I'm Not Your Husband, You Evil Dragon!

Location: Yuno City Park

The sun had already begun climbing higher above Yuno City, bathing the park in warm morning light. Children ran across the grass while their laughter mixed with the songs of birds hidden among the trees, and parents rested peacefully on nearby benches while watching them play. Everything around the park carried the simple joy of an ordinary morning.

Yet beneath one of the large trees, Yuuta stood completely disconnected from that peaceful scene.

His search had led him through several places across the city, but there had been no sign of Erza anywhere. With each place he checked, the hope he had carried from the apartment became smaller, while the guilt inside him only grew heavier.

Yuuta slowly lowered his gaze toward his hand.

The Eternal Flower Ring rested against his ring finger.

His crimson eyes remained fixed upon it as his thumb gently rubbed across its surface, and almost immediately, an old memory returned to him. He remembered the night he had lost this very ring in a lonely garden and how desperately he had searched for it.

Yuuta had spent whole night crawling through the darkness, pushing aside grass and digging through the soil with his bare fingers. His fingernails had become packed with dirt from digging through the soil, his skin had been cut repeatedly, and eventually blood had begun appearing across his fingers.

Yet he hadn’t stopped.

He had continued searching until he found it.

Back then, Yuuta hadn’t completely understood why losing that ring terrified him so much. He could have told himself it was valuable or important, but neither explanation had been enough to justify searching until his hands bled.

Now, sitting here after desperately searching for Erza, the answer felt painfully obvious.

The ring mattered because she mattered.

Yuuta’s vision gradually blurred as he continued rubbing it. The guilt he had carried since speaking with Elena returned alongside every memory of the previous night, and after searching the city without finding Erza, the pressure inside his mind finally became too much.

His legs slowly gave out beneath him.

It wasn’t physical fatigue. His body still had enough strength to continue walking, and if someone told him Erza was on the opposite side of Yuno City, Yuuta knew he would immediately get back onto his feet and run there without hesitation.

What exhausted him was everything happening inside his head.

The guilt of what he had said to her, the fear that she might have truly left, Elena’s revelations about the years Erza had spent waiting for him, and the memory of Erza flying away with tears running down her face had been consuming him since morning. Yuuta lowered himself beneath the tree and rested his back against the trunk, trying to calm thoughts that refused to leave him alone.

His eyes returned to the ring.

"...Erza."

Her name escaped his lips quietly.

Yuuta had spent most of his life alone. He had grown up without parents and learned very early that nobody was guaranteed to remain beside him. Whenever loneliness hurt, he endured it because there had never been another choice. Eventually, being alone had become so normal that Yuuta believed he had adapted to it completely.

But Erza had unknowingly destroyed that ability.

After having her beside him, returning to loneliness no longer felt familiar. It felt empty.

Yuuta had become accustomed to hearing her voice inside the apartment, seeing her sitting nearby and feeling her presence whenever he returned home. Even their arguments had become part of his everyday life. He hadn’t realized how deeply Erza had entered that life until she was suddenly absent from it.

Now it felt as though Yuuta had been thrown back into the same darkness he had spent years learning to survive.

Except this time, he knew what light felt like.

And that light was Erza.

A tear rolled down Yuuta’s cheek before falling onto his hand. His fingers tightened slightly around the ring as he lowered his head toward his knees, no longer caring whether someone passing through the park noticed him.

"Erza... where are you?"

His voice cracked.

Yuuta squeezed the ring inside his palm as another tear escaped.

"I’m sorry..."

His voice barely carried beyond the tree.

"I’m sorry, Erza."

There was no answer, only the distant laughter of children playing across the park. Yuuta remained beneath the tree with his head lowered, gently holding the Eternal Flower Ring while another tear escaped his eyes.

He didn’t know how long he remained like that. Perhaps he was resting. Perhaps he was crying. At that moment, even Yuuta couldn’t tell the difference anymore.

Then a voice suddenly reached him from somewhere above.

"Are you searching for something, boy?"

Yuuta’s body stiffened.

The voice was familiar enough that he instinctively raised his head, his blurred crimson eyes searching around him before eventually moving toward the branches above.

The moment he looked up, his eyes widened.

Isvarn was sitting comfortably upon one of the thick branches of the very tree Yuuta had been resting beneath. One leg hung lazily from the branch while the ancient dragon looked down at him with quiet curiosity, apparently having watched him for some time without making his presence known.

