Chapter 340

"Med mooluntarily, coll?" "Yes," he snapped, where he sat on the opposite sofa. Their gazes met. Sweat dripped from her forehead as she jolted awake on the sofa. Instinctively, she reached out beside her.

A heavy silence filled the room as they stared at each other, neither speaking. Time seemed to stop until the fragrant incense burned out.

"You saw me just now," Percival's hoarse voice broke the silence, low and steady in the dim room.

"It felt like a dream, yet it was so vivid it seemed as if I had lived through it myself," Odalys said. She grabbed a nearby bottle of water, twisted it open, and took a large gulp. Catching her breath, she continued, "I saw you, too."

Percival studied her panicked expression for a long moment. "So, in the previous timeline, before you married me, you saw the newspaper about Selah's death, were shocked, and jumped off a building!"

"Yes," Odalys replied softly. "I'd never seen it before. Today was the first time." Tears welled up within her. This was a technique her master had taught her, but she had never used it before. She hadn't expected that using Percival's birth date would reveal their connection in the previous timeline. She wondered why she had decisively married Percival on the day she was forced to be a substitute bride. In the previous timeline, he was the only one who came for her, who draped a clean blanket over her lifeless body and carried her up the mountain for cremation. She was able to travel back in time thanks to Percival. However, she didn't know why, after he carried her body up the mountain, he was never seen again. She wondered if Percival had died as well. "Why did you come looking for me? Whose debt were you repaying?" Odalys asked, her curiosity piqued as she looked at Percival.

Percival rubbed his temples and met her gaze. "Five years old, a fortune teller passing through Crownridge read my fortune. According to my grandfather, that fortune teller saved my life," Percival explained. "The Stewart family has always repaid its debts. As for what we just saw—where I appeared outside the Rennett Villa after your death—I was looking for you. I can't explain it either." His gaze grew more complex as he looked at Odalys. From the moment she married into the Stewart family as a substitute bride and began testing boundaries with him, he'd felt an inexplicable trust. "I understood. It was all predestined."

"Maybe the person you met was my master," Odalys suggested. Her master had never mentioned any of this, but when the Bennett family brought her back, it was her master who told her she had a destined path, one that required her to leave. Whether this calamitous forced marriage into the Bennett family or Percival's appearance, she still couldn't say for certain.

"Regardless, we knew each other in the previous timeline," Percival said. As he finished speaking, Odalys's phone buzzed with a notification. A familiar number was on the screen. Though she hadn't saved it, she knew it belonged to Caspian.

"He helped me," Odalys murmured. After her death, the Bennett family treated her with disdain. Only Caspian had bothered to cover her with cloth, yet he was also the one who needed to bring her into a posthumous marriage. Whether in the premonition or this life, not a single person in the Bennett family was a good person.

"He wants you to go there?" Percival frowned.

Chapter 310

Odalys didn't answer but handed him her phone instead. Percival read the message on her screen: "[Don't show yourself for now, Dad's coming back, and he will make trouble for you.]" A brief message, but it conveyed the situation. Odalys didn't reply.

Just then, Percival's phone also vibrated. Seeing the caller ID, he quickly answered and asked, "What's up?" After hearing the other person's response, his gaze instinctively shifted to Odalys.

Odalys had planned to return to her room; however, when her eyes met his, she paused and sat back down.

When Percival ended the call, he turned to her and said, "Orson just called. Edie had a miscarriage at the hospital and asked if I would go."

"Are you going?" Odalys asked.

Percival remained silent for a moment before standing up and saying, "Why not take a look?"

"Then I'll go, too," Odalys said.

As she spoke, Percival turned and headed to his room. Shortly after, he emerged in a black casual outfit, while Odalys hadn't changed her clothes. The two of them were dressed in low-key casual suits. Odalys was in white, while Percival was in black. But for some reason, it gave the illusion of a couple's outfit.

"Mr. Stewart, Mrs. Stewart, are you heading out?" Dorian quickly approached as he saw them heading for the door. Percival grabbed his car keys and replied, "Tell Grandpa we're heading to the hospital and make sure he eats his dinner."

"Of course, I'll bring him down right away," Dorian said, rubbing his nose sheepishly. Alexander had indeed been starving earlier but had refrained from interrupting the couple's meal together. Instead, he'd hidden in his room munching on chips—not healthy for his age.

Percival drove Odalys to the hospital. When they arrived outside the VIP ward, they could hear Edie's screams from afar.

"Odalys, you bitch!" Edie's curses rang out repeatedly. Percival's expression turned cold as a flicker of anger surfaced. Someone insulting her made him inexplicably irritated, and a faintly murderous glint thickened in his eyes. Instinctively, he felt a strong need to protect Odalys.

"Still has the strength to hurl insults? Looks like she isn't dying yet," Odalys said quietly. "I'm curious about the curse inside her." She couldn't understand why Edie hated her so much. Edie placed the curse worm in her body herself; Odalys merely killed it, which caused a backlash. Everything was simply karma. No one else was to blame.

"What will happen if the curse worm stays in her body?" Percival asked in a deep voice.

Odalys's eyes lit up with a touch of excitement. "Death, of course," Odalys explained. "Nurturing a curse worm inside the body means it burrows into the flesh and feeds on its host daily. If the host becomes too weak and the worm senses its survival is threatened… then it would try to escape the host's body. The life veins of the host would become the worm's only exit. To survive, the worm would devour the host's internal organs, causing a quicker death. Only then would the worm leave and seek a new host."

Edie's screams, calma but loud enough for those outside the ward to hear, continued. She was in so much pain that she rolled around, struggling to crawl out, cursing, "Odalys, you bitch! Why did you kill the curse worm? Why did you?" As soon as she finished speaking, Percival stood in front of Odalys. He stood tall, looking down at Edie with cold indifference. His expression was as if he didn't even know her.