We laid her down on the bed. She just slept there peacefully, while I took care of her daughter. It was my first time holding a baby, and I was a bit awkward at it. The little girl didn’t cry, though. Instead, she smiled up at me, and I couldn’t help but smile back.
While I was busy with that, Rose suddenly burst through the door and headed outside.
“Take care of them for me, Leon,” Rose said, her voice firm.
“What are you planning to do? Going after her husband?” I asked, raising an eyebrow.
“What else am I supposed to do? That bastard’s going to pay for what he’s done,” she replied through gritted teeth.
She really had a thing against douchebags, huh? Probably applied to me too.
“Aren’t you rushing things a bit?”
“How can I not be when I see someone suffering because of a fucker like him?” she growled.
“It’s not certain that her husband is the one to blame, you know?” I pointed out. “And maybe you should consider her feelings before you dive in headfirst.”
“Leon, you think someone like that deserves any consideration?” Rose’s voice was like a whip crack. “He puts his hands on a woman and just disappears, who knows what the hell he’s doing. I can’t stand that kind of shit,” she snapped, her eyes blazing. “Or what? You think he deserves to enjoy his life while his wife is suffering?”
“I’m not saying that,” I countered. “What I mean is, we don’t need to get involved in things that aren’t our business. When I say consider, I’m talking about her feelings, not her husband’s. What if she doesn’t want us sticking our noses in her business? Do you think she’d be grateful if you did something to her husband, even if she didn’t want it?”
Rose froze for a moment, her anger palpable as she processed my words. Then she stormed over to me, grabbing me by the collar with a vice-like grip. Her eyes were intense, filled with a fierce resolve.
“Are you telling me to ignore something that’s clearly unjust? To just turn a blind eye? Is that what you’re suggesting?”
“I don’t mean that,” I said.
As we argued, the baby in my arms suddenly began to cry. Rose’s grip on my collar loosened.
“Stay here, Rose,” I said firmly. “You’re not going to get anything by chasing after her husband. You’ll just end up exhausting yourself. Why don’t you take care of Grace while I handle Hana?” I suggested.
Rose’s teeth clenched so tightly I thought they might bleed from the pressure. Her eyes burned with a fierce glare, as if she was about to unleash more of her anger.
“Leon, I can’t make sense of you,” she said, her voice heavy with confusion and anger. “When I didn’t know who Irene’s mysterious man was, I was certain he was a scumbag, no doubt about it. I’d never even seen him, but based on his actions and what he did to Irene, I was sure he was a total piece of shit. Then I found out you were that scumbag. At first, I couldn’t believe it. You’re so different—kind and you even saved me. I thought my initial impression was wrong, that maybe you weren’t a scumbag after all.”
She was saying that despite meeting me and sharing moments together, she had hoped I wasn’t the scumbag I seemed. But if her initial impression was wrong, it meant she doubted her current feelings too.
“But thinking back to that night on the cliff, I can’t ignore the gut feeling that you played with my emotions to get me into sleeping with you. You knew I was starting to fall for you and used that to your advantage. I mean, under no circumstances would I sleep with a man who’s already in a relationship with another woman.”
She was right. The reason I could read a woman’s feelings wasn’t because I cared about them—it was because I knew exactly how to manipulate those emotions to get what I wanted. I wasn’t understanding them out of empathy or connection; it was purely tactical. The Goddess of Succubus’s Heir skill let me sense what I needed to say or do to push them, to bend them into submission. I’d been twisting their desires and vulnerabilities, bending them to my will. She wasn’t wrong when she said I was just manipulating the circumstances, setting the stage for them to fall for me—fall right into my trap.
“When I realized that,” she continued, “I knew how right I’d been all along. You’re a scum. No, you’re worse than I thought. More fucking scummy than I gave you credit for.”
With that, she turned on her heel, walking away toward Grace, leaving me standing there.
For a moment, I was rooted in place, staring at the floor. Maybe… maybe my past self and who I am now weren’t as different as I’d tried to believe. Maybe after all these years, I was still the same asshole who played with people’s feelings for his own gain. I thought I understood women, but now I wondered if I was just fooling myself.
“Yeah, right…” I muttered under my breath, the words dripping with bitter realization. “I manipulated Akane back then, didn’t I? I knew she had feelings for me, and I used that. Did I ever apologize for that? Have I even acknowledged it?”
The memories flashed through my mind, like shards of glass cutting into my conscience. Back then, I hadn’t really understood her, had I? I only saw the surface, too blind or too selfish to dive deeper into what she was truly feeling. Maybe I was never capable of understanding her—not the real her.
“…You’ve become a scum.”
Her words echoed in my mind, harsh and unforgiving, just like they had that day. She had seen right through me, called me out for what I truly was—a fucking scumbag. She wasn’t wrong. I was nothing more than a manipulative asshole, using people’s feelings to get what I wanted. No righteousness, no integrity, just a man who knew how to twist emotions in his favor. I had played the game too well, and now the consequences were like a noose tightening around my throat.
I should have apologized—back then, when it mattered. Instead, I left things unresolved, hoping that my saving her would somehow make up for the shit I’d done. But deep down, I wondered if it was enough. I hoped, after everything, that she managed to find peace, even if I never could.
