Chapter 198 - MERIT CEREMONY (1) (1/2)

“Ah.”

She slowly opened her eyes and let out a blank voice.

Because she was actually in a stupor.

“…lia…?”

She heard a voice in her ear, but she couldn’t understand it properly because her head was in a daze.

As her blurred vision gradually turned clear, Cordelia blinked a few more times.

“…ss?”

The voice became more audible. At the same time, Cordelia felt thirsty. Her mouth was dry, and it was difficult to swallow her saliva.

“Haa.”

She let out her breath after she groaned.

Her vision still felt cloudy, but she could somehow see ahead of her.

An unfamiliar ceiling.

But it wasn’t completely unfamiliar. She felt like she had seen something similar to it.

The ceiling had a flashy and luxurious feeling.

Where did I see it?

Duke Spencer’s mansion?

My room in the royal palace?

“Miss! Can you hear me?!”

The voice.

Cordelia shifted her blue eyes and saw.

The teary-eyed Dahlia was beside her.

“Dahlia…?”

As soon as she spoke while struggling a bit with her pronunciation, a response came back.

“Yes, Miss. It’s me. It’s Dahlia. Are you awake? Are you okay?”

Cordelia nodded a few times at the other’s fervent response. Frankly, she was still in a daze and didn’t know what was happening, but she didn’t want to worry Dahlia.

“Wate…”

“Water? Please wait, Miss. I’ll give it to you right away.”

Dahlia immediately answered at the words she mumbled, and after raising Cordelia’s upper body halfway up, she grabbed a cup with her empty hand.

“Here it is, Miss. Slowly. Slowly.”

Cordelia still had a blank face because she didn’t have much strength in her body, so Dahlia brought the cup to Cordelia’s lips and tilted it slowly, and Cordelia closed her eyes and drank the water like a baby.

Slowly but steadily.

“Fuuaa.”

After drinking all the water, Cordelia opened her eyes again. Although she was still lacking in energy, she felt a bit refreshed when she moistened her dry throat.

“Ah…uh…”

“Are you feeling better now?”

“Yes…”

“I’ll lay you down again. Slowly.”

Dahlia gently whispered and laid Cordelia down very carefully, and Cordelia opened her lips after closing her eyes tightly.

“Ah.”

Aaaaah.

Huuu.

She felt like the water she had just drank was circulating in her body.

Her blurred vision finally became clear.

“Dah…lia?”

“Yes, Miss. It’s Dahlia.”

Dahlia grabbed Cordelia’s hand and smiled with a tearful face.

Since she was a knight, Dahlia’s hands were rough but warm.

Cordelia somehow felt better and grinned, and she soon realized.

Dahlia’s hand.

What about Jude’s hand then?

“Jude?!”

Cordelia became conscious and shouted, sitting up and reflexively raising her right hand.

Her hand had always held Jude’s hand, but it was alone now.

“Jude.”

She remembered it.

She recalled it.

The last situation before she lost consciousness.

After all sorts of hardships, they defeated the Lord Protector and then she talked with Jude with their eyes.

They threw up blood and fell into a deep sleep while holding each other’s hands.

And now.

She didn’t see Jude. That fact made Cordelia very worried.

“What about Jude? Where is Jude? Is Jude okay?”

As she poured out words and tried to get out of the bed, Dahlia hurriedly stretched her hands and pressed on Cordelia’s shoulders.

She said as she softly smiled to reassure her.

“Lord Jude is okay too. He’s resting in another room now.”

“Another room?”

“Yes, another room. Please don’t worry since Maja is taking care of him.”

“Maja.”

Jude’s exclusive maid.

A person who was not just a servant for Jude, but was like a real sister to him.

“Haa.”

Cordelia let out her breath, and Dahlia asked as she carefully laid her down again.

“Have you calmed down?”

“Eh? Yes. Uh-huh.”

From her answer, it seemed like she had not yet completely calmed down, but Dahlia was satisfied for now. She held Cordelia’s hand and continued.

“He’s really okay. So please don’t worry.”

“Okay.”

Because Dahlia never lied.

Moreover, Jude had absorbed the Sphere of Life and boasted about it whenever he had a chance. He was a guy with a regenerative ability that was better than Cordelia’s, so he should be fine and not in poor health.

“Haa.”

That’s a relief.

I’m really, really glad.

Cordelia sighed in relief again before she turned her eyes and looked at Dahlia.

“Is Dahlia okay?”

“Me?”

“Yes.”

Dahlia was also in the grand banquet hall.

“I’m okay. Count Chase protected everyone.”

“Father?”

“Yes, not only did he support with his magic the palace that was destroyed, but he also defeated the zombies and traitors. Without the count, many people would have died or be injured by the collapsing palace.”

At Dahlia’s explanation, Cordelia slightly smiled.

Because she was proud of her father.

“But you’re not hurt anywhere, right?”

“Yes, I’m not. So please don’t worry about me.”

“Okay, I won’t be worried.”

When Cordelia faintly smiled, Dahlia also brightly smiled.

“By the way, Dahlia.”

“Yes, Miss.”

“How long have I been asleep?”

“Two full days.”

“Eh?”

Cordelia was surprised and unconsciously asked again.

Two days?

Not half a day or a day, but two days?

“Yes, I’ve been worried about you not waking up for two days. Everyone around me said that it was fine because you were so tired that you fell into a deep sleep, but… But it’s not normal to sleep for two days straight.”

“Indeed.”

Cordelia nodded her head and looked back at herself.

She was wearing a white and loose dress that seemed comfortable and resembled a patient’s clothing.

“Let me check for a moment.”

Cordelia briefly said and closed her eyes, checking out her body’s condition.

By lightly circulating her mana, she was able to know her condition.

‘My mana has been exhausted.’

