🔊 TTS Settings
Chapter 59
Nine Breads. Shit is Shit, It Can’t Become Soybean Paste (9)
Why am I running?
Her breath hitched almost immediately. Ellie couldn’t understand why she was running. Her body moved before her mind could catch up.
The moment she was certain something had happened, she was already in motion.
Seth had run away.
Damn girl… she must be crazy. Ellie had a gut feeling that the girl Seth mentioned was Elaine.
She didn’t know why. It was just a feeling. Maybe it was because Elaine, who had been quiet all along, had always made her uneasy.
“If I want to survive safely, I should pretend I don’t know anything!”
Hadn’t she said so herself?
Even if she met her by chance, she shouldn’t acknowledge her presence. She should just survive.
What could she possibly do by going there?
No matter what happened, what did it have to do with her?
She had spent her whole life running away to avoid entanglement with the heroine.
Even now, she could stop, return to her room, and lock the door. That way, she could survive safely and quietly.
Even though she knew all of that, Ellie couldn’t stay still. Her legs had already started running, and she couldn’t stop them.
Each time her heavy legs hit the floor, the weight made her knees ache. She was frustrated that she wasn’t even running that fast. She wished she had exercised a little, no matter how much she hated it. Once she got back to Rayad, she’d run every morning. For real.
Though she roughly knew Elaine’s location, she didn’t know which room she was staying in. She had intended to knock on doors blindly, but as soon as she stepped into the second-floor corridor, she found an open door.
She nearly twisted her ankle while running hurriedly.
Ellie steadied herself by pressing her hands to the floor, groaning not even once, and ran again. She then burst into the open room.
Elaine had raised a dagger, aiming to stab her own neck.
“Stop!”
Elaine’s blue eyes widened at the sight of Ellie. Gritting her teeth, Ellie approached and snatched the dagger with her bare hands. The blade cut into her palm, but she didn’t feel the pain.
“What are you doing, you idiot!”
“Ellie, your—your hand!”
“That’s not the problem right now! I’m asking what you’re doing!”
“Let go! Give it here!”
“I’m asking! What are you trying to do? You… right now, you’re—”
“…”
“What were you going to do with this?”
Elaine panicked as she looked at the blood flowing from Ellie’s hand, suddenly coming to her senses.
Ellie didn’t intend to keep holding the dagger either. She shifted it to her other hand so Elaine couldn’t grab it and gripped the handle firmly.
“You shouldn’t have that, Ellie… Please give it back.”
“Answer my question first.”
Ellie wasn’t asking because she didn’t know what Elaine intended to do.
Elaine, flustered by Ellie’s firm tone, bit her lip and glared at her.
“Whatever I do, what does it matter to you?”
“…”
“You said not to acknowledge you. That it was awful and miserable, and that we should cut ties and live separately…”
“…”
“So give me that, and go your way. No, go as far away as possible. Before anyone sees you.”
“Who sees what…”
A man fallen to the floor came into Ellie’s view before she could finish asking.
He was a large man, wearing clothes clearly made of high-quality materials.
Even from the thick-soled boots, Ellie could tell he was of a very high status. She looked back and forth between the motionless man on the floor and the pale, terrified Elaine.
Elaine had wasted away beyond recognition.
Her usually shiny blonde hair was now dry and frizzy. Her pearly skin had become rough and pale. She was still beautiful, but her bright, cheerful smile—what Ellie had always thought looked like a flower on her head—was gone, making her look like a different person.
Ellie was inwardly shocked.
Only a few months had passed.
“…It’s my fault.”
“…”
“I… misunderstood.”
“…”
“They said he’s the prince of the Yan Empire. My fiancé…”
“That bastard attacked you?”
“No. Ah. Yes. But I called him. And I wasn’t planning to… to kill him. No, I didn’t kill him.”
“What, if you didn’t kill him, it’s fine, right?”
“…”
“But then why did you try to die?”
“…”
Elaine fell silent again. Ellie waited quietly.
“Ellie, this has nothing to do with you. Please stop here and give me that. If anyone sees, they’ll misunderstand.”
“Oh, really?”
Ellie chuckled and held her bleeding palm right in front of Elaine’s face.
“Still doesn’t matter? I’ll temporarily cancel the ‘cut ties’ thing, so tell me.”
“…Dad, go.”
“…”
“Dad killed Franz…”
Ellie didn’t know who Franz was, but hearing he was dead reminded her of something.
‘Right, she was supposed to be the tragic protagonist…’
In the novel, Elaine also loses her first love right before her eyes. Her initially cheerful and positive personality becomes darker as she loses more people, and she gets trapped by obsessive men, leading to yet more tragedy.
“I…I wanted revenge. I thought it was Seth because I didn’t think Dad knew… so I thought it must’ve been Seth…”
“That lazy bum could’ve done that.”
“I wanted to believe it was Seth…”
“Why is that man passed out here?”
“He came with me. I thought it was Seth and attacked, but it wasn’t, so I just knocked him out for now.”
“…With that frail body against that huge man…?”
The implication was that it wasn’t even that difficult.
Ellie realized anew that Elaine was truly the novel’s protagonist. A talent given by God shines even under the most unfavorable conditions.
“I wanted to avenge Franz, we’re on the same team, we should do it, but I absolutely couldn’t kill Dad…”
“Of course not…”
Her father’s love for Elaine was genuine.
In the novel, because of Ellie’s presence and the Mayer family’s surveillance, he couldn’t openly show his love, but later it’s revealed that his unwavering love was only for Elaine.
Unlike the novel’s heroine, Elaine grew up loved.
“My very existence is wrong. Everyone becomes unhappy because of me. If I didn’t exist, you wouldn’t be unhappy, and Franz wouldn’t have died. I should die, then…”
“Don’t make me unhappy too. Who said you knew everything?”
“…”
“You and your father were obstacles, yes, but that doesn’t mean I was unhappy. Don’t misunderstand.”
Ellie didn’t care that they had been obstacles, traps, and snares. For now, she just wanted to stop Elaine.
She couldn’t let Elaine take her own life.
No matter what, she couldn’t allow it. Elaine suffering somewhere else, kidnapped by an obsessive man, rolling and crying in pain—that was one thing—but this was different.
“Did that man ask you to avenge him? Because you’re on the same team?”
“…No…”
“Whether you can forgive your father or not, he wouldn’t want revenge, and neither would I. It’s unrelated. It’s my life. I don’t expect anything from you.”
“…”
Ellie decided to be even more honest.
“I don’t know about him, but if someone dies just because I tried to take revenge, that’s a nuisance, not help.”
This time, Elaine’s shoulders twitched. Ellie worried she might have been too harsh, but at least the words sank in.
“So…”
“Shut up already, damn it!”
Ellie’s hair was grabbed from behind, lifting her feet off the floor.
