Holy Night: My Husband is Definitely a Paladin - Chapter 361

“Even so… I was afraid of you being in pain and struggling…”

Unable to finish his sentence, Michael once again lowered his head.

Irene embraced him, gently patting his trembling back.

It seemed that Reyna’s childbirth had affected Michael much more deeply than she’d expected.

Irene herself had been startled that day. Hearing Reyna’s screams and sobs from beyond the door, she had closed her eyes over and over, praying for her friend’s safety.

But Irene also remembered the expression on Reyna’s face when she held her child.

Crying and laughing, gazing at the new life she and Felix had brought into the world.

From the moment of birth until the child grew up, it would never be all joy.

Sometimes worrying, sometimes getting angry, always carrying the feeling that there was an endless task in some corner of the heart.

But if it was together with Michael, then even that would become just another part of her life.

Irene kissed his face again.

On his forehead, his nose, and his lips.

After showering him with gentle, bird-like kisses, she beamed and said,

“Then, will you smile for me, Michael?”

At her words, Michael, too, gave the brightest smile.

He buried his face in Irene’s shoulder and murmured,

“You truly… give me happiness that’s too much for me to bear.”

“That’s my line.”

At Irene’s reply, both of them giggled as they held each other close.

It was a night when another happiness had come into their lives.

* * *

“What in the world is all this…?”

A few days later, Irene muttered as she hugged the puppy in her arms.

It was the puppy that Michael’s desire had gifted her from the monster realm.

The puppy, who had arrived here first, was extremely smart.

As if it had already decided on its own place in the house, it dragged a soft cushion under the stairs and fell asleep on it, belly up.

[There are monsters above and monsters below. Got it? From now on, you must bow your head and show this body respect.]

Insisting that order must be strict, Chomp-chomp spoke to the puppy in a stern voice.

Seeing this, the puppy…

“Grrrk!”

[Ahh! It hurts! I surrender! I surrender!]

As if completely unfazed by the ‘who ever heard of a monster barking?’ attitude, the puppy chewed on Chomp-chomp’s body like a dog toy.

Hand of Appraisal, apparently now over its hangover, looked at this scene with exasperation and yawned. Then, a moment later, it shouted,

[Hey! Hey! What is with this dog! Why is it following me! Don’t bite! Don’t lick!]

“Yip!”

Regardless, the puppy, as if thinking ‘Wow, two moving toys!’, happily chased after Chomp-chomp and the Hand throughout the house.

But in the end, the chase only stopped after Irene scolded them.

“Aren’t you both supposed to have higher demonic power?”

[That’s not a real monster! It has some magic, but it’s just a puppy!]

[That’s right! It’s a weird one!]

So apparently, neither could win against the puppy.

But in Irene’s eyes, it just looked exactly like the puppy she’d always wanted as a child.

After that, the puppy followed Irene everywhere she went.

It was clever enough that, when Irene was with Michael, it would go off somewhere with Chomp-chomp.

Thanks to that, Michael also found the puppy extremely adorable.

At any rate, holding the puppy that had naturally become a member of the household, Irene watched Michael busy at work in the yard.

“Isn’t that a bit much, though?”

“Yip!”

The puppy barked shortly, as if agreeing.

Irene sat on the stairs, resting her chin on her hand, and watched Michael working hard, sweating in the yard.

In the yard was the huge workbench that he sometimes brought out when repairing the fence or fixing the house.

Beside it, there was a large pile of high-quality lumber that he and Chomp-chomp had bought from the nearby city.

Up to that point, it didn’t look much different from when he would fix up the house in his spare time.

But what stood in the yard now wasn’t something like a fence.

“For now… those look like your houses.”

“Yip!”

The puppy wagged its tail, seeming to agree.

The very first thing Michael made that busy morning was a doghouse.

And not just one, but several.

One, with a roof, was apparently for the yard, and the others seemed to be for placing around the house. They looked just right for putting a cushion inside.