Misunderstood Villain: Heroines Mourn My Death - Chapter 429: Eight Months

Chapter 429: Eight Months

***

{Inside The Projection}

The training quarters were empty, high walls swallowed the light, leaving only a pale wash spilling from the tall windows.

A massive arena floor sat in the center, ringed by polished wooden rails and padded pillars.

Layla was already there when Malik walked in, tying her hair back, laying it on her loose, dark clothes—he’d made sure that no one was here, not even female servants, he couldn’t have them see the outline of her body all sweaty, such a sight was only for him.

It was a matter of dignity.

***

{Outside The Projection}

And the projection seemed to respect that, blurring her body.

Or perhaps it was Malik himself blurring it.

Even with his soul chained, his Will remained uncontested.

For that, Layla loved him even more, smiling with reddish cheeks.

Yes, Dunya saw her nearly naked many times while helping her wash, but that was different.

They could be seen as trivialities, but these nuances mattered most.

It was what revealed Malik’s gentleness.

***

{Inside The Projection}

Layla moved toward the arena’s center, stretching her arms and legs.

Malik watched without a word, almost admiring his wife’s body.

She caught him staring and flicked her hair at him.

“Hmph…”

But she looked back just as she did so, needing to ask this question:

“Wait—don’t tell me… Is this your way of… apologizing?”

Malik, of course, didn’t answer, and not because he was taking that literally.

“You do know that no amount of apologies will unkill the hundreds of innocents you killed, right?”

Frowning, she lowered her voice.

“Nor would it your father-in-law.”

He gave a single, slow nod.

“It would not, no.”

Her eyes lingered on him a moment, then softened by a fraction.

“Good… and thanks for actually caring.”

She took a deep breath, shoulders rising and falling.

“So, what do we do? Before you, I’ve been busy taking care of the caravan, and stopping the… booze… that I haven’t really followed up with my training much. Even though I went through my pilgrimage—becoming a Jinn.”

Malik’s mouth almost curved into a smile.

His time studying the Equivalent Exchange Ability made him somewhat of an expert in the Death element, at least its earlier stages, so he was more than confident that he could help.

“First…”

He lifted his hand and, with a faint shimmer, a dagger blinked into existence.

“Show me what you’ve got.”

He let it fall from his palm only to catch it in his grip and point it toward the arena floor.

“Come.”

…

Layla lay flat on her back in the middle of the arena, chest heaving, arms limp at her sides.

Sweat dampened her hairline, and her eyes were fixed somewhere far above, like she was questioning every decision that had led her here.

Malik stood over her, staring down at her exhausted face.

“…I have my work cut out for me, it seems.”

***

{Outside The Projection}

Wow…

They truly seemed to be a… healthy Magi couple.

If they didn’t know what they knew, they’d certainly believe that by seeing this.

It felt… warm and comfortable. Like they were intruding on something personal, which, in their Sultan’s eyes, they certainly were.

Malik and Layla moved in sync, even when they weren’t speaking.

The way he stood there, letting her talk, letting her throw those sharp little barbs at him—and the way she threw them like she’d done it a thousand times before—it didn’t look like the talk of enemies.

For a moment, it was easy to forget the ending…

Easy to forget the blood, deaths, and fire.

In that arena, they could have been any other pair.

A husband and wife in their own quiet world.

It was a lovely scene.

An opinion that Layla certainly agreed to.

She kept her eyes locked on the projection.

Her jaw was tight, but she didn’t blink… she so knew this moment.

She remembered how that arena smelled… how he smelled, how he stood.

She remembered that warmth she never deserved to feel from him again.

And slowly, those memories made her feel… envy.

She envied her past self.

Here was her jealousy.

Not toward Huda, Safira, or Dunya, but to her own damned self.

It was ridiculous and so damned depressing.

Oh, how she wished she could relive those moments.

Be given one chance to be there for who she loved.

Especially those precious moments…

They didn’t last.

***

{Inside The Projection}

It was hard to say how much time had passed since that first day in the arena.

A few years? Dozens? The seasons, or what stood for them, had so easily blurred into each other until they were only changes in the sky Malik sometimes happened to notice between duties.

Their training quarter had long since lost its smell, replaced by a smell of smoke. Malik’s smoke… his fire.

