122 – The Sad Love Story of a Wicked Woman -6-
In a story not included in the reading,
Olivia searched for the disappeared Ricardo in front of her, anxiously looking for the one who bid her a foreboding farewell.
He disappeared.
Like a fool.
Like an idiot.
That insolent butler who teased his master…
With a bitter smile, he gradually lost his presence before my eyes.
The warm embrace of Ricardo, who used to hold Olivia, grew colder. The warmth that had nestled in her chest, cozy and comforting, was being scattered and chilled by the cold wind.
“Ricardo?”
Olivia looked around, searching for the vanished Ricardo. That mischievous butler, who had everything under control, had disappeared just to toy with her. Olivia continued to look around.
“Where did you go…?”
Olivia’s pupils trembled with unease.
“Don’t play games. Okay?”
Strangely, her heart was pounding.
She felt tears welling up in her eyes, and desperately called Ricardo’s name, but the only response that came back was the hollow sound of the wind.
Something…
Her heart felt strangely uneasy.
It was frightening.
“Ricardo…”
Olivia thought that everything was just another foolish prank by the butler.
She thought it was one of the butler’s events to dispel her gloomy mood, as always.
Because it couldn’t be anything else.
If it wasn’t Ricardo’s prank…
It was unbearable.
Olivia desperately called out Ricardo’s name, trying to steady her trembling heart.
“I’m going to get angry. If you don’t show up within 3 seconds, I’ll get angry… Okay?”
There were various senses in humans.
Visual, auditory, olfactory, gustatory, and tactile senses. Among them, one extra sense was weighing heavily on Olivia’s chest.
Intuition.
The intuition whispered to Olivia, “You will never see Ricardo again,” and it was terrifyingly pressing down on her.
The suffocating feeling began to crush Olivia’s chest, making it hard to breathe.
Stifling.
The stifling emotion slowly reddened Olivia’s sharp gaze.
Olivia touched the floor where Ricardo had disappeared with trembling eyes.
“It’s strange… Ricardo was here just a moment ago…”
Olivia looked at the academy students who had been spewing malicious insults at her.
“Okay?”
It was okay to curse, it was okay to throw rotten eggs, but Olivia asked with a trembling voice, filled with the desperate plea to answer her question.
“Not visible.”
“Not visible…?”
“He was definitely next to me until a little while ago, even playing pranks… Not visible.”
The silence of them…
My heart pounded as if it would burst.
While my head denied it as a prank by the butler, deep in my heart, I kept spewing negative responses.
It’s not a joke.
What you’re denying is true.
I kept whispering into Olivia’s ear.
“Huh…? I’m asking you.”
“I’m asking… you.”
“I am. I am. I’m asking, aren’t I? Huh? Why aren’t you saying anything? Why!”
Even with Olivia’s questioning voice echoing loudly, the crowd remained silent.
Olivia was afraid of the silence.
“Why aren’t you speaking… You talked so much, why aren’t you speaking?”
-Thud… Thud…
The Academy students, Mikhail, and Lune, who had been bowing to the disappeared Ricardo, closed their mouths as they saw a woman walking towards Olivia.
“I…”
Yuria clenched her teeth.
Yuria’s shoulders, trembling slightly, stood in front of Olivia with weak steps. The vibrations of the indescribable emotion weighed heavily on Yuria’s shoulders.
Yuria mumbled softly as she looked at the spot where Ricardo had disappeared.
“I thought you would thank me for leaving like this…?”
“Do you think I would be happy that a person as bad as you is being punished?”
“Why don’t you give me a chance… You apologize… You say sorry, but why don’t you even talk?”
“What is this?”
Olivia looked at Uriah, who was clenching her fist.
If it were Uriah, Olivia thought she might know where Ricardo was. As someone who was loved by many, Uriah would surely know where Ricardo was. Olivia nervously reached out her trembling hand to Uriah.
“Listen…”
“…”
“I can’t see Ricardo.”
“…Let go.”
“Ricardo was definitely in front of me. But he shouldn’t have touched that stone… The person who gave it to me said it was dangerous, and that I should definitely keep it.”
“Let go, I said.”
“You see, Uriah, Ricardo is not…”
Uriah forcefully pulled Olivia’s hand away.
“Just let go…!”
Tears welled up in Uriah’s eyes. As Uriah roughly pushed Olivia’s hand away, her body fell onto the cold floor.
Uriah glared at Olivia.
“You still don’t get it?”
“I’m a fool, so I don’t know. That’s why…”
Olivia gathered her trembling heart and looked at Uriah. She was a fool. No matter how much people said she was a genius, when it came to relationships, she was a fool.
Olivia asked the person she least wanted to rely on.
“So…please tell me…”
Clang, clang…
Olivia pounded on her tight chest.
“It’s so suffocating… It keeps telling me that there’s something wrong with my heart…”
“It feels like my heart is shrinking… Like I won’t be able to see Ricardo anymore…”
Hot tears welled up in Olivia’s eyes and streamed down her cheeks. Even if she tried to convince herself that it was nothing… Even if she whipped herself, saying it was nothing at all, an uneasy feeling whispered eerie words in her ear, causing the tears to keep flowing.
