Izer turned her pale face onto the pillow. He moved away the hair stuck to her mouth so it wouldn’t bother her.

Soon a warm washcloth caressed her heated body. When his hand reached between her sticky thighs, past her br*asts covered in saliva, her legs curled up.

“Stay still.”

“……”

Even in her sleep, his wife’s body that rejected him obeyed the command. Izer continued his task on the limp body with sunken eyes. When the washcloth cooled, he soaked it in hot water again, and again when it cooled. Finally, he rubbed her with a dry towel until her body was soft and dry.

While tending to Celian, his drunkenness had somewhat subsided. His clearer vision revealed bruising darker than usual and finger marks on her neck.

“……”

Pleasure is brief, but self-loathing lasts long. His irritated hands grabbed a robe. Heavy footsteps crossed the hallway and climbed the stairs. Heading to the third floor, to that person’s space which he hadn’t set foot in since his adoptive father’s collapse. Izer looked straight ahead. The corridor with more than half its lights out was desolate.

“Your Grace?”

The maid startled and bowed. She too was in mourning clothes.

“I’ll turn on the lights. I didn’t know you’d come here at this hour……”

“That’s enough.”

The lantern in the maid’s hand passed to Izer’s. With a cold face, Izer opened the firmly closed door. The place where no one could enter without permission was invaded so easily.

The room with its meticulously drawn curtains was cold. Though the maids seemed to clean regularly, that very fact made it feel like a well-maintained museum.

Behind the desk his adoptive father had used hung his mother’s portrait. Those gentle eyes that had both angered him and helped him suppress his rage whenever he was summoned here now watched her son.

His mother’s expression had been the same when she held the arm of her expressionless son looking up at the mansion where he would live from then on.

‘Izer, I’m proud of you. Thank you for accepting this mother’s decision, even though it must have been uncomfortable.’

He had wanted to be a son to be proud of. He believed without doubt that if he took revenge on the cause that had shattered their family, he could hold his head high and declare to those who had been proud of him that their son had done his best for them both. That he could still claim to be the proud son of those who had been proud of him.

But everything remained the same. Izer looked up at the painting and muttered dejectedly.

“It’s all the same.”

He still reeked of blood and filth. He remained trapped in that wretched day when he had hurled curses for the first and last time at his father, who had shouted at his son to get his act together as he convulsed under the weight of shock, shame, and humiliation.

There’s a basement below the floor and hell below that. What he had thought was rock bottom last summer now seemed like heaven in retrospect. The only person who truly cared for him was still alive and breathing, and he had thought this woman, now passed out in sleep, sympathized with his pain that no one else could understand.

Those two things alone had made the past season shimmer faintly.

That season when the one he hated so much was still alive with blazing eyes had been better for Izer.

He couldn’t even remember when he had last laughed sincerely. When was the last time he had lived without hating someone? Though he had thought the time he harbored hatred was just a moment compared to his lifetime, as one year became two and passed five, everything before felt like a dim dream.

He searches his memories. What had he lived for? In childhood, he had dreamed of becoming a man like his father. A little later, he had realized the world was beautiful. After passing his majority and having his life completely changed, he had lived to return his life to its proper place.

He sneered at the naive young man who had harbored the vain dream of returning to his proper place.

He had been foolish enough not to understand the obvious truth that dreaming of the past while ignoring the forward flow of time was absurd. His deceased parents could not be resurrected, the sparkling woman had been shattered miserably in his hands, and his sensitive soul had been destroyed.

To think this was all there was to what he had thought was his life’s purpose—maniacal laughter rang out.

“Ha, haha……”

He had lost miserably. His adoptive father’s wish had come true. No matter what he did, only unhappiness and loneliness were destined for him. The price of hatred and resentment was this great.

“Izer?”

The empty laughter stopped abruptly. The man who had been crying while laughing turned fiercely toward the door. At the half-darkened corridor, Celian stood leaning against the doorframe.

Izer asked in a desolate tone.

