Chapter 10. My Male Lead Can Only Bully Me. (2)
When I was with Adel, time flew by even when we weren’t doing anything in particular. I picked up a pen and tried to follow along with him, but all I managed to do was make him burst out laughing.
He bit his lip when he saw the drawing I’d put so much effort into completing.
Even though I’d tried my best, the eyes were uneven, the lips were far too small, and the angular jaw was so sharp it looked like it could cut through a brick. His nose bridge rose so high it seemed to have no idea where the sky ended, practically reaching the level of the pyramids.
Overall, something about the drawing was seriously wrong, but I couldn’t even figure out where to start fixing it.
“It really does look like me.”
“Do you want to die? How on earth does this look anything like you?!”
I snapped back at him instead. This was practically an insult to Adel.
While we were arguing because Adel stubbornly insisted on keeping the picture I’d drawn, someone knocked on the door. When Adel told them to come in, the head maid opened the door and politely bowed.
“Excuse me. Lady Anastasia, His Grace would like to have a brief conversation with you. Would you be willing to accept his request?”
His Grace referred to Duke Friedrich Magnus. Adel’s father and Anastasia’s father were close friends, so the two families had been acquainted with each other for a long time.
However, after Anastasia was diagnosed with an incurable illness and cut ties with the ducal family following her falling-out with Adel, the duke respected her wishes and never sought her out unless she wanted him to.
But now that I, as Anastasia, had come to the ducal estate first, there was no particular reason for me to refuse.
The duke was a pretty decent man. Well, at least when it came to Adel and me.
I readily nodded.
“Sure. Where should I go?”
“His Grace will come here.”
With that, the head maid withdrew. I gave Adel, who was looking at me with a slightly worried expression, a bright smile.
A little while later, the duke came to the drawing room. I couldn’t stop my mouth from falling open in time.
Was the person I was looking at really human?
Friedrich Magnus was such a handsome man that I wondered if Adel would grow up to look like this.
Holy crap. No wonder people liked mature, handsome men. I couldn’t tear my eyes away from his languid face, overflowing with effortless composure.
His neatly combed-back blond hair and deep blue eyes, whose depths were impossible to fathom, were the very definition of a handsome man.
On top of that, his sharp eyes, confident gaze that bordered on arrogance, and slender physique were more than enough to completely captivate me.
Wow. What the—wow… I can’t even speak…
When I first saw Adel, I thought I would never experience such a shock again…
Adel stood up from his seat.
“Father.”
“Your Grace.”
I got up as well, but the duke stopped me with a gesture.
“No need for formalities. Sit down.”
The duke sat across from us. He looked at the two of us, sitting so close together, with interest.
Adel cleared his throat and moved slightly away from me. At the same time, he secretly slipped the picture I’d drawn into his pocket.
I told you to throw that thing away!
“It’s been a long time, Anastasia. I’m sorry I haven’t been able to come see you more often.”
I reluctantly looked away.
Ugh. I’ll have to steal it back later.
“Have you been well?”
“I’ve always been the same. But your complexion seems to be getting worse as time goes by. Still, has something good happened? It’s fascinating to see you smiling so brightly with such a pale face.”
The duke’s deep, resonant voice was downright lethal.
Sometimes, when Adel looked at me seriously and worried about me, he spoke in a similar tone to his father, and it was enough to make me nearly faint.
On top of that, his voice carried remarkably well, so even when he spoke quickly or quietly, it was easy to understand everything he said.
“Of course something good happened. I’m with Adel, aren’t I?”
At my answer, the duke gave a hollow laugh.
“When I tried to set you up with Will, you made it abundantly clear that you weren’t interested. Yet the moment I stopped paying attention, you became close as though you’d been waiting for it. I knew Adel had practically been living at the count’s estate lately, but… Has my son been treating you well?”
“Of course. Why wouldn’t he?”
“He hasn’t upset you?”
“Not at all.”
I answered without hesitation.
“Hmm.”
The duke suddenly fell silent.
He stared intently at me for a moment, as if deep in thought, before turning his gaze toward Adel.
“Adel, would you mind leaving us for a moment? I’d like to speak with Anastasia alone.”
I tilted my head in confusion, but I let Adel leave.
“See you later.”
“Understood.”
Even after I heard the door close, the duke didn’t say anything.
He merely seemed deeply absorbed in his thoughts, so I asked first.
“Is something troubling you?”
Worry clouded the duke’s blue eyes.
“If you don’t mind, could you tell me what you think of Adel?”
Although I was technically beneath the duke in status, he spoke gently. It didn’t seem as though he was simply trying to gauge our relationship.
What did I think of Adel?
He was the male lead, my friend, and also…
In this short life that I had been granted only about two more years to live, he was the one person I could trust enough to open my heart to without fear.
Sometimes I teased him for being stubborn and inflexible, but Adel really was kind.
When I asked him to come visit me, Adel had invested his precious time in me without even a moment’s hesitation.
