Hoping For My Death

 

The Belfort Duchy was literally turned upside down.

That’s because this time it wasn’t an attack caused by a twist.

“We need to find out who the fucking Vermin did this right away!”

Auston gritted his teeth and ran wild.

To use teleportation magic circles, one must know the precise coordinates of the destination.

However, due to the risk of attacks on major bases, including Belfort Duchy, those coordinates were kept strictly confidential.

Even the coordinates that the king had specially disclosed for Sylvia and Randall’s wedding day were connected to an underground prison.

In case the people of Belfort were to invade the palace with the intention of exploiting the coordinates, they would end up imprisoned in the underground dungeon.

It felt bad, but it didn’t mean one couldn’t understand why.

After all, if the enemy were to infiltrate the castle using teleportation magic, it would be a grave situation.

However, a raid utilizing teleportation magic had occurred within the Belfort Duchy, right inside the banquet hall.

This happened either because someone leaked the castle’s coordinates or brought in a gemstone inscribed with the teleportation magic circle into the hall.

That alone was shocking enough, but due to the attack, Duchess Belfort suffered a severe injury to her back and fell into a coma.

Auston promptly administered first aid, but due to her inherently weak constitution and the shock of the attack, she wouldn’t easily regain her consciousness.

“So.”

While Sylvia collapsed.

The people of Belfort Duchy were frozen in place, unable to even breathe, for the first time in a long time.

Randall was undoubtedly an affectionate and kind person.

But that was as long as one didn’t cross the line of common sense and morality.

The culprit of this incident had betrayed his trust.

In that case, there was no longer a need to respect him as a lord.

“Who is it?”

Randall picked up the gemstone that was rolling across the floor of the banquet hall with an eerily cold expression on his face.

The gemstone was stained with blood.

He gritted his teeth, knowing whose blood it was, and pushed himself to his feet.

Behind him, the vassals, servants, and everyone from Belfort Duchy had gathered.

“I will ask one last time.”

The low voice made their shoulders tremble reflexively.

Just hearing a voice as cold as death was enough to suffocate them and make their eyes glaze over with fear.

The current Randall was no different from when he used to massacre demons and monsters.

Those who were now facing his murderous look head-on trembled with fear.

“If you come forward and confess now, I’ll let it end with just the culprit’s life. But if you don’t step forward, I will somehow find you and destroy every seed of your lineage. Unless you want to be torn limb from limb with your family and thrown into Kelvetia, this is your last chance. Come out.”

At his words, their eyes widened in shock.

For the people of the north who had lived their lives confronting the demon races and monsters, the most terrible death was to have their bodies torn apart and devoured by them.

In the past, it used to be a punishment reserved for the most heinous criminals, but in the present, it had become infamous and fallen out of favor due to its excessive cruelty.

The current Randall was declaring that he would impose this punishment on the culprit.

It was a decision unlike Randall, who usually tried to keep common sense and morality.

Those words showed how enraged he currently was.

Not a single person dared to speak hastily.

A chilling silence weighed heavily on the air in the banquet hall.

“Is there no one?”

Randall asked with a snarl of anger.

In that moment, someone spoke up.

“Um…”

All eyes turned toward the direction of the voice.

Randall’s eyes gleamed like a predator that had found its prey.

“That gem… got attached to the hem of my dress. It got caught in the lace.”

At the end of the gaze was a pale-faced individual, Rubea Glevor.

  

‘

I might actually die like this.’

Sylvia had such a thought just before losing consciousness.

The pain she felt from her back was excruciating.

As someone who had experienced multiple deaths and been tempered by pain, it was an unbearable agony even for someone like her.

‘Since you’ve lost this much blood, wouldn’t it be difficult to survive?’

Even as Rubea held her close, providing first aid, Sylvia could feel blood pooling on the floor beneath her. It seemed like this time, she might really die.

Sylvia thought with a contented heart.

Outwardly, it would seem like she got injured while trying to save Rubea, and it would hide the fact that she actually wanted to die.

