NOVEL NEXT Chapter 21
Chesha looked at Kiern with a slightly puzzled look.
‘Ah’, he said softly and rummaged through his pockets.
“Zhesha, my cute Zhesha. Should I give you some cookies?”
After rummaging around slowly, he pulled out a small thing.
“You like this, right?”
It was a cookie that looked like it was just bought on impulse from a bakery.
The cake wrapped in beautiful wrapping paper was damaged at the corner.
Kiern, who placed the cookie in Chesha’s hand, put on a very proud expression.
Thanks to this, Chesha could be sure.
‘He’s drunk.’
Come to think of it, the smell of alcohol had already been wafting from Count Rudin’s house earlier.
‘But he doesn’t seem drunk in front of Count Rudin.’
Kiern acted clearly, although he seemed slightly more languid than usual.
Sarcastically controlling Count Rudin’s mind, and even making him hang a rope around his neck with his own hands.
It was brutal in a way that even Chesha, who had seen all the atrocities in the Underworld, admired.
Without any bloodshed and thanks to conclude the incident as a suicide, Kiern was not accused of being the perpetrator.
‘I was going to give it as food for the people-eating flowers.’
Thanks to him, she managed to clean it up, though.
Anyway, she never thought that he was drunk in the process.
He might have been holding it tight, then loosening up as he reached the house he thought was safe.
‘I don’t think he has a weak alcohol tolerance.’
What was he doing before killing Count Rudin?
It must have had something to do with why he had been out late at night lately.
Making some guesses, Chesha rustled the cookie bag.
The bag of cookies shrunk when it was in Kiern’s hand, but in Chesha’s hand it was a little big.
She gave him a belated reply.
“I like cookiez.”
“Right? Dad was thinking of Chesha, so I bought it.”
Kiern giggled, looking happy.
She remembered what Kiern had said to Count Rudin.
“My little daughter is also waiting for me at home.”
She didn’t know that he would be saying that she was his daughter even when she wasn’t there.
Even bringing cookies while drunk.
Him, who was a terrifying executioner to Count Rudin, just behaved softly in front of Chesha.
His attitude made Chesha feel strange again.
It was similar to what she felt when she came out of the study after soothing Belzeon.
It felt like the inside of her heart was tickling.
“I’m glad Chesha likes it.”
With a loose smile, Kiern let out a sigh full of alcohol.
“Ah, I’m tired….”
He said he had a lot of work today, and he acted like the head of a household who worked until dawn.
‘Yeah…. He did work, though.’
Killing people was definitely tiring.
Honestly, she didn’t expect him to come to kill Count Rudin himself.
She thought he was only focusing on reviving his dead wife, and paying little attention to the affairs of the Count of Basilian.
‘Is he pretending not to be and secretly taking care of it?’
It was plausible to see that he ran like crazy as soon as the children were insulted and blew away Count Rudin’s life.
‘He works hard anyway.’
Chesha said, patting her hand on his forearm.
“Go to zleep quickly.”
“Yeah, let’s go to sleep.”
Kiern yawned and set Chesha down on the bed.
Then, slowly, he changed into pajamas.
In the meantime, Chesha put the cookie that was given to her next to the pillow.
It would be nice to eat with the twins during tea time after breakfast tomorrow.
Soon Kiern came into bed.
Lying on the bed, he picked up Chesha and placed her on his chest.
Chesha was placed on top of Kiern like a small loaf of bread.
It must have been funny how they were sticking together flat, so Kiern smiled as he quietly raised the corners of his mouth.
He said he was tired, and as if he had no intention of going to sleep soon, he played with Chesha’s hair with his fingers.
After that, he even touched her eyelashes.
When she narrowed her eyes in embarrassment, he smiled.
“How dare he insult Basilian? I killed him too easily.”
It was a sudden word, but Chesha could easily see that it was a word referring to Count Rudin.
Instead of giggling, Kiern suddenly let out a long breath.
“Dad is a bit strange today…. Sorry. I should have been drinking in moderation. I got drunk when I got home.”
