"Any bastard who so much as touches a hair on Young Master Kailan's head without my permission—no matter who they are—I'll turn them into a chunk of meat."
The terrible declaration of war from the Silver Swordmaster.
The moment those words fell, the temperature inside the sickroom plunged.
"……Lady Ellara. I feared my ears had deceived me."
The First Knight Commander of the Rothschild Ducal House, Bayern's face twisted viciously.
The elite knights lined up behind him all placed their hands on the hilts of their swords at their waists.
*Shring, shriiing—!*
The chilling sound of dozens of blades being drawn in the cramped sickroom echoed through the air.
"A mere knight dares defy His Grace the Duke's solemn command? And not only that—you had the gall to tell His Grace to 'crawl here'?"
"If your ears haven't rotted, do not ask twice."
Ellara didn't bat an eye.
Along the thin blade of her longsword, a pale blue Aura began to rise like a heat haze. Beneath Ellara's feet, the finest marble floor could not withstand the energy she unleashed, cracking with a *snap, crack*.
"The moment he leaves this room, the Young Master will be entangled with those disgusting assassins again.
Until the Young Master's noble body has fully recovered, no one shall cross this threshold. Take one more step closer, and I will cut your throat."
"You insolent bitch……!"
Bayern's patience had run dry. The instant he drew his massive greatsword and tried to step forward—
*Ah, please. You crazy bastards! Don't draw blades in my sickroom!!*
Lying in bed, I wanted to scream in despair.
That crazy silver-haired heroine was nominally affiliated with the Knight Order. If she were to cut down the Knight Commander, that would be unmistakable treason.
And on the surface, the reason she would commit treason was to 'protect me'!
'If those two fight here, my convalescence won't just be over—I'll be sent straight to the guillotine for treason!'
To make matters worse, a merciless system window flashed before my eyes.
[Warning! A sudden situation has occurred!]
[The knights of the Ducal House are testing your authority. Maintain the 'Dignity of a Villain' and bring the situation under control.]
[Upon failure, the penalty 'Curse of Retribution' (5% HP reduction and severe bleeding) will be applied.]
[Current HP: 8%]
'If I cough up any more blood here, I'll really die, you crazy system!'
I had no choice.
I had to stop that madwoman Ellara's sword dance, and at the same time act arrogantly toward the Knight Commander to avoid the villain penalty.
Clutching my still-unhealed wound, biting my lip hard, I forcibly raised my upper body from the bed.
"*Cough, kuhuk……!*"
Because I moved my body recklessly, I coughed up dark, blackish blood. Stains of blood splattered onto the white bedsheets.
"Young Master!!"
Ellara cried out in shock, sheathing her sword and rushing toward me.
I raised a trembling hand and firmly blocked her approach. Then, wiping the blood from my lips with the back of my hand, I cast the most frigid, ill-boding gaze in the world toward the knights in the room.
"……Who gave you permission to bark nonsense in my room?"
My cracked voice froze the killing intent in the sickroom in an instant.
I lifted my chin toward Bayern.
"Bayern. Have you grown so old you've gone senile? This is the room where the Young Master of the Ducal House lies stabbed and wounded, and you barge in here reeking of blood with weapons drawn? How could you commit such rudeness unless you were truly in league with the assassins who came to cut my throat?"
"Y-Young Master. That is a misunderstanding……."
"Silence."
I cut him off coldly, gasping for breath. My chest felt like it was tearing apart, but I sneered outwardly.
"Put Ellara's sword away. I don't want to see the marble in my room get damaged. And Bayern, did Father call for me?"
"Y-yes. His Grace asked for you in his office……."
"Then you will deliver my words clearly."
Forcing an arrogant smile, I desperately ignored the cold sweat running down my spine.
"It seems you are so idle as to order a dying son about. If he truly has something to ask of me, tell Father to personally deign to visit this shabby sickroom. I am in no mood, nor do I have the strength, to so much as lift a finger right now."
Silence.
A suffocating silence swallowed the sickroom.
Bayern's eyes widened in shock. The Duke of Rothschild was a cold-blooded ruler without a drop of blood or tears in his veins.
The old Kailan would have trembled like an aspen leaf at the mere mention of his father's summons and crawled his way there. And yet he told him to come himself?
'Shit, am I really crazy? No matter how terrifying the penalty, telling the Duke to come and go!'
I was mentally slapping myself dozens of times, but I couldn't take back words already spoken.
[Status: 'Dignity of a Villain' successfully demonstrated! Penalty exempted.]
I had avoided the penalty, but a real-world disaster was approaching.
"……Utter those insolent words before me once more."
*Clack—!*
Beyond the open sickroom door, a massive figure like a shadow revealed itself.
A black mane of hair like a lion's mane. Suffocating mana pressure radiating from his entire body.
He was the ruler of the North and Kailan's biological father, Duke Callion de Rothschild.
"Your Grace!!"
Bayern and the knights all fell to their knees. I too felt my heart drop to the pit of my stomach. To think he had been listening outside the door right when I uttered that patricidal line.
The Duke's cold, golden eyes gazed down at me.
"It seems the venom has eaten away at your brain, for a dying whelp to wake up and order his father about."
The Duke slowly walked toward my bed. With every step he took, an overwhelming pressure tightened around my throat.
*Sshhk—.*
But the moment the Duke tried to approach my bedside, Ellara once again blocked his path.