Satisfied with the wise decisions she had made, she felt content in many ways.

‘… Though Randall seemed a little hung up on it.’

Suddenly, the face of Randall that she had seen just before losing consciousness came to mind.

A fierce countenance devoid of any warmth, a face that seemed capable of tearing anyone apart at any moment.

Sylvia found it quite unfamiliar.

Because Randall had never shown such a face in front of her, not even once.

On the contrary…

‘He laughs well.’

The moment she realized that fact, a corner of her chest clenched tightly.

Sylvia tried to erase those thoughts, hoping that she would soon be completely unconscious.

However, instead of losing consciousness, she now even started hearing auditory hallucinations.

-….. What’s your name, kid?”

It was a voice that sounded familiar, as if she had heard it somewhere before.

She felt a sense of recognition, and just as Sylvia was feeling puzzled about where she had heard it, a grating boy’s voice echoed, and her vision suddenly brightened.

-Get away from me! I’m not going to tell you!”

A boy with silver hair and blue eyes was scrunching up his face in annoyance.

As Sylvia looked at the woman standing in front of the boy, she realized it as if struck by lightning.

‘It’s my memory.’

Among those memories, her first life, when she was ‘Allysa’.

‘Allysa’ continued to address the boy in a friendly manner.

-What’s your name, huh? I saved you from being devoured by demons, and you can’t even tell me that much?

-Who asked you to save me? Mind your own business and leave.

-Really? Fine. Take care.

As if intending to leave immediately at the boy’s words, Allysa drew a teleportation magic circle.

The boy, who had not expected Allysa to really leave, was lost in thought and grabbed her.

-Hey, wait! Are you really leaving?

-You told me to go, didn’t you?

-This is the forest of demons, you know?

-So?

-…….

The boy, perhaps embarrassed by the fact that he had received help, didn’t directly ask her to take him along.

Allysa was well aware of this but was still teasing the boy.

Sylvia observed this scene with a newfound feeling.

‘Come to think of it, what happened to that child after I died?’

Her first life.

During the height of the war with the demon races, she had ventured into a forest teeming with demons to gather materials for her research, where she encountered that boy.

The boy eventually swallowed his pride and followed her, and from then on, he worked as an errand boy in the camp.

By the time her research was nearing completion, her concern began to fray, so she hadn’t seen the boy for quite some time…

‘If I knew it would happen, I would have given you some money before you die.’

Sylvia clicked her tongue, feeling regretful all over again.

After all, she had saved him, so she felt a little responsible.

Even as Sylvia was lost in thought, the memory flashed through her mind.

The boy who had been frowning the whole time, parted his lips reluctantly.

Sylvia knew the name that would come out of his mouth.

‘Leo.’

She watched her memories unfold with a sense of boredom, much like watching the ending of a play she already knew.

But in the next moment…

-…on.

-Huh?

-… My name is Leon!

Sylvia’s eyes widened as she saw the boy’s lips move.

–

Aah

, Leo? Your name is Leo?

-No, not that! Are you deaf?

-Yeah, Leo. Do you want to come with big sis?

-… You don’t even listen to what I say. Fine, from now on, my name is Leo. Happy?

The boy muttered in resignation, and Allysa finally got the boy’s declaration of surrender. She smiled contentedly and left with him.

“… What is this.”

On the other hand, Sylvia, left alone in that spot, didn’t even realize that her surroundings were gradually becoming blurred.

‘Just now, I clearly…’

-Cleone, that’s my name!

He said ‘Cleone’?

As she blinked in confusion, her vision suddenly changed.

  

“……!”

As her eyelids fluttered, air rushed into her lungs.

Unfamiliar with the sensation, Sylvia had to fix her gaze on the ceiling for a moment and grow accustomed to the act of breathing.

‘I’m alive.’

It was not a sigh of relief but a disappointment.

Sylvia felt a brief sense of disappointment, but she composed herself.

