Acidity of Regret Ch 69
- Jan 23
- 7 min read
He fought to deny the reality before him, but then Vanessa reached out and feebly gripped his collar. Though her trembling touch was weak, it held him fast, leaving him momentarily paralyzed as if he were bound by iron chains.
Then, words sharper than any blade spilled from her lips, piercing his chest like a dagger.
[Vanessa] "I understand, so..."
She seemed to agree that he had been the one to bring her to this state. She pleaded with him to stop talking, if only for a moment, until the physician arrived.
He had to find a way to make her stop speaking. Every time she forced her mouth open, the hot liquid beneath his palms surged and pulsed. The sensation was so cruel and terrifying that it made his blood run cold.
[Declan] "Vanessa, please..."
[Vanessa] "I curse myself... for falling in love with you."
Even as she gradually lost her warmth, she seemed determined to force her poisonous truth upon him.
The moment he heard love and a curse joined in a single sentence, he gasped for air. It felt as if his heart and lungs were being crushed simultaneously under a heavy weight.
Tears streamed down his frozen cheeks. As the pooled moisture fell away, his vision cleared slightly, but it only allowed him to see her tragic and mournful state more vividly.
Her eyes began to drift shut as if she were losing the will to stay. Only then did an end he had never considered—or rather, one he had desperately denied—begin to haunt his mind.
That strange, frantic heartbeat he had felt long ago when he opened the door to his mother's bedroom began to throb in his chest once more. His hands shook with a sense of déjà vu, as if the horrific scene of the past were repeating itself.
[Declan] "No, no. Please..."
He shook his head like a madman. The slender, fragile body in his arms was losing its warmth, degree by degree. He could feel the change so clearly that goosebumps broke out along his spine.
Eventually, the white fingers that had been barely clinging to his collar slipped away.
The moment her hand, covered in crimson stains, finally crashed to the floor, His heart tumbled into a dark abyss. Although the bedroom was a chaotic blur of people and noise, he could no longer perceive any of it.
[Shiron] "Master!"
The physician, brought by the knight, rushed to her knees to examine Vanessa’s condition.
Had he been in his right mind, Declan would have erupted in a lethal fury, demanding to know why the physician had taken so long to arrive. However, he was so far gone that he lacked even that much reason.
The examination did not take long. The physician’s expression stiffened as she checked the pulse points multiple times. Slowly, she released the wrist she had been holding as desperately as Declan, her face filling with deep regret.
[Physician] "I am afraid it is too late to do anything."
[Declan] "..."
[Physician] "She has already... stopped breathing."
A desperate silence followed the words the physician could not finish.
Declan, who had been sitting as motionless as a rooted tree, suddenly let out a hollow laugh.
[Declan] "No."
[Physician] "..."
[Declan] "You are wrong. Check again."
[Physician] "Your Grace..."
[Declan] "I was... I was stopping the bleeding, so she must still be fine. Check again, quickly. Do something. Anything!"
His raspy voice was full of denial, yet the emotion behind it was raw and agonized, as if he already knew the truth.
The physician could only look at him in silence. The resignation in her eyes felt like a death sentence to him.
He ground his teeth and stood up abruptly, cradling his limp wife. Everyone gasped at his unexpected movement as he hurried to the bed and lay her down. His hand still gripped her neck tightly.
[Declan] "Bring bandages. I must stop the bleeding from the open wound."
[Physician] "Your Grace...."
[Declan] "She lost a lot of blood, but she’ll be fine. She has to be. Ah, yes. Send word to the Kingdom of Garten immediately. If they can use magic to treat her..."
[Physician] "No matter how miraculous magic may be, it cannot bring back a life that has already ended."
The physician spoke with her hands clasped together, her face a mask of mourning.
Declan, who had been acting as if his wife were still alive, suddenly froze.
The physician, standing outside the bed curtains, flinched as his dark, ominous gaze slowly drifted back to her.
[Declan] "Dead?"
[Physician] "..."
[Declan] "Who says she’s dead?"
In truth, everyone in the room agreed with the physician, but no one dared to speak a word against the Grand Duke’s lethal aura.
Under his strict orders, the physician was forced to sew the wound and wrap bandages around the neck of the late Grand Duchess. Afterward, the maids changed her blood-stained dress for a pure white nightgown.
Everyone remained silent, but a heavy air of grief floated through the room like dust. The atmosphere in the bedroom continued to sink into a deep depression.
The Grand Duke did not leave the bedroom for three days.
He ignored his meals, which were brought three times a day, and the mountain of paperwork waiting for him. He remained locked in that vast space.
