IDEFP 10

Chapter 10

Thanks to the auction descending into complete chaos, Jeffrey remained so stunned that he could barely regain his senses.

When I said I would take Noah with me, his eyes sharpened. Grinding his teeth, he insisted that since the child up for auction had not been sold, Noah was still his property.

“If you truly wish to take that child, then pay properly and win the bid.”

I didn’t have the money to bid for Noah. And besides, the sight of those high-ranking nobles behind the curtain treating the people on stage like merchandise was still vivid in my mind.

It disgusted me.

I didn’t want to drag Noah away by following the same vile process they used.

But at the same time, I couldn’t exactly just take him by force either…

As my thoughts dragged on, Noah—who had been sitting quietly beside me—lightly grabbed my right hand. The sting from the wound made me frown instinctively.

At that moment, a good idea flashed through my head.

I raised my hand, where dried blood had clumped messily over the long gash.

“Isn’t this a breach of contract?”

“Huh?”

Jeffrey’s furious expression softened ever so slightly. The moment I saw his face, the corners of my lips curled upward.

Then I spoke confidently.

“Jeffrey.”

“…Yes.”

“When I came up onto the stage earlier, how did you introduce me?”

“……”

Jeffrey kept his mouth shut, so I answered for him.

“You called me the flower of the auction house, didn’t you?”

I never thought those unpleasant words would actually help me. I flashed him a bright smile.

“So this is how you people treat flowers here?”

“T-That’s…!”

“If you check the contract, it says I agreed not to care how my name was used for promoting this auction, on the condition that I would never personally have to appear. Yet not only did I have to show myself, I even ended up injured like this.”

At my words, Jeffrey cautiously replied,

“That was because Lady Isabella stepped onto the stage first—”

Cutting him off, I raised my right hand high and cried dramatically,

“Ahh, my poor hand hurts so much! How am I supposed to eat or pick anything up now? I’m dying, absolutely dying.”

If Noah hadn’t been there, I probably would’ve rolled around on the floor for effect.

Jeffrey looked utterly troubled.

I cleared my throat quietly and continued firmly.

“You ruined the auction and tarnished the face of the very person who lent you her name. I won’t separately demand compensation for all of that… on the condition that I take this child with me.”

Jeffrey looked deeply unwilling, but he also knew that if he refused, there was no telling what a notoriously ill-tempered archmage might do to him.

In the end, he accepted my proposal with the expression of someone swallowing bitter medicine.

And Noah buried his face into my clothes as he followed me all the way to Monteo Garden.

I thought things would become easier once he followed me willingly.

“…How long are you planning to stay like that?”

“……”

Perched on the armrest of the sofa, I looked over at Noah.

The moment we arrived at the room, he had curled himself into a corner and refused to move.

Back at the auction house, no matter how much I tried to push him away, he wouldn’t leave my side. I thought he had opened his heart to me…

Apparently, that had been a huge misunderstanding.

“Could you at least wash up and come out? Don’t tell me I’m supposed to bathe you too?”

“……”

“Are you really going to act this childish?”

For a split second, Noah flared up at my words, but then he buried his head completely into his knees again.

I let out a hollow laugh.

“You might want to pretend you can’t understand me, but don’t you think it’s a little too late for that?”

It was nearly midnight already, and he’d been like this ever since we arrived. All I could do was sigh.

I thought I had barely escaped danger, yet nothing was going the way I wanted.

Maybe I had saved my life by keeping Noah away from Duke Rosenberg, but the future still looked bleak.

No matter how much I thought about it, this clearly wasn’t going to be a smooth road. And now, on top of everything else, I couldn’t even handle a single child properly…

I’m anxious.

The moment that thought crossed my mind, Noah’s shoulders trembled violently.

My eyes widened at the sight.

Thinking back, ever since we escaped the auction house, the tension had faded and anxiety had crashed over me like a wave.

I had unconsciously started shaking my leg and biting my nails in impatience, and every time I did, Noah became visibly uneasy too.

Come to think of it, the Oath of Dawn bound the contractor to me by sharing my mana with them.

Perhaps because of that, the two people tied by the contract were heavily influenced by each other’s emotions, almost like a penalty.

Because I’m anxious… Noah can’t calm down either.

After a moment of thought, I took a deep breath and steadied my mind.

Then I slowly called his name.

“Noah.”

