Welcome to the Rose Mansion - Chapter 107
Water droplets trickled down her hair.
The jelly-like substance covering her body—the strange, sticky remnants of the melted chef—was warm, and the bucket in her hands felt heavy.
These were sensations one could only feel when alive. As if savoring each of them, Richelle and Alan stared at each other in a daze for a long while.
It was Alan who broke the silence first.
“D-Did you… Did you just curse?”
The moment he said it, he realized how irrelevant it was to the situation.
Why was he even shocked? Words like ‘get lost’ or ‘son of a b-tch’ were mild to him, far from actual profanity. It was more like gentle scolding, by his standards.
But Richelle seemed to think otherwise. Her face turned slightly red.
“I-It was the first time… Something like that came out of my mouth…”
“If it’s really the first time, your pronunciation was pretty natural.”
Now, Richelle’s face flushed so red it almost blended with her hair. Alan felt an urge to smack himself.
‘Say something, anything.’
Panicking, the boy spoke without thinking, his words coming out before his brain had a chance to process them.
“W-Why are you embarrassed? Everyone curses sometimes. In this harsh world, profanity is almost like a necessary skill for self-preservation… For someone like you, I’d say it was actually quite elegant and refined. Who taught you?”
“Taught…? Oh, probably a friend…”
Richelle’s dear friend, Margaret Chester, had an impressive talent for spewing a torrent of swear words whenever she got riled up.
When Richelle once asked where she learned to curse like that, Margaret had proudly answered:
—Just spend a few rounds walking through the market. Don’t focus on shopping, listen to the people talking. And if a fight breaks out, make sure to watch. A whole new world will open up for you, our straight-laced Richelle.
Whenever Margaret stomped around, hurling curses left and right, Richelle always felt like fainting. She never imagined that, without realizing it, she had absorbed some of that influence.
Richelle buried her head in her hands. Then their eyes met.
Two pairs of wide, startled eyes.
And without anyone saying anything, laughter burst out. It was impossible to hold back. A warmth tickled deep inside their chests.
We’re alive.
We survived.
Richelle set the bucket down and knelt next to Alan.
“Are you alright, Young Master Otis?”
“What wouldn’t be alright? Nothing major happened. Well, aside from this disgusting feeling.”
Alan wiped off more of the sticky chef jelly from his body. The slimy texture made him scowl.
“At least it didn’t stick to me. It comes off pretty clean. Still, why is this stuff so warm? It’s gross. Though I guess it dried off the wet clothes I had on.”
“…”
“Teacher, could you hand me that bucket? We should clean this up.”
But no response came. Confused, Alan turned to see Richelle staring intently at his arm. Following her gaze, he saw the wound that was still bleeding.
Alan awkwardly tried to cover his arm.
“It’s just a scratch. The chef—”
“That’s a cut made by a sharp blade. You did this to yourself, didn’t you?”
“…”
He couldn’t come up with a lie or excuse. Richelle’s voice trembled with emotion.
“You promised you wouldn’t push yourself…”
“Teacher.”
“I know you couldn’t help it. But still, I…”
Richelle bit her lip as she looked up at the ceiling.
“I should have come running faster… before you got hurt like this…”
He told her to hide, and she did. Cowardly, she stayed safe, alone.
She had convinced herself that she was just being cautious, just avoiding making things worse. But in the end, wasn’t it just another way of running away?
Meanwhile, this boy had thrown himself into the line of fire. He had risked everything just to save her. The thought made her feel unbearably small, drowning in guilt.
But then, warm hands gently pulled her out of that suffocating feeling.
“Teacher.”
Alan Otis met her eyes with a steady gaze.
“I wasn’t trying to save you and die in your place. I had no intention of dying.”
“Young Master Otis…”
“You’re the one who told me we should survive. So I found the method that gave us the highest chance of both of us making it.”
Richelle understood the hidden meaning behind his words.
Alan Otis had chosen to live. The boy who had always wanted to die, who once saw death as his only hope, had fought to survive.
Warmth spread through her chest.
