kscans

Chapter 136 - I Want to Protect You and This Small World

"Aah! I absolutely demand a happy ending for them!"

"If my husband gets in the way, I’ll never speak to him again," Eleonora declared, her eyes glistening with tears.

Women are weak to this kind of pure love.

"Did you see it? That gentle gaze of his."

"I did. If he did that in high society, he’d steal the conversation from everyone." Mireille and Eleonora’s love talk was unstoppable.

Cowering off to the side were Adrian and Leonhard.

(...We tell them we love them too, right? Right?)

Their silent cries were elegantly ignored.

＊＊＊

"Darius. Where did you disappear to? I thought you’d gone back to the duchy," Leonhard asked. He hadn’t been able to find Darius no matter how much he searched.

"I had made the Tree Sea Defense Force a secret unit again," Darius replied dispassionately, gently stroking the sleeping Ariel’s hand.

"The monsters are increasing, and the Magic Furnace is short on mana. Only the Moonshadow Teahouse can make the alchemy tools for the Tree Sea. The ones for the Royal Capital’s roads are useless there. There’s a limit to how well I can protect the unit members with my defense magic... so in the end, I’ve had to go gather most of the magic cores by myself."

"...By yourself?" Leonhard’s eyes widened in disbelief. He himself had once been brought to tears by a single Helkaarn. And magic cores could only be taken one at a time.

"How is my brother?" Adrian cut in, his voice sullen.

"The same as always." Darius shook his head.

"Father and I have both spoken to him, but my brother’s ‘high noble’ mindset hasn’t changed. He’s in charge of the Magic Furnace now. Since there’s no Mage Order, he’s training selected mages while managing it... There’s the issue of not having enough magic cores, but more than that, there’s no one who can maintain the furnace."

Eventually, Darius brought up the topic of the Crown Prince.

"The Crown Prince is ten years old. Father has decided to educate him directly. Just as you said, Adrian, it would be wrong for him to be influenced by my brother and start brandishing his bloodline. But... he’s still just ten. He thinks he’s been torn away from his father, and he cries all the time. We’ve explained about his real father and the reasons, but he’s not old enough to understand."

"...That’s pitiful," Leonhard couldn’t help but mutter. It was better than being showered with twisted affection. But to place such a burden on such a small heart... a sense of unease spread through his chest.

"Even a child is doing his best. I can’t just throw away my work in the Tree Sea. But my status has nothing to do with this job, so I just need to be removed from the ducal register. If Ariel wants me, I want to be by her side. I thought she would never need me again."

Darius let out a breath and smiled faintly.

"When she wakes up, I’ll talk to her. I’m not even sure if she remembers my name yet. If she’ll have me, I want to live with her in the tower and help her control her mana. On top of that, if she’ll be with me, I want to marry her. I may not be able to guarantee a peaceful life, but this time, I will make her happy."

Mireille and Eleonora, who were listening nearby, were ecstatic.

"We want to see you two happy too!!"

Leonhard thought to himself. Before that, please marry me and be happy!

But, he felt a small glimmer of hope. If Darius and Ariel could find happiness together... maybe he and Mireille could finally propose and start their own married life.