“Want to get out for a moment and talk before we go?”
We were on our way to get divorced.
Inside the carriage.
All I wanted was to hold on, once more, to my wife Ashley, who sat beside me.
“Talk about what?”
“I was wondering if maybe we hadn’t talked enough. About the divorce…”
“Don’t. We both made up our minds, didn’t we?”
At my wife’s firm voice, my gaze fell weakly downward, while the stares of my sister-in-law and my wife’s friend sitting across from us crawled up as if they would devour me.
“Naru, you agreed to this too. Don’t be so clingy.”
“Ah~ I hate clingy men more than anything in the world~”
A cold stare.
A mocking stare.
My sister-in-law, Serina.
My wife’s one and only best friend, Roberini.
Their eyes no longer seemed to see me as a person.
They looked down on me as if I were a bug.
To begin with, these two had played a major role in urging my wife to divorce me.
Every day, chattering away by my wife’s side.
‘Sister. Think of your dignity. Are you really going to spend your whole life with someone incompetent, who even limps on one leg?’
‘What kind of job is porter? The whole world will laugh. This is a fraudulent marriage. Don’t you think so, Ashley? Think carefully. We’re telling you reality.’
And on top of that, my mother-in-law, Madam Michelle.
‘You. Is there truly no hope for you? Are you going to make our Ashley miserable? These days, I’m so embarrassed because of you that I can’t even go out to social gatherings.’
Once, I had been a successful hero.
With skilled companions, I had roamed the world fearlessly.
Then, by chance, I met my current wife, Ashley, and as if we were destined for each other, the two of us fell passionately in love and were married in no time.
After the marriage, my party disbanded.
I could no longer continue a wandering life after leaving behind my lovely wife.
Because I chose to settle down, my companions scattered and went their separate ways, while I maintained my membership in the guild I had joined since my early days as an adventurer, “Thunderfield,” and lived in my wife’s family home as a live-in son-in-law.
To keep my skills from rusting, I intended to continue guild activities steadily, even if I had to do them alone.
Moreover, I could not give up the benefits I received as one of the guild’s top-ranking talents, nor the high social status that came with it.
That was how renowned the Thunderfield Guild was—a famous guild everyone recognized.
My wife’s family, too, had been very satisfied and proud that I was doing well in such a famous guild.
My name is Kang Naru.
I am a Korean who, seven years ago, when I was a high school student, suddenly dropped into another world.
I don’t know who sent me to this other world, but at the very least, they had a conscience.
After all, from the very first day I arrived in this other world, I possessed great strength.
‘Come at me, you insignificant monsters!’
With the power overflowing inside my body, I gathered companions, defeated demons, and made a name for myself.
But my luck lasted only until before my marriage.
Not long after I married, I lost my power.
It began with a request from my father-in-law, Haireugeo.
‘Listen carefully to what I am about to say. The truth is, our family has a curse that has been passed down from our ancestors.’
The curse of my wife’s family—the Lapone family.
One hundred years ago.
It all began when the man who was Ashley’s great-great-grandfather secretly peeped at “Vera, the Antique East Wind” bathing in a forest lake.
‘Ooh, beautiful…! Those breasts…! That pubic hair! Ooooh! Is it not truly a work of art…!’
He went around telling the whole world what he had seen that day.
‘I am the only man in the world who has seen the naked body of the famous Vera, the Antique East Wind! Her breasts were this large, like two great grapes, and the green hair upon her mound was so radiant and fine…! Like silk, I tell you! I nearly went mad wanting to rush out at once, stroke that hair down, and smell what lay within!’
The words he spewed day after day at drinking parties spread far and wide, and eventually reached Vera’s ears.
‘How impudent!’
When the whole world began giggling as they appraised her body, Vera flew into a rage and placed a curse on him and his entire bloodline.
It was a curse that made them suffer seizures at the sight of the sea, rivers, or lakes, causing them to collapse foaming at the mouth.
In other words, epilepsy.
The curse was passed down to later generations, and the members of the Lapone family became so afraid that even the sight of a stagnant puddle was enough to frighten them; they could not go anywhere near water.
‘Defeat Vera and lift our family’s curse. You are a hero, so perhaps it may be possible for you.’
I was young, hot-blooded, and confident.
And for the sake of Ashley, my wife, who always gave me love and trust, I was filled with determination to accomplish it no matter what.
‘You say you’ve come to lift the curse of the Lapone family? Hahaha, very well. Then make a wager with me.’
The result was…
A wretched version of myself stood there, limping on my left leg and bereft of the hero’s power.
‘I’m sorry. With my ability, it was beyond me.’
When I returned to my wife’s family home after the adventure, looking like a defeated soldier, the atmosphere in the house began to turn sinister from that moment on.
Seeing me, who had lost my power, limped, and could no longer even properly do the work of one person, my mother-in-law looked at me as if I were crippled, and as time went on, my wife Ashley began to complain.
‘You took on work as a porter at the Thunderfield Guild? Weren’t you originally in an honorable position? Why did you take on such a lowly job?’
‘In our guild, if your results are poor, no matter how famous you are, it’s the rule that you have to take on internal duties like cleaning or reception, or work as a porter. I’m sorry things turned out this way.’
Once I no longer had the ability to take on requests, I plummeted from the highest position in the guild to the very bottom.
