The Abandoned Duchess Seems to Want a Peaceful Life - Chapter 168

Chapter 168: The Great Sorcerer’s Fiancée

Julius’s official position was that of an alchemist employed by Melfina and staying in the Enkar region.

At least, that was how it was on paper, and as an employed alchemist, he had contributed more than enough—in fact, excessively—to the Enkar region by giving form to Melfina’s ideas and developing various things.

Although Melfina had knowledge from her previous life, when it came to things with complex mechanisms or those requiring large-scale machinery, a person specializing in that field was necessary.

Originally, technological development was something that took shape only after years, even decades, of trial and error for a single technology. While he had some unconventional aspects, Julius had more than fulfilled the role of a lubricant between Melfina’s knowledge and the skills of craftsmen like carpenters and blacksmiths.

As an employer, she should not delve into the private life of the alchemist she had hired. Melfina, too, had a past and personal feelings she wished to keep hidden from others.

However, at some point, she had come to think of Julius as a troublesome friend.

There were times she thought he was a handful, and she wished he were a little more sensitive to the subtleties of human emotion.

But he was a person she couldn’t hate, someone whose happy laughter brought her joy as well.
Why, then, would such a person behave so coldly towards his fiancée?

“There’s no need to make a face like that, my lady.”

Julius said, looking unusually troubled, and stretched with a “hngh.”

“I was bent over for a long time, so my back is tired. I don’t notice it when I’m playing with Rena, but when the fun time is over, I think, ah, Rena and I are looking at things from different perspectives. Rena says that because I’m closer to the sky, she wants to grow up quickly too.

Huhu, no matter how big you get, you can’t catch the moon in the sky with human arms.”

“Lord Julius…”

“The sender of the letter is my fiancée in the royal capital. I can pretty much guess the contents. It will surely say that I should stop messing around, hurry back to the royal capital, marry her, and have children.”

That was hardly something a lady would write to her fiancé. I must have had a very skeptical look on my face, because Julius took out the letter again, broke the seal, and offered it to me as it was.

“I can’t. To read a private letter addressed to you from your fiancée…”

“You are a truly refined lady. Being in the Enkar region makes me wonder if the women I’ve seen until now were the strange ones.”

Julius said this, broke the wax seal, glanced at the contents, then quickly folded it and put it back in his pocket.

“My lady, my magical power is probably the strongest on this continent at the moment. Can you not understand what position a woman betrothed to someone like me is in?”

“That is…”

“Bearing my child is no different from a passive form of suicide.”

Women with strong magical power have a resistance to it. Or rather, both men and women cannot live to adulthood without that resistance.

And it is difficult for two people with strong magical power to have children.

If she was chosen as Julius’s fiancée, then Caroline must have little magical power.

However, if a woman with no resistance to magic were to conceive a child with strong magical power, her defenseless body would not be able to endure until childbirth—those were the words Marie had once told her.

Alexis’s mother, Merry Jane, had also tried repeatedly to have children, and in the end, her mind had broken, or so she had heard.

“Does your fiancée know this?”

“She does. I explained it to her myself. Along with what happened to the mother who conceived me. She says she doesn’t mind.”

“…”
That’s right. The fact that Julius was here meant that his mother must have existed as well.
What had happened to his mother, who had given birth to Julius, the one with the greatest magical power on the continent?

Judging from his tone, she had surely not been unscathed.

“My fiancée is a pitiful woman. It’s one thing to be betrothed to someone like me despite being the daughter of a respectable nobleman; for that alone, I would have sympathized. If she marries me, bears my child, and survives, my personal assets and the headship of the Savini family will belong to her and the child she bore. She is staking her life on such a hope, one with almost no chance of success.”

Julius’s tone was as smooth as ever. But within it, there was a clear tinge of a cold sneer.
That appearance overlapped with the character still of Julius from the game, who would toy with the heroine with a cynical smile.

“I think I must hate her. When she is in front of me, I can’t breathe. I’m shown a path that is blocked, with only a dead end waiting, and what’s more, I’m tired of being asked to take part in such a way of life.”

“Lord Julius…”

These were the first frustrated words Julius had uttered since coming to the Enkar region. As I hesitated, wondering what to say, his expression immediately brightened with a “pop.”

“I have no intention of causing you any trouble, my lady! It’s all right, I’ll write a proper reply to the letter.”

“…I’m sorry for asking such a personal question.”

“It’s something I spoke of on my own accord. You are not at fault at all, my lady. Besides, in any case—”

The sound of children’s playful voices echoed from the front of the building, and Julius swallowed the words he was about to say.

“Mooom, big brother! You used my paper, didn’t you!”

“I just borrowed a little! I ran out of paper for my writing practice!”

“I divided it up properly at the beginning, so don’t use it without asking!”

“I’ll give it back to you the next time a merchant comes!”

It seemed Rod had used Rena’s supply of paper. A wry smile escaped at the popularity of the plant-based paper, which was apparently being fought over by the siblings.

Writing paper was supplied at a low price at the lord’s mansion, so there was no need to wait for a peddler, but I had heard that Rod was studying diligently.

He probably couldn’t wait to come and get some.

At the sound of the small children’s footsteps and their echoing voices, Julius narrowed his eyes as if looking at something dazzling.

His expression was completely different from when he had been speaking of Caroline just moments before, soft and gentle.

“In any case, it won’t be for much longer now.”

And yet, the words that came out of his mouth were as if he were pushing himself away.
I was about to ask what he meant by that, but I held my tongue.

Cedric had said that before long, there would be a move from the Ivory Tower to bring Julius back.

And that he would obstruct it.

But Melfina knew. No matter how late, just as it had been with Cedric, Julius too would leave this land by next summer.

It would surely come in a way that neither Melfina nor Julius could do anything about.

“Moo, Lady Mel! Big brother used up all the paper, so there’s none left!”

“Rena… I have some plant-based paper on hand, so please use this.”

“Really? Thank you very much!”

“For the magic stone windmill, I’d like to be able to turn it on and off with a switch, just like the other magic stone tools. I’d also like to add low-speed and high-speed functions depending on the weather, and that will bring up issues with the overall strength, so we’ll need to calculate that carefully—”

“It would be better to reinforce the parts with a lot of movement with metal. It would be great if we could make the whole thing out of metal, but that would make it too heavy.”

“That would be difficult unless it’s a very small machine. Also, I want to adjust it so that the speed at which it moves the millstone and pestle is constant.”

Rena sketched the shape of a gear with a smooth motion, and Julius added supplementary text from the side. The two of them seemed to be in perfect sync, like children engrossed in a new toy.

The atmosphere from a moment ago had been completely dispelled from Julius.
It was as if he had forgotten all about the “reality” tucked away in the pocket of the boyishly smiling, happy-looking Julius.