MAJOR SPOILERS AHEAD
PROCEED WITH CAUTION
DO NOT READ IF YOU DO NOT WANT TO BE SPOILED
you’ve been warned
Let’s start off with the elephant in the room: “How did they, mainly the Male Lead, react after Blair’s death?”
- In the novel, we finally find out how the people closest to Blair reacted after her death around chapter 130+
It was so emotional to say the least. In the chapter/s, we learn Herdin’s reasoning as to why he acted the way he did in their first life. It was all due to the curse; the weird mark on Blair’s collarbone that show up from time to time.
Understanding the curse
The curse acts as a deadly magical tether between Blair and Herdin. Because they are husband and wife, Herdin's overwhelming and unstable mana naturally overflows and drains Blair's life force, physically manifesting as a dark death mark on her skin. If things go awry and they try to stay together without suppressing the curse, Herdin's dark magic will completely consume Blair, resulting in her agonizing death
The curse was brought to Herdin’s attention by the evil priestess, Miela. With her powers, she suggested to suppress his mana and keep Blair ‘safe’ as long as he listened to her. Essentially blackmailing him. She was obsessed with Herdin and unfortunately, she had the power to suppress Herdin’s overwhelming mana. With this, Herdin kept his distance from Blair with the fear of losing her.
To save her life, Herdin forced himself to act like a monster. He intentionally neglected her, brought a fake mistress into the house, and did everything in his power to make Blair despise him. He believed that breaking her heart and making her completely hate him was the only non-magical way to dissolve the curse's hold on her body. (the curse's power and the death mark grow stronger the more Blair loves Herdin.)
On the day Blair saw Miela and Herdin hugging, Miela suggested to make Blair hate Herdin so the curse would be nullified. She even said “I don’t mind even if you take me to bed to make your wife hate you” Herdin was pissed the hell off, but of course, Miela, the manipulator that she is, immediately followed up with “you dont want her to die, do you?” Making Herdin hesitate. With his hesitation, Miela immediately jumped in his arms and hugged him while loudly professing her love to him just as Blair arrived at the door and saw them. (To clear up, he did NOT take Miela to bed, he detested even the slightest idea of it, but he did follow through with the fake ‘head over heels for his mistress’ thing, hence he hugged her back)
the day of her death
After Blair’s death, Herdin was away from home. He’d been tracking down the origins of his curse just so he could finally be free. To be able to freely love Blair, to hold her, to be there for their newborn child. But on that very faithful day, just when he’d gained hope after finding ancient scriptures that may or may not include his curse, news from home arrived.
“Your Grace, the Madam…..”
Ruth, who'd ridden in to deliver the news, choked on the words and couldn't finish; his head dropped.
Herdin's heart lurched at the look on Ruth's face.
He wanted to ask and didn't want to ask. He didn't want to know.
But Ruth swallowed down the sob in his throat, and tried again.
"The Madam has passed away."
Herdin frantically rode back home, the news of Blair’s death still hadn’t fully clocked in his head yet. It wasn’t that he wasn’t listening, he just refused to believe it.
Upon entering the villa, he immediately went to her bedroom door, before entering, he’d reminisced Blair softly talking to their baby, but instead of being greeted by Blair with a bright smile holding their child, he was met with grief and weeping from the maids. Lina, Blair’s closest maid, flew at him. “Why are you here *now*?” “Why not wait after we’d buried her?” Herdin did not answer and instead walked past her and the rest of the maids. He trudged his way to Blair while Lina’s voice echoed behind him “She waited for you… do you have any idea how long…” Lina wailed before collapsing into the arms of the other maids who then hailed her out.
After the commotion left, Herdin walked to the bed and stared at Blair, while her arms lay neatly crossed on her stomach. He couldn’t believe his eyes. Her rosy cheeks became pale white, her hands were cold and went limp when he tried to hold them.
“….Blair.”
“I’m sorry I’m late… I meant to be back sooner…” he said in a hushed voice. He reaches for her face and continues to talk to her as if she could respond. His hands shook as his fingers trailed her bloodless face. Then, without taking his eyes off of her, he orders Ruth;
“Ruth, go get a priest”
“….Your Grace..” Ruth tries to reason with Herdin but it was no use.
“It’s not too late, if we treat her now we can still save her”
Ruth on the verge of crying wails “Your Grace, she’s already—“
Herdin pulls his sword and points it at Ruth
“Shut your mouth”
He stares blankly for a moment before turning back to Blair ‘you’re really dead..? ‘No… that cant be…it cant be…’ he kept thinking.
Seeing Blair completely unfazed, he throws his sword and gathers her up to his arms, alarming Mason who then calls out in panic.
“Your Grace!”
“Out of my way, I’m taking her to the temple”
He is convinced it doesn’t matter how many priests it takes just to save Blair, whether it takes 20, 30, he was willing to pay the price.
Amidst the gasps in the halls, he pushes forward until… Blair’s limp arm slips free and fall.