“Why did you come all the way here?”

“I heard sounds……”

“Ha!”

It was unpleasant to have his wife catch him crying like a child. Thundering footsteps crossed the room and he pulled Celian close. He felt no guilt. Now that he had come too far to desire this woman’s love, her body was the only thing he could possess.

Where she was laid down was on his adoptive father’s desk. Celian, suddenly pinned beneath him, sobbed.

“Izer, not here, I hate it.”

“Why?”

He asked while caressing her thigh. She had come wearing only a nightgown with nothing underneath. The wolf that had awakened after killing the remorseful lamb’s eyes gleamed.

Until she spoke her reason in a thin voice.

“Your mother is watching. Not here, please?”

“……”

The head that had been biting at Celian’s neck stopped. Izer slowly raised his eyes. Renéee was gazing down at her son violently handling his wife.

“F*ck.”

Instead of continuing, he buried his face in her collarbone. His strength-drained body settled heavily on top of the woman. Though heavy, it wasn’t oppressive behavior.

Just as Celian was about to relax her waist in relief. His red eyes gleamed.

“Rian, I want a child.”

Simultaneously, the man’s lower region swelled. Sensing something wasn’t right, Celian tried to twist her body away, but soon her nightgown was undone.

Izer whispered while spreading his struggling wife’s thighs.

“Mother will understand too. After all, a child becomes a new starting point for couples.”

“……!”

“Spread your legs, wife.”

If one couldn’t return to a point in the past, then change the starting point. Izer looked down at his wife’s face, which had already begun to tear up.

What he had lost included this woman’s smile. Because he was unhappy, the woman who had to be by his side became unhappy too. Like Izer wanted, Celian also needed a beautiful starting point. Nothing was more appropriate than a child as a discontinuous variable that would break their continuous time and open a new kingdom.

Izer whispered while pulling Celian’s hips toward himself.

“Our child will surely bring happiness.”

“It hurts, it hurts……!”

Coming to him first only to refuse now—Izer firmly gripped her jaw with a benevolent expression. The sensation of meeting her dry interior wasn’t particularly comfortable for him either, but thinking of the happiness a child would bring, he could pleasantly endure this much.

The screams changed to sobs swallowed by kisses. Instead of the affection that should accompany lovemaking, overflowing pain and submission wet Izer’s face.

“Sob, it hurts……”

“Bear with it. I’ll finish soon.”

Her inner walls that responded to him began to become slickly wet. Izer kissed his wife’s tear-stained eyes with a satisfied smile.

“You’ll be satisfied too.”

“Sob!”

“This is all for us.”

A new goal had emerged. Creating his new kingdom where no darkness could attack it.

That was the duty of the head of household and a father’s task. Izer poured every last drop of his s*men inside his wife. 

 * * *

 After Duke Harris Chesterfield’s funeral, two major changes occurred in the ducal household.

First, the Duchess, who had shown her face at the funeral, began engaging in small social activities.

Uniquely, Celian Chesterfield’s ‘socializing’ was accompanied by one maid who followed her like a shadow. Rumors spread that this was surveillance placed on the Duchess by the Duke who had strong jealousy.

Second was that the jealous Duke’s outings increased.

Duke Chesterfield would leave early in the morning and return late at night. On the occasional days when he heard his wife hadn’t returned yet, the couple’s bedroom would invariably be locked.

However, the next day the door would open wide as if nothing had happened, and the Duchess would go meet her female friends or walk in the garden with the young lord.

“We’ve arrived, my lady.”

“Thank you.”

As Celian stepped down from the carriage with her maid, her foot landed on a piece of paper. The front page of the newspaper, dirtied from being stepped on by many people, was filled with content Celian already knew.

[Will Ferbien Letters’ Rebellion Succeed?]

[Prince Edmond’s Argument: On the Economic Benefits of Sending Troops]

Celian walked past the newspaper. Behind her, someone clicked their tongue.

“What’s going to happen to this country……”