The Guardian Knight of Affection-Starved Young Ladies

107 – Long-Awaited Wish (04)

108.

“H-how…”

Dime Plache couldn’t accept the situation unfolding before him.

Was he even dreaming?

If not, then it was something no one could ever explain.

A dead person returning to life—that was something even the supposedly great power of magic couldn’t achieve.

Even Blamia Dranus, who was hailed as a divine being, couldn’t do it, could she?

Dime Plache walked, blankly, just blankly.

Nothing else in the world was visible.

As if veiled by thick fog, everything else was erased, leaving only the image of his wife he had sent away long ago.

The situation, no different from a moment ago, was speaking.

The faces of his father-in-law and those who recognized his wife, aghast, made him realize that what he was seeing was reality.

Dime Plache, his body trembling more and more, could do nothing but approach Velvet.

“Vel…vet…?”

“…”

Was this world a play?

Like a dramatic story where a male lead and female lead who had a sad farewell meet again.

Dime soon raised his hand, which he himself couldn’t stop from trembling.

And the moment he was about to caress his wife’s cheek, which he had tried so hard to forget…

*Slap-*!

“…”

The sound of skin colliding.

Daim stared blankly at his turned-over hand.

The back of his hand was flushed red, like he’d been hit.

That couldn’t be.

The only person who could hit his hand right now was his wife, Velvet.

Daim, still in a daze, turned his head again.

And there, where he turned, was Velvet, tears streaming down her face, looking at him with contempt.

“Velvet…?”

“Ha… ha…”

Whether from the force of the blow, Velvet’s breathing was ragged.

No, he didn’t know what the ragged breaths meant.

Her gaze was so sorrowful, it was impossible to think she was looking at her husband.

It was like a dam bursting in an instant.

The emotional limit she’d been building up had, as of this moment, shattered.

“…Bad person.”

That was the end of Velvet’s words.

A truly short sentence, but more shocking than anything else.

Only then did Daim slowly take in his surroundings.

From his retainers to his father-in-law.

His new wife and the son she’d borne.

His daughter, head bowed and trembling, and the boy who comforted her, staring at him impassively.

Lastly, his ‘former’ wife, looking at him with resentment.

The separation came suddenly.

Sending Velvet away was also a sudden disaster.

If not for that, there’d have been no reason to bring a slave into the family.

He wouldn’t have loved and married her, nor would they have had a child.

But when Velvet left, the one left behind had to face reality.

He’d taken Velvet as his wife, despite many concerns and opposition.

When Velvet left, that choice now bound him.

And it was his father-in-law who released him.

It was Flavell Ryl, of the Ryl Trading Company.

He wanted legitimacy, to be called the fifth, now sixth, generation family.

Daim, as the head of the Place family, had to prevent his family from collapsing.

Their ambiguous relationship, at first glance, seemed to be working out.

His new wife was a good woman, and his father-in-law had a lot of influence on the family, but Daim had no way to stop it.

The price for taking Velvet as his wife.

Daim had to pay it.

The one hardship was that he failed to keep the promise he made when Velvet left.

That promise to protect his two daughters had been shattered by the family of his new wife.

Flavell Ryl considered Velvet and her two daughters to be a stain on the family.

If it hadn’t been for that flaw in the first place, Ryl Trading Company wouldn’t have even come to him for marriage.

But Flavell Ryl had already become his father-in-law, and the benefactor who saved his faltering family.

Flavell Ryl treated the two daughters harshly.

At first, he tried to stop it, but the past always held him back.

His beloved wife and two daughters.

Paradoxically, what hindered their protection most was their very existence.

In that paradoxical and contradictory situation, Daim thought he must have been out of his mind.

The solution he came up with was to pretend to ignore his two daughters.

That way, wouldn’t they eventually leave the family first?

When that happened, he intended to secretly provide for them so they wouldn’t want for anything.

And once he stepped down as head of the family, when he didn’t have to be wary of the Ryl Trading Company anymore, he would find them and beg for forgiveness.

Daim blankly stared at the girl, her head bowed.

The result of the actions he thought were the best possible.

Daim had severed his own paternal bond.

He had inflicted an irreparable wound on his daughter.

And that was in front of his wife, miraculously returned, with whom he had exchanged promises.

In a beautiful play.

Hadn’t he thought of the touching story of a boy and girl?

Daim was sure he was that boy.

But he was wrong.

Somehow, when I opened my eyes.

Daim wasn’t the male protagonist of a moving tale, but had become a vile villain who tormented and wounded them.

“Ah, no…”

“…Lord?”

Flabber, sensing something amiss, twitched his eyebrow and called out to Daim, but.

Daim, his gaze fixed on Velvet, seemed not to hear the voice.