The butler, growing increasingly anxious, knocked on the door every day, but received no response. Having seen the tragic consequences of such a locked door during the time of the previous Grand Duchess, the butler was sick with worry.
Left with no other choice, he requested help from Julian Quasar, the Grand Duke's close friend. Since the servants could not act on their own, the Count was the only person who could speak to Declan without reservation.
Upon hearing of the situation, Julian hurried to the Grand Duke’s castle.
When he finally opened the door that none of the servants could, the bedroom was filled with a sweltering heat, as if it were the height of summer.
Julian stopped just inside the room.
Declan was sitting vacantly at the edge of the bed. His complexion was so dark that he looked like a man on the verge of death himself. Startled by the lack of life in his expression, Julian rushed forward and grabbed his shoulder.
[Julian] "Declan."
[Declan] "...Damn it. She’s too cold."
[Julian] "What?"
Declan was repeatedly rubbing the back of the woman’s limp hand. The movement was so persistent and obsessive that it looked pathological.
[Declan] "She won't get warm. Her body temperature won't return."
Julian noticed Declan’s eyes, which had completely lost their focus, and he slowly turned his head. When he finally looked at the bed behind the curtains, a chill ran down his spine.
The Grand Duchess, whose hand and wrist Declan was rubbing, was undeniably dead. The greatest proof was her face, which was even more lifeless than Declan’s. It had moved past mere paleness to a state that clearly showed life had long since departed.
Holding that corpse, this man was waiting for her to regain the warmth of the living.
[Julian] "Are you mad? Have you lost your mind?"
Horrified, Julian tried to pull him up. But Declan shoved him away with violent force and clung to his dead wife again.
He seemed desperate, as if he believed that if he stopped generating friction for even a moment, she would finally die.
[Julian] "Declan!"
[Declan] "Let go of me!"
Suddenly, Julian’s head spun. Declan had thrown a punch at the friend who was trying to stop him. Because he was not in his right mind, he hadn't restrained his strength; Julian’s cheekbone throbbed with a sharp, stinging pain.
[Declan] "Get out. Don't interfere."
[Julian] "...You."
He had completely lost his reason. He was like a beast guarding its fallen master, ready to bite anyone who dared to touch him. Since his lethal aura left no room for escape, Julian had no choice but to retreat for the moment.
Even Julian, the final hope, could not stop him.
Once everyone had left and he was alone again, Declan returned to his task as if nothing had happened. However, his mind was starting to fray. Julian's intrusion had brought back a tiny, agonizing sliver of sanity.
It wasn't that he realized he was acting like a madman, but rather... the fact that her hand remained freezing despite his efforts was finally starting to sink in.
[Declan] "No. I told you no. I said no..."
He spoke to the empty room as if someone were there, reminding him of her death. He continued to deny it, but his hands eventually stopped their rubbing.
His pupils, clouded as if by thick storm clouds, traced the memories of a day long ago.
It was the day he had been the first to discover his mother's tragic death. The moment he opened the door. The moment he saw the upturned chair. The moment he saw those slender toes hanging from the ceiling. The moment he pulled the body down with his own hands...
The chilling coldness he had felt so vividly against his fingertips back then was now present in his wife's body. The aura of death. The undeniable proof that someone had crossed the twilight and vanished from this world.
It was flowing out of Vanessa. Though he had added heat to the room over and over, her soul was departing as if nothing could hold it back.
His eyes, red from broken capillaries, grew unbearably hot. Though he denied it in his mind, his heart throbbed violently as if it had already accepted the truth.
Ah, once the truth was faced, it shook every reality he had been trying to push away. The shock left his entire body paralyzed and weak.
His body, which had not slept for days, finally reached its limit and leaned over her. He felt an aching pain in his limbs, as if poison were spreading through his veins. A sharp, continuous agony bloomed in his chest like a massive bruise.
His tears left marks on the dress the maids had put on her.
Three days.
It had been three days since Vanessa had made that terrible attempt on the terrace.
Was I too late to catch her?
He had already lost his mother once because he missed the chance to hold on.
[Duchess] “If you go, I might die of loneliness.”
He had only looked away for a moment, but the time his mother had granted him was even shorter than that. Because of that, he had been unable to leave Vanessa's side for even a second. He was terrified she would die the moment he looked away.
But she showed no sign of life, as if she had never been caught by him in the first place.
[Vanessa] “I will get out of here. I will not stay by your side. Ever.”
Why did those words return to him now?
Only now, when resignation was washing over him like a dark tide...
The moment his tear-soaked eyelids finally closed, he slipped into unconsciousness.
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