Rehabilitating the Villainess

The hug came as quite a surprise. 

To think that the wicked villainess would hug me on her own volition!  I found it quite hard to believe.

It seemed that me being unconscious for 15 days caused great concern to Shael.

“…”

“…”

I didn’t say anything. Because Shael was frozen while holding me, and I also became frozen like Shael.

Normally, I would be calm and thinking of a way to make fun of Shael for doing something stupid.

Perhaps I became an idiot as well…

I barely spoke to Shael, “Are you okay?”

“Ah!”

Shael hurriedly let me go, with her face blushing red. 

I wanted to make fun of Shael. It was clear that she hugged me without even thinking about it. But looking at her serious face, I couldn’t make myself do it.

“Explain.”

Suddenly, she asked me to explain something. It was really unreasonable to ask me that without even mentioning what to explain. 

Shael added, “Didn’t you have blood clotting disease?”

“Did you say the blood clotting disease?”

“Yes. I’m sure of the name, I heard it from a physician…”

It was an incurable disease. And it was a real one, because the name of the disease Clie was suffering from was the blood clotting disease.

I also bought Clie medicine for blood clotting disease in the past.

So I became curious. There’s no way I had the blood clotting disease. So it was clear that Shael was misunderstanding something.

“What do you mean by that? Why would I have the blood clotting disease?”

“Obviously. You had the medicine for the blood clotting disease the other day, right?”

Medicine for the blood clotting disease? There’s no way I would have had it.

Except for when Clie had asked me to buy it.

I felt even more doubtful, so I asked Shael right away, “Did you open my magic pouch?”

“… yes.”

So she did. Then I became even more confused about why Shael was so sure about it just from that.

While I became speechless due to my confusion, Shael said, “There were times when you looked tired, and there were times when you suddenly had a high fever…”

“It’s all a coincidence. And I was carrying the medicine for the blood clotting disease due to a certain circumstance.”

“What is it?”

I couldn’t say that it was because Clie had asked me to buy it for her. So I just ignored Shael’s question.

Shael gave up on the question due to my silence and asked, “Then, why did you suddenly lose consciousness for 15 days?”

“…”

I didn’t know what to say. I didn’t think she would believe me even if I told her that it was because I broke the bracelet of holy power.

I couldn’t find a suitable excuse for suddenly losing consciousness for over 15 days.

“Answer me!”

“I won’t.”

I chose to attack Shael instead of making excuses, and just like Shael did earlier, I also jumped on her and hugged her.

“What…!”

“You did it too, then why can’t I?”

The selfish villainess struggled to get out of my embrace. In fact, she didn’t even seem to be trying that hard. 

And, there was no way I would easily let go of her.

I began to think while holding Shael. It was about a memory I had recalled while I was unconscious.

It was the hidden memory from the original novel, in other words, the original timeline. I remembered that I was Eran Baslett in the original timeline.

I was poisoned and died. Perhaps the culprit behind it was the Crown Prince. No, I was sure it was him!

A person powerful enough to make a maid of the Azbel family, who boasted great loyalty, poison someone, it could only be someone like him. Additionally, only a powerful person would have the guts to kill me, who was the only son of a famous swordsman.

I could also guess the reason why he did it. 

Of course it was because of Clie! 

I was able to figure it out without even thinking about it.

Since I was the fiance of the villainess, of course the past me also had contact with Clie.

Maybe I also had a private conversation with Clie in order to ease the conflict between Clie and Shael. And the Crown Prince, who always stalked Clie, would have seen it.

So it was natural for the obsessive prince to misunderstand.

In fact, it was really quite difficult to misunderstand, considering I already had a fiance. I even had the status of the heir of a duke. It was basic common sense that I wouldn’t be attracted to some commoner like Clie.

‘But I shouldn’t apply common sense to him.’

Because that Clie-crazy basta*d tried to kill even the Mage Tower Lord. Not only that, he tried to kill all the men who had private conversations with Clie.

So what if I was a man who already has a fiance? The moment I had a private meeting with Clie, the obsessive male protagonist, the Crown Prince, became enraged.

The Mage Tower Lord could keep himself safe through the Mage Tower’s excellent protection and his powerful battle magic, but… I didn’t have any of that. 

I didn’t even learn any proper magic, so I couldn’t detect such a powerful poison at the time.

Befitting a male protagonist who was perfect in everything except for his personality, the Crown Prince must have completely gotten rid of all the evidence so that no one would ever know that he was the person responsible for the poisoning.

Only Shael, who was close to me, would have noticed that. But there was nothing she could do.

No matter how powerful the duke’s were, they couldn’t attack the Crown Prince with just a conjecture.