Adopting the Male Protagonist Changed the Genre - Chapter 41

When Belinda’s movement halted, Cheshire stepped leisurely over the line.

Until then, Belinda remained seated in the comfortable chair without saying a word.

Cheshire, having reached Belinda, naturally placed both hands on the armrests of the comfortable chair, blocking her way.

As Cheshire’s shadow fell over Belinda’s face, her eyes, looking up at him, darkened.

Witnessing her hesitation for the first time, Cheshire looked down with a somewhat regretful heart.

He had not wanted to come on to her in such a threatening way.

If she was the type to crumble under aesthetic stimulation, this would all be as easy and simple as picking at the chocolate icing on a cake.

Cheshire ‘s fingertips were carefully intertwined with Belinda’s.

Then, the traces of dark magic cast upon Belinda, like the reaper’s scythe, became even more vivid.

Cheshire observed those traces greedily, just as he did when he first saw her at the magic tower.

Then he whispered, sweetly and docilely, as if suggesting a secret rendezvous.

“Master, what I want in exchange for my silence is very simple.”

He lowered himself so as not to intimidate his opponent, then looked up at Belinda and smiled sweetly.

A cornered mouse bites a cat.

He cautiously took her hand, so as not to provoke his opponent, and rested his cheek against it, like an affectionate cat rubbing its face against its master.

All the while, his gaze never left Belinda.

“I won’t do anything bad to you, Master. Just like this every day…”

“…Stop.”

It was then that Belinda, who hadn’t said a word the entire time, spoke up.

Cheshire stood up, leaning his upper body towards her, and asked.

“Huh? What did you say?”

“Sir Penadel! Terry!”

Belinda jumped to her feet and shouted, causing Cheshire to stumble back a couple of steps.

If she was found to be involved in black magic, she would be summarily executed. And to think she’d dragged someone else into this.

Cheshire quickly turned to the door, intending to block others from entering first and then calm down Belinda.

He wanted to make it clear that he wasn’t her enemy.

However, just as a golden glint appeared in Cheshire’s eyes, the sound of someone sneaking up behind him was heard.

“Tsk tsk, I expected this.”

“Where…!”

“Gotcha, you rascal!”

Intruding with unknown methods, Terry lightly struck the back of Cheshire’s neck with the edge of her hand, causing him to stagger without a sound.

Terry grabbed Cheshire’s clothes, turned him around, and propped him up to check Cheshire’s state of unconsciousness.

“Hey, guest? Uh, why are you so fragile? Please get up. No, I just lightly tapped you! You can’t be like this here!”

After a few minutes of shaking Cheshire repeatedly, Terry sighed and turned to Belinda.

“What should we do, Master? Should I kill him?”

Belinda glanced back and forth between Terry, who had popped out of a secret passage she hadn’t known existed, and the unconscious Cheshire.

“Found you…….”

 As the door opened belatedly, Cedric, who was about to enter the room, paused.

He looked like an innocent citizen stumbling upon a crime scene, carefully surveying the situation in the room. Cedric stopped in his tracks, slowly closed the door, and said.

“I’m going to pretend I didn’t come here today.”

Thud.

At the sound of the closing door, Belinda, as if coming to her senses, sat back in the comfortable chair and said.

“For now, let’s confine him.”

***

When Cheshire suspected me of being a dark sorcerer, I was speechless.

It was just too absurd.

Why would he say such ridiculous things? I can’t possibly be a dark sorcerer…

‘…Can’t say that…’

Suddenly, a hypothesis came to mind.

Whether or not I am a dark sorcerer, Belinda Blanche could be one.

For a moment, my mind became a blank sheet, and I couldn’t hear anything Cheshire was saying.

Only one fact filled my mind.

Dark sorcerers face immediate execution.

If, as Cheshire said, I, or rather, Belinda, is even slightly related to dark magic, my future would be like a runaway locomotive heading towards a cliff.

‘Confirming the truth can wait.’

‘For now, get rid of the only witness, Cheshire, no, what am I thinking!

‘Yes, for now, let’s get him out of the way so he can’t go around talking.

‘So, what I need right now is…’

“Sir Penadel! Terry!”

My head had probably never spun so fast in any of my previous lives.

“Gotcha, you rascal!”

The large frame above the fireplace in the study swung open like a door, and unexpectedly, Terry popped out of a box like a jack-in-the-box.

Given the many secret passages in this old mansion, it seemed to be one of them.

And afterward, the abduction and confinement progressed smoothly, as if it were a natural flow, leading to the current situation.

I groaned, covering my head with my hands.

Belinda might be a dark sorceress.

All I knew about dark magic was through ominous rumors.

For example, someone’s child from a certain household was accused of being a dark sorcerer, and the royal knights were dispatched to transfer them to the temple, or someone suspected of being a dark sorcerer was dragged to the temple and eventually faced execution at the gallows in the witch prison, and so on.

Amidst these disturbing rumors, I suddenly noticed a commonality.

“All those suspected of being dark sorcerers were taken to the temple.”

Why?

Perhaps the priests could sense the aura of dark sorcery.

‘But when I visited the temple before to boost Leo’s divine power, no one suspected me.’

As my thoughts extended to that point, I had one question.

How on earth is Cheshire so convinced that Belinda is a dark sorceress?

He’s not a priest.

Feeling like I might find some clue, I anxiously paced around the dark room.

First, let’s assume there is some special power in a temple or a priest’s place that allows the recognition of a dark sorcerer.

In that case, who could identify a dark sorcerer outside the temple?

There was only one hypothesis that came to mind.

A colleague knows how to recognize a colleague.

Perhaps Cheshire himself…

“Cheshire, you’re a dark sorcerer.”

Believing that Belinda was a dark sorceress because he, too, was a dark sorcerer.

I said the assumption as if it were a certainty.

I held onto that assumption as if it were a conviction.

“Huh, I thought something was off…”

In response to his somewhat odd comeback, I turned around from where I stood near the window.

Cheshire, who blinked his eyes several times as if coming back to his senses, confessed in a slightly strained voice.

“You’re not a dark sorcerer, customer. You’re just a victim of dark magic.”

Cheshire’s lush eyebrows fluttered like a butterfly’s wingbeat several times.

Cheshire, with a slightly sarcastic tone, suggested.

“Such a thing won’t work on a mage like me. So, could you please release this restraint?”

“No.”

With my firm rejection, Cheshire shrugged his shoulders and slumped his body.

I slowly walked over and sat down across from him.

The reason I ignored Terry and Sir Penadel’s dissuasion, saying it was dangerous, and spoke to him alone was because the topic we were going to discuss was just as dangerous.

There is a risk that Penadel and Terry could suffer due to their association with dark magic.

“Cheshire, it’s time to be honest this time. If you miss this opportunity, you may never get what you want.”

I spoke calmly, hiding my tension.

Cheshire’s face, still as beautiful as an angel with no hint of a smile, seemed to reveal a somber secret.

“…There are certain forbidden magics that should never be tampered with. One of them involves manipulating the soul. There are traces of the most forbidden dark magic related to souls left on you, Customer. Can you guess what it might be?”

Forbidden magic involves the manipulation of the soul.

His words hit my chest like a lump.

Now I couldn’t dismiss it as a mere joke.

It could possibly be the cause of my connection to Belinda’s body.