I Thought It Was a Common Transmigration - Chapter 41

“I’m sorry, Lizé. I didn’t mean to make you feel so bad. I’m really…… really okay.”

“Edith!”

Lizé stepped in front of me and grabbed my hand.

Killian’s eyes narrowed and he seemed to read my mind.

Yeah, he must be suspicious, since I’m blabbering on and on about how I’m fine.

“I don’t believe it.”

Not surprisingly, Cliff wasn’t convinced.

He seemed offended that Lizé had been framed for attempted poisoning.

He glared at me and Sophia, then called for some maids.

He ordered them to search my room.

“What, what are you doing!”

Sophia jumped to her feet in surprise, but she was no match for Cliff’s ferocity.

But I honestly didn’t care. Sophia must have put in the poison, and there was no way it would be found in my room……

“What is this?”

……I’m screwed.

In his hand was a small glass vial of a clear liquid. Suspiciously, even at first glance, there was a piece of paper with a picture of a skull attached to it.

‘That’s poison, no matter what anyone says. It’s obvious.’

Cliff was no exception, and his eyes immediately fell on me.

“That’s…… not…… mine.”

“Interesting, then who do you think hid it in the ceramic decorations in your room?” Cliff questioned mockingly, waving the small vial in front of me.

His mouth was smiling, but the look in his eyes made me think he was going to strangle me at any moment.

Luckily, though, Lizé clung to him. “Cliff! Edith is a patient, what are you doing to a patient!”

“But Lizé!”

“Edith said it’s not hers. Why are you blaming a patient? And it could be just makeup or emergency medicine.”

Lizé was eagerly defending me, but I was convinced that the thing Cliff was holding was the one that I’d eaten, because Sophia’s face was more nervous than ever.

‘Did she leave that in my room? Ugh…… now who’s the fool?’

I’d rather she just throw it outside.

Of course, this episode wouldn’t go like that.

The episode would be too long if the vial was hard to find and it would be hard to figure out who it belonged to, so the author decided to go with this simple solution.

I let out a long sigh and closed my eyes.

Even Killian’s gaze on me was too much for me right now.

By the next afternoon, the vial proved to be a poison that caused abdominal pain and vomiting.

Well, it was to be expected, and it was clear that my future was bleak.

Cliff was furious that I’d staged a self-inflicted wound to frame Lizé, and even though it wasn’t Cliff, everyone would definitely suspect me.

“Crazy! To search the room right away……! So annoying!”

Sophia, the cause of all this, was getting annoyed next to me.

“You’re acting all smart, but can’t do anything right.”

I grunted at her while lying on the bed, and she glared at me with a fierce expression before punching me in the stomach.

“Ack!”

I yelped. My stomach, which was bleeding inside from the damn poison, felt like it was going to burst.

“You use your snout one more time in front of me and I will kill you.”

As if her failure hadn’t been enough, Sophia snapped at me with all her usual ease.

Then she walked out, leaving me alone curled up like a shrimp.

“Ugh…… ugh, ugh……”

My stomach twisted because I was poisoned after days of starvation.

Having had leukemia in my previous life, I thought I could tolerate most kinds of pain, but I was wrong.

Pain is always new.

“It hurts…… ahh……”

I couldn’t tell exactly where it hurt.

Sometimes my stomach hurt, sometimes my back hurt, sometimes my chest hurt, and sometimes my heart hurt.

Just then, the door opened and someone rushed in.

“Are you in a lot of pain?”

It was Killian.

I took a deep breath and nodded slightly.

But what came back was not sympathy, but scolding.

“Then why did you take the poison……! Don’t you realize it’s dangerous?”

He seemed to believe I’d staged a self-inflicted wound.

It’s the same thing every time, but this time I couldn’t help but say it.

“I didn’t. I never did.”

“Then who the hell did……!”

“It wasn’t me! Ack!”

I felt a sharp pain and tears welled up in my eyes.

I tried to hold back my tears, afraid he would accuse me of pretending, but the pain was too much to bear.

I was so used to enduring pain alone, but familiarity didn’t make it okay.

