The Way To Protect The Female Lead’S Older Brother [EN]: Chapter 3

Protecting the Heroine’s Older Brother-3

Protecting the Heroine’s Older Brother Episode 3

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“Could you lend me the key for a moment?”

Back in the present, I found myself in the underground prison.

Descending the stairs and standing before the iron gate, I could feel the dampness and cold seeping out from within.

“I cannot. The master has ordered that no one be allowed inside…”

“So, you’re saying no? Really?”

At my question, the guard flinched.

I tilted my head, as if telling him to think carefully before answering, and stared intently at the jailer.

I had been a regular attendee of the grand banquet ever since being invited for the first time, from my sixteenth birthday until just recently.

In other words, I was a rising star and a promising prospect of Agrit.

Well, of course, I wasn’t proud of it at all.

If you were to ask me how I, who wasn’t even dreaming of becoming a villain, ended up like this, I would answer that I had been working incredibly hard to survive.

“But…”

The jailer hesitated.

It seemed like he would cave with just a little more. Should I threaten him, or try to appease him?

I pondered for a moment, gazing at him. Gradually, the jailer’s face began to turn red.

Wait a minute. I haven’t even used my feminine wiles yet; how can you be like this already?

This… this is someone with a high potential for ending up in shackles himself?

Of course, he still seemed quite young, probably in his late teens, perhaps because he was still a novice.

It seemed that he had never been exposed to me because I hadn’t come to the underground prison often.

Well, that was good for me.

While the guard was flustered, I snatched the key from his hand.

“I’ll just take a quick look and come out. Then there won’t be any sign of it, so you don’t have to report it to Father.”

The situation was resolved with a single laugh, whispering in a deliberately gentle tone to soothe him.

The guard, flustered, even opened the door himself, telling me to go in quickly and come out, promising not to tell anyone.

Hmph. It seems this person won’t be working in this house for long either.

I coldly assessed as I stepped into the underground prison.

As I fully entered, a clearer chill brushed against my skin than before. Moreover, the underground prison had a nasty stench.

Well, this place had been used for kidnapping, confinement, and torture for generations, so it was to be expected.

I hardened my face and went further inside.

Soon, the figure of a person trapped in an iron cage came into view.

I used the key I had extorted from the guard earlier to unlock the door and stepped inside.

Creak.

The rusty iron door opened with a sharp sound.

The boy who had been kidnapped was still tied to the wall, his limbs bound.

His head was tilted downwards, so his mysterious silver hair with a bluish tint was the first thing that caught my eye. The murderous golden eyes that had glared at my family earlier were now closed.

He seemed to have lost consciousness.

I stood by the door and quietly called out to him.

“Hey.”

Hey, Mr. Heroine’s Brother. Open your eyes.

“Cassis Pedelian.”

But even when I called his name, the boy didn’t move.

I quietly looked down at him before moving my feet, which had been stopped in front of the gate.

Looking at the boy up close, he was in worse shape than I had thought.

His wrists and ankles were deeply chafed from the restraints, and there were new wounds on his body that hadn’t been there when I first saw him.

They told me to keep him locked up until he became docile, so they had already whipped him.

Still, looking at the marks, it seemed they had used a regular whip instead of one with glass shards, which was fortunate.

Since his limbs were still intact, it seemed they weren’t planning to decide on this boy’s fate right away. The people Lant Agrit had brought in so far hadn’t been in such good condition.

Of course, it might be absurd to call this boy’s current state ‘intact’.

But according to Agrit’s standards, this was a very good condition.

In that case, I could breathe a sigh of relief for now.

If this boy were to die like this, I, as a member of this family, wouldn’t be safe later on.

I took out the medicine I had hidden in my pocket and grabbed the boy’s head, which was tilted to the side.

Clink.

Yes, he’s handsome after all. He looked like a perfect aristocrat.

With his delicate face and the scars, he looked quite masochistic. It gave the impression that you would want to torment him.

He had been so fierce when he glared with his eyes wide open, but now that he was quietly closing his eyes like this, he looked so innocent and pure that it was almost anticlimactic.

He seemed a little older than me. According to my information, he should be seventeen.

