A moment later, Adela flinched at the cold sensation touching her skin and pulled away. Leon, his face set hard, was spreading ointment across her shoulders and neck.

“I will not tolerate damage to what belongs to me.”

Watching Leon’s supremely arrogant, grave expression, Adela pressed down the laugh threatening to escape.

‘Every last one of those ugly marks on my shoulders and neck is something you left there.’

Leon’s gaze settled on her bluish bruised cheek and went cold. The hand carefully spreading the ointment was delicate, but Adela gave a small flinch every time his fingertips made contact.

The scratch from the ring throbbed more fiercely as time passed. Every time she felt his touch, her jaw clenched tight and her brow furrowed on its own. Compared to the merciless flogging of her past life it was bearable, but it was not painless by any means.

When Adela could not hold back a wince, Leon murmured coldly.

“Did you not declare you would be my mistress? In the Urcheka Empire, save for the Emperor himself, there is no one who dares lay a hand on what is mine.”

He was suppressing his anger, yet throughout the exchange he kept claiming her as his own without pause.

‘Yes, Leon. I am yours. And you are mine as well.’

Adela lowered her gaze and murmured to herself, and Leon, finished with the ointment, raised his voice again, low and sharp.

“Look up, Adela Valent.”

“……?”

What on earth rubbed him the wrong way?

Adela looked up quietly to read his intentions, and a faint crack crossed his otherwise impassive face.

Leon’s anger kept going, and Adela found it harder and harder to bear. In the end, she pushed herself upright and pressed a kiss to his cheek, light as a feather.

It was the tender comfort she used to offer out of habit whenever he was upset, back when they were children.

“Adela, you really……”

When she pulled her lips away, Leon’s eyes only darkened further rather than softening.

The warmth that touched his cheek was the same as eight-year-old Adela’s, but the Leon receiving it was no longer a boy.

After that brief kiss, his breath caught and turned hot in an instant. While Adela blinked in confusion, he bent his head and pressed his lips roughly to her nape.

Forgetting he just applied ointment there, he buried his lips in her nape as though he could not hold back. A firm hand reached through the loose robe and seized both her br*asts roughly.

“…Augh.”

A suppressed m*an tore free between Adela’s lips, startled by the fierce grip. He slowly laid her back on the bed and pressed down heavily.

“If you want to be my concubine, you will not rest for a single day.”

“Leon, just a moment……”

She wanted his child and meant it sincerely when she said she wanted to be with him, but right now it was too much. The aftermath of the night before was still vivid all over her body.

He read the fear in Adela’s eyes and seized her jaw roughly, pressing his lips to hers. While Adela gasped for breath under the shower of kisses, his fingers twisted and worked at the tips of her br*asts with relentless focus.

Her n*pples, hardened with arousal, caught on his fingertips, and a rush of heat surged downward through her lower body in an instant.

Instinctive pleasure ate away at the fear.

‘If I go through this again tonight, I might actually die.’

Adela twisted under Leon’s hands and tried to ease herself away, and he straightened up, threw off his shirt, and unfastened his belt without hesitation.

The metal buckle of the belt struck together with a sharp clang. Even at that small sound Adela shrank her shoulders, and in that moment the cold leather belt wound tightly around her wrists.

“Where do you think you’re going? You have a duty to fulfill here.”

Leon fixed her with the eyes of a predator refusing to let go of its prey and drew a small pill from his pocket. He placed the red tablet in his own mouth, then gripped Adela’s jaw, forced it open, kissed her, and pushed it in.

“Wh, what is this……”

Adela furrowed her brow at the strange sensation and bitter taste spreading through her mouth, and he slowly curved his lips and licked them.

“They say it is a secret remedy that can rouse even the dead.”

“……”

Adela knew well the reputation of that red tablet, said to save even the departed. It was prepared by a renowned physician of the Pasa Empire, a rare treasure said to be nearly impossible to obtain even for ten million gold.

“So I intend to take you tonight.”

Leon’s declaration left Adela with a strange feeling. He fed her that precious medicine out of concern for her worn-down body, and the only words he could manage were a threat to have her all night.

‘Leon, were you actually worried about me?’

He was endearing, and at the same time pitiable, acting fierce to hide his clumsy sincerity.

Her gaze resting on his chest, Adela let out a low laugh. Leon’s breath stopped for a moment at the sight of her eyes curving softly.

Reading the longing on his face, Adela suddenly recalled the memory of the night before. She lost consciousness first, so Leon may not have fully satisfied his desire.

“…Then go a little easy on me.”

Adela turned her head and whispered in a wet voice, and Leon immediately bent his head and took her n*pple deep into his mouth.

“L, Leon……!”

His rough tongue worked the tip with relentless strokes, and a shivering tremor ran up her spine, making her hips jerk on their own.

The moment Leon released the binding on her wrists, Adela instinctively beat against his firm chest.

Whether the medicine was moving through her veins, her entire body flushed hot.

The memory of that strange and overwhelming sensation from the night before surfaced, and fear outran anticipation, making her tremble.

‘I’m so dizzy……’

At this rate, she felt she truly might lose her grip on reason.

She pushed back with all her strength, and Leon stopped moving and stared at Adela with relentless focus. Then, one by one, he took her slender fingers carefully into his mouth and sucked them deep.

In the quiet bedroom, only the wet sounds of friction gathered. At the tips of the fingers his lips visited, clear saliva glistened and remained. He checked the moisture soaking deeply into the sheet beneath Adela and murmured low.

“You are this wet, yet you push me away?”

Leon’s gaze swept over the damp sheet, and Adela’s cheeks blazed hot. It was a reaction clearly mixed of shame and heat.

This was truly unfair.

‘You’re the one who pushed me to this point.’

On top of that, he was her first love. She misread his true feelings for many years, but now she knew all too well where Leon’s heart pointed.

A man like that, set on making her lose her mind, made it nearly impossible not to be aroused. But it was a confession she could not bring herself to say aloud right now. Cornered, Adela bit her reddened lip.

“I said I would not allow a single mark on what is mine.”

Leon murmured low and licked at her ear with relentless persistence.

“…St, stop.”

Even as her mind went hazy, Adela felt that the hand cupping her cheek was unbearably tender. Her eyes grew hot at that deceptive warmth.

Whether it was the effect of the red medicine, or his tongue exploring every corner of her body with such care, Adela found herself gripping Leon’s hair and pulling him toward her without meaning to.

The hands that pushed him away pressed close with a flushed m*an, and Leon’s breathing broke apart even rougher. Against her will, Adela’s parted lips kept spilling his name.

“Leon, Leon……”

Goosebumps rose wherever his fingertips grazed, followed immediately by a melting heat. He swallowed her desperate m*ans and let out a wet voice.

“You really are a terrible liar.”

In her blurred vision, Leon’s flashing eyes were already those of a beast that lost its reason. He bit deep into Adela’s nape like branding a mark and would not let go.

A hot and unfamiliar sensation spread through her entire body.

Adela looked at Leon consuming her with hungry desperation and gripped his shoulders tight.

Their night was just beginning.