Chesha looked at him.
A dark bedroom, a space where only the gentle moonlight illuminates each other.
Bright red eyes alone in the darkness of dawn when everything is unclear.
Blood red eyes, the trademark of the Basilian family.
The red eyes, which gave a sense of intimidation to whoever saw it, would prevent them from making eye contact.
These were the eyes that looked best when they were shining with arrogant malice.
However, Chesha saw a boy crying with the same eyes as his.
He was a boy who persevered through anything.
The boy who behaved coldly in everything collapsed in one piece with the comfort given by an innocent baby.
The red eyes of the boy who cried while holding a lily of the valley….
Would it be too much of an illusion if it looked similar to Chesha’s eyes now?
Strangely indeed, it dawned on her that he seemed to want to cry too.
Kiern, who had been eyeing Chesha for a while, opened his mouth.
“Chesha.”
His thin lips moved slowly.
“Chesha Basilian.”
It was a call that was a reminder for Chesha and himself.
He smiled and buried his lips in Chesha’s forehead.
The painstaking pressing and releasing movement was incongruously reverent.
Kiern let out a self-deprecating laugh.
“What should I do? I keep thinking of you when I see Chesha. So hard but so good….”
He paused.
It was an attempt to calm the rising emotions, but it didn’t do much.
Drunk, loose lips let out a lonely murmur.
“I miss you….”
Chesha stopped breathing without realizing it because of the deep feelings that were revealed at first glance.
It was a time when she forgot to breathe and became stiff.
Kiern slowly closed his eyes.
Closed eyelids do not open again.
He fell asleep.
As soon as she saw the man in a deep sleep, Chesha let out a breath she had been holding back.
‘What a surprise.’
The man who suspected many things had not given Chesha complete trust.
Nonetheless, at this moment.
It must have been so painful that he couldn’t stand it without leaning on her while revealing his true feelings to Chesha.
She didn’t even have to guess who it was he said he missed.
It was the dead countess.
There was no trace of the dead countess left in the Count of Basilian’s family.
Not to mention that there were no portraits or mementos, the employees didn’t say a word about the dead countess.
It was dismissed as a taboo existence.
The three brothers rarely talked about their mother, and neither did Kiern.
But as for Chesha.
Very occasionally he would mention the Countess.
‘Last time under the flower tree in the imperial palace, too.’
Chesha exclaimed and pouted her lips.
‘If we look alike, how similar are we?’
Still, she doesn’t feel bad or anything like that.
When he called her Chesha Basilian, something a little….
‘It really makes me feel like we’ve become a family.’
Chesha shook her head inwardly at the thought that came to her mind.
As she hung out with the Basilians these days, she seemed to keep forgetting that it was a temporary job.
Chesha pinched her cheek with her finger.
After pulling and releasing it, unnecessary thoughts disappeared.
After confirming that Kiern was completely asleep, Chesha cautiously got up.
And quietly went down the bed.
She was sure he wouldn’t wake up tonight.
Chesha gently raised her strength.
Flowers and butterflies wrapped around her body and moved to Kiern’s study.
It’s a place she usually comes in and out, so she had a good idea of what was where.
‘I’ve already searched the desk.’
In the snake castle, and in the townhouse.
She has already looked at all the good places.
Chesha stared at the bookshelf with a serious expression.
She had been suspicious of it, since Kiern seemed to be staying in the study for a long time, but she hadn’t had a chance to look into it.
Because it was time consuming.
She put her hands together and spread them out to the side.
Hundreds of butterflies came to life in an instant and flapped their wings all over the office.
Butterflies clung to the books on the bookshelf in groups of three or four.
And began to look through hundreds of books at the same time.
After waiting, the butterflies brought Chesha a book.
Inside the leather-covered books were several sheets of paper.
The book was thrown on the floor, and Chesha grabbed the paper and read it.
“…!”
And her eyes widened.
The written on paper is.
‘Isn’t this about me?!’
It was a report about the witch fairy Richesia.