As Long as I Have You, It Doesn't Matter
As Long as I Have You, It Doesn't Matter
Since the total ban on magic training.
As time passed, Renoa gradually recovered her eyesight.
She became able to walk on her own feet and eat with her own hands.
It was a fortunate thing.
For someone like Renoa, the fact that she had to receive help even for such basic tasks would have been quite a blow to her pride.
'But why.'
For some reason, in Irion's eyes, Renoa seemed rather displeased by it.
"Is there... something you are dissatisfied with?"
"...It's nothing."
Even when he asked, she only showed a prickly attitude. She never gave a straightforward answer.
Well, how could she speak honestly? That she wanted to act spoiled toward him using her illness as an excuse.
She couldn't say it even if she died.
Instead, she was simply resentful of Irion, who failed to notice her feelings.
All she could do was send him dissatisfied glares.
'What is it this time.'
Irion had no way of knowing why she was acting like that.
He simply thought that as she got healthier, her unique temperament had recovered along with her. When she was sick, she was at least quiet and pretty.
He dismissed it as her usual hysteria and didn't think much of it.
There was something more important than that.
'Is it about time I told her.'
Irion had not yet told Renoa the truth.
Her health was already poor, and he feared that if she received a shock, it might worsen.
But now she had recovered enough. She also had the right to know the inside story of the incident.
"Agassi. I have something important to tell you. Please listen without being too surprised."
Irion began to tell the story to Renoa.
About the conversation with Aether.
About the witch the Imperial family was chasing.
About Renoa's origins.
Since not a single part of it was ordinary, Renoa was swept away by bewilderment as she listened to the story.
And finally, when Irion brought up his prediction of Bibi's intentions.
"Stop."
She couldn't bear to hear any more and cut him off.
"Stop it. I don't want to hear it."
The betrayal by someone she trusted. The horrifying truths intertwined behind it.
Renoa's inner self was not yet fully healed enough to contain all of that.
"But Agassi. This is something you must know...."
"I said that's enough!"
In the end, Renoa let out a shout.
Renoa's shoulders heaved rapidly from intense, uncontrollable emotions.
She turned her head irritably and bit her lip hard.
"I want to be alone, so get out."
"......."
"Can't you hear me telling you to get out?"
"......Understood. I will come back later."
Irion gave a short bow and withdrew.
Because he knew well that clumsy comfort or sympathy would not provide any solace to the current Renoa.
-Cheol-keok.
The room door closed.
Left alone, Renoa hugged her knees. She buried her face deep into her knees.
She wondered exactly where things had gone wrong.
In the end, her very birth was the problem.
With such a cursed bloodline, there was nothing she could do.
Thinking that things would work out if she tried was just a child's delusion.
What was Bibi thinking while she was adding the poison?
Was it a sense of duty that she had to kill a monster? Or was it a sorrowful mercy to end this miserable fate?
Either way, it was utterly wretched.
Pitying her own situation, Renoa surrendered her consciousness to the silence.
And yet.
'......Irion.'
The end of her train of thought invariably reached him.
Come to think of it, it was strange.
Irion must have been the first to know the fact that she was of the heretical bloodline chased by the Imperial family.
Even so, he didn't run away. He still remained by her side, acting as her hands and feet, protecting her.
Just why?
Why did he stay by her side?
The question that once sprouted swelled into an uncontrollable impulse.
It felt like her thirst would only be quenched if she resolved this stifling curiosity right before her eyes.
Renoa stood up.
Inside the pitch-black room.
Irion was lying on the bed, staring blankly at the ceiling.
His gaze was directed toward the air, but his mind was a messy tangle of the situation from just a moment ago.
'As expected, was it still too much?'
The fact that her roots were of the witch bloodline that everyone loathed.
The fact that the reason she was born was not for love or anything else, but for the purpose of a single witch.
Pouring out that heavy burden all at once might have been a cruel act.
Should he have taken more time and unraveled it slowly?
