What Happens When The Second Male Lead Powers Up [EN]: Chapter 762

The Sub-Male Lead Goes on Strike – Episode 762 (762/920)

The Brothel (1)

The king’s mind, which had been a tangled mess, began to race.

“Huk… Hooo…”

Her pink and gold-flecked eyes quickly regained their reason and began to assess the situation.

She needed to meticulously recall everything from the beginning to now, so she could make the right decisions moving forward.

She had to stay calm.

“I must stay calm to maintain this state for…”

A deep breath. Her eyes, deeply submerged, floated to the surface of the river of reason.

“…even a little longer.”

It was always like this. Every single day.

On days when her reason miraculously returned, she always calmed herself and went back to the ‘first moment.’

Tracing back the chaotic and disorganized flow was useless.

The royal physician had urged her to undergo rigorous training.

To not forget her beloved country, her people, her family, it was important to reflect on everything she remembered in chronological order.

She had to dredge up everything that had been buried, forgotten, and erased. No matter how overwhelming.

‘The Crown Princess is too young. She doesn’t have the strength to face it yet.’

‘…Even the divine is so heartless. How could such a good Majesty be so young…’

‘I must protect it. I… I must hold my ground and keep my eyes wide open and stay alive. So, Royal Physician, you must help me with all your might.’

To not forget who she was, she had to do that.

-Clang!

“Hoo…”

Madness, yes. Christiana Venetian was suffering from madness.

If her memory was correct, the onset had been over twenty years ago.

‘-Crash! Clatter, clatter!’

‘Good heavens… Someone, is anyone out there!’

‘Yes, Your Highness!’

The voice of her daughter, for whom she would gladly give her life, echoed.

At the same time, a sense of guilt that she would carry to hell washed over her.

From that day on, Christiana’s vision became dark and stuffy, as if covered with black muslin.

‘Pauman, summon the royal physician at once. But what happened today must only be known to you and me. Do not tell my father.’

‘Your Majesty, how…’

The royal physician.

‘It seems my mother… doesn’t recognize me.’

‘Oh, good heavens.’

And her predecessor, who had already retired. And that predecessor’s predecessor. Renowned cardinal-level priests from home and abroad. Even a famous doctor who lived hidden in some mountain valley… There wasn’t a single physician of any renown who hadn’t examined the king.

But none of them could cure Christiana.

Some high-ranking nobles said that she seemed to have inherited the disease from her ancestors.

There had been kings with madness in the thousand-year history of the Venetian family, so it wasn’t a completely unconvincing opinion.

A hereditary disease that couldn’t be cured was certainly a good excuse to ease everyone’s burden.

However, Court Count Etzard Roseharder and his close aides suspected that Christiana had been poisoned.

‘I regret to inform you, but you must suspect everyone around you.’

‘Your Majesty’s… the priest Michael, who was the lover of the precious one, is dead. And now, even Your Majesty’s healthy mind and body are beginning to be threatened.’

The old man was cold-blooded.

Roseharder of the Rose Garden was originally an insensitive character, but he was a loyal subject who could make the right decisions faster than anyone else when necessary.

He advised Christiana to undergo a so-called ‘purge.’ The king did not take his words lightly.

Without warning, she carried out the replacement of most of the servants and maids in the castle, except for a small number of her closest confidants, including Chief Secretary Babette Pauman, whom she could truly trust.

Almost everything that touched her skin, from the bed and bedside table to the candlesticks, jewelry, nightgowns, shoes, water glasses, and soap, was replaced with new items.

Meanwhile, a toxicological examination was carried out to sift through the entire royal castle, and even the crown and scepter, which were the king’s exclusive possessions, could not escape this.

However, no traces of poison were found anywhere in the royal castle.

Moreover, the king’s symptoms worsened day by day. She summoned the court count again.

‘Sneider killed Michael.’

‘Huk, huk…’ She was out of breath as if she had been running across the prairie at full speed.

Clutching the blanket, Christiana frantically searched through time, unsure whether it was the present or the past.

‘Your Majesty. But there is no evidence. His body, after the autopsy, was sent to the desert, where he returned to the bosom of the divine under the blessing of the vicar general.’

‘Sneider killed him! I saw it myself!’

‘-Thump, thump, thump!’

She could not control her impulses, could not bear her anger, and could not suppress her resentment and fear.

The king felt that the shattered vase and teacup resembled her own brain.

It was too hard to accept the fact that she was no longer ‘normal.’

She was extremely ashamed and scared, and wanted to bite her tongue and die.

But no matter how sad and resentful she was, she had to endure.

Because Christiana was the last person to touch Michael’s body.

The memory that had been moving in a straight line made a sharp curve.

‘Ah, ah…’

If her memory was correct, it was the underground crypt of the Pantheon.

The eyelids that had always sent her playful smiles were tightly closed.

The skin, strangled to death, was mottled with blue and purple, and the lips were as stiff as if sealed with wax from the underworld.

The hardened body was chillingly cold. The terrified king couldn’t even shed a common tear.

Instead, sentences resembling the ghosts of the past swirled around her eyeballs like a flock of crows.

‘…Since I’ve been caught like this, I have no choice. I’ll tell you everything.’

Unfortunately, even his voice is now faint.

Some may not believe it, but that was the truth.

