I Will Not Fall For the Villain’s Flirtations - Chapter 40
“This can’t be.”
Did he really leave like this? So anticlimactically?
Did he really come all the way here just to attend mass?
The desire to deny it quickened my steps. I hurriedly left the chapel, passed through the corridor lined with statues of saints, and checked all the rooms accessible to outsiders. But even after coming out to the garden, he was nowhere to be seen.
He’s a tall man with a striking appearance, so there’s no way I could have missed him. Could he have already left?
Forgetting that the ground was dirt, I collapsed in despair. As I took rough breaths and rested my forehead on my palm, I suddenly felt a small hand tugging at my sleeve.
“Sisther.”
“…….”
A young child was staring at me with wide eyes, holding onto my clothes. As I looked at the child in surprise, the boy, who seemed to be about three or four years old, offered me his toy and spoke.
“It went poof here, and the thingy…….”
“…….”
His lisp made it hard to understand anything except for the word ‘poof.’ Concentrating on his words like I was taking a foreign language listening test, I still couldn’t grasp what he was trying to say.
“Hey, um, where are your parents……?”
“Waaaah!”
In the end, instead of giving a clumsy answer, I tried to ask a constructive question about his guardian, but the child began to cry, seemingly upset. As I awkwardly wiped his tears with clumsy hands, a heavy sound of footsteps on the dirt echoed.
“…….”
My heart started pounding again. If I felt like I knew who it was without turning around, it must be a delusion. But with my face flushing and my heart racing from just the sound of footsteps, I could only think of one person.
“Why are you crying, little one?”
A gentle voice echoed in my ear. My body stiffened at the sound that didn’t deviate from my expectations.
As the child momentarily paused his crying at the new presence, the man seemed to seize the opportunity and picked up the child. I stood up awkwardly and blankly watched the man converse with the boy.
“It broke, didn’t it? Shall I fix it for you?”
“Y-Yeth.”
“Then promise me you won’t cry. Here.”
When the child, with teary eyes, hooked his pinky with his, he smiled gently and put the child down. Then he took the toy and began to fiddle with it.
The lion-shaped metal toy, which I hadn’t had the chance to inspect closely in the commotion, had a broken tail. He used fire magic to slightly melt the broken part and reattach it to the body, then handed the toy back to the child.
“Magic!”
“That’s right, it’s magic.”
The way he tousled the child’s hair and patted him seemed incredibly natural, as if he had dealt with children of that age many times before. He lightly pinched the cheek of the child, who was now laughing heartily as if he had never cried.
“It looks like your mother is calling you.”
At his words, I turned my head to see a middle-aged woman desperately calling the child’s name as she wandered through the garden. The child, seeing his mother, ran off in excitement, forgetting to even say goodbye.
When the child left, the chaotic atmosphere quickly settled. Still at a loss for words, I watched him as he turned towards me, only then snapping back to reality.
“Ah.”
I took a step back as I faced the pair of amethyst eyes I hadn’t seen in a long time. Though I had been looking for him, now that he was right in front of me, I didn’t know what to say.
I should tell him to leave quickly before someone sees him.
“How have you been, Duna?”
“…….”
With a refreshing smile, Keene spoke first. Even though it had been months since I last saw him, he greeted me as casually as if we had seen each other just yesterday. I took another step back.
“Why… did you come back?”
Swallowing hard, I finally managed to speak.
“Don’t tell me, you’re here to threaten me again……”
“Of course not. I came because I missed you.”
He interrupted and closed the distance with a familiar jest. Blinking slowly, I met his violet eyes as they drew nearer.
My rational mind knew. He was a dangerous person. I should have fled the moment I saw him instead of searching for him.
But my emotions were foolishly optimistic, busy believing that this man would never hurt me.
When did it start? When did I begin to harbor this strange trust in this hypocrite who constantly threatened me while making baseless flirtations?
Was it that night when he retreated without hesitation, even though he was close to seizing the key? Or the day he brushed off vigra with a joke?
Or perhaps, going back further, the first day when he stopped my drunken escapade?
Lost in my tangled thoughts, I stood there blankly as he suddenly handed me something.
“…….”
It was a cute wrapping paper, completely out of place in the current situation, filled with colorful drawings.
Lifting my head to look at him, wondering where this unexpected object had come from, Keene averted his gaze. He then responded with a slightly awkward smile.
“You said you wanted to visit this place.”
“…….”
“Since you can’t leave the country until your mandatory service is over, I brought the most popular tea leaves instead.”
Looking at the paper bag again, I noticed the name of a neighboring country’s tea house written in cursive, something I had once noted on my bucket list.
Mattnum Possun.
Suddenly, a passing comment I had made in Rosenwood came to mind.
[Still, there are so many things I haven’t done yet. I haven’t even been to the Mattnum Possun Tea House.]
Seeing the name, I blinked slowly. Ha. My lips parted, and a bewildered laugh escaped.
“Why are you doing this… to me?”
I had known for a long time that this man had an unnecessarily good memory. But using that memory on a severed, no, a relationship that should be severed, was a completely different matter.
Why do you keep making me misunderstand?
Because of this, I, I……
“I was curious.”
“…….”
“I became curious. About you, Du.”
Facing his unusually serious expression, I stood there for a long time, staring back at him. His eyes, fixed on my face without a hint of a smile, shone brilliantly.
It was laughable. This was a man who never gave a proper answer, and even when he did, it never felt sincere.
It wasn’t like the playful banter disguised as rational affection or the earnest confessions from before. Strangely, those few words felt oddly out of place.
And yet, I…
“Don’t be ridiculous. Do I still look like a toy to you?”
I actually knew. The reason I was deliberately putting up thorns was to cover my despicable inner feelings.
My heart was pounding so hard that I could feel the vibration behind my ears, not because of anxiety.
I was secretly pleased. Pleased to see this man again.
It felt like he was the one who could pull me out of my supporting role in life. Such a pathetic delusion had taken hold of me.
“Not a toy, but a candle.”
“What did you say?”
“Du is like a candle. I want to touch it for no reason, and I even want to snuff it out at least once…”
How is that different from a toy? I was filled with a mixture of absurdity and irritation.
“But it’s so beautiful when it burns that I keep watching it, and as I keep watching…”
I feel like I’m getting enchanted.
As he added those words and chuckled, he lowered his gaze and spoke.
“I’ve been wandering around the Holy Kingdom. I’ve dealt with priests and met many ordinary citizens.”
“……”
“But I’ve never met anyone who blasphemes as boldly as you, Du.”
He threw out a seemingly irrelevant jest and quietly looked at me. The eyes that met mine were somewhat dim, carrying a vaguely sinister aura. An unknown desire swirled within them, seemingly capturing me, and then his low, sunken voice flowed into my ears.
“I thought about you every day.”
“……”
“I had to see you.”
The fierce wind that had been swirling around suddenly stopped as if by magic. He looked down at me serenely, wearing a faint smile. His eyes, which had found peace after the storm, curved gently as if they had never been sinister. The man, who had regained his mischievous smile, reached out to tuck my hair behind my ear and asked,
“Du, did you really not think of me at all?”
“……”
“Not even for a single moment?”