My Husband Was Definitely a Paladin
Irene felt the soft, plump sensation of the blanket enveloping her body and slowly opened her eyes.
For a moment, she could not recall where she was, who she was, or what time it was.
Yet soon, the last memories began to surface one by one, and she let out a soft groan without realizing it, closing her eyes once more.
“What… what happened to me?”
Before she lost consciousness, she remembered everything clearly.
The Night of the Contract. Michael covered in blood. Princess Cecilia. The purifying light. And… the Pair.
The Night of the Contract began completely differently this time, but it ended exactly like the past one—with her forming a Pair with him.
“Why…?”
“Oh my, you’re awake!”
Just then, the maids who had entered the room saw Irene regain her senses and quickly left to fetch others.
Most were from the Kingdom Alliance, but among them was also a priest.
They looked at Irene and asked her.
“It seems our report and your current purifying power are different. It might be necessary to check.”
Checking the level of purifying power was simple. Just bring some demonic blood and use your purifying ability on it.
The level was determined by how transparent the demonic blood became in water.
From highest to lowest.
Others would also easily understand, so the power was divided into stages numbered from 1 to 10.
The top tier was 1st Rank, and the lowest was 10th Rank. Naturally, in the previous life Irene had been 10th Rank.
And in this life, the Count had shouted the moment he saw her eyes that 10th Rank was nothing, just before she arrived at the fortress.
So the fact that she was still 10th Rank would not have changed. She had written that in the registration documents before coming to the fortress.
Yet suddenly she had seen the purifying light of a 1st Rank purifier, and everyone’s world should have turned upside down.
“Since you’ve only just woken up, you must be tired, but because of the purifying light, the fortress is in great commotion…”
The Alliance members kept glancing at Irene’s eyes while pressing the demonic blood on her.
She had almost refused, but Irene also suspected the purifying light she had seen. Moreover, the purification that had occurred so naturally, as if it were an old Pair.
Irene sat up and purified the demonic blood the Alliance members had brought.
The result was quick to understand.
“9th Rank…?”
Irene and the Alliance members were stunned by the priest’s measurement.
It had risen one rank from the past. But it was still the ability of the lowest tier.
Seeing that people could not believe it, they asked her to try purification again many times, but no matter how many times, the result remained the same.
In the end, because she had used her power too much in such a short time since waking, Irene fainted once more.
And when she opened her eyes again, no one was in the room.
“Everyone must have left saying they have no more business here.”
Thinking that, Irene slowly sat up. Then she swept her hands over her face.
“This is not… right.”
From the moment she left the Count’s residence and came to the fortress, Irene had been thinking about how to live this life.
It was not something that required deep thought.
She would pair with a suitable knight, quickly gather ten million gold, and after the dungeon extermination period ended, she would become free, leave for a distant place, and live quietly. And live a life for the second time that had nothing to do with dungeons or purifiers.
That had been Irene’s goal.
So she had deliberately not made a proposal that would make a low-class knight fall for her.
She said that she did not mind if they took all the rewards from all the dungeons. She only wanted the lowest dungeon reward that she wanted.
Everyone would think it was a loss for her. But it was never a loss.
“After a few days, there will be a lowest dungeon near here with a small entrance that only one person can enter.”
Irene remembered it clearly.
Five days after the Night of the Contract, a lowest dungeon with a small entrance that only one person could barely enter would appear near the fortress.
Kingdom Alliance identification number 181.
That dungeon would later become legendary.
“Who would have thought that an artifact would appear there—not a metal fragment. A transparentizing ring, of all things.”
At the time, the knight and 6th Rank purifier who entered there only for practice earned an enormous amount of money in an instant.
The transparentizing ring had been sold at the Kingdom Alliance’s official auction for the third-highest price in history.
“With that, not only would she repay the Count’s body price, but she could also earn enough money to live on for the rest of her life.”
That was why Irene had deliberately set conditions so overwhelmingly disadvantageous to him while still wanting to form a Pair with a low-class knight.
Then she could make excuses, spend the night together without immediately taking the reward and leaving, and leave right after.
But she had ended up pairing with Michael, not that knight.
A sigh escaped her, as the first mistake she had intended to correct had gone awry. But she had no choice. Others must have already formed Pairs, and the rumor that she had purified Michael had spread everywhere, so there was nothing to be done.