"Step aside."
The Duke growled in a low voice.
"Lady Ellara. I commend your merit in acting as the Young Master's shield, but do not commit the rudeness of inserting yourself between a father and his son."
"……I cannot."
Ellara stood without a hint of trembling before the Duke's overwhelming momentum.
Her silver-grey eyes glowed with a chilling hostility.
"Until just moments ago, the Young Master was coughing up blood. The violent waves of Your Grace's mana are no different from poison to his currently frail noble body. Withdraw."
She's crazy. She's really crazy.
Even a daughter-in-law blocking her mother-in-law would be more respectful than this.
The Duke's eyebrow twitched.
"You truly have gone mad. We took in lowly blood into the Knight Order, and now it bites its master?"
"My master is only one person—the Young Master Kailan who lies in this bed. Even if it is Your Grace, I will cut down anyone who means him harm."
At Ellara's answer, terrifying mana began to swirl in the Duke's hand.
I had to tear the two apart immediately. If Ellara died to the Duke here, or if the Duke was injured, the rest of my life would be utter ruin.
"Both of you…… stop."
With a voice squeezed out with all my might, I grabbed Ellara's wrist tightly.
"Ellara. Step aside."
"But Young Master……!"
"He is my father. Stand down."
When I growled lowly, Ellara bit her lips with an expression mixed with frustration and rage, reluctantly stepping back.
But her gaze remained fixed on the Duke's neck with the intent to tear it out at any moment.
The Duke looked down at me with interest.
"You seem to have tamed a stray bitch quite well. So, let me ask you, Kailan."
The Duke's golden eyes pierced into my vitals as if to skewer them.
"Why did you take that dagger in her stead? You, who loathed that wench as you would a bug, had no reason to risk your life to take the blade for her. Was this a self-orchestrated scheme?"
It was the sharpest and most dangerous question.
The moment I made the slightest excuse about good intentions (that I saved her because she was pitiful, etc.), I would be struck by the system's curse and die instantly.
I put on the most arrogant, rotten young noble expression I could muster.
I tilted my chin up and looked straight into the Duke's eyes.
"A self-orchestrated scheme? Ha, have I gone mad to inject myself with deadly poison?"
I glanced at Ellara and twisted my lips into a smirk.
"That girl…… is mine."
"What?"
"She is my toy—one I must torment, trample, and break with my own hands. And yet some gutter-rat assassin dared try to break my toy; was I supposed to simply watch?"
I let out a dry cough, *cough*, and added chillingly:
"Any bastard who touches what's mine, I kill. Is that not the Rothschild way, Father?"
In that instant, a strange light flickered in the Duke's golden eyes.
He had discovered the 'cold madness unique to the Rothschilds' from his son for the first time—his son who had always behaved like a back-alley thug, wallowing in inferiority.
"……'Any bastard who touches what's mine, I kill.'"
The Duke chewed over those words in a low voice, then suddenly burst into hearty laughter.
"Hahaha! So, after eating poison and burning your brain, you've finally become worthy of the Rothschild bloodline. Very well.
I shall handle the assassins' backers myself. As you said, heed your toy and focus on your convalescence."
The Duke turned around with a look of satisfaction.
"Bayern. Withdraw the knights. From today, anyone who approaches the Young Master's quarters without permission will have their head severed by my hand."
The Duke and the knights retreated like an ebbing tide.
*Boom—*
The heavy door closed.
The instant the door shut, my tension snapped and I collapsed onto the bed.
*I survived…….*
My entire body was soaked in cold sweat.
I had deceived the Duke and avoided the system's penalty. Now I could finally convalesce without any interruptions…….
"……Young Master."
At the moist whisper by my pillow, I jolted awake in shock.
Ellara. She was leaning over the bed, caressing my cheek pitifully. Transparent tears fell *plip, plop* from her eyes, wetting my cheek.
"I know…… that what you said just now was not your true feelings."
"Huh?"
She clasped my hand and brought it to her forehead as if in prayer.
"To think you would cover yourself in such a terrible stigma to reassure me, and to dispel His Grace's suspicions……"
No, fuck. I actually meant it!
"The whole world misunderstands you, and even your own father refuses to recognize your true feelings. You were thoroughly alone inside this great house."
The snowball of misunderstanding was swelling with the momentum to swallow the entire solar system.
Ellara's eyes shifted from sorrow to a terrifying conviction.
"This place is dangerous. It is full of assassins waiting for your life, and heartless household members who mock your sacrifice."
She fiddled with my earlobe and whispered softly, yet with a voice that chilled to the bone:
"I shall take you away."
"……What? Where?"
"To a place where no one can harm you. A place where you can remove that heavy villain's mask and rest comfortably. A perfect place…… where only I can see you."
I gasped for breath.
This woman was not talking about taking an injured patient away for recuperation.
She was spouting madness about kidnapping me from the Ducal House and locking me away in some basement where no one would know!
"Please wait, my lord. I shall make all the preparations and return shortly."
Ellara left a long, deep kiss on my forehead with an ecstatic smile.
Then, flaring the hem of her knight's uniform like a dress, she glided lightly out of the sickroom.
*Boom.*
The door closed again.
I stared blankly at the ceiling.
The system's time-limit penalty, my cold-blooded mastermind of a father, and the strongest yandere heroine in the world trying to lock me away.
……I want to live.
I really fucking want to live.