In the moment, Herdin’s feet stops as if it was planted to the ground as the tears he’d suppressed come falling down.
“Blair”
“Open your eyes…please…”
“The ocean—the one you wanted to see, I’ll take you. We’ll go together..”
“Dont—dont do this. Please….Blair”
His voice shook as he pleaded for Blair to open her eyes. Her body was cold. He realized neither his tears that fell to her face nor any number of priests could bring her warmth back.
Trying to summon up her eyes, Herdin realised the last time he'd seen them was the moment she'd caught him with Miela, and the sound that came out of him was somewhere between a laugh and a sob.
The choice he'd told himself was for her had been the last, biggest dagger he'd driven into her chest—One he could never pull out now.
"I'm sorry, Blair. I'm so sorry……"
Words she couldn't hear anymore tore out of him like he was coughing up blood.
The grief he couldn't carry started bleeding into his mana. The current that had been churning rough took over its master's mind along with the rest of him.
Ruth and Mason, feeling the shift in the flow around him, looked up sharply.
"Your Grace!"
The instant they stepped toward him, the mana broke loose and lashed every person in the room. The bedroom, which a moment ago had been full of crying, filled with screams and groans.
In the centre of the chaos, Herdin — mind drowning under his own power — rose with Blair's body cradled against him.
‘A world without you means nothing.’
‘One of the humans in this world must be the one who killed you…… so I'll kill them all, and that'll be my revenge.’
Herdin goes on a rampage and kills every knight in his path, smashing through the next door, he spots a room where a cradle is stood.
Herdin turns toward the cradle, a second later Ruth comes running in to abruptly stop in front of Herdin.
“Your Grace, you cant”
“….”
“You’re his FATHER. Don’t do to him what your own father did to you! Please….”
Ruth begged him, the cut he'd just taken still bleeding; Herdin, without a flicker, cast against him anyway.
The blood pooling at his feet bled across the floor toward the cradle, gathering there.
Inside it, the baby, startled awake by the commotion, was crying.
"Mama!"
Herdin, his eyes still flat and mechanical, started to raise a spell — then caught his son's eyes on him, and stopped.
They were violet. The exact violet he'd been starving to see in Blair's.
Looking into them, the memory of Blair introducing him to the baby, once, came back.
Aciel, say hi to Daddy.
Staring blankly into the child's eyes, Herdin's own eyes shook violently, and the mana that had drowned his mind cracked, and for one heartbeat, his awareness came back.
‘No.’
The hand he'd started to raise toward Aciel dropped. Then, as his focus started to slip again, Herdin bit down on that hand — hard enough to feel bone crunch.
In that instant, a memory he'd buried came back to him.
Years ago, he'd looked into a forbidden magic that could send someone back in time. When his parents died. And later, when Esmeralda died.
But he hadn't known whether the spell would hold or fail, and the price of casting it had terrified him off — so he'd never tried it.
Now he wasn't afraid of anything at all.
Pulling hard on what he remembered from childhood, Herdin traced the time-magic circle he'd practiced hundreds, thousands of times. With himself as the offering.
What he needed to fill in last, on the nearly completed circle, was the subject — the one who'd cross back in time.
Without a breath of hesitation, Herdin wrote Blair's name into the circle.
‘If I go back with my memory, I won't be able to let you go. I won't be able to cut off my own feelings — and I'll lose you all over again.’
‘So, Blair.’
‘In the next life — please, please run from me.’
The circle finished and started tearing the body he'd offered to it apart, strip by strip.
Inside that agony, Herdin pulled Blair against him, pressed his mouth to hers, and whispered,
"……I love you. I love you, Blair."
Words he wouldn't be able to give the next version of her.
And then the dark came, absolute.
And after a long, long stretch of time —
Blair opened her eyes.
Three years before her marriage to him. In the past.
-this is the conclusion of chapter 134-
Next, I will be making the actual lengthy spoilers of each and every character.
I want a story exactly like this… but the FL actually does divorce and follow up on her plan with running away, new name, etc. it’d be nice if she could find a new ML too that truly loves her and she’s happy elsewhere. But it is also fine if the ML she divorces and runs away from is still the ML… BUT only if he suffers as much as she did, and he goes through hell and back to woe her…
Also, I’d love to see spoilers about this story too.
Im rlly bouta torture myself by reading this fully knowing the comments are saying it’s stopped updating for 4 years
RAVIOLI(along with other authors in this thread) IS A TERRIBLE PERSON!!!
https://x.com/hanacore/status/1412469550088560643?t=pudxNFY6S0_YkuIoyajmog&s=19
SPREADING AWARENESS. Inspired by someone who did this first.
THE AUTHOR OF THIS IS A TERRIBLE PERSON!!!
https://x.com/hanacore/status/1412469550088560643?t=pudxNFY6S0_YkuIoyajmog&s=19
spreading awareness, inspired by someone who did it first.
We got a weirdo with caterpillars for eyebrows and a big eyed freak. Yeh Im out