He probably knew that it was like pouring water into a bottomless jar…
But when he treated me so gently, I couldn’t help but feel my heart flutter.
“Adel is someone precious to me.”
The words suddenly slipped out of my mouth.
The duke stroked his chin.
“That’s somewhat surprising. Whenever other people talk about Adel, they always describe him as a good and upright person. But you call him someone precious.”
Of course Adel was kind. But to me, he wasn’t simply a “good person.”
He had his awkward sides, was surprisingly innocent at times, and even knew how to feel wronged. He was just an ordinary boy.
The duke muttered as though he had made up his mind.
“I suppose I can tell you.”
He relaxed his posture. Leaning back against the sofa, he stretched out his legs and sighed.
“That boy lacks humanity. No, he tries. He really does. Very hard, in fact. But sometimes he just… misses the point.”
I could understand what he meant to some extent.
Adel could be quite stubborn at times.
He was rigid, inflexible, and so earnest that sometimes I wanted to grab him by the collar—and yet he could also be so cute that I wanted to bite him…
Gasp! What am I thinking?!
“There is such a thing as taking teaching a child to be unconditionally good too far. From a parent’s perspective, having a child who is too much of a model student can actually be frightening.”
I quietly listened to the duke.
Even in the novel, the duke and duchess had struggled while raising Adel. He was almost unbelievably well-behaved.
He didn’t cry or throw tantrums. It might have been convenient for a while, but eventually, any parent would start wondering whether something was wrong.
Being outside the normal range wasn’t necessarily something to be happy about.
The duke rubbed his forehead as though he had a headache.
“When Penelope was still with me, I was confident that even if we made mistakes along the way, we would be able to raise our child well. But now that she’s gone… honestly, I don’t have that confidence anymore. He’ll be an adult in just two years, yet I still don’t really understand that child.”
“I don’t think there’s anything particularly wrong with Adel.”
Adel’s mother, Penelope Magnus, had passed away three years ago. Around the same time, Anastasia had been diagnosed with an incurable illness.
Perhaps Adel’s obsessive insistence on hope was also connected to Penelope’s death.
Although the novel didn’t delve deeply into it because these events had happened in the past, Adel had been far too young to properly accept both his mother’s death and the diagnosis of his childhood friend, Anastasia.
“…Anastasia. The kindness he shows others is the result of what he’s been taught, and the reason he’s so polite and respectful toward everyone is because Penelope and I practically drilled those things into his head through sheer indoctrination. We figured that if the alternative was having him go around committing murders, we’d rather have him become excessively kind. Besides, with the wealth of our family, we can clean up almost anything as long as it isn’t treason. And I dislike blood.”
I was utterly bewildered.
“Adel would commit murder?”
“I was giving an example, but I can’t completely deny the possibility. In the past, Adel… No, perhaps it’s better to keep that a secret for now.”
The duke suddenly trailed off.
“The reason I’m telling you all this in such detail is because, apart from being a father worrying about his child like any ordinary parent, I think you should know. Don’t come telling me later that you were deceived.”
I couldn’t deny that I felt confused. I had never imagined that the duke thought of Adel this way.
Why? How?
The duke knew a side of Adel that I didn’t, and from what I’d read in the novel, he wasn’t someone who judged people carelessly. He was by no means an opponent to be taken lightly.
Yet this very man was saying that, out of concern for his son’s future, he had raised him to be almost excessively kind.
“My son is objectively perfect. Kind, merciful, intelligent. Even his appearance is flawless because he takes after me, so he’s practically a man without a single flaw. He’d give away even the last piece of bread to a beggar standing before him after going three days without food himself. That’s how I raised him. But an artificially created, unconditional virtuous nature isn’t necessarily a blessing. I’ve been involved in politics for twenty years now, haven’t I? From what I’ve observed over those years, people of that type can cause truly massive trouble once they finally snap.”
“You’re rather harsh.”
I couldn’t help muttering.
The duke gave me a smile whose meaning was impossible to read.
“Then again, there must be a reason I’m a duke.”
The duke gave me time to think by pretending to focus on his tea.
His blue eyes gleamed sharply. He seemed to be waiting for my answer, but I couldn’t bring myself to say anything carelessly.
How was I supposed to process the fact that he had deliberately instilled “goodness” in his son from an early age because he was afraid his child might grow into some cold-blooded psychopath who would become a murderer?
I was certainly taken aback, but I wasn’t particularly offended.
After all, the duke had clearly told me all of this out of goodwill. He genuinely cared about me.
Even though his method was blunt and ruthless, he was giving me a chance to be wary of Adel.
Duke Friedrich Magnus was a father, a shrewd businessman, and a politician. No one could match his ability to see through people.
I knew he wasn’t doing this to separate me from Adel.
My head was throbbing.
This made no sense.
No, I simply couldn’t accept it.
How was I supposed to take this…?
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