One Day My Sister Died - Chapter 16

Chapter 16: Proof of the First Night

Claude walked briskly towards the console attached to the wall, pulled out some medicine from a drawer, and chewed and swallowed it.

After tilting his head a couple of times, he touched his head with hands that trembled as if they were someone else’s, then glared fiercely at Yuan.

“Just because your body’s crushed doesn’t mean you’re useless.”

His crimson eyes seemed to pierce through her.

As if questioning whether she still desired the first night after seeing him in such a state.

White teeth were visible through his widely stretched mouth.

Sometimes, extreme pain could make someone laugh like a madman.

She knew that all too well.

“Try it.”

The man, who looked like a blackened mansion itself, forced a longer smile, suppressing his pain. He appeared to be an angel fallen into profound corruption.

Yuan stopped admiring for a moment and placed the candlestick she was holding on a nearby table.

“Continue. Do what you can.”

She tensed her jaw and cautiously approached him.

The skin, a dark reddish-brown, was rigid and intertwined.

The face showing the pain that rose up and the clenched jaw were visible in turn.

‘I can heal this.’

This was pure pain itself.

It wasn’t caused by a disease but was pain itself, visibly rising.

It seemed she had read about similar symptoms somewhere before.

The sound of Claude’s mocking laughter could be heard as Yuan examined him as if she were diagnosing a skin disease.

“What are you doing? Should I take it off for you?”

“P-please, take it off.”

“What?”

It was time to check if that hideous condition had spread all over his body.

Yuan, with courage, carefully examined his skin through the loosely draped nightgown.

“…Please take it off.”

Claude, who looked up cautiously, had an expression that overturned the shame suppressed by his pain.

***

For a while, the Prince, who had been frozen in place, began to shake his shoulders and laugh.

He laughed so hard that his hair, now like faded autumn leaves, shook, then suddenly lifted his head and threw off the nightgown that was already half undone.

As soon as his body, blackened by pain, was revealed, he strode toward Yuan. When Yuan didn’t move away, he raised an eyebrow.

His eyes, which had wavered faintly in the carriage that day, now focused on her.

“You’re holding up quite well, aren’t you?”

Yuan stared at him without answering.

His eyes, twisted with pain, sparkled as if searching for new amusement.

“So, what? Do you want more? Do you want to do more?”

The Prince provoked more aggressively.

Yuan walked past him to the console cluttered with medicine packets. A crystal goblet, presumably used to forget the pain, was carelessly placed there, half-filled with yellowish liquor.

Yuan grabbed it and abruptly offered it to the Prince.

Her hands trembled violently, causing the liquid in the glass to slosh around.

Her heart felt as though it might burst.

“Drink this.”

The Prince approached with a look of amusement and took the glass.

“Go ahead. Try to kill me if you can.”

He had a face that was convinced Yuan had added something to the glass.

But he didn’t throw the glass or discard the drink; instead, he stared straight at her and brought the glass to his lips.

“This little poison…”

As soon as he drank, pain seemed to strike him, and Claude emitted a groan and a sneer simultaneously.

Yuan cautiously approached and reached out her hand.

He flinched momentarily, pulling back as if in refusal, but she extended her hand further and gently wiped the corners of his mouth.

At the same time, she absorbed a small amount of his pain.

As Yuan wiped away the droplets of liquor, a trace of smooth, white skin, like marble, began to show through.

Yuan stared blankly at his face, now relieved of pain.

An incredibly sparkling and beautiful face was revealed before her eyes.

The red, pain-soaked eyes quickly returned to their original, radiant violet hue.

For a fleeting moment, Yuan faced the most unblemished version of Claude Yufrees.

“What is this…?”

Claude, too, had noticed the fleeting change.

Having absorbed the pain from his face, particularly his head, his mind would have become clearer, as if he had experienced a splash of cold water. His eyes, once glazed with madness, widened and stared at Yuan like a ghost.

Soon, his massive body swayed forward. It was the same reaction as those he had treated secretly over the past ten years.

Whenever Yuan took away someone’s pain, they would either briefly lose consciousness or fall asleep instead of suffering. This was why she had managed to keep her treatment methods secret for a decade.

Yuan quickly caught Claude as he lost consciousness, struggling to drag him to a secluded bed where she laid him down.

Then, she let out a stifled groan.

“Ugh—!”

The pain felt like her brain was tangled and being pulled in different directions.

A headache that struck like shallow lightning every few moments.

Her entire face felt like it was burning, and the pain was as if her skin were being sanded down.

Yuan gasped for breath, burying her face in the bedding next to Claude. After crying out into the bedding for a while, the pain began to slowly subside.

