The Demon Lord's Bride (BL)-Chapter 22: It needs courage to peek into people’s past…especially your own

Chapter 22: It needs courage to peek into people’s past...especially your own

It was winter. It was snowing. And it was lonely.

It was the kind of loneliness that made me want to go away rather than join in. As other people fell into winter festivities, the ward was pretty much deserted.

I could hear the sound of celebration from other rooms and the nurse’s station. It was like the quiet policy was being discarded at that time. But thanks to that, I had a chance to sneak past the complaining nurses that would rather go home to be with their family than be with a bunch of sick strangers.

Tip-toeing to the stairs, I climbed up to the rooftops. To this day, past my own death, I still had no idea where I had the strength to go through all those flights of stairs.

Perhaps that moment of loneliness made me a little bit depressed, and felt like I had nothing to lose. I couldn’t remember anymore whether I arrived there properly, or through crawling and heaving and regretting anything.

But I did reach the rooftops, miraculously.

And whatever state I was in that moment held no importance. Because there was snow in front of me, and the moment that tiny coldness touched my skin, there was indescribable happiness inside of me, like a dream come true.

A fleeting dream. A foolish dream.

I remembered standing there, at the entrance of the door, mesmerized by the chill and the falling snow, the countless white dot that seemed to be glowing in ethereal light.

I remembered a reprimanding voice, a tall figure rushing at me from the other side of the rooftop.

It was only after my gradually blurry sight shifted that I realized my body was falling down. The voice kept shouting, and my stupid brain only thought about how sweet and gentle was that harsh-sounding shout. ƒree𝑤ebnσvel.com

It sounded like concern, like worry, like something warm.

I remembered the feeling of firm arms lifting my body, and the sturdy chest I leaned against.

And then I remembered nothing more from that night. I surely got the biggest scolding of my life after I woke up a few days later. The head nurse was glaring at me so much, and I felt a little guilty because the staff on night watch was getting scolded because of my little action.

Just a little bit.

I got to know later about the man who brought me back down. Fortunately, a doctor was up on the rooftops at that time, which was why I managed to survive without too many repercussions.

When I saw the doctor again, I remembered then; he was one of the residents under the professor that was in charge of me. Perhaps because of our close-call encounter, he was put to be my overseer afterward.

I recognized the man from the gazes of others—the palpable admiration on the female staff and patient. I had heard about him too, the handsome young doctor. He wasn’t anything special though, aside from his looks. Not that he was a bad doctor—his skill was good, but nothing eye-turning—but I heard he was not really attentive or cared for the patients.

Or so I heard. But...

He was sweet? He was attentive, and asked about how I was feeling that day with patience and care. He spoke in a sweet and gentle tone, in the voice that I heard on the rooftop.

At least when it was just the two of us.

During the professor’s round, or when there were other people, he acted like what people said—like it was just work and business. But his demeanor changed when he was checking up on me alone. I had thought it was just my delusion, but when he started to stay and chat in my ward during his break, or deliberately making his round during his night shift...a feeling that I might be a little bit special surfaced.

What could a poor virgin heart do but fall?

Actually, it would be weirder if I didn’t develop any feelings for this gorgeous man who was strangely extra-attentive to me. I remembered we had a lot of random talks, and it was during one of them that the name came up.

He asked me to call him by name instead of ’doctor’ if it was just the two of us. But when I spelled his whole name, he pondered about it for a bit.

In the end, he smiled and told me; "Just call me Nat,"

* * *

I woke up with a terrible feeling. I had tried to remember my past so much that it even appeared as a scene in my dream.

And what a weird sensation it was.

To see a human with Natha’s face, with a name that was almost similar to his.

Oh, how I wanted to strangle the author.

I knew then, that the name I was calling that night must have been the doctor’s name. Of course, Nat could also be used to shorten the Demon Lord’s name, and I might fly with insisting that I was calling Natha’s name that night.

I would think like that too, had it not for the existence of that doctor in my previous life.

And it might work, if not for the ability that Natha had.

—Whose name were you calling?—

The very fact that Natha asked it like that told me that he knew...he knew I was thinking about someone else. Which meant he probably knew it too, every moment I saw the doctor on him.

Which also meant that I was screwed.

Wordlessly, I screamed into the pillow. I screamed and cursed in any curse word I knew, including in the new demon language that Zia sneakily taught me.

