My Ex-Girlfriend Was Appointed as a Knight Commander

Chapter 22

At Marquis Leon’s words, the medic stepped forward in protest.

“Marquis, even if you are the marquis, to ask us to leave while we are treating a patient right now...”

“Do my words really sound like a request to you?”

The medic froze at Leon’s answer. The bald instructor glared at the escort knight standing behind Leon and the monocle-wearing man with fierce eyes.

“Marquis, those words...”

“Don’t make me say it twice, medic.”

Leon’s voice suddenly turned icy cold.

“I said to make a place for me to talk with Maxim Apart for a moment. Is that young man going to die if you don’t treat him right now?”

The medic shook his head heavily.

“No, Marquis.”

“I understand well. Instructor, leave with him. It won’t take long.”

“What do you intend to do?”

Those words came from the bald instructor. Leon looked at the bald instructor with languid eyes.

“You see, instructor, that’s not your duty. You seem to be worried that I might harm Maxim Apart, am I right?”

The bald instructor couldn’t answer and just stayed still. Watching such an instructor, Leon spat out a careless laugh and waved his hand.

“Enough. Both of you, leave quickly. I won’t do anything harmful to that cadet.”

The marquis’s escort knight approached and almost drove the two out of the hospital room. The escort knight who got rid of the medic and instructor didn’t return to the hospital room. The hospital room door was firmly closed, and the escort knight who wouldn’t come in seemed to be standing in front of it to control access.

“They’re out.”

Leon muttered while looking at the closed door.

Maxim was lost in all sorts of thoughts while grasping the scar area. He wondered why the marquis, who should be at the villa right now, was at the academy, how he knew Maxim was here and came to find him, why he came to see him then, and what the matter was with him.

Maxim’s fingertips were trembling. Maxim couldn’t even imagine what would happen to him right now. The marquis was sitting arrogantly on the medic’s seat with his legs crossed. He looked at Maxim silently for a long time and then opened his mouth in a dry voice.

“Maxim Apart.”

When his name came out of that mouth, Maxim suddenly felt like he was suffocating. Leon was tapping his temples with his fingers.

“From the third son of the Apart Viscount family. Although a branch of a prestigious family, you’re practically unrelated to the main family since you split off too long ago... Just a petty nobleman who received a territory given by the main family and lives self-sufficiently while acting as a local magistrate.”

He knows. This man knows everything.

Maxim’s eyes grew cold.

“But you are a genius who learned swordsmanship from a wandering swordsman and passed the academy with that swordsmanship that isn’t even a proper form. But I heard your talent in mana isn’t outstanding?”

Every sense in his body was telling him to be wary of Leon. Maxim tensed his muscles while sharpening his nerves.

“Anything else? Ah, and...”

The corners of Leon’s mouth rose up.

“You’re the lover of my daughter, Theodora. Isn’t that right?”

Maxim didn’t answer. Leon looked at Maxim’s attitude and shrugged his shoulders.

“Well, that’s not important to you right now.”

“What is going on here.”

Maxim opened his mouth for the first time. After unfolding his crossed legs, Leon pulled the chair closer to Maxim’s hospital bed.

“Well, why don’t you tell me? What happened.”

Leon rolls his eyes downward and looks at the wound area Maxim is grasping.

“Why it became inconvenient to circulate mana, why you can’t activate aura, why the guardian under the dungeon was that strong. Why it was set to target Theodora, what the fog that gushed out before entering the last room of that dungeon was.”

It was as if a cold wind had rushed into the hospital room.

Maxim exuded killing intent. The color of his golden eyes had lost their light and looked dead. The monocle-wearing man caught by Maxim’s killing intent took a step back with a startled expression. Still, Leon received Maxim’s killing intent with an indifferent look.

Thud.

The sound of the monocle-wearing man falling was heard. Leon glanced sideways in that direction and then looked at Maxim again.

“You’re exuding killing intent well in that state.”

Leon rubbed his hands together.

“I did really well cutting off the bud.”

Leon leaned back on the chair with a satisfied expression.

“The Magic Tower and our family... have maintained an intimate relationship for quite a long time. I also have quite a significant influence on the academy. So... for example, it’s possible to be somewhat involved in the academy’s exams that the Magic Tower cooperated with.”

Leon sighed.

“Our family’s finances have been quite damaged because of you. Money to manufacture a Living Armor, money needed for dungeon construction, money to lobby the academy... I never thought Theodora would have someone to whom she would open her heart... You were someone who deviated from my expectations a lot.”

