The Male Lead Is Obsessed With My Health – Chapter 163

Author: Asternkm

The beginning of an old nightmare is always the same. A grand piano left standing all alone.

When I closed my eyes, I could smell the resin scent I’d grown sick of. And when I opened them again, a violin and bow were already in my hands.

Then—click—the lights turned on, and the scenery changed.

A grand hall.

The seats that should have been packed with an audience were empty, and at the judges’ table sat only one person, elegantly poised.

Mom.

“Mom wants our daughter to become…….”

Mom was a beautiful person.

It wasn’t a distorted, sorrowful kind of praise like a child idolizing their mother.

Mom was beautiful and talented, and I was a daughter who seemed to have inherited all of that perfectly.

“Mom believes in our daughter.”

Yes, a daughter who had inherited all of your talent.

“Mom believes you can fulfill Mom’s dream.”

“I believe.”

“You can do it, right?”

A piano without an accompanist began to play. Familiar music echoed through the hall. Memories I had stopped and tried to forget came rushing back all at once.

I couldn’t lift my bow.

On a stage where only the piano accompaniment rang out, missing the notes the strings were supposed to fill, I just stood there, unable to do anything.

Staring at only one person.

“Mom…….”

She was too far away.

So far that I couldn’t even see what kind of expression Mom was making. I couldn’t tell.

“Mom…….”

Why did you do that to me? What was I to you? Did you love me at all?

Do you still love me?

The words I couldn’t bring myself to ask were still piled up inside me. Unresolved feelings were knotted tightly within.

“Mom…….”

But before all of that—

Longing.

“Mom…….”

I missed you.

“Mom…….”

Are you leaving?

Are you going to leave me alone again?

“Mom, Mom…….”

Don’t go.

Don’t leave me alone.

“Mom…….”

Please.

Don’t leave me alone.

I had to say it—I had to tell you not to go—but my throat felt blocked tight, and no words would come out.

The only words that escaped were calls for Mom.

Is it happening again?

Am I losing you again?

Am I being left alone again?

In this cruel, terrible darkness, alone again…….

“Shh, it’s okay.”

That was when I heard it—a voice that was familiar, yet unfamiliar. A strange hand holding my outstretched one.

“Mom…….”

“Yeah, I won’t go. I’ll stay right here.”

Mom?

The hand patting my back was clumsy, but very gentle.

“Mom…….”

The hand holding mine was so warm, and the hand patting me was so, so gentle, that without realizing it, I think I relaxed.

For the first time since I started having this nightmare, I fell asleep peacefully.

And when I opened my eyes—

“……Huh.”

Mehen was in front of me.

****

“…….”

Huh?

“…….”

“……Mom?”

Why is Mehen here?

“I’m not your mom.”

Maybe because it was someone I never expected to see, my brain froze.

“…….”

A deathly silence. I tried to understand the situation.

Mehen holding me, and my hand gripping his clothes.

……Let’s stop figuring it out there.

“Are you feeling okay?”

A low, tired voice spoke. Even as he brushed back his hair, Mehen carefully and thoroughly checked my condition.

His long eyelashes and light green eyes reflected the sunlight streaming in, glowing gold.

Wow… he really is delicately handsome.

Maybe because fatigue softened his mood, the sharp impression I was used to felt dulled. It was a face I saw often, yet it felt different.

“Mom…….”

Did Mehen… stay with me the whole time?

Mehen flinched as he raised his hand to check the heat on my forehead.

“I’m a man.”

“Mom.”

“…….”

I thought it was Mom.

But it wasn’t again. Was I alone after all?

As tears welled up in my eyes, Mehen panicked. I wasn’t trying to trouble him on purpose.

It was just…….

It was just that things like this always broke me down.

“Your fever has gone down, at least…….”

Mehen glanced at my hand clutching his clothes, looking troubled, then let out a sigh.

“Mom, Mom…….”

Watching me repeat the same words like a broken record, Mehen frowned deeply.

“My lady.”

“Mom…….”

“Lady Arellin.”

“Mom…….”

“Haah.”

Mehen let out a deep sigh.

“All right. What does a title even matter? Call me whatever you want.”

That’s strange.

Why is he being this gentle?

The Mehen I know isn’t this kind. I thought he’d push me away, but instead he told me to call him whatever I wanted.

“Mom…….”

“…….”

He looks troubled, but he doesn’t push me away either. That felt so strange it made my throat tighten.

Why?

“Mehen, you don’t like me.”

