The Extra's Regressor Wives

Catrina was still wearing a simple black nightdress, with only a thin outer robe draped over it. Her hair, which was usually carefully maintained, was slightly messy now, and even her mask had been put on in such a hurry that the straps behind it were not completely straight. However, she paid no attention to her appearance at all.

The moment she saw Lathel bent over with his face covered, Catrina immediately quickened her steps.

"Lathel?"

She walked to the bedside and sat down. Instead of repeatedly asking what had happened, Catrina only looked at his trembling shoulders for a second before reaching out and pulling him into her arms.

Lathel stiffened instinctively.

One of her hands supported the back of his head while the other wrapped around his back, allowing Lathel to lean against her chest without being held too tightly. Catrina noticed his initial reaction, but she did not let go immediately. She only slowly patted his back, as though comforting someone who had just awakened from a nightmare.

"I’m here."

Lathel did not push her away.

Catrina did not use that chance to pull him closer either. She simply continued patting his back at a steady rhythm and softly said, "If you don’t want to talk, then you don’t have to. I won’t ask."

Lathel gripped the blanket tightly.

"If you want to cry, then cry."

Catrina’s voice was very soft, completely different from the stubbornness she had shown when locking him to the bed.

"No one here will laugh at you."

Lathel lowered his head until his forehead nearly touched her shoulder. His body still trembled occasionally, but his initially chaotic breathing gradually slowed.

Catrina did not ask what he had seen, nor did she try to guess the reason. She simply sat quietly beside him, occasionally stroking Lathel’s hair or patting his back whenever she noticed that he was having trouble breathing again.

Only after a very long time did Lathel gradually calm down.

When Catrina felt the hand clutching the blanket finally relax, she softly asked, "Do you feel better?"

Lathel did not answer, but he was no longer trembling as badly.

She waited for several more seconds before slowly loosening her arms, intending to let him sit upright again.

At that moment, Lathel accidentally glanced toward the still-open door and immediately froze.

There was a blanket spread across the stone floor in the corridor outside. Beside it was a small pillow and a cup of water that was almost empty. Catrina’s foil was propped against the wall within easy reach, and it was obvious that those things had not just been placed there.

Lathel stared at the blanket for several seconds before looking at Catrina.

Then he looked outside again.

Catrina immediately understood.

She turned her face slightly to the side, rarely showing such an unnatural expression.

"Ah... that..."

Lathel slowly signed.

’You slept there?’

This time, Catrina did not pretend to misunderstand.

She remained silent for a while before nodding.

"Yes."

Lathel looked at the cold stone floor outside, the confusion on his face becoming even clearer.

Pandora also spoke inside his head. "I sensed her presence outside the door earlier. I didn’t expect her to really be lying there."

Lathel signed again.

’Why?’

Catrina watched his hands, this time with no intention of teasing him or pretending not to understand.

"Because I thought that if I slept inside the room, you would feel even more uncomfortable with me."

Lathel paused slightly.

Catrina looked at the blanket outside the door and continued, "But if I went back to my own room, the distance would be too far. If you suddenly felt pain in the middle of the night, had some problem with Pandora, or something like what just happened occurred again, I wouldn’t be able to get here immediately."

She pointed toward the corridor, her tone very natural.

"So sleeping there is fine. You don’t have to see me, and I can still hear any movement inside."

Pandora immediately commented, "That sounds very reasonable, if we ignore the fact that she is a Duchess with an entire army of subordinates."

Lathel was thinking the same thing.

As long as Catrina gave the order, the female Black Rose knights outside could completely take turns standing guard. She had no need to personally bring a blanket and sleep on the corridor floor just to make sure that the moment he made any movement, she could immediately rush inside.

He looked at her for a long time before slowly asking:

’Why do you care about me so much?’

Catrina immediately fell silent.

The eyes behind her mask followed every movement of his hands, but this time, she could not casually brush it off with a joke.

After several seconds, Catrina sat closer again and reached out to hug Lathel.

His body stiffened slightly, but he did not push her away.

She did not hold him tightly either, only resting her forehead lightly against his shoulder.

"Because my life was once saved by you."

Lathel frowned.

He had absolutely no memory of ever saving Catrina.

Of course, she knew that, because that event had not happened yet in his current life.

"You don’t need to remember."

Catrina’s voice was very soft.