“It hurts strangely… So, tell me. Please?”
Olivia held Uriah’s hand again.
“I’m begging you. Mikhail will stop liking me too. So, tell me.”
Kneeling before Uriah, Olivia screamed desperately.
“I can’t live without Ricardo.”
“That idiot was so good to me. I couldn’t do anything for him, it’s absurd to send him away like this.”
The emotions of Olivia, who had let go of something precious, began to unravel the tightly wound bandage.
The emotions, friendship, and lingering attachments that she had felt for thirteen years were crumbling all at once.
“I couldn’t even give him a proper gift. I said hurtful things… It’s not right to send him away like this, right?”
Olivia rested her forehead on Uriah’s hand.
“Please… say something! Anything!”
Uriah glared at Olivia with bloodshot eyes. She couldn’t control her trembling shoulders as she looked down at Olivia, who was sitting on the floor, biting her lip tightly.
“I clearly told you.”
“That Ricardo is in pain… That he feels like he’s going to die!”
“Even though I was scared of you and what you might do to me because of the words I spit out! I said it because I thought Ricardo was going to die. Do you understand?!”
“But, what did you say?”
“I…”
From Noble mtl dot com
“What did you say!”
“I’m an idiot…!”
Yuria laughed bitterly, grabbing Olivia by the collar.
“You know why I can’t speak… why do you pretend not to know!”
Yuria’s eyes glared at Olivia with resentment.
“It’s because of you.”
Olivia bit her lip and lowered her head.
“No… I didn’t know.”
Sigh… Yuria let out a hollow laugh as if to say it was all the same.
“It’s because of you that Ricardo died.”
Ricardo’s face kept appearing in Yuria’s mind.
His pitiful smile, as if he could break at any moment, while holding the fraying thread, kept flickering before Yuria’s eyes.
No matter how much she hated him.
Even though he was the one who tormented her.
Because he was her first love.
Her heart hurt too much.
“He was someone who only did terrible things…”
“He was someone I thought would be okay no matter what.”
“He was the one who tormented me when I tried to get better…”
The sky began to darken, and before long, the clouds burst into tears.
The falling rain showered Yuria and Olivia.
“Why is it so painful like this?”
Yuria looked up at the sky with a heavy heart.
“Ricardo was in so much pain.”
“…”
“He couldn’t even walk alone, and his body was covered in black scars. His breathing was rough… His eyes were lifeless.”
“My heart hurts so much…”
Olivia shook her head, unable to regain her composure under the relentless barrage of questions and responsibilities.
She didn’t know.
She thought it would never happen.
But.
The reason for Ricardo’s pain, pouring out of Yuria’s mouth, pointed solely to her own responsibility.
“You never even said a word about being in pain like a fool…”
“You said it was okay with a foolish smile… You know!”
Amidst the pouring rain, Yuria shouted at Olivia.
And.
The arrow of the incident was not aimed at Olivia.
“What are you talking about? That Ricardo came.”
Platinum-haired Inyoung was piercing through the students.
Princess Sharthia.
Sharthia, who had finished her busy work, stood before Olivia, who everyone’s attention was focused on, breathing heavily.
“Where did he go?”
Sharthia looked around.
Silence.
Seeing people shedding tears, Sharthia spoke with an angry voice.
“Where the hell did he go?”
There was no response.
Uriah lowered her head.
Olivia, with trembling eyes, only looked down at her own hands.
“I’m asking you! Where the hell did that idiot go?”
Sharthia asked Uriah with a trembling voice.
“He made a wrong judgment at the Student Council.”
“What…?”
“Three days ago, he gave me a strange stack of papers and left.”
Sharthia was taken aback.
The contents of the documents she hadn’t seen because she was busy were too different from what she knew.
Having seen the truth that Ricardo had meticulously hidden in the dungeon and the arson at the academy, Sharthia could only be bewildered.
“… “
“It had nothing to do with that guy. They were just blaming everything on Ricardo and handing out disciplinary actions… Damn it.”
With trembling eyes, Shartia looked at Uriah and spoke.
“I had nothing to do with him.”
Shartia asked Uriah with a trembling voice.
“Don’t you remember anything? You wouldn’t know.”
“I…”
“Ricardo came and saved you, didn’t he? Mikhail, you said you saw Ricardo saving Uriah back then.”
The arrows of responsibility began to branch out in various directions.
And.
“You bastards.”
With a harsh voice, she suffocated their breath.
“Do you know what we’ve done?”
Shartia spat out her judgment to them.
“If that guy wasn’t here…”
A cold judgment, that is.
“He would have died a long time ago.”
***
Olivia opened her tightly closed eyes and looked at the ceiling.
“Ricardo…”
She felt a warm touch.
A warm heat brushed through her hair.
“Did you have a nightmare?”
When she opened her eyes, Ricardo was there, smiling gently.
As always, Ricardo smiled warmly at her with his soothing voice.
“But there’s still no chocolate.”
She said it like a fool.
Oof these chapters… 😭