If this was the pain from only a brief taste, she couldn’t imagine how unbearable it must have been for him.

Yuan looked down at the sleeping Claude with a sweat-soaked face.

Under the moonlight seeping through the curtain slits, the man, beautiful as a finely crafted gem, slept peacefully.

The dark, infectious aura of pain seemed to creep back up from her neck towards her face, but for tonight at least, it would be peaceful.

Yuan traced the face of the man who had lived in pain every night, as much as she had.

The smooth, white skin of the man, devoid of the earlier hideousness, was almost translucent.

It was hard to believe she had entered the tiger’s den with a moment of pity.

But considering the situation she had faced earlier, where she would have been chased away if she had stayed still, this might have been a better choice.

Breathing heavily, Yuan continued to stare at Claude’s face, trying to clear her blurry mind.

‘I need to go back…’

Her body had collapsed like a paper doll under the terrible pain she had faced after several days.

***

He hadn’t dreamed a nightmare.

It was the first time since the ninth bride entered the mansion.

Claude, shaking his strangely refreshed head, squinted against the direct sunlight pouring onto his face.

…Did I draw the curtains?

As he sat there dazed, trying to recall the previous night, the bedroom door was abruptly thrown open.

There was only one person who would dare to do such a thing in this mansion.

“What’s this noise? Claude. What on earth happened?”

It was Lancelot Reve.

Seeing his pale face, it was clear he had seen something as disturbing as a rat the size of his forearm while binding in the stables.

Behind the flustered Lancelot, Eddie Reve, Lancelot’s elder brother and the eldest son of the Reve Marquis family, entered with him.

Eddie, just as tall as Lancelot, stood with his arms crossed and mouth tightly shut.

His caramel-colored eyes behind his rimless glasses were set in a stern expression, indicating that something serious had happened.

“What’s all the commotion?”

“Hey, you look well? Huh? What happened to all your pretenses? Now you’re hugging a woman?”

“What?”

Confused by Lancelot’s unexpected fuss, Claude furrowed his brow and got out of bed.

He nervously pulled the curtains back and looked around the now-darkened room.

The items that were always scattered in the morning were neatly in their places. A chill ran down his spine as his blood ran cold.

“So, you spent the first night last night, and this morning you proved the first night to the imperial family? Your ninth bride has apparently decided to live here permanently?”

“What?”

“Instead of finding a tenth bride, they said they would fully recognize the ninth bride. The response was so quick that it seemed everyone was just waiting for your reply.”

The day after the nightmares that resumed after the ninth bride arrived, Claude faced a situation even more nightmarish than the nightmares themselves.

“They say the butler pretended not to hear the noises coming from this room last night, so all the servants who were sleeping in the stairway rooms were dragged into it. Just how extraordinary was that night?”

***

While Lancelot continued to mock and laugh, Claude wandered around the bedroom for quite some time.

Eddie, who had entered the room, remained silent, watching Claude with a serious expression.

The mental fog and piercing headaches that had plagued him daily seemed significantly reduced that morning. So, recalling the events of the previous night with his now-clear mind wasn’t too difficult.

What came to mind as he remembered the familiar night filled with pain was that suddenly the door had opened, and a woman, dressed in black and white and very unguarded, had entered.

Yuan Felice. The uninvited guest who was called his ninth bride.

‘The first night proof period was waiting for so long, but she didn’t come.’

—Bang!

Claude slammed his fist down hard on the table.

Only now did memories begin to trickle back.

She had come to his room in an unforgivable state, and offered him a drink…

What happened?

His hazy memories began to mix indiscriminately.

Images that came to mind included the woman’s almost nude attire.

A frightened woman’s face.

Himself throwing off his nightgown.

And…

‘Prove your worth.’

‘Take it off.’

‘You’re holding up quite well.’

‘So, what? More? Want more?’

Ridiculous lines supporting absurd rumors.

“Gustav!”

At the sharp shout, the butler Gustav rushed in, his face embarrassingly flushed.

Lancelot began to whistle from the side.

Claude growled with even more irritation on his face.

“Why is your face so red?”

“Eh? No, not at all.”

The old butler’s flushed face irritated Claude even more.

“Explain. What’s going on?”

“What explanation…”

“First night proof.”

Gustav blinked for a moment and then lowered his voice.

Hesitating

to say such things in front of Lancelot, who had started humming, and the stiff-faced Eddie, he finally spoke.

“Last night, the two of you spent the night together. This morning, the lady handed me the bloodstained bedclothes, and I reported it to the imperial family.”