The Male Lead Is Obsessed With My Health Chapter 173

What do I think about Chloe?

“The original story’s female lead…?”

Yeah, I couldn’t exactly answer like that.

When I didn’t reply for a while, the girls seemed to get anxious and started adding comments one by one.

“Isn’t Lady Chloe way too rude? She talks back while staring people straight in the eye.”

“I think her personality’s weird too. I don’t get why everyone likes her so much.”

“And honestly, Miss Arellin is waaaay prettier!”

“Right, right.”

Jealousy, envy, rivalry, or drawing a line that said you and we are on different levels.

Seeing things I’d once gone through being aimed at someone else made me feel strange.

Guess people are all the same, everywhere.

“What do I think….”

Once upon a time, I’d admired Chloe like a star in the distant sky.

Her easygoing personality, bright smile, kind and gentle way of speaking.

She was the embodiment of “loveliness”—something I believed I could never become, even if I were reborn.

“Some readers hated how much the story coddled the heroine, saying it lacked realism or tension, but…”

I was different.

I was just jealous. And I liked her.

Someone like her would’ve been loved by her mother, right?
If I’d been like that, would my mom have loved me too?

Those pathetic thoughts that only made me feel worse—now all part of the past.

It’s fine.

I’m okay now.

“Hm, hm.”

It felt unfamiliar to recall memories that would’ve broken me just a few months ago without any pain.

Feeling oddly proud, I smiled—and the girls looked at me with puzzled expressions.

“Chloe? I don’t really think anything of her.”

Seeing her in person had surprised me.

It was like she was glowing, so much that it’d be weird not to notice.

An overwhelming presence, as if she’d been blessed with all the love and favor in the world.

“So that’s the protagonist.”

Just like when I first saw Pession, I felt it clearly—
This is someone who lives in a completely different world from me.

“Ah… you really don’t think anything at all?”

The girls stared at me, flustered.

“Yeah, nothing. Is there something you wanted me to say?”

If this were a novel, they’d probably be side characters or extras like me.

“Oh—are they those types?”

The villainess nobles who pick fights with the heroine and get taught a lesson in return?

Thinking that way suddenly made me feel amused.

Kind of pitiful, really—acting like this without knowing their future.

“Chloe is pretty, and she’s kind, right? No one hates a kind person. And if they do, then that person’s the weird one.”

I guess that included past-me, who used to dislike Pession—but, well… humans are complicated.

“And that feels like such a long time ago now.”

I’d reincarnated into a novel as a terminally ill extra, but I no longer thought of this world as just a story.

As long as I was alive, breathing, and had free will, this was a real world—one where anything could happen.

I’d already seen that what I thought was a fixed fate could change.

Because I had changed.

“It can change.”

Back when I believed nothing would ever change, when I thought no one would ever love me, when I built walls around myself and chose to be alone, planning to quietly disappear when the time came—

Compared to that, this was a complete turnaround.

“Uh… uh…?”

“Umm……”

I looked over the young ladies, who were left wide-eyed and speechless by my sudden rebuttal.

They could probably change too.

Not that it was my job to make that happen.

“You’re all pretty too.”

Life was too short for me to spend it hating someone.

 

 

 

****

 

 

The girls went blank.

“Did you hear that just now…?”

“Miss Arellin said we’re pretty.”

“Was she just saying that…?”

“But Miss Arellin doesn’t usually say things like that!”

The young ladies whispered among themselves, their cheeks turning red with shy expressions.

She said we’re pretty!

If someone else had said it, it might have sounded like polite empty words, but coming from Arellin—who had said it seriously, with a soft smile—it carried a completely different weight.

“To be honest, since His Highness has been talking to Chloe a lot lately, I thought Miss Arellin would obviously dislike her too, just like us.”

“Me too.”

Everyone who attended these gatherings had already known for a while that the relationship between Arellin and Pession was unusual.

Even the girls who had once hoped to catch Pession’s eye and become crown princess had no choice but to face reality now.