Perhaps when she released that last divine lightning, all the mana in her body was released too.

Add to that was her physical fatigue, so it was understandable for her to sleep for two days.

“Are you all right?”

“Yeah, I’m fine now.”

It wouldn’t originally take two days of sleep to recover her depleted mana, but it seemed to have somehow recovered due to the increase in her angel rank.

“Dahlia, what about the others?”

She was not only worried about Jude.

There were a lot of people she was worried about too.

To the extent that she didn’t know who she should ask about first.

At Cordelia’s somewhat awkward question, Dahlia replied with a smile.

“I’ll tell you about the royal family first.”

“Okay.”

They were the most important people in this fight.

“His Majesty The King and the three queens are all safe. Crown Princess Daphne, Prince Dion, and Princess Darianne are also safe.”

Cordelia breathed in relief at Dahlia’s statement.

In fact, she wanted to slightly question if Crown Princess Daphne was really fine since her right hand was cut off, but it wasn’t life-threatening anyway, so it was good news to her.

‘She’s royalty, so she can have it reattached with healing magic.’

Her severed hand was surely at the scene.

“What about father? I mean, my father.”

Instead of immediately answering Cordelia’s question, Dahlia laughed ‘Ufufu’ before she furtively smiled and teased her.

“Miss, your father? Or his father?”

“F-father is father, whyyy?”

Dahlia giggled as Cordelia responded with a slight blush on her face.

T/N: The father part here is a wordplay in the formal and informal ways of calling your dad in Korean. ‘Abeoji’ is the informal/casual way of calling your own dad. ‘Abeonim’ is the formal way of calling your own dad, but it is also used to refer to a friend or someone else’s dad.

So when Cordelia asked, ‘what about father?’, she used the formal ‘abeonim’ but corrected it later to the informal ‘abeoji’, which is ‘my father’ because she was only referring to her own father. But Dahlia teasingly asked Cordelia if she was referring to Jude’s dad (because ‘abeonim’ could be used to refer to someone else’s dad or your father-in-law) or her own father (Count Chase). Dahlia used both ‘abeonim’ in her question of ‘your father or his father’.

Dahlia was subtly teasing Cordelia if she was only interested in Jude’s father because of Jude, even though Dahlia knew that Cordelia was only referring to her own father. Cordelia replied that she was only interested in her own father, but that blush on her face hinted that she understood what Dahlia was teasing her about.

“Miss.”

“Why?”

“Can I pinch your cheek? You’re so cute that I want to pinch it.”

“No.”

“Why? Because it belongs to Lord Jude?”

“Yes- NO! Why are you mentioning Jude!”

“You asked about his father, right? And you unconsciously answered ‘yes,’ right?”

“No, I did not, okay? My cheeks are mine, okay? It doesn’t belong to Jude, okay?”

“Then, can I pinch it?”

“No! Why aren’t you listening to me!”

As Cordelia became annoyed, Dahlia chuckled again.

“Miss is so cute.”

“Dahlia is not cute at all.”

“Really? Is that really true?”

“Ueueue… Why are you doing this to me? Why?”

Cordelia asked if she was crying, Dahlia replied with a smile.

“Because I like miss so much. Plus, you’re so cute. It’s not my fault but my lady’s fault for being cute, okay? Who said that you can be so cute?”

“Dahlia has become weird.”

What’s wrong with you today?

When Cordelia was at a loss on what to do, Dahlia giggled for the last time before she corrected her expression.

“Anyway, this is enough… let’s go back to the main point. Does miss like me too?”

“I hate Dahlia.”

“I like my lady.”

She had been really worried for the past two days.

So she was really happy to see Cordelia open her eyes.

Dahlia continued as she stroked Cordelia’s hands.

“Both Count Bayer and Count Chase are safe. They both did very well in this incident.”

Count Bayer defeated First Sword, one of the traitors, and Count Chase saved everyone in the grand banquet hall.

A catastrophe would have occurred if neither of the two were there.

“Haa… That’s a relief.”

Because her father-in-law was safe.

She was honestly worried since First Sword was his opponent.

“Because Count Bayer is strong. It seems like he wasn’t overwhelmed at all by First Sword… that traitor, I’ll rip him into shreds.”

Dahlia’s voice was mixed with various emotions.

When she talked about Count Bayer, she was proud of him as if he had already become a family member of theirs, and when she talked about First Sword, she revealed her blatant hatred for him.

‘I guess they all know now.’

Two days had already passed.

Everyone must have already exchanged information to figure out the full situation.

‘But it’s kind of… shocking.’

She had never thought that First Sword was a traitor.

‘I never even imagined it.’

He had always been kind to Jude and Cordelia.

Above all, there was no story of a traitor in the game.

‘But that did not mean there was no traitor.’

First Sword only existed in the background setting, so there were still a lot of things they didn’t know about.

‘Hmm… If I think about it, he might have faked his death and was not actually killed by one of the 7 major calamities.’

And after that, he might have changed his name to his demonic human name like the other Ten Great Swordmasters who were traitors too.

“Haaaa.”

Either way, it was something unpleasant.

Furthermore, when she heard the story from Dahlia, it seemed like First Sword had escaped.

“What about unnie? What about brother-in-law Gaël?”

Instead of answering Cordelia question right away, Dahlia shrank her lips and spoke in a cautious tone.

“First of all… Adelia-nim is safe. She was really exhausted, but she wasn’t that hurt.”

Cordelia was relieved to hear that Adelia was safe, but she did not breathe in relief for now.

Because she felt like there was something wrong with Gaël with the way Dahlia talked.

“As for Lord Gaël… his life is not in danger.”

“Life…?”

“Yes, he was a bit… he was hurt a lot. He had a lot of injuries all over his body, and he lost his left arm.”

Cordelia blinked her eyes.