"Perhaps to you, it was only a very ordinary thing. You saw someone in trouble, reached out to help, then walked away without thinking much about it afterward."

Her hand slowly tightened behind Lathel’s back.

"But to the person you saved, it was not a small thing at all."

Catrina closed her eyes.

In her previous life, she had spent many years hating her cursed face and everyone around her. When Lathel appeared, he did not ask what she could give him in return, nor did he care that others called her an unlucky widow.

He simply helped her.

Then he even intended to leave as though he had never done anything special.

By the time Catrina understood how important that person was, she had already arrived too late.

She lowered her voice.

"To me, that was my entire life."

Lathel looked at her.

Catrina slowly pulled back, leaving enough distance between them so that she could look directly into his eyes.

"I know chaining you here is wrong."

Lathel clearly did not expect her to admit it herself.

But Catrina continued before he could react. "I also know you are angry, and you may even hate me more and more. I’m not going to pretend that everything I do is right simply because I say I want to protect you."

She reached out and touched the silver chain before quickly withdrawing her hand.

"But I still can’t remove it yet."

Lathel’s expression immediately changed.

Catrina smiled very faintly.

"You see, I really am a selfish woman."

He remained silent.

"I don’t need you to love me right now, nor do I ask you to forgive me. Later, if you want to blame me, hate me, or even find a way to repay me for what I did today, that’s fine."

Catrina paused.

The stubbornness in her eyes was still there, but her voice trembled slightly.

"There is only one thing..."

Lathel looked at her.

"Please, stay alive."

He froze.

Catrina did not avoid his gaze.

"I only need you to stay alive."

The room became quiet again.

Lathel unconsciously remembered what he had just seen.

Aldric watched three hundred and twenty-seven lives disappear and laughed, even regretting that the System had not found a larger city. In his eyes, those people were only NPCs, numbers that could be used to replenish his own fate.

Meanwhile, the woman in front of him had slept in the cold corridor simply because she was afraid that he might wake up in the middle of the night with no one beside him.

One person considered the lives of hundreds of people worth less than a little of his own power.

The other considered the fact that Lathel was still breathing important enough that she was willing to accept being hated.

Lathel still did not like the chain.

He still could not accept the way Catrina was keeping him here, and he also did not understand why someone he had only met a few times in this life could hold such extreme feelings for him.

But at least at this moment, he understood one thing.

Catrina was genuinely afraid that he would die.

It was not just words.

The blanket outside the corridor was enough to prove it.

When Catrina saw that Lathel had gradually calmed down, she slowly left the bed. "All right, you should rest. I’ll go outside. If anything happens, then—"

She had just stood up when the corner of her dress was suddenly tugged lightly.

Catrina stopped.

Lathel also froze.

His hand had unconsciously grabbed a corner of her black dress.

The two of them looked down together.

Lathel himself did not seem to know when he had done it. Perhaps after everything he had just seen, he simply did not want the room to become quiet again immediately.

Pandora, who usually loved to tease him, remained silent this time.

Catrina did not laugh either.

She did not take the opportunity to hug him again, nor did she say anything that would make Lathel uncomfortable. Catrina only slowly sat back down in the chair beside the bed and said:

"I’m here."

Lathel continued holding the corner of her dress for several more seconds.

"Go to sleep." She pulled the blanket up over him. "I won’t leave the room until you fall asleep."

Lathel looked at her before slowly letting go.

He lay down, but before closing his eyes, he still unconsciously looked at the silver chain around his wrist.

It was still there.

Lathel still hated it, and tomorrow, when he woke up, he would definitely still ask Catrina to remove it.

But tonight, he did not continue trying to pull it.

Catrina sat beside him and did not take the initiative to touch him again. She only remained there, watching Lathel’s breathing gradually stabilize. When his eyes finally closed, she gently pulled the blanket a little higher.

"Sleep."

Her voice was almost only a whisper.

"I’ll watch over you."

Pandora remained silent for a very long time before finally murmuring inside Lathel’s soul:

"What a strange woman."

No one answered.

The night continued to pass.

Far away, Aldric was sleeping more peacefully than he had on any night in the past few days, because the lingering wills that had tormented him had almost disappeared, and his realm had also been forcibly stabilized by the System.

Meanwhile, at the place where a village of more than three hundred people had once existed, there were no longer any cries or voices calling for their mothers.

Among the houses that had burned into charcoal, only a few small flames still quietly burned in the black ash.

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