This had happened so many times in her past 99 lives that she wasn’t surprised anymore.

As the disappointment subsided, the confusion that had briefly receded took its place once again.

Sylvia was in a rather perplexed state due to the memory she had just seen before waking up.

‘Leo is Cleone?’

She was certain she had known him as ‘Leo’.

After Leo joined the camp following Allysa, nobody had raised any objections when others referred to him as Leo.

Everyone knew the boy as Leo, but had they been mistaken?

Cleone was undoubtedly the one who had killed ‘Demon King’ Allysa…

“Are you awake?”

At that moment, a low, hushed voice came from nearby.

Sylvia stopped thinking and turned her eyes to her side.

“… Randall?”

The dimly lit room was illuminated only by the crimson candles.

Sitting by the bedside with his back to the light, Randall looked strangely haggard.

At the sound of Sylvia’s voice, he was silent for a moment, then spoke in a whisper.

“How’s your body?”

“My body, well…”

It was only then that Sylvia recalled she had injured her back quite badly.

As she instinctively tried to shift her body and sit up, Randall reached out, placing his hand on her shoulder.

“You shouldn’t get up just yet. Auston’s magic may have healed the external injuries, but there could still be lingering effects.”

Sylvia nodded with an

ahh

at that.

‘No wonder I was in a prone position instead of lying down.’

Randall hesitated when Sylvia refused to move, then he withdrew his hand.

He clasped his hands together on the bed and fell silent again.

Sylvia awkwardly rolled her eyes as she hadn’t experienced such a tense atmosphere with Randall before.

Suddenly, Randall’s face came into focus.

She wasn’t sure how much time had passed since she’d collapsed, but she could tell he was very haggard…….

“You.”

The next moment, Sylvia was surprised and reached out to touch Randall’s face.

He flinched, trying to step back, but Sylvia wouldn’t let him go.

Her white, thin fingertips brushed the corners of his eyes.

Despite the darkness, the redness around Randall’s eyes was clearly visible.

“… Did you cry?”

“No, I didn’t.”

Randall hurriedly denied, trying to move his body away.

But when Sylvia made a move to pull herself up, he hastily stopped her.

“Didn’t I tell you not to get up?”

“That’s not the point. Did you really cry?”

“…….”

The silence that followed was an affirmation.

Sylvia blurted out without realizing it.

“… Why?”

Once again, her heart stirs.

Sylvia was someone who didn’t believe in human emotions.

Every moment, changing with every situation, is the mind and emotion of a person.

She had seen someone who acted like they would give her everything and then turn cold one day.

She had also seen someone who, after merely half a day, broke the promise of being with her forever.

Sylvia did not believe in the goodness of humans or the lasting nature of their hearts.

However…

“… Because I was afraid you might not wake up.”

Why do I keep thinking that this man might be different?

Why does Randall Belfort’s heart feel like it will remain sincere and upright like this forever?

Sylvia pulled her hand away from Randall, almost as if trying to escape. 

But Randall sighed softly and leaned his face into her hand. 

The warmth of his skin against her palm felt intensely hot.

The movement of his lips, his breath, the fluttering of his eyelashes, all tickled her hand.

Randall, while leaning his face against Sylvia’s hand, looked at her with a pitiful smile.

His face, emotion, voice.

Everything merged into one, causing a profound tremor within Sylvia’s being.

So strongly that even she was taken aback.

  Hello, everyone~!!! Eica here~ Thank you for having the time to read my translations.Due to my ongoing classes, I will provide updates once a week, specifically on Sundays, unless something unexpected happens.Despite my shortcomings in translating this, I hope everyone of you will have a good time reading this.For any mistakes, you can comment down below, or you can ping me at discord.You can support me on ko-fi. And please rate this on NU. Any comments of yours will be appreciated. And though I may not reply, rest assured that I'm reading and anticipating each and every comment of yours.Once again, thank you, everyone~!!! Happy reading~!!!