Or would it have been better for her if he had kept his mouth shut until the very end?
He didn't know what the right answer would have been, no matter how much he thought about it.
-Beol-keok!
It was then.
The firmly closed door opened without warning. Irion reflexively sat up.
His nerves, which were on guard against a midnight intruder, froze as soon as he identified the figure standing at the door.
"Agassi?"
The one standing with her back to the dark hallway was none other than Renoa.
And she was wearing thin pajamas thrown on haphazardly.
Irion hurriedly got off the bed, unable to hide his flustered expression.
"Agassi. What brings you here at this late hour...?"
Renoa walked into the room with long strides without a word. She passed Irion and climbed straight onto the bed.
She even settled in and lay down.
"Agassi...?"
"I'm sleeping here today."
"Pardon?"
"I am your master, so your bed is mine too. Do you have an objection?"
"......."
Not only did she barge in the middle of the night, but she also presented a miraculous logic.
Irion lost his words for a moment. Then he soon came to his senses.
He had realized long ago that bickering with Renoa was a waste of life.
"Understood. Then I will sleep outside......."
"Iri on (Come here)."
"......."
"Iri on."
Renoa patted the spot next to her with her hand.
At that, Irion finally couldn't hold back and blurted out what was in his head.
"Does your head happen to hurt?"
"What?"
"I mean, isn't it obvious? For you, of all people, to say you'll sleep with a slave. Unless you've lost your mind, it makes no sense."
Renoa furrowed her brows fiercely.
"The one who lost their mind isn't me, it's you. Do you think I'm doing this because I want to sleep with you?"
"Then why?"
"What if an assassin comes while I'm sleeping?"
"Augh."
There it was again.
A logic that was both a sound argument and a forced one.
A miraculous and invincible logic.
'Doesn't she ever get tired of it.'
Irion knew perfectly well what would come if he took it one step further.
"Bibi......"
"Yes, yes. You're going to say Bibi would have slept with you. But I'm not Bibi. If I were born a woman, I would have slept there too. What, should I go learn magic from Iskalon to turn into a woman or something?"
"I don't want that."
Renoa rejected it flatly.
At her stubbornness, Irion let out a sigh and raised the white flag.
"If you're that worried about assassins, I'll keep watch from here. Wouldn't that be safer?"
"Do whatever you want."
Renoa turned away with a huff, showing him her back. She pulled the blanket up to her neck.
Sleep was out of the question today.
Irion sighed and pulled over a chair to sit down.
"The bed is narrow."
"It's just that your bed is unnecessarily wide, Agassi."
"It's not very fluffy."
"Compared to a pile of straw, this much is a cloud."
"I can't believe you sleep in a place like this."
"If you're just going to grumble, why don't you just leave?"
"Fine. I'll endure it since I have a kind heart."
Clearly, the quality of the bed Irion used fell far short of the bed in Renoa's bedroom.
If she slept in a place like this, it was certain that all the joints in her body would be broken the next day.
But ironically, Renoa felt a greater sense of stability in this bed than in her own.
The bedding gave off the same scent that came from Irion. It felt as if she were surrounded by him.
It was very cozy.
Enough for all her negative emotions to fly away.
Renoa turned her body once more. She slightly opened her eyes to check what Irion was doing.
Irion, sitting in the chair, had his arms crossed and his eyes closed.
"...Are you sleeping?"
"I am not."
"Then why are your eyes closed?"
"When your vision is limited, it's more advantageous to focus on your hearing to read presence. You said you were worried about assassins."
Irion replied dryly without even opening his closed eyes.
At that calm attitude, Renoa secretly put strength into her hand gripping the blanket.
Because there was something she definitely wanted to ask.
"You......"
Renoa began to speak in a slightly trembling voice.
"You noticed long ago that I am of the witch bloodline."
"That's right."
"But why didn't you run away? If the fact that you are the guardian knight of a witch becomes known, you won't be safe either."