Maxim’s face when looking at Leon became even more ferocious.@@@@

“That potion too. Actually, that potion was the most expensive after the Living Armor.”

“...What do you mean.”

Maxim’s killing intent grew stronger. A storm of sharp malice that ripped through space burst out from Maxim. Leon stepped back for a moment. For the first time, a little bit of surprise was tinged in those emotionless eyes.

“You know best.”

“What did you do to my mana.”

The door swung open. It was the marquis’s escort knight. He drew his sword and rushed towards Maxim, who exuded killing intent. Maxim ignored the knight and continued to glare at Leon. The knight thrust the tip of the blade at Maxim’s throat. The tip of the sword tore Maxim’s skin and shed new blood.

“Her ex-lover and father killing each other, and the reason being herself. She’ll really like that.”

==

The few months until the breakup were a series of pain for both Maxim and Theodora. He constantly pushed Theodora away, and she kept approaching him even though she knew he was pushing her away. Maxim kept delaying it. He kept delaying telling her until the graduation ceremony approached.

He reduced the number of times they crossed swords. Because she might become suspicious.

He didn’t respond well to her words. He didn’t actively seek her out first.

When she said she loved him, he avoided answering. He didn’t hug her.

The end was approaching.

“Theodora.”

It was a snowy day. Maxim stopped while exchanging swords with Theodora in the training grounds.

“Don’t say it.”

Theodora cut off Maxim’s words. Tears were welling up in those rain cloud-like eyes.

“Don’t say it, please.”

“Let’s break up.”

“I don’t want to hear it, Maxim. Let’s stop here for today.”

He had to hold on.

Hold on and miserably dump her.

“A few months ago, I got a fiancée.”

Theodora’s footsteps abruptly. Came to a halt.

“No.”

“The Bordin family. The daughter of a court noble.”

“Stop talking.”

“They said they would revive our family and me. They said they would let me live comfortably as a court noble without having to be a knight.”

“I said stop.”

Large teardrops fell from Theodora’s eyes with a thud.

“Why...why are you doing this, Maxim? Why...”

“I originally became a knight to succeed.”

Maxim was surprised by his own voice which was too dry. Theodora was crying. She was hurting and crying right in front of him, and what he had to do was drive a nail into that wound.

“....Then can’t you just come to me? I was joking back then, but you can really stay at our house as a live-in son-in-law. Our family is not some falling family, and we have a lot of money.”

Theodora’s words stabbed Maxim’s heart like a sword. He couldn’t show it. He shouldn’t show it.

“I... I’ll try harder too. I’ll become a knight who can create your success.”

“... I’m sorry.”

His head whipped to the side.

Theodora’s palm slapped Maxim’s cheek. It didn’t hurt, but the emotion in that hand hurt more.

“You...you changed me like this.”

Tears fell endlessly from Theodora’s eyes.

“Letting me know what it means to care for someone, to love someone. Making me unable to look at anyone but you. Telling me to only look at you...”

Theodora’s words blurred as she continued.

“Telling me that I can be loved too...”

Theodora cried. She kept crying.

If only he could speak. If only he could ignore that threat. If only he could hug her and tell her it was a lie.

Snow was falling. It was the cold weather Theodora disliked, but the snow Theodora liked.

==

Maxim opened his closed eyes. The painful memories were still vivid even though a long time had passed.

“Damn it.”

He shouldn’t have thought about it.

Maxim smacked his bitterly stinging mouth.

What happened after that? Maxim was assigned to the frontier, known as a knight who couldn’t use aura and was demoted after being pushed back in factional fights.

The moment he gave up everything was when he was first assigned to the Raven Knight Order. The powerless years had taken away his ambition for the sword, his hatred for the marquis, and the faint thoughts of Theodora.

And...

Knock knock,

There was a sound of knocking on the door. Maxim got up from his seat and approached the door.

“What’s the matter in the middle of the night?”

When Maxim opened the door, in front of it was,

“I can’t fall asleep.”

His junior, wearing pajamas, smiling with those deep and splendid blonde hair hanging down and green eyes.

“Can I come in for a moment?”

Translator’s Corner

I forgot to mention this in the last chapter, but I’ll be switching to the every other day schedule now. You can donate for bonus chapters, but yeah. Too many chapters to do. Also, I’ll be going abroad for a week, so the next chapter will be around then. Unless I somehow find time before the flight.