No, in the original novel, Hayden was the indifferent type of person who didn’t care at all about what Raha or the other element masters did, so this ambiguous interest he was showing right now was incredibly surprising and baffling.
“Do you actually get curious about things like that?”
Because of his surprise, his inner thoughts slipped out of his mouth without him realizing it.
At that, Hayden’s brow furrowed slightly.
“Am I not allowed to be curious?”
“No, it’s just that you are someone who usually has absolutely no interest in other people’s business.”
“Isn’t your head completely filled with nothing but border region defense, monster disposal, and things like that?”
When Raha spoke with a small smirk as if he knew everything, Hayden’s face changed subtly.
Raha quickly pulled back his smile and focused on treating him.
“Teore…”
Hayden spoke in a relaxed voice that felt a bit different from how he had sounded until now.
“I think I understand a little bit now why he brought the High Priest to the Grand Duke’s castle. The Crown Prince’s official document, too.”
At his words, Raha blinked his eyes as if asking what that meant.
But he didn’t ask further.
He himself felt the changed attitudes of Teore and Blizan toward him better than anyone else.
‘Well, I’m sure this will quickly wither away too once they get completely trapped in Edrion’s fishing net.’
Stirring up trouble would only result in his own loss, so staying as quiet as possible would be what helped his peaceful future ahead.
While thinking about that, Hayden’s words about Edrion failing to manifest the light attribute suddenly came to mind.
In the first place, it was an area Raha had never experienced himself, since it manifested automatically just by coming into contact with an element master.
And as soon as that thought occurred, Edrion’s light attribute, which he had forgotten about for a moment, popped into his mind.
‘Come to think of it, Edrion didn’t possess the power of the attribute from birth like Raha.’
Perhaps because the story needed adversity or a heartbreaking narrative for the main bottom, Edrion’s father, Viscount Havigael, had planned long ago to control the empire’s five attribute nobles at his own whim.
He used his own son as a test subject to artificially make him possess the light attribute.
That happened after he found out by chance that a certain grass growing in the Monster Forest possessed a certain amount of the light attribute, and it was when Edrion was only three years old.
‘Then, did Edrion become unable to use the light attribute because he couldn’t eat the grass from the Monster Forest?’
If that were the case, from now on, every time he treated the five element masters, he would have to boil and consume the grass containing the light attribute from the Monster Forest.
Of course, this method belonged solely to Edrion, who had boiled and consumed the light attribute grass for a long time since childhood to finally manifest the light attribute as an adult, so there was no need to worry about light attribute users multiplying all over the place.
But either way, it was certain to be inconvenient in many ways compared to himself, who could use the light attribute autonomously.
Raha tried hard to recall the ending of the original novel that he had read while performing Hayden’s rampage suppression treatment.
Because he hadn’t read until the very completion, he didn’t know how Edrion, left alone after the only true High Priest Raha died at Teore’s hands, lived while treating the element masters.
He roughly knew that, fitting for a harem keyword story, he placed all five Tops beneath his feet, escaped his father’s shadow, and met a happy ending.
‘Yeah, well. They’ll figure it out on their own.’
Thinking that they would take care of things among themselves after he disappeared, Raha decided he shouldn’t worry about it that far.
‘Right, won’t they bring the light attribute grass and make a drug that can suppress rampages through consumption, or figure out some kind of way?’
Thinking that way, Raha nodded inwardly.
Since making such a drug could also be useful in emergencies, he wondered if he should drop a hint to Teore later.
But if he did that, it felt like Edrion’s secret would be revealed earlier than in the original novel, so he stopped.
‘But how was Edrion’s secret revealed again…?’
He had definitely read up to that point, but no matter how much he tried to recall, he couldn’t remember.
Right then, Hayden suddenly called him.
“High Priest.”
“Yes?”
“Don’t your legs hurt? It looks uncomfortable in many ways, not just your legs.”
Since he was standing awkwardly while covering his body with a blanket, holding hands as if shaking hands to perform the rampage suppression treatment, it made sense for Hayden to think that.
Raha smiled awkwardly toward Hayden and said,
“It’s almost over, so it’s fine.”
At those words, Hayden’s eyes widened.
“It’s almost over?”
“Yes, soon…”
Since more than half of his attribute waves were already untangled, Hayden should have definitely been able to feel the difference.
Raha couldn’t understand why the man was looking at him with such wide, surprised eyes.
Looking at Hayden staring back at him with startled eyes, Raha thought about how handsome he was—in a completely different way from Teore or Blizan.
He knew it was a trivial thought, but since these men were the Tops of the original novel, their visuals were exceptionally outstanding, which seemed to make the thought slip into his mind automatically.
“You are different from usual.”
Ah, the usual treatment time…
Only then did Raha seem to realize the exact reason for Hayden’s surprise, and the corners of his lips curved up into an awkward smile.
“I am sorry about how things were before. I was certainly lacking the proper qualities of a High Priest.”
The original Raha, who had been pathologically obsessed with Blizan, had always excessively prolonged the treatment sessions to pry into various matters concerning Blizan while treating the other element masters.
Because of that, Hayden—who was always pressed for time where every minute and second counted—had tried desperately to find something to do during those treatment sessions, which used to take a whole day.
Consequently, whenever it was time for treatment, he would handle all the estate management tasks at once—matters he had entirely pushed off onto his aide while he was busy guarding the border region.
Because of that, Raha had always talked to Hayden’s back as the man kept his eyes fixed on paperwork, as if he were speaking to a wall.
‘Of course, the original Raha wouldn’t have cared about that at all.’
It was only natural, since everything in his world revolved around Blizan.
Without caring in the slightest about how the other element masters treated him, he would have focused his sharp attention solely on observing whether Edrion was trying to seduce Blizan and steal him away.
“In any case, that won’t happen from now on. Three hours at most. The treatment time will not exceed that, so rest assured.”
“…Won’t that be harder on you, High Priest?”
Raha’s eyes widened slightly because Hayden asked with a somewhat worried expression.
And for good reason—in the original novel, Hayden was someone who had never cared about any aspect of Raha until now, so this sudden concern felt foreign.
“The time is not so urgent that you must cut the treatment short while enduring dizziness. Besides, I have separate materials I look over during the treatment time anyway.”
“Yes, but now there is no reason for me to forcefully drag out the time anymore… Before, yes, I am sorry, but I was holding you here on purpose.”
Raha expressed his apologies repeatedly, speaking as if making a firm promise to never do so again.
Hayden, who had been staring straight at him without a word, suddenly pulled his hand away.
Because of that, the light attribute that was flowing into him snapped and cut off.
“First, put some clothes on, and let’s sit down to talk calmly.”
“Pardon…?”