It clung to him no matter what he wore, evidence of every village he burned.

Layla came to him every day, no matter how little sleep she’d gotten.

Sometimes she’d arrive straight from the caravan’s affairs, her voice still hoarse from arguing with merchants or settling disputes. Other times she’d come with her hair damp from the West’s rain, or the North’s snow. Malik never really commented.

He didn’t speak unless it was necessary, a fact that had only gotten worse as time went by.

Malik taught her new fighting styles, Abilities, and techniques, including the one that allowed her to draw the Pathing of her Abilities better, which in turn allowed her to customize her spells, becoming more and more of a threat by the day.

She was quick, sharper than most, but never as ruthless as him.

Her eyes still held that spark of restraint, and Malik didn’t try to take it from her.

Outside their training, the world darkened.

His control over the world expanded, his ties ever increasing, his work overencumbering.

The West called on him more often, his fire reaching places far, far from the palace—villages, towns, and even cities too deep in Corruption.

Sometimes Layla came with him, though she never followed to the end, stopping just before, unable to witness the tragedy despite wanting to… despite needing to face what her husband did every other week.

It made her sick.

Eventually, seeing what that did to her, Malik took the choice away from her, forbidding her from coming… a mercy that allowed her to breathe.

Yet that didn’t apply to the rest of the world.

His name spread everywhere, an evil tyrant, a demon.

South, West, and East, all speaking of him in the same light.

A Sultan who burned thousands for no other reason than to entertain himself.

Someone who flipped a coin to decide the pitfuls Fate, playing God of mortals.

Scheherazade was under his thumb, likely in the same way Cyrus was, a backstabber.

They had to believe that, otherwise, it made no sense that the one Emperor of the West would allow him to do as he liked, ruining all that she ruled.

Such a belief didn’t make them lose hope, however, at least not all of them.

Those who held a flicker of resistance sent even more assassins after him, making it a near-daily thing, forcing his Shurṭat al-Khamīs to be involved more often.

Acting the part of a worried Council, his people repeatedly asked him to have an heir, constantly pushing other wives at him, ones that he always denied and most often ignored, focusing on his wife instead.

Layla, without his burning of people clouding her mind, grew strong, nearing Mithqal.

She could move faster than most Jinn, summon shields of death in a blink, and bend her body around an incoming strike like she had no bones at all.

Her laugh, when she let herself have one, echoed in the space and made the place feel almost alive.

Seeing herself grow so strong was fun; it almost became an addiction, a new ’vice,’ something to bury herself in when her doubts grew too loud.

It was in the middle of one such day, after she had sent a spear spiraling through three of his sand constructs, that Malik saw something more obvious than her enjoyment.

’Obvious’ to him, it wasn’t anything dramatic; there was no collapse, but…

The spear left her hand a breath too late.

Anyone else might’ve found that normal, perhaps a sign of overtraining or a simple slip-up, but not Malik. He knew his wife, and this wasn’t usual… something was wrong.

Again, Jinn didn’t get sick; this was beyond that, and, unfortunately, what he saw next proved that he was right, as before he could say anything, her follow-up step dragged across the floor instead of snapping forward.

Trembling, Malik immediately let the sand around him fall to the floor in a faint hiss.

“Break already?”

She glanced at him, wiping her forehead with the back of her wrist.

“We barely just started; I can go on!”

Malik didn’t reply.

Instead, he walked past her, out the arena’s far door.

She called after him, but he didn’t look back.

When he returned, the door banged against the wall from the force.

In his grip, dangling like a sack of rocks, was a woman in healer’s robes.

Her hair was half-undone, her satchel swinging at her side.

“Find out what’s wrong with her.”

Malik’s voice was beyond dangerous.

The healer blinked, stammering:

“S-she looks fine—”

“Now.”

Layla raised her hands.

“Malik, I’m fine, this is—”

The healer was already in front of her, hands glowing faintly as she ran them over Layla’s chest, then her stomach, before they slowed and her brows furrowed.

“What is it?”

Malik stiffened, and the healer swallowed, struggling to calm what seemed to be surprise.

“She’s… she’s not sick.”

She hesitated, glancing between the two of them before speaking again.

“She’s eight months pregnant.”

The Sultan of death now carried life.

Source: Webnovel.com, updated by novlove.com