My Wife Waited in the Wheat Fields

PR: Badman

How did they get here?

Elric thought, as he lay erect in Tyria’s bed, staring at the ceiling.

Then, he sighed inwardly.

‘Why on earth…?!’

It was all because the legs of his bed had been broken.

There was nothing else to say.

Elric’s resentment toward the cleaning company began to rise.

“You should start sleeping. You’ll have to get up early and diligently move around tomorrow.”

Tyria said.

He glanced over and saw that she was lying in the same uptight position that he was in.

Even her sleeping position was aristocratic!

After a brief moment of admiration, a thought flashed through Elric’s mind.

“…Don’t you feel uncomfortable with me here?”

“What do you mean?”

“Milady usually sleeps curled up, so perhaps she finds sleeping due to me uncomfortable, right?”

It was a habit he’d noticed and remembered while caring for her.

How Tyria always slept curled up in a ball.

He wondered if this upright position was uncomfortable for her, because even when he tried to straighten her up, she’d be back to sleeping like a shrimp in less than ten minutes.

Tyria was silent for a moment before answering.

“…It’s okay, and the bed is large, so it doesn’t really matter.”

“I see. I’m surprised the bed is so big.”

“The former head of the household took care of that.”

“…My father?”

“Yes.”

Elric’s head snapped up.

It was rare for her to bring up his father first.

The frustration he’d been feeling since entering the mansion deepened.

Elric asked, his voice tinged with longing.

“Can you tell me more about my father?”

Perhaps he could get a sense of his father’s intentions, which he hadn’t figured out until now.

He’d have been lying if he said that he didn’t feel any anticipation.

At first, he hadn’t thought that she and his father would have shared anything personal with each other, but it had been ten years.

Although, it was a likely possibility that they hadn’t talked at all.

Tyria hesitated, then answered in a small voice.

“…The former patriarch mentioned in passing that if you were to return, I would need a larger bed for you.”

He flinched, and Elric’s fingertips trembled.

“Did he think I would return, that man?”

“I don’t know. The former patriarch was a man of contingencies, so I suppose that was just part of his nature.”

His frown deepened.

It was a plausible explanation, given his father’s proclivities in life; but his inheritance made him think otherwise.

Perhaps he had been waiting for him.

Elric had already shaken the thought off, but it had somehow creeped up on him again.

When Tyria’s gaze shifted from the ceiling to him, Elric forced a smile, hoping it would show in his expression.

“Of course it was.”

Elric tried to look like he was okay.

Tyria didn’t say anything right away.

She held his gaze and remained silent, and Elric felt strangely relieved.

Sometimes, a moment of silence was more comforting than a hundred words.

The words came to his mind, and he felt wonderful for some reason.

There was more.

‘…Green.’

Even in the unlit room, Tyria’s eyes glowed a pale green.

And the hair that covered the nape of her neck was dazzlingly gold.

It was strange how the color didn’t change even when it had been shadowed in a dark environment.

Then, his gaze suddenly fell onto her bare skin.

Ah! He blushed.

It was a moment that made him glad that the lights were off.

“I-I should go to sleep now. Goodnight.”

As he closed his eyes, he felt Tyria stirring.

“…Yes.”

Her breathing was steady behind a whispered voice.

As for Elric.

Thump, thump.

His heart raced and the blush refused to go away.

He wanted to throw off the covers.

But every single one of them covered both of them, so if he did, Tyria would be awoken.

He wondered how long he’d be tossing and turning, unable to do anything.

Rustle.

The sound made it clearer that Tyria was also tossing and turning.

Elric opened his eyes and looked at Tyria.

She was definitely asleep, unlike him.

And from the frown on her face, it was clear that she was uncomfortable in her position, that being the reason for her movements.

As he watched, Tyria fumbled and reached out…

…finding Elric’s arm.

“Hnn…!”

And that was when Elric remembered another one of her habits that he’d forgotten somehow.

She had a habit of always sleeping with something.

Once, it had been his hand, and usually, it was a pillow.

Tyria, who had been fumbling with Elric’s arm, was now closing the distance between them.

Elric stiffened, holding his breath.

“Mmm…”

With a whimper, Tyria clung to Elric’s arm.

This was dangerous.

In more ways than one.

“M-Milady…”

“…”

As there was no answer, he checked, as no one slept like this, not even the best sleepers.

