Please Leave The Sickly Villainess Alone

I opened my eyes again four days later.

Blinking and looking around, I found myself lying on a makeshift bed in a small infirmary, with Luka watching over me beside it.

I carefully raised my head to check my condition, trying not to wake the sleeping Luka.

In fact, I could tell without looking.

As in the original story, my legs had become unable to walk.

My numb legs didn’t move well at will.

“Hah…”

It should have been a shocking situation, but I wasn’t particularly surprised.

I just thought that I had passed the first hurdle to becoming a villainess.

“Mmm…”

Luka woke up at the sound of my rustling.

“Ria? Are you awake?”

Luka hurriedly checked my condition before his eyes were fully open.

Luka’s condition wasn’t great either as he kept asking if I was okay while examining me from all angles.

The wounds from the high-level demonic beast couldn’t have healed so quickly.

“Have you been watching over me this whole time?”

“Watching over… I don’t deserve to hear such words.”

Luka’s eyes were red, as if he had been blaming himself countless times while I was asleep.

I raised my hand and stroked Luka’s cheek, which was biting his lip tightly.

My hand soon touched his lips.

His lips were cracked, as if he had been constantly hurting himself.

“It’s okay. We’re both safe. That’s enough.”

It was nothing short of a miracle that we survived against that high-level demonic beast.

Although it’s painful that my legs ended up like this.

“What about Layola?”

“She was unconscious for a while after that night and only woke up yesterday. She… doesn’t remember anything that happened at night.”

Luka spoke while tightly clenching his fists as if suppressing anger.

It was a grievous matter.

Looking at it closely, Kablos was the main culprit behind everything, and it was difficult to expect any apology or compensation.

I nodded and smiled, trying to change the atmosphere.

“I’m hungry, Luka. Let’s go to the dining hall.”

“I’ll prepare a meal for you right away.”

Luka said that as he removed my blanket and held my hand to help me get up.

“You might have trouble walking after lying down for so long. Hold my hand…”

As soon as I took Luka’s hand, I collapsed, unable to support my two legs at all.

‘I didn’t think it would be this bad…’

Taken by surprise, Luka embraced me and supported me to prevent me from falling to the floor.

“…No way.”

Luka laid me down on the bed and checked the condition of my legs.

When attacked by a demonic beast, one could suffer internal injuries even if there were no visible external wounds.

“Um… Luka, I can’t feel my legs.”

When I realized that the sensation in my legs had dulled to the point where I couldn’t walk alone, Luka’s expression was… indescribable.

When I became unable to use my legs, I expected my daily life to become quite inconvenient, but it was the opposite.

Luka became my legs.

He took care of me from morning until bedtime to an extent that the word ‘devotion’ wasn’t enough.

“Ria, do you want to go to your room if you’re tired?”

He would say that as soon as he saw me dozing off while reading a book in the living room.

I was very grateful for his behavior, but on the other hand, I felt sorry that this young child seemed to be bearing too much responsibility.

As time passed, one might think he would get tired of me, who couldn’t even walk well alone, but Luka was consistently caring.

When I turned fifteen, as in the original story, my birth father, Duke Rayes, came to the orphanage.

Upon discovering me, he was at a loss for words, then soon bent his knees in front of me, who was barely standing with a cane, and said:

“Won’t you come with me?”

I had no choice.

If I didn’t go with him, I might be sold as a slave to the mines.

Although I was reluctant to leave Luka, it wouldn’t be long before the female protagonist Senia would come to find and save him.

‘In the end, everything flows according to its natural course.’

That day, Luka confided a special secret to me.

Whether it was part of the curse Kablos had placed, he would lose memories of a person he cherished if separated from them.

“That person is me?”

Surprised that he cherished me to that extent, Luka said he absolutely didn’t want to forget me.

So I asked Duke Rayes to get a pair of magic necklaces that neutralize weak curses, and we shared them.

There was no reason to hold me back anymore.

“I’ll be back soon, so you should be fine without me. Why are you making that face, Luka? It’s not like we’ll never see each other again.”

“…”

“I heard the adopter is extremely wealthy. Don’t worry about me anymore. I heard they even made a special magic cane for me.”

I tried to smile and reassure Luka, who had a gloomy expression.

“You’ll really come back soon, right?”

“Of course.”

If I didn’t say that, it seemed like the hands embracing me wouldn’t let go.

After a difficult farewell, I left the orphanage, and after that, I pulled myself together and never visited that place again.

Everything flows according to its natural course.

I certainly thought so, but there was one thing that deviated from my expectations.

“Ah…!”

While walking in the Rayes garden, the center of my cane scattered and my body tilted.

I thought I would fall to the ground any moment, but I was saved by a familiar embrace.

‘Wait, a familiar embrace…?’

I checked who had caught me, thinking ‘No way,’ and was astonished.

“Luka?”

It had been a year.

I had already read in the newspaper that Luka had escaped the orphanage with Senia’s help and successfully reclaimed his position as Crown Prince.

I had just read that news this morning.

So Luka had come to find me right after being reinstated as Crown Prince.

“I could bear it for a day or two, but after that, I felt like I was going crazy. I even thought that maybe Ria had actually run away from me.”

“What…”

“It feels like I’ve finally regained my world.”

Luka said that and hugged me tightly.

The unexpected thing was that Luka’s feelings for me, which I thought were just responsibility and nothing more, were actually immeasurably deep.

“Luka, do you… like me?”

The answer to my dazed question as I hugged him back after meeting him again after a long time came a month later.

I rubbed my eyes and looked at the beautiful ring sparkling on my ring finger.

Luka had formally proposed to me.

For noble children, it’s common to pick out future spouses at this age, but I never received any marriage proposals.

Who would want to take me, an adopted commoner Duke’s daughter who limps, as their fiancée?

I certainly thought so, but…

“If Ria is okay with it, please give me the right to spend my life with Ria.”

A well-raised little brother appeared as a fiancé.

“I’m fine with it, but won’t you have problems? It’s obvious that people will oppose…”

“That will absolutely not happen, so don’t worry. I’ll make sure of it.”

Somehow, I sensed a killing intent from Luka, who smiled innocently and brightly at me as he said that.

“Then let’s have a secret engagement for now. We’ll announce it officially later.”

At my words, Luka smiled brightly as if even that was good and kissed my hand.

I thought I had indulged in a small selfishness for myself.

Although it was still awkward to express my feelings for Luka as love, it was close to that.

Time passed, and the day of the debutante ball arrived.

On that day, Luka’s sister, Princess Rachel, died in front of my eyes, crushed by a chandelier.

Even I, who had read the original story, hadn’t expected her to die like this.

Luka frantically investigated the incident for a while, then soon came to find me.

“Luka…”

“Why does everyone around me become unhappy?”

He said that with a pained smile.

“The mother I longed to see passed away on the day I returned to the palace without giving me time to hesitate, and my sister died at a young age at the debutante ball she had been looking forward to so much. It’s all because of me…”

“It’s not because of you, Luka.”

“Now, Ria is all I have left.”

“…”

“From now on, I’ll bear all the misfortunes and revenge myself.”

Luka seemed to think that fate would take me away next.

Because I was the only one left by his side.

Not long after, he went to war to face the final hurdle to become Emperor.

As the war began, newspapers delivered daily updates, and among them, what people were most excited about was the love story between Luka and Senia, who had volunteered for the war.

“Cough, cough! Hah…”

And meanwhile, I started showing symptoms of an incurable disease.