Return of Black Lotus system:Taming Cheating Male Leads

Chapter 417: Chapter-417

The heavy mahogany table in the grandmother’s pavilion was practically groaning under the weight of a lavish, comforting feast. Bowls of steaming broth, roasted meats, and seasoned vegetables had been laid out to celebrate the Grandfather’s return and to pamper Heena.

But Heena didn’t touch a single thing.

She just sat there, resting her chin in her hand, staring blankly at the silver bowl of soup in front of her. It wasn’t because she was throwing a tantrum or trying to be stubborn. The truth was, a thick, suffocating wave of nausea was curling in the back of her throat. The sheer smell of the rich food made her stomach violently turn.

If this were a normal world, and if she were a normal woman who had suddenly missed her period, she probably would have assumed she was pregnant. But she knew that was utterly impossible.

’System,’ she called out silently, her mind dead calm. ’Confirm it again.’

’’"Host, your reproductive system is entirely normal. There is zero chance of pregnancy,"’’ the System’s mechanical voice responded instantly in her head, sounding uncharacteristically quiet.

Heena knew the truth anyway. The contraceptive medicines she meticulously brewed and took were so incredibly concentrated and potent that a pregnancy was a literal impossibility. This wasn’t the morning sickness of a new life.

This was the steady, quiet decay of an old one.

She rested her arm flat against the table, her fingers slightly trembling. She felt so profoundly weak. It was as if her bones were made of lead, and her skin felt entirely too cold despite the warm summer breeze rustling through the courtyard’s bamboo gardens.

’This Marquis house,’ Heena thought, a bitter, dark smirk ghosting over her lips as she watched her grandfather loudly argue with her grandmother across the table about a piece of roast duck. ’It is a literal curse.’

The original Seera had poured her entire health, her mind, and her sanity into the foundations of this estate, and the place had essentially drained her like a parasite until she withered away. Now, Heena was left holding the keys to a grand, wealthy palace, but the physical vessel she inhabited was paying the ultimate price.

Beside her, Samuel hadn’t touched his food either. He sat like a frozen statue, his dark eyes beneath the wooden cat mask entirely fixed on her pale face. He noticed the slight tremor in her fingers. He saw the faint, translucent pallor of her skin under the dining room lanterns.

Without a word, Samuel reached beneath the table, his massive, warm hand gently but firmly wrapping around her freezing fingers, squeezing them tightly as if he could physically force his own boundless strength into her failing body.

The Grand Madam’s sharp eyes, which had been playfully glaring at her husband a second ago, instantly softened and fell squarely on Heena. She noticed the untouched silver bowl, the pale complexion, and the way the girl was simply staring at the feast.

"Sweetheart," the grandmother called out, her voice filled with a deep, maternal worry that she rarely showed to anyone else. "What happened? Why are you not eating? Are you feeling unwell? Is your cheek hurting too badly to chew?"

Hearing the old woman’s frantic barrage of questions, Heena forced the fog in her mind to clear. She pulled her hand gently from Samuel’s warm grip under the table and offered her grandmother a soft, reassuring smile.

"Ah, it’s nothing, Grandma," Heena lied smoothly, her voice light despite the heavy nausea swirling in her stomach. "It’s just... I don’t feel very hungry right now. Don’t worry about me, please enjoy the food."

But the grandmother didn’t look reassured at all. She stared at Heena, her ancient eyes clouding over with immense worry and a sudden, violent wave of hidden fury.

In her mind, the Grand Madam was currently slaughtering her own son a thousand times over. She remembered how the original Seera used to look forward to meals in this pavilion, always eating with a bright, happy appetite whenever she visited her grandparents.

’What the heck has that monstrous son of mine done to her?’ the grandmother thought, her fists clenching beneath her long silk sleeves. ’He must have terrified her so badly, broken her spirit so thoroughly over these past few days, that my poor baby can’t even stomach a single bite of food in her own home.’

The old woman’s eyes turned incredibly dark, a silent promise forming in her heart that the Marquis would pay a heavy price for this, long before the Grandfather was even done with him.

And of course, when her internal fury toward her son reached its absolute boiling point, how could the father who raised him possibly be left unscathed?

The Grand Madam abruptly shifted her deadly gaze away from Heena and locked it onto her husband with an expression of pure, unfiltered annoyance.

"See?!" the grandmother snapped, pointing an accusing chopstick directly at the towering Old Marquis. "This is exactly why I told you to let him study and become a proper scholar! But no, you just ’had’ to force him to be a military general like you! Now look at what happened! Look at the absolute, violent brute he has become!"

The legendary, bloodthirsty Grandfather—who had literally commanded legions of men and slaughtered thousands on the battlefield—visibly shrank in his chair.

Unable to offer even a single word of defense against his wife’s flawless logic, the old man just pitifully lowered his head once again, silently accepting his scolding and staring miserably at his bowl of rice.

Seeing the old man utterly defeated, Heena couldn’t help but smile. Deciding it was time to change the heavy subject, she rested her chin on her hands and looked at the old couple with a cheeky, curious grin.

"So, Grandpa," Heena asked brightly. "How exactly did you marry Grandmother?"

Hearing that, the old couple immediately stopped their bickering. They looked at each other for a brief moment before the Grand Madam let out a loud, highly amused scoff.

"He married ’me’?" the grandmother laughed, waving her hand dismissively. "No, my dear. I kidnapped him."

Heena’s jaw literally hit the floor.

Behind her, even the unfazed, battle-hardened Samuel visibly stiffened, his mind entirely short-circuiting at the revelation.

"You... you kidnapped him?" Heena stammered, staring at her grandmother in absolute shock. "How?!"

The grandmother leaned back in her chair, a deeply nostalgic and incredibly proud smirk forming on her wrinkled face.

"You see, dear, I belonged to a very wealthy, highly influential noble family," the Grand Madam explained smoothly. "We had money, power, and status. And your grandfather? He was utterly useless back then. He was just a poor, scrawny boy—thin as a bamboo stalk—who came to work in my family’s estate as a lowly servant after his own family was killed or something. I didn’t really care about the details."

Heena slowly turned her head, fully expecting the legendary, bloodthirsty Grandfather to be deeply offended or heartbroken by his wife’s blunt description of his tragic past.

Instead, the Old Marquis was just sitting there, nodding along enthusiastically as if saying, ’Yep, that’s exactly how it happened!’ As his wife continued the story, the terrifying war general’s face slowly started turning a bright, rosy red.