The Rotten Lady Rosa Wants to Watch Over Love from the Shadows

Chapter Twenty-Seven: Rosa Wants to Protect the Moe Icons (II)

“Don’t burn them! Ahhh!”

Rosa wasn’t a combatant; thus, she couldn’t strengthen her body, so the icon picture, or rather the flame that she embraced, was exceedingly hot.

She felt the urge to scream in pain, but she held it back as she pressed the icon firmly to her chest.

AHHH! Hot, hot, hot! Although it’s hot, my heart, my love, burns hotter!

Rosa reasoned that the fire would feel cool as long as her mind stayed rotten.

After all, rotten food leftovers couldn’t possibly be burnt with a flame that couldn’t even burn a single sheet of paper.

Rosa continued to convince herself as she strongly embraced the icon.

She assumed that the fire would be put out if the oxygen supply were cut off.

However, Rosa was gripping the icon far too firmly.

Like a snake pursuing its new prey, the ravenous flame began reaching its tongue out to Rosa’s hands and clothes.

Ah! This isn’t good!

“Rosa!”

Leon, who had started the fire, had turned pale right next to her.

Due to the nature of magic, once a spell was released, it couldn’t be undone. In other words, not even Leon himself could put out this fire.

That’s why Leon wanted to use a water spell, but Rosa shouted and interrupted him as soon as she realized what he was about to do.

“NO! You shouldn’t get these precious books wet!”

A bottom’s lovely eyes are the only thing in the world that can get wet.

Leon, ready to cast his magic, came to a halt as though startled by the shout.

“Dear sister! Oh wind, blow!”

Bernando yelled in place of Leon.

As if to say, “I’ve had enough,” the fire disappeared from around Rosa.

Rosa collapsed on the spot simultaneously, seized by an inexplicable lack of air.

“Cough! Cough!”

“I apologize, dear sister! For a brief moment, I controlled the wind and expelled the air from the area surrounding you.”

Bernardo dashed over and apologized while rubbing Rosa’s back.

Rosa stared up at Bernardo, tears rolling down her face beneath her tangled hair.

My kid is a genius! He is undoubtedly a genius! Wind leads to the rise of fire, yet it can also expel it if there is no air. This is the world’s only graceful technique to put out a fire without getting the books wet. And with such a brief chant.

Rosa returned to her senses and struggled to her feet, nearly nodding her head in a grand display of sisterly affection.

“Hey… Hey! You….”

Ladu gasped and uttered a concerned cry at that point.

“That was dangerous!? Let me see your wounds! Your trachea too!”

He gave Rosa a rare, or rather, unseen before, look of genuine worry, having completely discarded the mockery he’d shown her previously.

He also didn’t appear to have the time to try to speak with Rosa in Berg’s language.

Ladu reached out with his arm to tear the burnt dress’s bosom off, but Rosa pulled away from him and walked over to Leon.

“Your… Your High… Highness… Cough!”

Rosa still had something to say to the prince, despite her inability to speak clearly owing to the consequences of her severe choking.

“Rosa…”

“No… No matter the… The reason… These… These… I… Icons… Should… Should… Not be… Burn… burned…!”

Leon held out his hand, a look of anxiousness on his well-toned face.

Rosa, on the other hand, pushed it aside and looked him in the eye.

“We should get you treated first…”

“Your Highness! Please look! I’d like you, His Majesty the King and Her Majesty the Queen, to see this image.”

Rosa boldly interrupted the prince, thrusting the unburned icon in his face.

She could hear Leon Leon gasp as he focused on the image.

Rosa speculated that the image’s immorality was to thank for the gasp.

Rosa’s eyes were now a deep purple, and her entire body was filled with a heavenly force, or rather, the notion that she had to complete the mission to deliver this moe image at all costs.

Rosa spoke to the prince in hushed tones, and he gazed back at her as if he’d been sucked in.

“Leave your prejudices aside and look. Can you see?”

Can you hear it? Can you see it?

If only her thoughts were fine, Rosa would have told Leon the whole story eloquently.

Isn’t it wonderful!? This lovely young man, Moe Faz’s lament!? Doesn’t it make your heart flutter when the previously cynical and aloof (*Rosa’s additions) young god morphs into a love-crazed character? The scorching hellfire, the terrified spectators, and every part of the performance make this image priceless. Don’t you realize how fantastic this is!? It should be etched in the minds of the country’s upper echelon and, if feasible, printed on the back of the country’s money!

“Just what am I supposed to see…?”

Leon, on the other hand, appeared confused.