Only then did Irion open his eyes and meet Renoa's gaze.
Renoa was looking at Irion with moist eyes, her usual poisonous gaze nowhere to be found.
"Since you're someone who can't do anything on your own, I should at least stay by your side."
"What do you mean I can't do anything on my own?"
"Then what can you do?"
Renoa thought for a moment.
Magic... she couldn't use that anymore.
It wasn't like she could use a sword.
She obviously couldn't cook.
She didn't know how to clean either.
She knew how to eat by herself, but if she said that out loud, she was sure to be teased.
After agonizing for a long time to find her talent, Renoa painfully squeezed out a thought.
"I know how to read books."
"Is that, like, something great?"
"Of course. Being able to read and write means you can acquire and freely handle the vast knowledge accumulated over hundreds of years. Considering that most of the Imperial citizens are illiterate, reading is a noble intelligence that only a chosen few can handle."
Renoa rattled off the words.
At her attitude of being proud of herself, Irion burst into a small laugh.
"You certainly have a silver tongue. If I were the master and you were the slave, I would have thrown you away immediately."
"That is precisely the difference between you and me. I recognized your value while you were rolling around in the arena and took you in, but you would have thrown away a talent like me just because you were only looking at immediate usefulness. In short, it's a difference in foresight."
It was a shamelessly arrogant sense of superiority.
It wasn't something to say so confidently while lying down after forcibly taking over a slave's cramped bed.
"Then if there were a slave like you, Agassi, where would you employ them?"
"If I were a slave...?"
Renoa's pupils wandered in the air.
Even she thought there wasn't really a place to put her to work right away.
Her physical strength was at rock bottom, her personality wasn't very good, and her only merit was that she could read text.
But if she quietly admitted it here, her pride would be cracked.
Using her wits, Renoa found a value of hers that no one could deny.
"I would keep them for display."
"......For display?"
"Yes. I'd place a fluffy chair in a corner of the room and just have them sit there quietly. Even without making them do any rough work, just by having them there, they would easily do the work of hundreds of reasonably competent slaves."
"On what basis do you reach such a conclusion?"
"Because, I am pretty."
"......?"
Irion tilted his head, wondering if he had misheard.
But Renoa confidently continued her words.
"Just by looking at me, fatigue would vanish and stress would be relieved. That value is so great it can't even be converted into money."
A declaration that was utterly without shame, extremely arrogant, and full of conviction.
Irion, who was blinking blankly, let out a sigh as if it were absurd.
Renoa narrowed her eyes.
"Why don't you agree? Are you saying I'm not pretty?"
"To think you'd earn your keep with just your face. Well, I won't exactly deny it."
Irion couldn't bring himself to put down her appearance in the end and stepped back.
She was pretty, after all.
A face that would get rejected at a marriage meeting, so to speak.
At his lukewarm declaration of defeat, Renoa curled the corners of her mouth upward as if intoxicated by the feeling of victory.
"My future is bright even without someone like you. I can do everything by myself."
"Then shall I just go?"
"......No."
"What is it, really. Stop talking and just sleep."
With that, the room became quiet.
Renoa quietly gazed at Irion sitting in the chair, with only her eyes peeking out over the blanket.
It was truly a meaningless wordplay. Silly grumbling and impudent backtalk.
If it were before, she would have cut off the conversation as blasphemous, but strangely, this bickering was very comfortable now.
Enough that the cruel truths that had pushed her all day felt like nothing.
'Whether I'm a witch or whatever...... it might not matter much.'
As long as Irion stayed by her side like he was now.
Of course, Renoa had no intention of being satisfied with the current state. She hoped for more progress than that.
Nevertheless, since it would be very damaging to her pride to approach him from her side, she would have to make Irion come to her first.
It might take quite a while, but that was fine.
Because Irion was a slave.
As long as she didn't release him, he would be by her side for a lifetime.
'There's no need to be in a hurry at all.'
