MLCDF 64

~Chapter 64~

“…Just how much do you know?”

He even knew this.

All the effort I’d made to keep my secret felt like a waste.

“Haha…”

Now that I think about it, I could only give a hollow laugh.

“This is as much as I know,” Damien said calmly.
“But even so, I can’t fully understand the pain you’ve lived with until now.”

“…Does that matter?”

“It does.”

His clear, steady amethyst eyes met mine.

“Because Ruby is my one and only wife.”

It felt strange.

I had always thought this was a contract marriage that could be broken at any time.

But if he spoke like this…

It’ll just make me hope again.

I bit my lip lightly and, in the end, began speaking for his sake.

“Damien is right. I’m the Swallower.”

I don’t remember exactly when this started.

But at some point, about once every three months, for about a week, I began losing my memory every night.

“Once every three months, ‘that thing’ takes control of my body and acts.”

It usually didn’t move in the daytime.

But during the active week, the time it spent in control would gradually increase, and for about a day, it could even act during daylight.

“And strangely, I normally don’t remember anything from when it’s active. Last night was the first time I remembered.”

“…That’s probably because I fed you a curse.”

I turned to him in surprise.

“So that’s why?”

“Yes.”

Damien looked straight at me and asked carefully,
“This is almost the first time you’ve eaten a curse, right? Why haven’t you eaten one before now?”

“…”

“If you’re a Swallower, you wouldn’t be able to endure without eating curses.”

“…I didn’t want to kill something I liked.”

I had used my power to erase curses a few times.

That was only when those curses caused excessive harm, hurt people, or threatened my life.

When there was a valid reason, I believed I should erase the curse—even if it was something I liked.

But eating them was different.

The chance that, during the Swallower’s rampage, there would be a dangerous curse right in front of me was almost zero.

Most of the curses it craved were innocent.

That’s why I didn’t want to eat them.

Now, even ropes and chains couldn’t stop it, but just a few years ago, I could endure sleepless, painful nights and somewhat keep the Swallower in check.

It was easier to suffer myself than to use eating a curse as an excuse to stop it.

A memory flashed—when I was locked in that small dark room in the Aristea household.

My only joy back then had been listening to stories of the outside world from the occasional curse that wandered in.

“When I lived in the Aristea house, curses were my only friends.”

Of course, curses hated me.

They knew instinctively.

That I was a Swallower—and could eat them at any time.

And that, because I was a Swallower, I also had the power to erase them.

Even so, I couldn’t help but love these strange beings that lived in the dark like I did.

“How could I kill them? Without curses, I would have long ago…”

I stopped mid-sentence.

That time in my life was too miserable to speak of.

Grip.

Damien’s hands tightened around mine.

For some reason, I felt like he understood me.

“It’s very hard to kill something you love. I know that too.”

Damien had also suffered from curses, but he liked and found them interesting enough to overcome the pain.

So, when the time came that he had to erase a curse, he must have felt something similar to me.

“…But if I were you, I don’t think I could have resisted the urge to swallow them.”

The very purpose of a Swallower’s existence was to swallow and devour curses.

A Swallower instinctively desired all curses.

“How have you held back until now?”

“…Just.”

I had tried everything.

When I heard its voice, I’d cover my ears or sing loudly.

At night, I tied myself with rope or chains.

When the urge to swallow a curse became unbearable, I stuffed my stomach full of human food to quiet it.

“At first, those methods worked. But over time, they didn’t. No matter what I did, it wasn’t satisfied.”

When the Swallower couldn’t get curses, it would turn to the blood of living creatures.

Once, after I blinked my eyes, there was a dead cat at my door.

Seeing cat blood on my lips, I realized the culprit was me—taken over by the Swallower.

After that, I never went near the stables.

I was afraid the Swallower would remember and target those animals.

Since then, no more animals had died, but I was still afraid.

During its active time, when I was dazed, I once saw it licking its lips at a rat on the floor.

If there were no curses, it would drink the blood of moving creatures.

“I was afraid I might end up hurting a person without even knowing…”

That was part of why, in the Aristea household, I hadn’t left my locked room despite hating it.

No one would deliberately come to such a place.

“Here, I’ve been afraid I might hurt the good people in this mansion… or Damien.”

“…That’s why the being you fear most is yourself.”

Exactly.

My greatest fear was myself—and that I might harm someone.

“So I thought maybe eating a curse would help, and I tried once.”

Damien looked at me quietly.

Then, as if seeing through me, he said,
“But in the end… you couldn’t eat it, could you?”

That’s right.

I had held a squirming curse in my hands, opened my mouth wide to take a bite—

But I couldn’t.

“Yes.”

There were times I felt pathetic and irresponsible.

To put others at risk because I couldn’t eat a single small curse.

But I couldn’t kill the curses that had been a comfort in my life.

“I don’t even know why or when I became a Swallower.”

When had I first found that dead chick at my door?

It was so long ago I could barely remember.

“That’s all of my story.”

I stared quietly at Damien.

“But knowing I could hurt someone… you still truly want to stay married to me?”

“It’s the truth.”

I nodded slightly at his quick reply.

Even so, I still didn’t fully understand why he would choose that.

“I’d be happy to keep living here, but I just don’t understand.”

“I didn’t either.”

“…What?”

“When I first saw you taken over by a curse—and even when I saw you lose control last time—it was strange that you didn’t leave my side.”

Come to think of it, the first time he saw me overtaken by a curse, Damien had assumed I would run away.

“But now I think I understand.”

The warmth of his hands around mine didn’t fade.

His voice was still gentle as he looked at me.

“Even if Ruby is a Swallower, that doesn’t make you a different person from the Ruby I know. You’re still Ruby, and I like that Ruby.”

Being a Swallower didn’t make me a different person.

Damien saw the inhuman side of me when I was taken over—but still accepted it as part of me.

“Isn’t it cool? Being someone who eats curses?”

Damien gave a small smile.

“But because Ruby suffers so much, I just want to help.”

I looked up at him in surprise.

He remembered everything I had said to him back when he’d lost control—and now he was saying it back to me.

“You remembered all that?”

“They were the best words of my life.”

Damien smiled and leaned closer.

“So I wanted to make sure Ruby heard them too.”

For some reason, his face blurred.

“Ah, I didn’t mean to make you cry. Don’t cry.”

Ah.

It was because tears were falling.

“You’ve been through so much on your own.”

In the end, I broke down.

In Damien’s arms, I let out the tears I’d been holding back, and he silently held me.

“Your eyes are still swollen.”

I shot him a look as he stared straight at them.

“B-be quiet.”

“It’s fine. You’re cute.”

“What… no…”

Impossible. I must look like a ragged doll right now.

“Right. Anyway, I’ve come up with a bit of a plan for the Swallower. Want to hear it?”

I quietly nodded.

And when I’d finished hearing all of Damien’s explanation, my mind went blank, and I asked in a daze:

“So… you’re saying I have to do what every week…?”