“Showing up and making this kind of joke…”
I reached to flick his forehead, but he seized my hand, stiff and guarded.
For a moment, both of us froze.
That distance in his eyes—it wasn’t Adrian anymore.
Awkwardly, I pulled my hand back.
“They all say you’re my fiancée, but I’m sorry—”
Adrian’s lips tightened, his face paling.
“I don’t remember you.”
He pulled Stella protectively behind him.
“When I was injured, Stella was the one who nursed me back. We’ve been husband and wife in all but name. Master, even if you kill me today, the only woman I’ll marry is her.”
Adrian knelt heavily, banging his head three times against the floor to prove his resolve.
The hall froze in silence.
The other six apprentices shook their heads, some even gritting their teeth to plead with him.
“Adrian Cole, you fool, don’t lose your mind!”
“Have you forgotten how desperately you pursued Lila five years ago?”
“So many suitors came to propose, and you chased them all away!”
“If not for marrying her, why risk your life taking on the hardest mission, nearly dying for it?”
“Lila waited five long years for you—how can you forget her?”
But by now, I understood.
Adrian truly had lost his memory.
He had forgotten his promise to marry me, and instead had fallen for someone else.
The room was tense with silence.
Everyone watched me closely, fearful of my reaction—
after all, the last person who crossed me now lay beneath a mound of weeds on his grave.
Adrian, oblivious to the danger in the air, pressed his forehead to the cold floor.
“Please, Master, grant us your blessing.”
My father gave a chilling laugh. “Blessing?”
“Then who will bless my daughter, who waited five years?”
Before anyone could respond, I had already cocked the gun and pressed it to Adrian’s forehead.
His eyes softened with pain as he looked at me.
“Lila, should I kill him for you?” my father asked.
“If Adrian dies, your five wasted years won’t become a laughingstock in others’ mouths.”
Gasps echoed through the hall.
Everyone knew my father wasn’t joking.
For his treasured daughter, the jewel of his eye,
he would truly kill Adrian without hesitation.
But I only smiled, pushing my father’s hand away.
“Forget it.”
That single word swallowed every expectation and bitterness of my five years of waiting.
I turned to the girl behind him.
Since the moment my father drew his gun, she had gone pale as a frightened rabbit.
I smiled faintly at her.