Rosa, irritated by his lack of understanding, realized that this was probably not Leon’s type, and she quickly grabbed another image that was nearby.

She showed him an image of the ordinarily cheerful Moe Gal dispersed across the front lines and transformed into a field of yellow flowers.

This was Rosa’s second favorite scene.

Even if you ignored the rose’s meaning, it was an extremely heart-stopping scene, and it wasn’t easy to look at it and not think it was moe.

“In this scene, Gal Aptus, the protector, overcomes his foes in return for his own life. His body then transforms into a field of golden flowers. Even Your Highness should be able to understand this one, right…?”

Ladu, standing directly next to her, exclaimed as he noticed Rosa beaming as she spoke.

Leon was surprised to see Ladu show a rare, sincere expression of shock on his face.

Leon figured that these images most likely had a vital meaning hidden inside them.

He carefully looked at the two images before focusing on the one that displayed the image of the person Rosa had referred to as the protector.

A guy whose body had been torn apart stood amid the artwork, his eyes vacant, looking up at the skies.

The demons avidly consumed the blood and intestines gushing from Gal’s wounds, and their scarlet bodies, with bulging bellies, and filled stomachs, transformed into yellow flowers as they neared the bottom of the image.

The flowers were in no way pleasant. With their sloppy, dissolute shapes, they reminded one of pus.

Something clicked in Leon’s mind at that moment, and he glanced up as if a light bulb had gone off in his head.

The protector? ‘You lot are a mere shadow of your former selves! You’re no better than pus!’ The protector eventually turns into pus.

“It can’t be…”

Leon’s mind immediately connected the dots.

It all seemed unreal.

However, the Apts were people who viewed medicine as a miracle. It was pretty likely that their religion was founded on medical concepts.

“Does this depict how pus came to be?”

What?

Rosa froze with a smile on her face as Leon inquired with a straight face.

What did he just say?

On the other hand, Ladu returned a silent gaze to Leon before gently curving his lips.

“That’s right.”

“…”

“It depicts the phagocytic activity of neutrophils, which are blood cells that fight infections.”

Leon was left speechless.

Rosa, who stood next to him, was also dumbfounded, but for a completely different reason.

It’s kind of different from what I imagined…

Faced with the two perplexed individuals in front of him, Ladu continued to explain.

“Both surgery and internal medicine require a thorough understanding of the blood and immune systems. Since childhood, that information has been hammered into us, the Apts, in the guise of myths. The information is given to us as a set of images and oral tales to prevent it from being leaked to other countries. However, it appears that this girl was able to see right through it.”

Rosa came out in a cold sweat when Ladu gave her a serious look.

After all, she hadn’t intended to see through any of it in the first place.

“Then…”

Leon looked up and shifted his attention to the other icon, ignoring Rosa’s silence.

In the middle of the icon was an image of a young god wailing.

Flames engulfed him, and any plants or animals that came into touch with them were scorched and began to suffer as a result.

Cracked ground, patchy-furred animals, squashed rotten fruits, and limp flowers — scarred skin, hair loss, uncontrollable vomiting, and signs of weakening.

Leon felt shivers run down his spine.

He remembered what Rosa had told him just now.

She’d told him that was something that he, as well as His Majesty and Her Majesty, had to see.

“This… Is this mother’s…”

“Correct.”

Ladu replied with a gravelly voice and a flat tone.

“This icon is called Fazu, or Autoimmune Disorders. It’s a scenario that depicts a symptom of an overly powerful immune system that goes berserk in its quest to battle foreign invaders, generating inflammation and other irregularities throughout the body.”

WHAAAT!?

Rosa had finally been rendered speechless.

Never in her wildest dreams did she imagine that this moe icon would have such profound meaning.

Rosa was stunned, and Leon, who had entirely forgotten about her, talked to Ladu with a serious expression.

“So you were hinting at your examination results when you originally offered me this icon?”

“I wasn’t hinting at anything. I outright explained it. I told you that it was just like this and that you should get a better look at the icon.”

“There’s a limit to how bad your explanations can be… Besides, even on the first day, you gave up saying that this was incurable…”

“I did not. I stated that it was not within the scope of physicians. I also provided you with a thorough explanation. If you didn’t get it, you could only blame your own incompetence.”

“You provided a thorough explanation!? But…”

They visibly pecked at one other, and their argument was going nowhere.

The two men, dreadful expressions on their faces, were about to attack one other when a polite voice interrupted them.

“I brought a maid!”

Chris arrived, accompanied by an elderly maid.