My muffled voice must have startled the little bundle curling on the nightstand, for a soft white ball frantically bounced around my head. With little high-pitched noises, Jade buttheaded me in panic.

"I’m okay, I’m okay..." I patted his small head, and a sound akin to a whimper came out of the little bird. It jumped into my chest, and peered at me keenly with its deep green eyes.

Maybe because it was born with the infusion of my mana, I could more or less sense its thought. I could feel Jade’s concern about me, its suspicion that I fell ill because of my muffled screaming.

Ah...was that how it was for Natha when he sensed others’ thoughts? Moreover, since he was the Demon Lord who had lived for almost a century, he could probably sense those thoughts more clearly.

To the point that he knew I was thinking about someone else when we were together.

As I scooped the little bird off my chest and sat on the bed, a sigh came out of my parted lips. I patted the little white ball while feeling like a cheating wife, even though I clearly hadn’t had any relationship before.

But it wasn’t like I choose to be his bride, right? I wasn’t the one who dragged myself into this...whatever relationship we currently had. All I did was beg for a miraculous, almighty cure so I wouldn’t die and...

—and I choose to agree to his term.

Yeah. Okay. If we looked at it that way, then we could say that I chose to enter a contractual marriage.

I paused for a full minute before burying my face in my palm.

Oh my god. I was a cheater!

I felt like someone who got engaged to an older twin while having a crush on the younger one. What kind of messed up drama was this?

I let out a groan at the same time the bedroom door opened and Angwi brought me my morning drink. It smelled different than before; still had those herbal drink scents but also something sweeter.

Jade flew into my shoulder as I received the warm cup from Angwi. My reflection inside the surface of the slightly steaming liquid was that of someone who knew he had screwed up. Absentmindedly, I sipped on the warm drink and instantly felt warmth flood inside my system, calming the turbulence inside my mind.

"Ah..." it tasted nicer; a subtle sweet and sour taste, like honey and apple and some spice. "Oh, it’s like apple pie?"

How weird...but good. Seeing that my body and mind instantly relaxed, it probably had a calming effect.

"Thank you, Angwi," I said while drinking more of the liquid. But the maid shook her head, and it took me a while to understand her silent word. "Is...is this prepared by His Lordship?"

She nodded then, and I continued to sip on the drink in silence. I remembered then, when I had my breakfast/lunch yesterday, and Natha gave a box to Angwi. It was only now that I recalled the slight scent from that box—something like cinnamon and cloves.

Wasn’t that sweet of him? I thought as the entire drink entered my system.

"Haa..." I wanted to laugh, I wanted to lament.

Guilt! I felt so guilty right now!

* * *

The guilt persisted for days, and I found myself rolling around in frustration. I rationalized with the fact that it was something I couldn’t control, and blamed the devious author girl for using the doctor as a model for Natha.

Even giving them a similar name!

But aside from the guilt, there was fear. I remembered the coldness that emanated from the silver eyes when I showed him my reluctance of being tied to him. The disappointment—the slight anger.

I was distracted by Jade’s birthing at that time, so I didn’t even realize that we stopped our conversation abruptly in awkwardness. Although I genuinely had no idea that I blurted out another person’s name at that time, perhaps we should talk about it?

I heard communication was important for a healthy relationship.

Even if I had no idea what state of mind and heart I had toward the Demon Lord, it was still the truth that I was tied to a relationship with him.

The problem was...how could I explain it to him? Because there was no way I could just nonchalantly come up with a story about how I came from another world, and that this world was a novel, and that I had a crush on a human that looked just like him, so I couldn’t help but thinking about that man whenever I saw him...

Yeah—somehow it sounded worse than saying I used to like someone and hadn’t moved on.

But truthfully, it wasn’t like I still had a feeling for that doctor. As I said, it was just a temporary crush. Wasn’t it normal for our hearts to beat faster when encountering people we used to like? So it wasn’t that I hadn’t moved on...

Oh God, I had no idea anymore.

Saying this or saying that—either way they all sounded bad.

"The conclusion is that I’m totally, utterly screwed," I brought Jade up and stared at the little bird’s beady eyes. "So let’s just screw up some more!"

In front of me was a door. A closed door that I hadn’t dared to open for the past two weeks. But I didn’t care anymore now. Inhaling deeply, I opened the closed door and entered the room.

To the Demon Lord’s private study.