It was the same even when he looked around.

The expressions of the retainers were ominous.

Rumors spread when the master is absent are the easiest things to manipulate.

Flabber Lyle had, in the meantime, planted a single thought in them from behind the family’s back.

The thought that, ‘Laris must have been that wrong’.

Indeed, Laris had consistently broken the family’s rules, and a mood of disregard for her had gradually developed amongst the retainers.

For Flabber, it was the easiest thing in the world.

But now it was different.

The ones at the center of the rumors they so easily manipulated were all gathered here.

A girl was abandoned by her father.

If you just look at that fact, the work he’d done so far shines.

But after that.

The moment the fact was added that the father broke his promise with his wife, it all becomes useless.

Daim, who, because of the interests at stake, should be on Flabber’s side, was in an unstable state.

Flabber found this situation deeply unpleasant and uncomfortable, and said with what seemed like an angry breath.

“These… these rootless whores…!!”

A roar echoed through the common corridor.

Everyone focused on the loud outburst of anger.

And there was Flabber Lyle, breathing roughly.

To inherit the Lyle Merchant Guild and make it the best.

That damn bloodline, bloodline.

He had finally succeeded in realizing his long-cherished desire against his low bloodline.

But the former wife and daughter of the family head, they brought it all back to mind.

This long-awaited wish had finally been achieved.

Absolutely cannot let it crumble like this.

Flabber Lyle urgently moved to the center of the hall, pointing at Velvet from behind Dyme.

“Listen, everyone. That woman is already dead!”

Old servants who remembered Velvet nodded.

“How can a dead person come back to life! Don’t be fooled! Those are wicked demonic tricks!”

After all, the force is on his side.

If he nullifies the cause, he can somehow manage.

Flabber pointed at Laris, who was bowing her head and touching the ground.

“Strip that wench! Nadel! Manudan! She’ll have a slave mark on her body!”

A twitch.

Flabber Lyle’s words about a slave mark.

Kalen felt Laris tremble greatly.

He hadn’t heard anything about a slave mark from Laris.

It was deeply startling that even though her mother was a slave, and her father was a noble, she would have a slave mark branded on her.

But none of that mattered right now.

Kalen covered Laris’s severely shaking hand with his.

Nadel and Manudan.

Manudan was probably the leader of the contracted mercenaries.

Kalen roughly guessed, and quietly whispered in Laris’s ear while her head was still bowed and touching the ground.

“Miss.”

A twitch.

Kalen whispered gently.

“What do we do?”

“…”

Laris turned her pitifully trembling head.

No, she only barely turned her ash-grey eyes towards Kalen.

A deeply gentle voice.

Like a calm, like it was nothing at all.

Just like it had always been.

Maintaining her unique indifference.

“…How…?”

“I am the young lady’s escort knight. Right now, I’m solely on your side, someone who can only handle you.”

*Squeeze-*

Kallen pressed down on Raris’ hand, which was resting on his own.

But never enough to hurt.

So that Raris could regain her composure.

“You…you’re not…asking…?”

“Asking about what?”

“That…sla…ve…”

“Young lady.”

Kallen closed his eyes.

He spoke softly, in that state, cutting off her words.

“Don’t you have something else to say?”

It was a kind of coercion, demanding a different answer because he didn’t want to hear that.

But Raris, that coercion was so gentle that she just burst into tears.

“He…help…me…”

The head of the household is out of his mind because of his wife.

Flaver is somehow in a state of excitement.

Nadil is on Kallen’s side, so the only thing left to do is get rid of the mercenary group that Manudan belongs to.

“Hicc…”

“…”

Raris bowed her head even further and sobbed.

Kallen removed his hand from hers and said,

“Raris.”

“Hicc…?”

“Look at me.”

Kallen’s tone abruptly changed.

Raris struggled to turn her eyes, but Kallen grabbed her head, forcing her to face him.

“Wanna make a bet?”

“…”

“Whether I can beat that senile old man.”

Laris couldn’t understand Kallen’s words, but one thing was clear.

This boy, who was always impassive, sometimes even cold.

Was smiling brightly.

“If I win…”

Kallen took off his coat and draped it over Laris.

Laris didn’t take off her own clothes.

It was just, a message not to be shaken by the ramblings of a senile old man.

“Stop crying and go to your father confidently, and tell him what you think.”

Kallen smiled one last time, then slowly stood up.

Several sharp-faced individuals were glaring in their direction.

In a situation that wasn’t particularly threatening, Kallen’s expression hardened as soon as Laris could no longer see him.

Caring for a young girl who was in great emotional turmoil, this was enough.

Kallen turned his head and looked at Belen, who was anxiously watching him.

“How long do I have to wait?”