Only then did Noah lift his head to look at me. His wary gaze remained unchanged.

Keeping my voice calm, I continued.

“It’s okay. Go soak in warm water and come back out. No one’s going to hurt you anymore.”

Because he had wildly swung the dagger on stage, vivid bloodstains covered Noah’s clothes and skin.

His skin was so pale that the red stood out all the more sharply. Looking into his crimson eyes—so much like my own—made my throat tighten on its own.

“Why did you save me?”

Noah asked. His confused eyes trembled faintly.

“I told you I’d explain once we got out of there.”

At his question, countless answers tangled in my mouth.

But after pushing everything else aside, the words that came out were unexpected even to me.

“Because I hate them too.”

“Hate them?”

“Yeah. Those bastards in masks, and all the people who throw their power around however they please. Every last one of them.”

That wasn’t really the truth so much as it was a deeply personal feeling.

Words I had wanted to say to the lonely Noah, who lived hidden beneath the mask of the Blood Shadow.

“That’s why I wanted to help you get your revenge. Because I thought it would become my revenge too.”

I thought my voice would tremble pathetically, but it came out stronger than expected.

“……”

Noah still looked unable to trust me completely.

After some thought, I raised the hand I had clumsily bandaged.

“You can tell, can’t you? Whether I’m lying or not.”

“…Yeah.”

At that answer, I placed my hand over the left side of my chest, closest to my heart, and met Noah’s eyes.

Silence lingered between us for a while.

Then Noah set aside the robe I had draped over him, picked up the thick towel beside him, and headed toward the bath.

Looks like I managed to get through to him.

Only after the door closed and I heard the sound of him sinking into the bathwater did I finally relax and smile faintly without realizing it.

Taking Noah with me had never been part of the plan.

Once Duke Rosenberg realized Noah wasn’t the “item” he had been searching for, naturally he wouldn’t bid on him. And if that happened, Yurié and Noah would never meet.

It was the best strategy to completely uproot the threat of my death.

The Oath of Dawn had merely been a means to achieve that.

But once that part of the plan actually succeeded, what remained wasn’t simple at all.

If I had left Noah there and ignored him, it felt like he would’ve been beaten to death by the mages and handlers.

I had promised to help him get revenge, and after feeling that small warmth in my arms, I couldn’t pretend not to care.

That was why, somewhat impulsively, I ended up bringing Noah with me.

Sitting in a chair inside the dim room lit by a single candle, I looked at Noah sleeping curled up at the edge of the bed.

Whenever the candle flickered, the whole room seemed to sway.

Within that darkness, Noah was as still as a shadow. But perhaps because he was exhausted, unlike before when he remained constantly guarded, he had fallen into a deep sleep.

“A child had to go through far too much.”

Now that the debt was repaid, I no longer had any reason to stay here.

I had absolutely no intention of walking the same path as the villainess in the novel.

So, as soon as dawn broke, I had to leave.

In my panic, I had formed a contract without even knowing how to解除 it, so I had no choice but to take Noah with me as well.

“I’ll have to find a way to break the contract once we get there.”

There was only one possible place for me to go:

The true home of Isabella Gwell—the Marquis Gwell family.

Whenever Isabella introduced herself, she avoided saying her full name, to the point of obsessively refusing to speak about her family.

But the reason for that was never explained even once in the novel.

I could only assume that, like most villainesses, she had endured a cruel and lonely childhood.

The only thing I knew about the Gwell family was that they were in Roxia.

Roxia, the eastern land where the sun first rises on the continent.

The Gwell family ruled Roxia as marquises, yet their political standing was strangely narrow.

Other than that, everything about them was shrouded in mystery.

Isabella had left home at fourteen to enter the academy, and now, at twenty, this would be her first return in six years.

I wasn’t sure whether they would welcome their suddenly returned daughter, but perhaps things would be different now that she held the title of archmage.

And more than anything, I wanted to go there precisely because it was a place the novel itself never paid attention to.

While Yurié and the three male leads tangled themselves together in drama, I wanted to exist completely outside the story.

It was unfortunate that I had to take along his loyal dog.

But Noah had spent his entire life caught between them, never once earning Yurié’s attention, suffering endlessly from nightmares anyway…

“It’s selfish, but let me have at least this much.”

Looking at the sleeping Noah, I quietly murmured those words.