Pession was completely taken with Arellin.

Whether his eyes were open or closed, he looked for Arellin.

Whether Arellin came or not, he only talked about Arellin.

And if Arellin did show up, he’d stick right by her side, giving off an intimidating aura like he’d kill anyone who got close, entering a world of just the two of them.

If Arellin paid attention to something else, he’d look displeased—yet still follow her around anyway.

As for everyone else, it was like they didn’t even exist to him.

Even for girls who liked Pession and dreamed of being crown princess, it’d be strange not to notice all this.

“I think I get why His Highness likes Miss Arellin.”

“Me too…”

She always seemed indifferent and emotionally distant, making people wonder if she even had feelings at all—but when the doll-like Arellin smiled, the world looked different.

It wasn’t a bright, dazzling smile like Pession’s or Chloe’s, shining like warm sunlight.

But a smile from a pretty child who rarely smiled was something incredibly rare.

It was… mesmerizing.

As the girls unconsciously flushed, lost in the memory of that smile, a figure who had been hiding nearby quietly turned away.

Chloe—who had happened to overhear people talking behind her back—wore a strange expression at the unexpected outcome.

“…Did Miss Arellin just defend me?”

Even when they’d first met by chance at the imperial palace, Chloe had thought Arellin was very pretty.

Chloe herself had grown up being told she was pretty, but that was the first time she’d seen someone who truly fit the word beautiful.

Maybe that was why she’d shown kindness when they met again at the Mage Tower event.

“…I didn’t know she was the Halbern family’s young lady, though.”

Thinking back to the weeks when her teacher had been away, Chloe shrugged.

Because access to the Sky Tower was strictly restricted to high-ranking mages, Chloe spent most of her time inside the Mage Tower.

Even so, news reached her there—news that high-ranking mages, lofty as the sky itself, were visiting Halbern every single day.

Considering the usual relationship between ability-users and mages, it made no sense at all.

“…At least, not until I heard the music box.”

The beautiful melody that flowed from the music box her teacher had brought back.

How many times had she listened to it, enchanted by music she’d never heard before? And then she learned it was the work of the Halbern young lady.

And when she joined this gathering—

She realized that the Halbern young lady was Arellin.

Her curiosity only grew, but seeing that Arellin spoke little and didn’t try to get close to anyone, Chloe had been disappointed.

She’d thought, I guess high-born noble ladies really do pick and choose people…

“Do you know where Arell is?”

A boy suddenly approached—Pession.

Staring at him, Chloe also asked about the person she’d been looking for.

“Where is Harun?”

“Why are you asking me?”

Well, because Harun was usually right next to Pession.

In the first place, Chloe’s real reason for joining this gathering was Harun.

“Move away. Arell might misunderstand.”

“We’re not even that close.”

“No, farther. Do you know how strangely Arell looks at me every time I’m with you?”

Pession complained, sounding wronged.

Chloe couldn’t understand it.

Why does Miss Arellin like such a weird guy?

Because he’s the crown prince?

“I’m not interested in Your Highness either, you know?”

“Good. You don’t know where Arell is, right?”

“She went that way.”

The moment she finished speaking, Pession disappeared.

“I was going to ask where Harun was, but he just left.”

Then someone caught Chloe’s eye.

“Huh?”

She thought Arellin had gone the other way.

Before she realized it, Chloe ran over happily and called out.

“Miss Arellin!”

“…?”

Arellin looked at Chloe.

As Chloe gazed into those softly glowing rose-quartz eyes—so different from her own deep pink hair, eyes that looked like they’d feel gentle to the touch—she smiled.

“What do you think of me?”

She already knew the answer.

Nothing in particular.

But now that she was facing her in person, she wanted to hear it directly.

“Um… uh…”

After a brief silence, Arellin—wearing a troubled expression—answered.

“You’re… lovable?”

At the unexpected reply, Chloe burst out laughing.

Hearing her clear laughter, Arellin looked flustered, and Chloe laughed again, thinking—

I want to be friends.