Yuuta quickly wiped the moisture from his face, although there was little point pretending Isvarn hadn’t already seen it. He stared upward for several seconds, surprised that the person he least expected to encounter during his search had somehow been sitting directly above him.

His lips finally moved.

"...Grandpa?"

Isvarn suddenly moved from the branch without giving Yuuta any warning. One moment he was sitting comfortably above him, and the next his body dropped directly toward the place where Yuuta was resting.

Yuuta’s crimson eyes widened. His mind barely had enough time to register what was happening before his body reacted instinctively. He pushed himself away from the tree and stumbled several steps backward just as Isvarn landed exactly where he had been sitting moments earlier.

The old man straightened calmly and brushed a few leaves from his clothes. Instead of attacking again, he looked toward Yuuta with a faintly impressed expression.

"Not bad. You managed to dodge it."

Yuuta stared at him in disbelief. His already exhausted mind needed several seconds to understand that his master had apparently decided dropping from a tree onto him was an acceptable way of saying hello.

"Are you trying to kill me?"

A small smirk appeared on Isvarn’s face.

"I wish I could. Unfortunately, I have no intention of provoking my Queen by killing her husband....I mean, her human."

Yuuta’s expression became strange. He couldn’t tell whether Isvarn was joking or genuinely disappointed that killing him wasn’t an option, and knowing the old man, either possibility seemed believable.

"That’s not what I meant." Yuuta sighed and rubbed his forehead. "I mean, what are you doing here? Why were you sitting on a tree in the middle of the park?"

Isvarn didn’t answer immediately.

His gaze moved away from Yuuta and settled somewhere farther across the park. The usual sharpness in the old man’s eyes softened slightly as he watched something in the distance.

"Nothing important. I was simply watching those children."

"Children?"

Yuuta followed his gaze.

Several children were playing together across the grass. Some were chasing one another between the trees while others had gathered around a small ball. Their laughter occasionally reached the two men whenever the morning breeze passed through the park.

Yuuta watched them for a moment before slowly turning toward Isvarn again.

Something about this scene felt familiar.

Then he remembered.

The first time he had encountered Isvarn had also been in a park, and even back then, the strange old man had been sitting alone while watching children play. Yuuta had actually become suspicious of him because of it. At the time, Isvarn had looked so strange and mysterious that Yuuta had wondered why an old man was silently observing children from a distance.

That misunderstanding had eventually led to their first proper interaction.

Yuuta’s expression softened slightly at the memory.

"So that’s what you were doing back then too..."

Isvarn glanced toward him.

"What are you talking about?"

"The first time we met." Yuuta looked back toward the children. "You were watching children that day too. I remember thinking you looked extremely suspicious."

Isvarn’s eyebrow twitched.

"You thought I was suspicious?"

"You were an unknown old man sitting alone and staring at children for a long time. What exactly was I supposed to think?"

Isvarn gave Yuuta an irritated look before shaking his head slightly.

"You really are the strangest human I’ve ever met."

"Strange?" Yuuta blinked, wondering what he had done this time.

"Yes, strange." Isvarn glanced at him before beginning to walk toward the park bench in front of them. "You’re far too comfortable around me despite knowing perfectly well that I could kill you whenever I wanted. Whether I should call that bravery or foolishness is still something I haven’t decided."

Yuuta was about to respond normally, but the moment Isvarn mentioned bravery and foolishness, his expression changed.

Bravery or foolishness...

Last night’s argument immediately surfaced inside his mind. Yuuta remembered standing against Erza without backing down, believing he had every right to say what he felt. At the time, perhaps he had even considered himself brave for confronting someone as powerful as her.

After everything Elena had told him this morning, however, Yuuta couldn’t see any bravery in what he had done.

He remembered Erza’s tears instead.

The way her face had broken when he called her love animalistic. The way she had slapped him while crying before leaving through the balcony. Then came the words he himself had screamed after her, words that now made his chest ache every time he remembered them.

Yuuta released a tired sigh.

"I’d prefer if you just called me a fool."

Isvarn stopped for a moment and glanced back at him. He noticed the unusual lack of resistance in Yuuta’s answer, but rather than questioning it, he continued toward the bench and sat down.

"I’m glad to know the disciple I accepted possesses at least some self-awareness."

"I see..."

Yuuta didn’t have the energy to argue with him. He walked toward the bench and sat beside Isvarn, leaving a small distance between them as both gradually fell silent.

For the next few minutes, neither of them spoke.