“Thinking about it, I should talk to Michael about the reward distribution too.”
With anyone else, the first thing they would do was negotiate the distribution.
But because she had suddenly become his Pair and fallen, she had not said a single word about the reward distribution.
“If it’s the same as the past, it will be troublesome.”
Irene recalled the conditions she and Michael had in the past.
“Nine to one, right?”
After he had begged to be her Pair, when they were alone, Michael had sighed and said.
“I send everything I obtain from the dungeon to the Temple. That way, more people can get warm food and a place to sleep. If it’s all right with you, Irene, could you also help them?”
At his words, Irene had no choice but to nod. She had not formed the Pair by clinging to him?
If she rejected Michael’s request, he might abandon the extermination this year, end the Pair, and simply go home.
Then it would be troublesome for Irene.
Still, she could not accept the distribution he thought appropriate.
“All right. But I want at least a little of my share. Five percent or so… I want to receive…”
As she spoke, her voice grew softer.
Even though she would not help him at all, she had forced him to accept the distribution.
But this life was different. The condition of 100 to 0 as he had originally wanted was fine.
“I should ask Michael for the same conditions as that knight.”
While Irene thought, the confusion in her mind gradually cleared.
Unexpected things had happened, but what she needed to do remained the same.
Take the artifact, sell it, end the Pair, and leave this place.
“These known pieces of information are a little annoying.”
Irene looked at the bag placed in the corner of the room and rose from the bed. It seemed the fortress maids had brought it here.
Inside the bag were the papers that had been organized in the Count’s residence, as they were.
“With this alone, she could earn even more money.”
Records that organized which dungeon would produce what in the future.
She did not remember everything perfectly, but with this much, becoming a rich person highly regarded on the continent would be no problem.
Moreover, since the Pair was with Michael, she would have no trouble exterminating these dungeons.
“And since it’s Michael, he won’t demand her body.”
Other knights would want to spend every day with the purifier, but Michael would not.
Then, after gathering the body price, couldn’t she stay a little longer and conquer dungeons that could become money?
Irene, who had been thinking for a moment, shook her head.
“Stop with the foolish thoughts and leave quickly.”
The more money she gathered, the better. But if Michael got badly injured again like the past, it would only repeat the same life.
She did not want to see Michael’s face twice—unwanted sleep, and contempt.
That was for her sake, but also for Michael’s. If the Pair period became long, she might become a nuisance to him like in the past.
“I should just get one thing and leave right away.”
Just as Irene had firmly decided, a knock sounded at the door.
“Are the maids back?”
Perhaps because she had formed a Pair with Michael and caused a commotion due to the purifying rank.
Unlike the past, Irene had been assigned quite a luxurious room.
It was probably the room given because they expected her to be a high-rank purifier.
“Since it’s been judged as 9th Rank, she will probably stay in a place similar to where she was in the past.”
The Alliance fortress provided rooms for purifiers.
Purifier rooms were extremely important.
Because knights had to return from the dungeon, spend relaxing time with the purifier, and then go out to exterminate again.
Naturally, the higher the purifier’s rank, the better the room. Spacious, comfortable bedrooms, and personal bathrooms with warm water available anytime.
If a purifier or knight wanted a better place than assigned, they had to pay.
That was why knights worked hard to obtain high-rank purifiers as Pairs.
That was why in the past, Irene had never dreamed of such accommodations.
“In the past, it was the smallest, most modest room.”
The Alliance representative who muttered that she did not know which room to give a 10th Rank purifier for so long had given her the corner room of the fortress.
A thin wooden bed and a very small bathroom.
Still, it had seemed like heaven because there was no worry about being sold and she could use it alone.
Knock. Knock.
At that moment, the sound of knocking at the door came again.
Irene, realizing she had not told anyone to enter, quickly folded the paper and rose from the bed, facing the door and saying.
“Come in.”
She had turned around thinking it was the maid, but there stood Michael in the holy knight’s uniform.
“Ah…?”
Irene, who had not expected him to come, stood blankly without greeting him and stared at him.
He naturally entered the room, looked around once, and said to her.
“Do you like the room?”
“…Yes?”
Irene, who had not understood his question for a moment, blinked several times and asked in a startled voice.
“Is this my room?”