--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
After that.
Idris carried me out, and when I came to my senses, I was gasping for breath outside the water.
"Cough...!"
I was spitting out water from my nose and mouth in a daze, and I felt a warmth caressing my back.
"Letizia, are you okay?"
"I'm okay..."
I was about to answer absentmindedly, but I stopped when I met Idris's golden eyes.
It was because I remembered what happened in the water a moment ago.
At the same time, my face flushed and I felt hot.
'...S-Stop! That was just an act to save me!'
But the feeling of our lips touching kept coming back to me, and I couldn't bring myself to look Idris in the eye.
I cleared my throat and subtly avoided his gaze.
"Ahem... I'm fine. What about you..."
Before I could finish speaking, Idris's left shoulder, stained with blood, caught my eye.
I was horrified, completely forgetting the embarrassment of a moment ago.
"You're hurt?!"
"Oh, so I am."
His shoulder and arm were covered in blood, but Idris's reaction was nonchalant.
"I guess an arrow grazed me earlier."
"Let me see."
"It's just wet from the water, it's not that deep of a wound."
He tried to brush it off as if it were nothing, but I grabbed his arm.
Carefully examining the torn clothes, I saw a deep wound.
It didn't seem to be a fatal wound, but it wasn't something to take lightly either.
'Because he's been rolling around on the battlefield, his standards for judging the severity of wounds are different from others.'
I clicked my tongue inwardly and held out my hand to him.
"Give me a handkerchief."
"Hmm, I don't want to get blood on the handkerchief you gave me."
"That's what it's for."
When I shook my hand as if urging him to hurry, Idris reluctantly took out a handkerchief.
The handkerchief was far too small to tie around his forearm, so I plucked a nearby flower stalk, put the handkerchief on the wound, and tied it up.
Then, I suddenly remembered Rudian, who was wearing a pale yellow handkerchief.
"By the way, did you meet the Crown Prince? We parted ways to lure those guys away."
"He was hiding well. Just like someone told him to."
"Then, the Crown Prince..."
"I left him with the knights who followed us, so Rudian will be safe."
Only then did I heave a sigh of relief and stroke my chest.
"I think we should worry about ourselves first."
Listening to Idris's words, I looked around and saw a vast forest spread out before me.
A truly wild space, where no trace of humans could be found.
Looking at the dark shadows between the dense trees, I couldn't help but get goosebumps.
"Where... are we?"
"Outside the imperial hunting grounds. The back side, to be exact."
The Imperial Knights would have followed us, but they wouldn't know our exact location.
'And Feidan will never reveal our location.'
In other words, it wouldn't be easy to wait for rescue.
"...Even if the knights come to rescue us right away, it will take a long time, right?"
"Probably. But the situation isn't hopeless."
Thinking that I was scared, Idris added an explanation.
"We fell off a cliff and survived without getting hurt, and fortunately, it's a long and hot summer."
Listening to his words, I felt grateful for the current situation.
I nodded with a lighter heart.
"You're right."
"Let's hurry. If we're lucky, we can meet the knights before the sun goes down."
We each found a suitable wooden stick and, following the cliff, began to make our way through the forest path.
The forest was vast and easy to get lost in, so we judged that it would be less confusing to return as close as possible to the direction we had come, focusing on the cliff.
Idris led the way, and I followed behind him for a long time.
Contrary to my nervousness, nothing special happened, and I gradually relaxed and remembered something I had forgotten.
'The butterfly illusion I saw earlier... Is it related to Idris?'
The moment I saw that butterfly, the first thing that came to mind was the butterfly illusion I had seen right before my regression.
The butterfly that brought me back.
And the unidentified man who appeared with that butterfly.
I began to suspect that Idris might be the person who magically brought me back.
'But I don't even know if regression magic exists, and even if it does, I had no contact with Idris in my previous life.'
Would he have sought out a woman he only saw fleetingly a few times?
'And even if he is the one, Idris, who doesn't remember his previous life, wouldn't be able to answer.'
If I asked about regression magic or previous lives, he might worry that I hit my head when I fell.
'...But maybe I can ask if regression magic exists, and what that butterfly illusion is?'
Maybe I can find a clue about that man from my previous life in that answer.
Just as I had made up my mind to call Idris,
The body of him, who was walking ahead, faltered.
I hurriedly approached him and grabbed his arm.
"Idris?"
"Ah... Sorry. I didn't see the rock."
But his complexion didn't seem good, as if he had not simply faltered because of a rock.
"Is it because of the wound?"
"No, no. Thanks to you taking care of it properly, the bleeding has stopped."
"Really... are you really okay?"
"I'm fine. So don't worry about it, let's go quickly."
As he said, the bleeding had stopped, but I couldn't shake off a vague sense of unease.
Because of that, I was so focused on his condition that I didn't have a chance to ask the question from earlier.
But despite our haste, the day slowly began to set before we could meet the knights.
"...It seems like we'll have to sleep here tonight."
In the end, we decided to spend the night in a nearby cave.
The first thing we did after finding the cave was to find firewood and start a fire.
Thanks to the hot weather, almost all of our wet clothes had dried, but even in summer, it would get cold after the sun went down.
"Before the sun sets completely, let's look for some edible berries—"
Turning to Idris as I made the suggestion, I found him sitting against the wall as if he had collapsed.
At the same time, my heart sank.
"Idris!"
When I hurriedly approached and grabbed his hand, I felt a heat that was hotter than usual.
His forehead was the same.
"What on earth is going on..."
Did something go wrong with the wound? Or was the bleeding not stopped enough? Or is there another wound I don't know about...?
As I was about to examine his body in a hurry, Idris, who was closing his eyes with a painful expression, replied.
"...It's not the wound."
"Then..."
"It's poison."
Poison. He said poison.
My hands began to tremble at the word.
"Why... why didn't you say so sooner? Why until you're in this state...!"
"Because it wouldn't have changed anything."
"..."
"We're in the middle of the forest, there's no antidote on hand, and it would only make you worry."
He's right.
And that's how hopeless it was.
Idris looked at me, who was caught in despair, and then took my hand.
"Don't make that crying face."
Even in this situation, as if to reassure me.
"My body will recover from most poisons after suffering for half a day."
"What... what do you mean?"
Suddenly, I remembered the story of his childhood that I had heard sometime.
'Could it be.'
Please, please. I hope it's not the reason I'm thinking of.
But the words that flowed from Idris's mouth hit my prediction accurately.
"...I should be grateful to my Imperial Father today."
The late Emperor fed Idris poison. Many kinds of poison little by little, so that he could detoxify himself.
Not for him, but for the sake of his eldest son, who was to become Emperor in the future.
At this moment, should we be grateful for that cruelty? Or...
I couldn't bring myself to speak and sobbed, holding his hand.
Idris's fingertips touched my tearful eyes.
"I'm sorry. For making you go through this."
"Why is this your fault?"
An edgy voice popped out, unlike my intention, because I was upset.
It's all my fault that this person became like this.
Even in this situation, he was protecting me.
"No, it's my fault. I... I hid your divorce papers."
Surprised by the unexpected confession, I looked at him instead of asking questions, and I saw familiar golden eyes.
Only my image was contained in the painfully distorted eyes.
At first, those eyes, which were clearly a little scary and frightening, were no longer frightening at some point.
"You asked me before who I liked."
Because of the emotion contained in those eyes.
"That person was you, Aria."
Why didn't I know that this feeling had been directed at me for a long time?
Comments
Post a Comment