TLAD 06

Chapter 06 …

The elevator carrying Christine and Lucy began to ascend.

“…Um.”
“Yes, speak.”
“Never mind.”

Christine seemed about to ask more, but hesitated and eventually gave up.

The elevator stopped on the 10th floor, and Lucy guided her to Room 1001.

The entire 10th floor was a single suite.

Christine let out a dry laugh at a structure that was on a completely different scale from her own apartment.

A servant who had been waiting in the room bowed deeply.

“Good day, my lady. I will be at your service.”

“It’s fine.”

“That is the Director’s order.”

The servant looked troubled. Christine smiled and shook her head.

“He has nothing to do with me. Please go out. I will speak to him myself. It’s uncomfortable with others around.”

“Understood. If you need anything later, please call.”

After the servant left, Christine went alone into the bathroom.

“…Ha.”

Right. At this rate, she clearly wasn’t returning to her apartment today.

She had many things to ask him, so she decided to wash up and wait. She soaked her body in the warm bath prepared in the tub.

I’ve been through too much.

Christine’s expression darkened sharply.

“…We were living fine as we were, so why is he suffering so much? I wish it were a lie. I wish it was just a headache.”

It had not even been a year since she separated from him. What on earth had happened in that short time?

It does seem like he really is sick.

Honestly, just that fact alone made her uneasy. Her thoughts were still tangled.

After staying in the warm bath for a long time, Christine came out feeling even more drained.

She still had many things to ask him.

After drying her hair and changing into simple sleepwear, Christine sat in a rocking chair, stroking her slightly raised belly.

She had intended to wait for Seimon, who still hadn’t come up from the lobby, but her eyelids kept growing heavier.

Why isn’t he coming? Is he still too sick to move?

I’m tired…

It was true that after living in the grand and luxurious Dayrte mansion, moving to a small apartment had been uncomfortable.

But now, even though it wasn’t as grand as the Dayrte estate, staying in a spacious, fine hotel suite made her body feel at ease.

Even the baby inside her seemed to prefer such luxurious and wide spaces, as expected of Dayrte blood.

Genetics really are fascinating.

With that thought as her last, Christine could no longer resist sleep and drifted off in the rocking chair.

Stop being sick and come up soon, Seimon.

Some time later, Seimon came up to the suite.

Entering with Lucy, he silently looked down at Christine, who was sound asleep in the rocking chair.

“……”

Lucy glanced at her silent superior.

His long eyelashes hid his golden eyes, making it impossible to tell what he was thinking.

“Director, are you feeling bet—”

“Shh.”

Lucy, about to ask if he was alright, immediately shut her mouth at his subtle gesture to lower her voice.

Seimon whispered.

“Go out. Call me if anything happens.”

“Yes.”

Lucy answered briefly and turned away.

She was already aware of the situation—that the divorced Madam and the Director had a child together—and it was strictly confidential.
And also that her superior had a terminal illness.

What on earth would become of the Dayrte Company?

At the center of this chaotic situation stood Princess Christine, a royalist faction leader.

Lucy let out a dissatisfied sigh and quietly closed the door behind her.

Seimon pulled a chair closer and sat, silently observing Christine as she slept in the rocking chair for a long time.

“……”

Silver-platinum hair that shimmered faintly white.
Closed eyelids that would reveal clear, vivid green eyes when opened.
A much smaller face and petite frame compared to others.

And her slightly rounded belly.

How can such a small body hold a baby?

Seimon frowned slightly. Honestly, even watching Christine walk made him uneasy.

Her swollen belly made her small frame wobble as if she might fall at any moment.

When he had reunited with her—

He had been quite shocked to see pregnant Christine, and when he saw her in such an advanced stage, he had almost rushed over to support her.

It might be better to just carry her.

But there was no way Christine would allow that. She was a proud princess.

The suspicion that the child might be another man’s had already been discarded long ago.

If it had truly been another man’s child, Christine would have been far more composed.

“Don’t make your mother suffer too much.”

Seimon, who had been silent until now, finally spoke for the first time—to the baby inside her belly.

Would it even be able to hear him?

“…Haa.”

Imagining the child peacefully inside that belly, Seimon smiled faintly before sighing.

What exactly were his feelings toward this woman?

The moment he heard Christine insist the child was another man’s, he had scoffed.

He had been that certain.

Based on timing alone, the child was conceived while she was still his wife—adultery? Impossible.

And there was no way a noble princess raised in the Oredot family would behave so recklessly.

Seimon’s expression darkened as he fell into thought.

Why did he want to hold onto Christine so badly and make her look at him? Was it a pathological obsession born from her sudden disappearance without a trace?

While Seimon was away on a two-month business trip to the Kingdom of Carlisle, Christine had vanished.

Finding her empty bedroom and her absence had shocked him deeply.

The place that had always contained Christine… no longer did.

And his father, Duke Dayrte, had handed him divorce documents, confirming they were no longer husband and wife.

It was due to his failure to uphold one condition of their contractual marriage.

No matter how many times he asked what that condition was, his father kept silent.

Seimon had been furious.

They had lived together for over two years. Even dogs that live together that long greet each other.

Yet she had disappeared without a word, as the only remaining royal blood of the empire, alone and vulnerable.

To Seimon, she had become something even less than a dog.

That realization enraged him, and from that moment he began searching for Christine like a madman.

Months passed with no results.

No matter how thoroughly he searched, there was no trace of her. That itself felt strange.

So, suspecting something, he investigated internally—and discovered that his father had been hiding her.

Seimon stormed into the Duke’s office and demanded answers. Unlike his furious state, the Duke calmly replied.

— “She is not a woman who wants to live with you.”

— “I know that.”

— “Then why do you keep searching for her? Why are you acting like a madman?”

— “I don’t know! I’ll understand when I meet her. I don’t even know why I’m acting like this.”

“…Mm.”

Seimon snapped out of his thoughts at Christine’s faint sound.

Seeing her shift uncomfortably in her sleep, he lifted her gently into his arms.

…Too light.

“Ha, I really don’t like this in many ways.”

He let out a dry laugh. How could a pregnant woman carrying a child be this light?

She was far too thin. A pregnant woman should be round and full, not like this.

She had refused to tell him why she wanted a divorce—and it turned out she had been pregnant.

A faint laugh escaped him.

He resented his father the most for agreeing to the divorce just because she was pregnant and letting Christine flee to the Republic of Rojas.

At the very least, she carried Dayrte blood. Even if half Oredot imperial blood flowed in her veins, this was still his grandchild.

“You went too far as well.”

Christine, who did not trust him at all and ran away in fear.

Seimon looked at her sleeping face with a faint hint of resentment and carefully laid her on the center of the large bed.

Then he lay beside her on his side, gently brushing her hair.

It felt as though a hollow space inside him was being filled.

Ah.

His heart throbbed sharply.

Now he understood.

“Haha…”

He let out a hollow laugh and covered his eyes with the back of his hand.

“Father… I finally understand why I’ve been acting like a madman.”

This… this sound. This breathing.

He had wanted to hear it.

He did not want to be separated from Christine.

Seimon stared at her for a long moment, then went to the study.

He picked up a fountain pen and took out a sheet of white paper.

His mind was heavy. Still, he forced himself to write calmly.

It was a will.

A long will beginning with the line:

“Measures for the Dayrte heir and the child’s protection.”

However, the first person to read this will would not be Duke Dayrte—

but Christine.