‘If only I could just die like this……’

The thought that I wanted to just end it all came back to haunt me. It was an urge that I had been trying to push away all my life.

I pulled the covers over my head and buried my face in them, knowing I wouldn’t be able to handle any more criticism from Killian.

“If you don’t have anything to say…… go back.”

He stood there for a long moment, then finally turned and left.

I heard the door close and the room fell silent.

I thought it was hilarious.

Pretending to be strong, I asked him to leave, and when he did, it felt like my heart was being ripped out of my chest.

***

When Killian returned from Edith’s room, he was confused.

There was no denying it was Edith’s doing.

If Cliff hadn’t used his animal instincts to search her room and find the vial of poison, Lizé would have been accused of trying to poison her, despite Edith’s insistence that she was fine.

It seemed like the peaceful atmosphere of the bazaar had been shattered in an instant.

However, the reason he couldn’t blindly hate Edith was because of what the doctor who examined her said.

“Her body is too weak. She should take her medicine well for the time being.”

At first, he thought he meant that she was weak because she had taken poison.

But when he asked again, the doctor gave him an answer he never expected.

“I think she’s been starving for a few days.”

“Starving……?”

“Not exactly, but that’s what I think. I know a lot of young ladies who starve themselves to lose weight, and her condition is similar to theirs.”

He couldn’t believe it.

If nothing else, he knew how well Edith ate.

“I don’t think she’s been starving for long, but she swallowed the poison on an empty stomach, so it’s more deadly than if she’d swallowed it when she was healthy. She’ll be in pain for a while.”

“Is there any medicine to take the pain away?”

“The medicine I’m prescribing has some painkillers, but that’s only for a while. For now, she just has to bear it patiently, and the only thing that will help is keeping her stomach warm.”

It was ridiculous.

The fact that she’d eaten poison after days of starvation made him angry, quite apart from the fact that she was trying to frame Lizé.

‘Are you stupid? What if it kills you!’

Killian was so furious that he called Edith’s maid, Sophia, to question her.

At first, Sophia insisted that Edith ate well every day, but when he told her the doctor’s diagnosis, she admitted that she was starving herself to lose weight.

“To lose weight?”

“I’ve noticed that the young lady has gained a lot of weight since she got married, and I don’t think she was even aware of it, but when I mentioned it to her, she said she needed to lose weight……”

Edith has gained weight since her marriage? But as much as Killian tried to remember, he could not recall where she had changed.

Edith didn’t even need to lose weight, because in fact, she was very thin in places like the nape and collarbone……

‘She has no reason to lose weight!’

Besides, how nice it is to see you eating so well……

Suddenly, he remembered Edith sitting quietly at the bazaar.

‘By any chance, did she feel self-conscious at the bazaar when she heard people only praising Lizé, so she decided to lose weight……?’

Before her marriage, she had been the center of social attention, despite rumors that she was a wicked woman.

It was understandable that she missed the attention of others when she was suddenly treated as a nobody.

‘Maybe she ate the poison because she wanted attention, not because she wanted to frame Lizé.’

If so, it was pathetic.

If she hadn’t eaten for days, she would have known she wasn’t feeling well, yet she swallowed the poison without fear.

‘But I can’t let her incur my father’s wrath like this!’

Duke Ludwig was furious that Edith had gone so far as to swallow the poison and try to frame Lizé.

And rightly so.

The Duke and Duchess had rescued Lizé from a life of persecution by the Sinclairs and promised to keep her safe.

Yet another threat to her had arisen from within the Ludwig mansion.

Killian let out a long sigh.

‘I must somehow calm my father’s anger, or he will not leave Edith alone this time.’

Thinking hard, Killian headed for Edith’s room.

He thought she had opened up to him, so he would try to convince her to be honest with his father and beg for forgiveness.

But when he entered Edith’s room, he found her curled up in agony.

Her hands were clutching the sheets so tightly that they were white and shaking.

“Are you in a lot of pain?”

Killian rushed over to examine her, but there was nothing he could do either.

The doctor said that Edith would be sick to her stomach for a while, even with the prescribed medication, so this is a pain she has to bear.

Seeing her thin body in pain was frustrating, and it made Killian angry.