“This is troublesome.”

If I had seen him somewhere else, I would have purely admired the boy’s appearance, but now I was somewhat serious.

This is quite Charlotte’s taste.

Charlotte was one of my two younger siblings who had been chattering about wanting to play with this boy earlier.

She was my younger sister, three years younger than me, and already a promising villain in the making.

She was still young, but she had a sadistic temperament and enjoyed playing with the ‘toys’ that Father brought.

I narrowed my brows and scanned the boy’s face, then grabbed his chin and opened his mouth.

Ugh. Let’s get the medicine in first.

Perhaps I touched his blood-caked lips, because the boy winced.

I stopped for a moment, wondering if he was about to wake up. But the boy remained still.

Well, this is nothing. We get these kinds of injuries every time we have our monthly evaluations.

I thought with a bit of indifference and put the pill into his mouth.

It might be better that he’s unconscious like this. If he were awake, he wouldn’t have obediently taken the medicine I gave him.

“Umm.”

Just then, a small groan escaped from the boy.

Ah, could it be that he was pretending a moment ago? It seems like he’s really going to wake up this time?

My guess was correct. The boy’s eyelids fluttered, and then golden eyes appeared.

The unfocused eyes blinked slowly, opening and closing.

Oh, this is a disaster. I thought he would be unconscious for a little longer.

The next moment, the boy’s eyes met mine.

“Oh, hello?”

I greeted him without thinking.

Of course, this wasn’t the time to be leisurely saying ‘hello’.

The boy in front of me didn’t seem to have grasped the situation yet. But soon, a light flickered in his blurry eyes.

He seemed to have finally realized my presence in front of him. He also seemed to have realized that there was medicine in his mouth.

“Wh, wha… mph!”

A hoarse, rough voice was forcibly cut off.

Because I had covered the boy’s mouth with my hand. It was almost a reflexive action.

At that moment, sparks flew from the boy’s eyes. He began to thrash wildly to get me off.

Clang, clang!

Oh my, he’s still quite energetic.

I was a little surprised because I didn’t think he would have this much strength left.

Still, the chains connected to the restraints were tightly fixed to the wall, so the boy’s movements didn’t have much of an impact on me.

“Mmph! Mmph!”

“Don’t spit it out. This is an antidote.”

“Mmph!”

“If I were trying to kill you, why would I bother using poison?”

But he kept thrashing like crazy, so it didn’t seem like he was in a state to listen to me.

Well, I guess that’s to be expected. He was forcibly kidnapped and brought into the enemy’s lair, and now someone was trying to feed him medicine while he was unconscious. It would be stranger if he were calm.

Still, from my point of view, it was annoying that he kept struggling like this.

I just had to wait until the medicine dissolved, but this was a bit of a hassle.

“Sorry. I can’t help it if you keep struggling.”

I covered the boy’s mouth and pushed his arm as it was, tilting his head back. Then I raised my other arm and struck his exposed neck with a knifehand strike [a martial arts technique using the edge of the hand].

“Mmph, cough!”

Perhaps he couldn’t help it with the sudden attack, the boy forcibly swallowed the medicine I gave him.

Umm, but if I let go now, there was a very, very high chance that he would throw up the medicine.

Then I have no choice. Just pass out.

“Cough! Ugh, what is…”

“Sorry again, Oppa [Korean term for ‘older brother’ used by females].”

Thwack!

“Kuh-uck!”

After apologizing in advance, I punched him in the solar plexus [the area below the sternum].

Attacked in a vital spot, the boy let out a groan and lost consciousness again, drooping down. He looked even more powerless than when he was unconscious earlier.

Oh, did I hit him a little too hard?

I let go of him with a slightly embarrassed feeling.

Since all the children of Agrit learn basic martial arts, subduing a boy of my age wasn’t a difficult task for me.

Especially in a situation where the other person’s arms and legs were tied up like this. Moreover, he was even poisoned.

Sigh, I thought I had to do this much because he was struggling so vigorously, but I guess not.

Well, it couldn’t be helped since it was already done.

I left the unconscious boy behind, sweating, and left the underground prison.