IATAOTHKG | CHAPTER 125

[CHAPTER 125]

As if a dam that had been forcibly blocked had collapsed, the words that had been pouring out all at once suddenly stopped because of a memory from some day in the past.

Banze had said.

“Sway as Caliph Lennox sways you.”

“……”

“Stop suppressing your emotions, Lady.”

“……”

“Be shaken. Faithfully.”

“……”

“Torment yourself several times a day. Was it good that I quit? Or should I go back to Caliph again? Go back and forth along the edge of your emotions. It would be even better if you cried along the way.”

In truth, the core of Banze’s advice had nothing to do with worries about being an aide.

It was not about Meyna’s aptitude or freedom either.

The core lay elsewhere.

It was also the reason she had decided to leave Caliph’s side.

“Quit. Just like you planned. And become Prince Biterion’s aide.”

“What?”

“You said you don’t know whether you love Sir Lennox or not. You also don’t know whether you like being an aide.”

“……”

“Try working with someone else. See if you feel the same.”

The reason she had kept him at a cold distance even after leaving Lennox Castle.

The single reason she had worked so hard to bring Biterion into the Ocean Agency and assist him.

“I’m scared, Teacher. I’m afraid that I really love Sir Lennox.”

“……”

“I’m afraid it started much earlier than I thought. That I wasn’t assisting him all this time, but loving him.”

Love.

Because of that long-standing emotion she had never once shown to Caliph.

She only realized it after leaving his side.

That she had loved him.

That she had not been supporting Caliph Lennox, the top-tier holy knight and star, but loving Caliph Lennox as a man and as a human being.

And that love for him had ended.

The moment he abandoned even the final stronghold that had supported him and the duty that had made him shine, the responsibility to save the empire and its citizens, and fell to rock bottom.

Her love for Caliph Lennox had ended.

She was sure it had ended, but…….

“Meyna.”

“……”

“Don’t cry.”

Why did her heart collapse like this in front of his cold 모습.

“Even if you cry in front of me, nothing will change.”

“Hic…….”

Meyna, who had been sobbing quietly for a while, staggered weakly.

Caliph, who almost reached out instinctively to support her, barely held onto the edge of his reason.

He had thought she was a woman without tears.

Even in situations where she could have cried, she always endured calmly and overcame what was given to her.

Even when she faced the danger of being sold to creditors, even when she was pushed into signing a contract, she had accepted her fate with composure.

Even on the day she threw down her resignation and left Lennox Castle, she had not shed a single tear in front of him.

After she suddenly awakened as a healing mage, he had had to watch her cry several times.

Unable to comfort her, only watching.

It pained him that he could not help even when he saw her suffering from helplessness, and he often could not believe that they had to enter dungeons together.

However, Caliph realized only a few days ago that all those painful feelings had actually been nothing.

The moment Meyna jumped into the flames of the curse on her own.

The moment she risked her life to save Biterion, Caliph realized it.

That excluding her from this training was not enough.

That he had to make sure she could never set foot again in this abandoned city and its life-or-death dungeons.

“At least tell me the reason.”

With eyes swollen enough to look pitiful, Meyna looked at Caliph as if begging.

“Why can’t I live as an ability user?”

Her desperate question, like someone clinging to a departing person’s pant leg, rode the damp night breeze and disturbed Caliph’s heart.

“Is it because I can’t handle mana properly? Because I’m lacking, because I cause trouble for the guild members?”

Caliph’s eyes twitched slightly.

“Because I recklessly tried to save His Highness without controlling my mana? Because I followed the children to the secret house without asking your permission?”

No, that was not it.

He wanted to grab her shoulders, shout at her, and tell her the truth as she hurt herself with self-blame.

Suppressing his surging emotions with difficulty, Caliph looked at Meyna with deep, calm eyes.

“You didn’t do anything wrong.”

“……”

“Following the children to the secret house without wasting time was the right decision. If you had hesitated to ask my permission, they would probably have died.”

They were not words of comfort.

Meyna had truly made the right choice and saved everyone.

“Not just the children. If you hadn’t told me what you saw at the secret house that day, we wouldn’t have found the dungeon core and sealed the gate safely.”

However, it seemed that Caliph’s sincere words no longer reached Meyna.

Caliph let out a short sigh.

“That works out.”

“……”

“We needed to talk about what happened in the dungeon anyway.”

After staring for a while at Meyna’s wet face blinking weakly, a fragment of laughter slipped silently from between Caliph’s lips.

His hollow gaze turned toward the lake.

“Why do people even have hearts?”

He thought he had only said it to himself.

The self-mocking words scattered into the air.

…If only I could throw my heart into the Lake of Oblivion.

If only I could erase the feelings I came to have for this woman, the feelings I realized too late, as if they had never existed.

If only I could make them be forgotten forever from this world…….

“Let’s go inside.”

Caliph, who gathered his painfully sharp emotions as if scraping his insides with a blade, gestured toward the hotel.

“There’s something important we need to talk about.”

After speaking like an order, he immediately turned his back and walked away.

Meyna, who felt dazed as if she had lost all will along with her strength, walked while looking at Caliph’s back, from which she could read no emotion.

* * *

The room the two had shared, which Meyna had used alone for two full days.

The first thing Caliph did was take off his suit jacket and hang it on the rack.

Then he pulled out a chair by the bedside table and sat down.

Meyna, who had been staring blankly at his troubled face as he pressed his brow, collapsed into the opposite chair.

“Tell me again what happened in the dungeon. Go over it carefully and see if you missed anything.”

He went straight to the point.

So this was the ‘important talk.’

After keeping his hand near his eyes for a long time as if calming his physical and emotional fatigue, Caliph looked at Meyna.

There was no trace of personal emotion in his resolute gaze.

Meyna understood.

That he had no intention of putting their private matters on this table.

He was speaking solely as the leader of the reconnaissance team.

It was the moment when her tearful outpouring of raw emotions became meaningless.

“Where did you go after meeting the children?”

It was something she had already told him in the dungeon.

Though his question sounded like he was checking unclear memories, his real intention lay elsewhere.

His face resembled that of a detective interrogating a suspect in a closed room.

His cold gaze demanded clearer information from Meyna.

As if instructing her to retrace anything she had missed.

“Let me organize my thoughts for a moment.”

Caliph nodded lightly in permission.

As Meyna carefully recalled that day, her gaze fell on her right hand.

She cautiously lifted her palm to check it so he wouldn’t see, but there was no trace of anything.

Do I have to be honest about this too?

…No, why should I?

A misguided thought raised its head.