Duke, Please Stop Because it Hurts

She was so sure that it had just been a mild cold. She was smiling softly while talking—it had been that fine. She was worried about him instead, even while her face had been running red with fever.

Raven grabbed a hold of the horse and galloped quickly. The people were frightened by his violent speed as they screamed through the streets and fled all over the place.

It didn’t really take that much time for him to finally arrive at the Duchy. He then got his body completely off from the anxiety which stemmed from running all the way from the Imperial Palace back to the Duchy.

Raven immediately left his confused servants to sleep from his raging words before hurrying back to his mansion. The butler, who was running a bit late, followed him soon after.

“Molitia!”

He dashed ahead and opened the bedroom door. Surprised by his sudden appearance, those who were already inside quickly bowed their heads down.

A pallid woman was lying on top of the bed. The fever that struck her in the morning had made her look like a red apple, but now, she was just as pale as a corpse.

When he looked at her, he saw that her lips, which had always been budding, were now cracked away. Raven bit his lips in response even when the blood he hadn’t wiped off was completely dried around his mouth.

“Why did she collapse?”

His burst of anger that had nowhere to go immediately headed towards the doctor. In such panic, the doctor quickly lowered her head.

“I don’t know either. She was fine until this morning, but…”

“A woman in good health suddenly bleeds?”

“I’m so sorry. We’ll try to find out the cause as soon as possible.”

“That means you still don’t even know why she was vomiting blood and the reason she collapsed?”

Raven was heartbroken when the doctor didn’t give any answer. It was just like back then. When she collapsed suddenly and had to suffer for the whole ten days. Even in that situation, the male doctor back then said that he didn’t know as well. (TN: there was a male doctor back then)

She had to deal with the pain by herself all the while they kept on saying with those flapping tongues of theirs that they didn’t know. He had to keep on watching as she endured all the pain with that petite body of hers.

“Say, don’t you really know already?”

“Sorry—I’m so sorry.”

She thought that she had somehow gotten used to her life in the Duchy. But then, the doctor was currently unable to even breathe properly due to the seething fury that seemed to have swallowed her whole.

Up until this morning, the Duchess merely had a common case of cold. It appeared to be attacking her until she was quite weak, but that was just all. If you had gotten a cold, the medicine that she prescribed to Molitia couldn’t have made her body unfit like now.

Even though her body seemed to have closed up until she had gotten to be this weak, that was just it. If she, herself, had gotten a cold, the usually prescribed medicine should have alleviated her body by now.

‘No way.’

She recalled the medicine that she had just manufactured for body aches. If there was anything different from usual, it might only be the medicine for colds and the medicine for body aches.

However, the poison was commonly used even by the general public. In fact, she hadn’t heard of any side effects as well.

The Duchess of Linerio could have consumed something else. The doctor bowed herself more and more while trying to calm her trembling hands.

“For now, it’s a matter of Madame’s stability and her awakening. So, I will figure it out quickly once it has been resolved.”

“Okay, good.”

Raven responded with a cold voice.

“Keep in mind that I can’t wait that long since I’m not patient at all.”

“Understood.”

When the doctor had stepped out, the servants who had only been looking around soon left the room successively. There was nothing more that they could do after completely cleaning up the blood. All they had left was to pray earnestly for their Madame to overcome everything and regain her conscious back.

Raven quickly reached for her cheek. But he stopped, just as soon as his hand was about to reach her cheek.

There was this fear that his cold hands might worsen her condition. His fingertips could be seen to be trembling slightly.

“…Molitia.”

He whispered under his breath while sitting at the edge of the bed.

“Molitia, open your eyes.”

Despite his resounding low voice, her long eyelids were not even budging. It appeared as though her lean complexion was constantly taking her warmth away.

“If I just hadn’t gone to work, you wouldn’t have collapsed like this.”

The back of Raven’s hand swept her hair ever so carefully. A sense of regret was leaking inside his mind—desperately.

“All because of work.”

His mouth contorted in response. Why did he even leave her alone? He could actually finish up the work tomorrow. No matter how different she was, she always said that she would stay strong.

The hand that was patting her cheek slid carefully across her mouth. The dried blood fell into pieces after being smeared on the tips of his fingers.

Where in the world could someone spit out so much blood from such a little body? How painful it must have been when it was pouring out.

Raven turned towards the carpet. There were some traces of blood that hadn’t been cleaned up. Just like the blood of the dead, a dark sense of red was embroidering the carpet.

Raven was heartbroken. If he could, he wanted to be the one who was sick instead of her. He wanted to endure everything for her, whether it was about vomiting blood or even collapsing.

“Don’t lie down for too long this time.”

It was the first time he felt that he missed someone so much even though she was just right in front of his eyes. He finally realized that he would only feel comfortable once she looked at him with her eyes wide open.

“You have to get up soon.”

He decided to do something together, but there was absolutely nothing he could do. The fact that there was nothing else to do but only to watch her like this made him nervous even more.

Raven reached out carefully before embracing her. He felt that her body, which was already small, had become much smaller. Raven breathed onto her cheeks carefully enough as it seemed like they would easily break away and collapse.

He just wanted to see his wife smiling with her eyes open wide—as soon as possible.

(Duke, Please Be Gentle Because It Hurts—continues in Volume 3.)