Had the train ride been that tiring for her?

Hoping that it was just a prank, he raised his mana and tapped into her senses, but all her vital signs told him that she was asleep.

“If you sleep like this, I’ll be…”

But she wouldn’t wake up.

And it didn’t end there, either.

As Tyria further nodded off…

…she curled up, and he became more aware of things.

Her softness, her scent, her warm breath. Something tingled in his body.

Elric tried slipping away to a corner of the bed.

But Tyria clung to him wherever he went.

And he had driven himself into a deeper and deeper hole.

He’d only had to give her one arm before, but now he had given her his whole body.

Her head rested on his arm as a pillow.

Her arms were wrapped around his waist, and her legs were wrapped around his thighs.

And the final nail in the coffin was that he was a terrible sleeper.

Thus, he couldn’t help but resent the fact that she was the only one sleeping soundly.

Elric took a deep breath, but it didn’t calm his nerves.

Even his father’s will, which had been so upsetting a moment prio, had become a distant thought.

His mind wandered.

He wondered if she wore perfume to bed.

As he couldn’t understand why she smelled so sweet.

‘Calm down. Calm down.’

Elric scolded himself for his ugly thoughts.

‘Right, how was the Defensive Battle of Chevor…?’

He started to think about the Defensive Battle of Chevor, which he hated to think about.

But it didn’t help.

Her sweet scent washed over his bloody memories of the Defensive Battle of Chevor.

The gentleness of her soft flesh overlaid his taste of death.

That was not the end of it.

Her gentle, fresh breath would pierce his body more intensely than a bullet cutting through the wind.

It was driving Elric crazy.

He’d rather just sleep.

Closing his eyes tightly and steadying his breathing, Elric began his relentless effort to fall asleep.

To say the least, he succeeded.

It was uncomfortable, but somehow, he’d managed to shut down his mind and fall asleep.

And,

“…”

For some reason, Elric didn’t have any nightmares that night.

Or, well, he did have a nightmare.

But he, who had always roamed through the battlefield in his nightmares without a single exception when he dreamt, dreamed today not of the battlefield, but of struggling within a slime’s belly.

It had been a gentle nightmare indeed.

Tyria opened her eyes as soon as her entire body felt refreshed.

Then she stiffened.

“Unn…!”

Within reach of her nose was a pale-complexioned, groaning Elric.

Her arms were wrapped around his rigid body, and for some reason, Tyria was in the corner of the bed with Elric.

Her first thought was, ‘Is this a dream?’

It was too stimulating to be real, so she started to deny it.

But the sensations she felt were too vivid to be that of a dream’s.

She needed to take some time to understand the situation.

Why did she wake up in this state?

Tyria eventually came to one conclusion.

‘You must be a bad sleeper, Milord.’

She must have tucked herself in and drifted off to sleep.

She had to have.

Otherwise, she would be so embarrassed that she would want to hang himself.

Elric’s arm was around her shoulders, too.

Tyria’s face flushed into a blush.

Her breathing became ragged, like waves in the middle of a stormy sea.

Yet, she couldn’t bring herself to move.

No, she didn’t want to move.

The composition of their bodies carried a tension in it.

Despite her embarrassment, Tyria remembered a memory from her childhood.

The day she’d spent the night with him in the tent under the bridge, this was what she’d woken up to.

She was both happy and excited.

Her body tensed unnecessarily, whilst her mind melted like cotton candy in water.

She stared at him in a daze, thinking his whimpers were adorable.

“Unnn…!”

Elric’s eyes snapped open.

Then, in three, two, one…

“Wah!”

Thump!

Elric flopped like a live fish and rolled to the foot of the bed.

Barely centering herself on the bed, Tyria felt her heart sink.

She was embarrassed to have been caught spying on a sleeping man.

Quickly rising to her feet, Tyria straightened her clothes and calmed her complexion.

Turning away from him, she muttered an excuse.

“…I couldn’t get out of it. My lord seems to be a heavy sleeper.”

She couldn’t tell him that she had been distracted by the sight of his face and stayed in that position.

So her only answer had been to shift the blame.

Meanwhile, despair and resentment washed over Elric’s face.

“…My sleeping habits?”

Of course, Tyria, who had turned her head away, didn’t answer.

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