“……I don’t dislike you.”

“You do.”

“I don’t disli—haah.”

Mehen made a frustrated face and roughly ran a hand through his hair.

“How could someone like me dislike you, my lady?”

“You’re lying.”

“I’m not.”

“You frowned.”

He froze.

“You said I was a nuisance.”

“…….”

“You wanted to get rid of me, didn’t you?”

Mehen’s brow furrowed. The hand reaching toward me hesitated. When I lifted my lowered gaze, my eyes met his.

As he slightly lowered his eyes, an emotion I couldn’t name surfaced in his light green pupils.

A slightly twisted expression, troubled eyes—and yet those green eyes trembled faintly, like they were hurt.

I had never seen Mehen make that kind of expression before.

“I was just…….”

This meticulous man couldn’t even deny my words and pressed his lips together, like a prisoner awaiting execution.

“Haah.”

A sigh full of distress.

I should be trying to be cute, yet here I am throwing a tantrum like this. I sighed at my own pettiness.

But if I was going to end up alone anyway, it was better to be alone from the start.

Even as I told myself that, I saw my hand stubbornly gripping Mehen’s clothes—but I pressed my lips shut.

“My lady.”

“…….”

“Lady Arellin.”

“…….”

“Arel.”

“……!”

Startled by the unfamiliar nickname, I reflexively looked up. Eyes tinged with pale gold in the morning sunlight were looking down at me.

Sharp eyes as ever, eyes that seemed troubled—yet somewhere in them was a gentleness that held me in place.

Seeing me shrink back, he wrinkled his nose as if troubled, then sighed.

“Arel.”

Mehen’s large, delicate hand came into view. A gentle, warm, clumsy hand rested on my head.

“Wow, I want one too. Can we buy one as well?”
“If you have enough money, probably.”
“…….”

At the mention of money, the lounge fell into instant solemn silence.
Just then, a new mage entered the lounge. Hege, looking tired, gathered the mages together.

“The investigation results from the last capital terror incident are out.”

“Finally?!”

Albert, whose major institutions had been attacked, had been conducting its own investigation, but the Mage Tower—where even a high-ranking mage had been kidnapped—hadn’t been idle either.

They had only been delayed a little because they were chasing after Arellin.

In any case, Hege got straight to announcing the results.

“What we expected was correct. The culprits behind the terror were defectors.”

Sighs escaped from all around.

“And our concerns have become reality. There is a very high chance that the suspicion—that the defectors have found a way to accelerate the contamination—is true.”

Muti, the mage who had barely survived thanks to Arellin’s grace right before going berserk, nodded with a grave expression.

Everyone’s faces darkened.

“They’re insane.”

“They’re mages themselves.”

This was the fundamental reason why the high-ranking mages had been so desperate in chasing Arellin, and why they had rushed to sign Halbern’s unfair contract without hesitation.

“So, that means we—”

“We need to treat Halbern better.”

“……?”

A moment of silence hung in the air.

“So what’s the conclusion?”

Everyone looked dumbfounded, but not a single mage objected to or argued against it.

“Hah, you idiots. I’ve already bet my entire fortune on Miss Arellin!”

“Hehe. Don’t you see these scrying orbs? I’m a hardcore fan of Miss Arellin. From today on, any attack on Arellin will be considered an attack on me.”

“Ah, you fools.”

In the past, it might have been different when there was no solution—but as long as they had the cheat key called Arellin, they were invincible.

“So, by the way, how is Miss Arellin’s condition? Do we have any idea what she’s actually sick from?”

At the newly raised topic, a mage who had been quietly listening to others talk until now lifted their head.

“Well, first of all, it’s not an illness.”

“Not an illness?”

The mages, who had thought it was a rare disease, voiced their doubts.

Halli, the mage with especially deep dark circles, downed a stamina potion in one go and spoke.

“It’s hard to analyze because the authority of the Immortal is protecting her, and even aside from that, everything about it is incredibly complex, so we can’t be certain, but……”

“That’s a long introduction. So is it a curse?”

“No, it’s not a curse either.”

“Then what is it?”

The mages’ gazes gathered. With everyone’s attention on her, Hilla chose her words carefully before answering.

“It seems like a kind of… side effect.”

“?”

“Like… the price you pay for having power that’s too strong?”

“……?”

****

“Dad is hurt.”

Was it really that shocking to rank lower in affection than Pession? Dad spent the whole day launching emotional attacks with his face.

It was funny and kind of cute, though.