Deeply disappointed by that, my wife began sleeping in a separate room from that day onward.
‘My husband is a porter? How embarrassing!’
And so, little by little, Ashley and I grew distant in both body and heart.
Though we were husband and wife, we barely saw each other even once a week.
The seat beside her was taken by Serina and Roberini.
‘Sister, are you going to keep living like this? People are laughing at our family. They say the son-in-law who came here does nothing but eat our food.’
‘Divorce him. It’s better to settle things before it gets any later. If you live with an incompetent man, only the woman loses out.’
The persistent urging of those around her to break up.
But the decision was Ashley’s to make.
Because she was wise, I had hoped she would not listen to her younger sister and her friend, but that hope shattered into pieces.
In the end, our married life fell apart after three years.
‘You. Let’s get divorced.’
‘Think about it again. I’ll try harder.’
‘Even if you try, I can’t accept it. You’ve become someone who can no longer live without another person’s help. I need a husband I can rely on.’
A divorce required the consent of both parties.
I cherished Ashley and tried to maintain our marriage until the very end.
But I had no choice but to yield after Haireugeo persuaded me.
‘As a man, when I look at you, I can see that what you’re living isn’t truly a life. A mother-in-law who looks down on her son-in-law, a wife who hates her husband… I’m sorry. It would be better for the two of you to divorce.’
‘No. I love Ashley. This feeling will never change. I can give everything I have for her.’
‘Even though you aren’t even treated like a husband?’
‘Someday, she will cherish me…’
‘Hoo… Why are you such a fool? If it were me, I wouldn’t even look at a family like this.’
At the time, materials concerning Vera, the Antique East Wind, were scattered all over Haireugeo’s desk.
Countless cases and data collected and accumulated over a long period of time.
As someone directly afflicted by the curse, he must have known more about Vera than anyone.
I had heard that even before me, many people had tried to subjugate Vera or gone to appease her.
Each time, they had failed without exception.
With those experiences accumulated, he seemed to know at least something.
Could it be that I…
Did he know I was still in the middle of my wager with Vera?
But he never once asked me about it.
Even if he had asked, I would not have answered.
It absolutely had to be that way.
The first victory condition.
Do not reveal our wager to anyone.
‘Every single day, my wife and daughters commit atrocities against you that cannot be forgiven. I can no longer bear to watch. I beg you. Letting you go free is the best apology I can offer. Escape from this wicked wife and meet a better woman. I never knew my own daughter’s character had rotted to this extent.’
Haireugeo spoke of divorce without ceasing.
Several times, he called me to his study and tried to persuade me.
His face was always full of worry, and he sincerely pitied me, who was not even treated as a human being in the family.
‘Escape from hell. Quickly.’
In truth, even Haireugeo was a husband who could not hold his head high in his own home.
The reason was the curse.
My mother-in-law, Michelle, was a woman who had married him despite knowing, when she was still a maiden, that her prospective groom was cursed.
Thanks to that, her voice was loud in the household, and Haireugeo always felt apologetic toward his wife.
Even their two daughters, Ashley and Serina, had inherited their father’s curse, and could not go anywhere near water.
Except for Michelle, her husband and daughters all lived in cursed bodies.
‘You are my son. I will think of you as my own child, so even after the divorce, come visit anytime without hesitation.’
In the end, I chose to divorce Ashley.
Leaving Haireugeo aside, there were my mother-in-law, my wife, my sister-in-law, and my wife’s friend.
I had been driven to the point where I could no longer endure the venomous attacks from those four.
Merciless verbal abuse was only the beginning; I had also suffered humiliations several times that made me feel ashamed as a man.
‘Ashley’s heart has completely left me.’
And so, belatedly realizing the sorrowful reality that we could never return to how we once were, I put an end to our short marriage of three years.
“I’ve completely sorted out my feelings. Don’t ever come looking for me again. I won’t miss you at all.”
“Ashley…”
In front of the royal capital’s family court.
We had just finished the trial and were on our way out.
Perhaps thanks to the influence of the Lapone family, the judge had proceeded not with a divorce, but with an “annulment.”
An annulment…
It was a good thing for both me and Ashley.
However, it would not be annulled immediately; we had to go through a one-year cooling-off period.
After one year, the intent of both husband and wife to divorce would be confirmed once more, and if even one of the two still wished to divorce, the judge would hand down the ruling, and ultimately the marriage would be made as if it had never existed.
“The law may still consider us husband and wife, but the people of the world will see that we came all the way to the family court and think we’ve already separated. I feel the same.”
Ashley was coldhearted until the very moment we parted.
“You are a stranger to me now. From now on, you cannot call me Ashley.”
I was barely holding back the tears that threatened to spill from the pain of parting, yet how could the woman before my eyes be so cruel?
‘Was it this easy for you to forget a person?’
I thought I had known Ashley well all this time, but it seemed I had been mistaken.
There was a cold side of her that I did not know.
I looked at her.
“…Understood, my lady. Please take care on your way.”
As of today, I will forget you completely too.
For what little time it was, thank you.
The second victory condition.
Suffer as much as possible.
The more you do, the shorter the wager’s duration will become.
Today, I added another pain I had never wanted.
The pain of being betrayed and discarded by the person I loved.
It was bitter, yet sweet.
Because the wager was still ongoing.