unlike the extravagant woman she was, because she feared Allen, or was there another reason?
“Hk…!”
The village entrance, when she reached it again, was empty. The villagers who had crowded it before had vanished like ghosts. It felt as if she had just woken from a dream.
Was Allen plotting something else? Was even this escape within the palm of his hand?
The darkness behind her, where she couldn't see an inch ahead, seemed to shimmer. It sounded like she could hear the distant beat of horse hooves. It felt as if Allen, on horseback, would appear at any moment, pushing back the darkness.
“N-No…!”
Suppressing the rising anxiety, she forced her feet to move. The harsh winter wind blocked her path, seeping through her overcoat and freezing her to the bone. The color drained from the hand clutching her clothes.
The cold, the pain, slowly faded. And so, Sophia didn't even realize she was running barefoot on the frozen ground.
Her senses were focused solely on the darkness behind her. The sound of hooves continued. It seemed to follow her, maintaining a constant distance as if to test her limits.
Her face etched with terror, Sophia ran again.
Kraww—
The sound made by the fierce winter wind was like the roar of a beast. The rustling of grass made Sophia jump and look back frequently. It was then that she tripped on a stone and fell.
“Ack! Wh-where am I…?”
Only then did Sophia realize she was in the middle of a thicket, far from the main road.
Her shoes were nowhere to be seen, and her bare feet were bruised blue and covered in cuts. Her body, too, was as stiff and cold as a corpse.
To make matters worse, the torch she had dropped when she fell was extinguished by the strong winter wind. The world was instantly plunged into darkness.
“Ahh…”
Sophia shivered, her eyes darting around ceaselessly. The sound of hooves had stopped at some point.
Rustle.
Instead, she heard the sound of something trampling the grass. The sound, which started from a distance, grew steadily closer. In the faint moonlight, the blades of grass bent back, and between them, a baleful yellow glow seemed to appear.
Sophia pulled a dagger the length of her palm from her clothes and aimed it in the direction of the sound. The tip of the dagger trembled like her body, but she didn't notice.
“A-Allen…?”
She had run to escape Allen, but now, Sophia hoped the source of the sound was him.
However, as the clouds parted and the moonlight grew slightly stronger, the owner of the sound was revealed to be a beast with baleful yellow eyes.
“…!”
The beast, having already reached close range, stared at her from its hiding place in the thicket.
Drool dripped from its mouth. It was the size of a large dog, but its hook-like claws and yellowed fangs clearly belonged to a predator that had tasted human flesh.
Rustle. Rustle.
The beast approached slowly, wary of its surroundings.
“Get back! Go away!”
Sophia shouted, aiming the dagger, but her trembling body only served to convince the beast that she was prey. Finally, judging that there was no danger nearby, the beast lunged.
“N-No!”
Sophia squeezed her eyes shut and thrust the dagger. But there was no way a blade, stabbed without even looking, could stop the beast.
The beast twisted its body to evade the attack and aimed for Sophia’s neck. Drool dripped from its wide-open mouth, soaking the earth in anticipation of the human flesh it would soon taste.
Just as its teeth were about to sink into Sophia’s soft flesh, a flash of light cut through the darkness.
“Kelp—”
The beast was thrown back twice as fast as it had charged. The fallen beast got up again, but after a few steps, it collapsed to the ground.
Its torso, revealed in the moonlight, was split in half, spilling blood and entrails.
Hearing the beast’s yelp instead of the pain she had expected, Sophia, thinking her attack had succeeded, opened her eyes.
Her eyes fell upon the sight of Allen, flicking the beast’s blood from his sword before sheathing it.
Her body froze solid.
“A-Allen…”
I grinned and held out my hand.
“A stroll at this time of night is too dangerous, Mother. Shall we not return now?”
“N-No!”
Sophia aimed the dagger she had pointed at the beast toward me. One would think she would have given up by now, but she was unwavering.
“Why not? Even if you return to the Baron, do you think he will welcome you? On the contrary, he will try to cut off your head, if only to feign ignorance. My embrace would be much warmer, don’t you think? Don’t you remember the nights we spent together?”
“Don’t come any closer!”
Sophia backed away, the dagger still aimed at me.
I couldn’t understand her. Nor could I give up on her. She was, for a time, my mother in name at least.
Her appearance was also to my taste. Where else could I find such a duplicitous woman, one who glared at me defiantly while her body was so honest? I was about to approach her, to take her by force if necessary.
Something caught my foot. I lowered my torch and saw a leather pouch lying on the ground. As I picked it up, Sophia panicked, patting herself all over.
“G-Give it back!”
Was this her emergency fund that even Bertio couldn't find? I opened the pouch and saw seeds instead of jewels. There weren't many of them. The strange thing was, they had all sprouted.
“Don’t tell me.”
Meeting my gaze, Sophia dropped the dagger. Then, she clutched her stomach with both hands and continued to back away.
Only then did I understand why I hadn't been able to conquer Sophia.
“You’re pregnant. With Roland’s child.”
My heart grew cold. An incomprehensible anger welled up inside me. The sight of her, ready to face even death for her child, was unbearably irritating. Was it because the child wasn't mine?
“Aaaah…”
Her secret exposed, Sophia immediately turned and fled, without a torch or a weapon to protect herself.
I just stared blankly until she became a dot and was completely swallowed by the darkness. It was clear she would become a future problem, but I couldn't bring myself to kill a pregnant woman with my own hands.
That was likely due to the memories of my past life that I had regained. Still, I wasn’t worried.
“Kyaa—”
Sophia’s scream echoed faintly from the distance, followed by the roar of a hungry beast. The screams and roars mixed in a chaotic frenzy. The scent of blood drifted on the wind.
I stared into the darkness for a long time before turning away. The screams and roars had already faded.
The world, steeped in darkness, was as silent as if nothing had ever happened.