The park remained lively around them. Children continued playing different games across the grass, occasionally arguing over some meaningless rule before forgetting about it moments later and laughing together again. Parents watched from nearby benches while the morning sun filtered through the trees, creating a peaceful atmosphere that slowly eased some of the pressure inside Yuuta’s mind.

What none of those children realized was that one of the most powerful dragons they could ever encounter was sitting only a short distance away, quietly watching them play.

Yuuta eventually glanced toward Isvarn.

The expression he saw surprised him.

Isvarn’s eyes were unusually gentle as he watched the children. There was no irritation, impatience or coldness in them. For once, he didn’t resemble the ruthless old dragon who struck Yuuta with a wooden stick whenever his aura fluctuated even slightly.

Instead, he looked like the same gentle old man Yuuta vaguely remembered from their first meeting.

Yuuta had always found that contrast strange. Isvarn could speak about death as casually as discussing the weather, yet right now he seemed genuinely peaceful simply watching a group of children running around.

A faint smile appeared on Yuuta’s face.

"Looks like you really like children."

Isvarn didn’t look toward him. His eyes remained fixed on the children as one little boy ran away laughing while two others chased him.

"Yes. I do like them."

Yuuta remained quiet, and after a moment Isvarn continued on his own.

"I like their happiness. Children have a carefree nature that disappears as they grow older. They can laugh over the smallest things and forget whatever made them cry only minutes earlier."

His gaze shifted toward another child who had wandered slightly too far from his parents. The boy didn’t appear worried at all, occasionally looking back as though completely certain his parents would still be there whenever he needed them.

"They’re careless about danger too," Isvarn continued. "Not because they understand it, but because they believe someone else will handle it. Their parents are nearby, so in their minds, there is nothing they truly need to fear."

Yuuta followed his gaze toward the children and gave a small nod.

"I see..."

There was something strangely peaceful about the way Isvarn described them. Yuuta had never expected someone like him to pay attention to such ordinary things.

Then Isvarn’s next words completely contradicted everything he had just said.

"But I used to hate children for exactly that reason."

Yuuta immediately turned toward him, wondering whether he had misheard.

"You hated children?"

"Yes." Isvarn answered without hesitation, his expression remaining calm. "I hated how weak they were. How helpless they were. Always crying, always depending on someone else and completely incapable of surviving without protection."

Yuuta stared at him for a moment. That description certainly sounded more like the Isvarn he knew, but it only made the old man’s current behavior more confusing.

"What?"

Yuuta looked from Isvarn toward the children and then back again.

"If you hated them that much, how did you suddenly become someone who spends his free time sitting in parks and watching them play?"

For the first time, Isvarn turned away from the children and looked directly at Yuuta.

Yuuta immediately noticed something strange.

The old man’s gaze remained fixed on his crimson eyes for longer than necessary. There was no hostility behind it, but Yuuta felt as though Isvarn wasn’t truly looking at him. His expression had become distant, almost as though Yuuta’s face had reminded him of someone from a memory he hadn’t visited in a long time.

Yuuta didn’t interrupt.

After several quiet seconds, Isvarn finally spoke.

"It was because of your daughter."

Yuuta’s eyes widened slightly.

"...Elena?"

Isvarn turned his gaze back toward the children playing across the park, and that unusual gentleness slowly returned to his ancient eyes.

"Yes."

His voice became quieter.

"Elena."

A faint smile touched his lips.

"The weakest little dragon I had ever seen... yet somehow, she was the one who forced me to look differently at the creatures I had spent my entire life considering weak and pathetic."

Yuuta remained silent.

Isvarn spoke calmly, almost peacefully, yet Yuuta could sense something buried beneath every word.

Guilt.

Deep, lingering guilt.

"I still don’t understand why that child became so attached to me," Isvarn continued. "Even now, whenever she sees me, she runs toward me without hesitation. She smiles. She climbs onto me. She calls me Great-Grandpa as though it were the most natural thing in the world."

His smile slowly disappeared.

"And that..."

He lowered his eyes.

"...is precisely why I am still ashamed whenever I look at her."

Yuuta’s brows furrowed.

"Grandpa...?"

Isvarn remained silent for several seconds.

Then he turned toward Yuuta.

"Because Elena still loves me despite knowing the truth."

"The truth...?"

Isvarn stared directly into his eyes.

"That her own great-grandfather..."

He paused.

"...once wanted her dead."

Yuuta froze.

For a moment, the laughter of the children around them seemed to disappear.

His eyes widened as though the entire world had suddenly slipped beneath his feet.

"...What?"

To Be Continued...

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