The years governed by the moon are so cruel.

‘As you expected, I am a priest dispatched by the Vatican. However, I did not come for the purpose of education or lectures.’

‘…’

If only they hadn’t met, this terrible thing wouldn’t have happened.

The corners of his mouth, which turned up refreshingly when he smiled, were impressive.

The two first met at the Pantheon.

It was the day Christiana participated in the foot-washing ceremony for the sick held at the Pantheon.

Dozens of people who were homeless and slept in the canals, and children who had been abandoned by their parents and were being cared for by the temple, gathered in the huge lobby and lined up.

She was the first king to wash their feet herself.

She held the hand of a person suffering from an infectious disease for a long time, and wiped the face of a child whose eyes were sore from crying with clean water.

‘If you do that, soap will get into the child’s eyes.’

‘…What?’

Christiana’s eyes widened at the cold remark.

She met the eyes of the man who was squeezing pus from an old man’s wound next to her.

‘I said if you do that, soap will get into the child’s eyes.’

The priest, who had rolled up his plain clothes above his forearms, said in a low voice.

He was a handsome man with broad shoulders, distinct features, and neatly arched eyebrows, but Christiana at the time had no time to think about that.

She was more bewildered because it was the first time she had heard such a rude remark.

Pauman, who was attending to her, also looked at the priest in surprise.

Then the man smirked and put down the pus-squeezed towel to the side. His forehead was wet with beads of sweat under his short-cut brown hair.

‘You put soapy water in this basin and clean water in that basin. It’s good that you separated them, but it’s a problem because you’re putting both hands in both sides. If you do that, the soapy water will spread to that basin, and in the end, only the child will cry again.’

‘…’

It was a principle that she couldn’t have been unaware of, but it was her first time attending to someone else, so she made a ridiculous mistake.

Christiana was silent for a long time and eventually chose to ignore him. It was the petty pride of the royal family.

Pauman, sensing the situation, got up to prepare a new basin.

Then the priest took advantage of the fact that the chief secretary had left his seat….

‘-Clatter!’

‘What…!’

He took Christiana’s water basin. The horrified king looked back at him.

Is this guy really crazy?

‘-Clang!’

‘Use this. It’s clean water that I haven’t touched once.’

‘Are you really crazy?’

‘I really didn’t think you would say that. It was written clearly on your forehead.’

‘…What? What did you just say?’

‘Ah. Are you punished for looking at the forehead of a noble person without permission?’

She was so shocked that her mouth slowly opened. How could such a rude person….

‘But today you have come to lay down all authority and bestow the will of the divine, haven’t you? Forgetting about blood and status, as the same child of the divine as me and this old man here.’

‘…’

‘…I was rude at first. But if you do it at that speed, it will be difficult for you to return to the castle today.’

The man smiled and received the next patient.

Then he busily walked around and called a subdeacon who was attending to him and whispered.

‘Send the little ones in line for Her Majesty to me. The kids are very shy, so it’s better for me to see them.’

‘Yes, Father Michael.’

‘…’

He was a truly outrageously cheeky and impudent guy who didn’t know any manners.

But that wasn’t their last meeting.

“Haa… Hoo…”

The king’s memories were fragmented, worn out, and intertwined under the name of madness, making it difficult to recognize their true form.

But there were certainly moments she would never forget until she died.

For example, the days when she gave birth to three children she wouldn’t trade for the world.

The days when she gave love to those children and received love in return, and smiled sincerely happily….

‘…Since I’ve been caught like this, I have no choice. I’ll tell you everything.’

‘Michael’. The time he stayed in her life.

‘Since you are my friend, Your Majesty, I will be honest with you.’

Friend, yes.

About a year after their first meeting, the two had become quite close friends.

‘As you expected, I am a priest dispatched by the Vatican. However, I did not come for the purpose of education or lectures.’

‘…’

‘Under the secret order of Vicar General Rupert… I am investigating the leak of documents from His Holiness Pope Ireneus Sneider.’

‘…’

It was truly shocking. He was a person who had only given Christiana shocks all along.

Whatever that meant.

‘God, what did I just… Did I hear correctly?’

‘Yes. I sometimes think that too, so you heard correctly.’

The priest answered, his Adam’s apple bobbing. Then he shrugged his shoulders.

‘I heard that you are also having trouble with the Sneider ducal family, who are your in-laws.’

Christiana swallowed a sigh silently.

Around that time, half of her sighs were Sneider’s fault.

‘…It can’t be helped. The duke is known as a frugal and humble man, but in the king’s eyes, he holds too much power. If he has any intentions in the future, there will be nothing he cannot achieve, so before Elissa ascends the throne, we must prepare a check [a safeguard or preventative measure].’

‘Is that so? He just looked like a well-connected nobleman to me.’

‘That’s the problem.’

‘Ah, how would I, a commoner, know?’

Michael chuckled and replied.

Christiana was lost in thought for a long time before suddenly raising her head.

‘…Michael, I have a good idea.’

‘I’m nervous. Things have rarely gone smoothly when you say that, Your Majesty.’

‘You and I will deceive him.’

-Clang!

“…What a fool.”

Waking up from her reminiscence, Christiana glared fiercely at the shackles that were tightly gripping her swollen wrists.

The end of the iron-smelling ring was deeply embedded in the ceiling.