Leonhardt grinned as he watched Anaïs’s severely trembling eyes.

“I got it right, didn’t I?”

“Le-Leon……”

When Leonhardt mentioned Helmut, Anaïs was so shocked that she missed the timing to pretend ignorance.

Still, she had to hold on. If she agreed here, it would truly be over. Anaïs barely managed to move her lips.

“W-what are you talking about?”

“Drop the lie about your mother giving it to you. As I said earlier, I have no patience left.”

Leonhardt said as he closed the box.

“After the ball, did you think I just locked myself away at home lamenting? I’ve done my research. Tell him this: if he gives me that magic stone, he can achieve something much greater.”

Leonhardt grinned. That smile, once eerily beautiful, now sent shivers down her spine for entirely different reasons.

“There are already people who have noticed this magic stone. Tell him I can pacify them too, so he should think carefully.”

Leonhardt turned his back on Anaïs, who was still sitting on the floor.

But she couldn’t let him leave like this. Anaïs grabbed his clothes as he turned.

Her hand trembled violently as she desperately clutched at his garment.

Leonhardt shook her off as if brushing away an insect.

“What are you doing?”

“Please, help me.”

Anaïs was sobbing so severely that she couldn’t speak properly.

Leonhardt turned back as if suspecting some trick. Anaïs practically threw herself at his legs, grabbing them.

When he frowned and tried to push her away, she cried out desperately.

“If I deliver your message, I’ll die.”

Leonhardt slightly raised one eyebrow as if asking what she meant.

“Once that person and you, Young Duke, make direct contact, I’ll have served my purpose and will be eliminated.”

“So?”

Seeing him ask so nonchalantly, Anaïs momentarily lost her words.

“If he’s valuable enough to join hands with me, there are ways to reach him without you delivering the message. And you know very well that I suffered great losses because of you. Don’t even mention old affections. My blood still boils when I think about being enchanted by that magic stone. Why would I feel sorry if you die?”

Only then did Anaïs realize how foolish it had been to try to threaten him with the land he had sold.

Plop, plop, tears fell. Not an act, but genuine fear. Death felt like it was right in front of her.

She clasped her hands together and begged desperately.

“Young Duke, please don’t abandon me!”

But even after seeing her like this, Leonhardt felt nothing. Was he feeling satisfaction? Not at all. He felt worse knowing that someone so pathetic had reduced him to this state.

Fearing he might turn away again, Anaïs clung to him once more.

“Helmut Bering!”

She screamed out the name.

“That’s his name. He’s the kind of person who would kill even a princess of a country once she loses her value. Wouldn’t having me, someone who knows this cruel opponent well, be advantageous to you, Young Duke?”

“Haha, Anaïs. You’re making me feel worse. That’s just his public name. Even bribing someone working in the Lucian royal palace would easily reveal that much. Your life is worthless to me if you don’t even know his real name.”

“N-no……”

She frantically wracked her brain. She needed to turn his heart while he was still talking to her. If she couldn’t capture Leonhardt’s interest, it would truly be the end.

Rolling her eyes desperately, Anaïs cried out:

“I was trained directly by him. And so were my other siblings. Information from people who have experienced him firsthand can be crucial, even if it seems trivial. A-and there’s one more way I could be useful. Wouldn’t it be easier to turn Lady Daphne’s heart by using jealousy?”

She poured out whatever conditions came to mind as she begged him.

The villainess who had driven Daphne to death and exploited Leonhardt until the end in her previous life was nowhere to be seen.

Leonhardt gritted his teeth as he looked down at her kneeling at his feet. His temper made him want to wring her neck right then and there.

How much had he lost because of this woman?

But thanks to her, he had also awakened to the reality of his situation.

She didn’t seem completely useless.

The information that Helmut Bering had the Lucian royal family in his grasp was easy enough to buy. The problem was his past. There was no record of his activities before coming to the kingdom.

In that case, listening to people who had directly experienced him was the best option.

‘And as for Daphne… While she’s not the type to be easily swayed by jealousy, I should try everything that might work.’

Leonhardt extended his hand to Anaïs. She grabbed it eagerly as if it were salvation itself.

Leonhardt sighed lightly. Her hand was damp with tears and sweat, making him want to shake it off immediately, but he barely restrained himself.

“Anaïs, listen carefully.”

“Yes, Young Duke.”

She nodded her head quickly.

“As long as you’re useful, I’ll treat you like a lady, even though you were just groveling at my feet. But if not, well, you know what happens, right?”

Anaïs exhaled the breath she had been holding with a gasp and reluctantly nodded.

“So I hope you’ll do your best to prove your value.”

He gently helped Anaïs up and escorted her to the door. His manner was so gentle that it was impossible to imagine those same hands had tried to kill her moments ago.

Only after boarding her carriage did Anaïs let out a long sigh.

Should she be impressed by the power of the magic stone that had bewitched someone so calculating?

“Somehow, I need to get my hands on that magic stone. Otherwise, I’ll just be used by everyone until the end.”

Only by surviving could she have a chance for revenge.

Pushed to the edge of the cliff, Anaïs had nothing left to lose.

⁕⁕⁕

Anaïs wasn’t the only one feeling desperate.

Since he started calling Gustav “Your Grace,” Leonhardt had been living each day feeling like he was walking a tightrope.

It had been since the moment Gustav told him to call him “Your Grace.” The duke’s title was no longer something he would inherit just by waiting.

It was a wake-up call in the truest sense.

A sense of crisis washed over him—if he didn’t take action, he might lose everything.

Being the marquis’s son-in-law and the duke’s title weren’t separate matters. If he ended up breaking off his engagement with Daphne, could he still safely become the duke? He couldn’t be sure.

Given how cruelly Gustav treated his own wife and son, he might even bring someone from a branch family to inherit the title.

‘He’s more than capable of doing that.’

Growing serious, Leonhardt began moving diligently. First, he met with his friends.

But birds of a feather flock together, as they say. Every single one of them only calculated how much they would inherit, without any thought of what they needed to do to secure it.

That, however, became excellent motivation. Leonhardt badgered his aide to find information about the information guild.

“Young Duke, I’ve found the continent’s best guild.”

“Are you sure?”

“Of course! They said they’ll let me meet the guild master directly as soon as they see me.”

“Someone like you?”

Leonhardt frowned, even more doubtful.

“I was skeptical at first too. But they immediately recognized that I was your man and said so.”

“Really?”

This meant that the master of this supposedly impressive guild acknowledged him. His mood, which had been down for days, immediately improved. And his first meeting was quite satisfactory.

But as he continued to meet with the guild master, he felt himself falling further and further.

He gradually purchased more information. When he investigated not only Anaïs but also the Kingdom of Lucia, the name Helmut Bering emerged.

His intuition, which he hadn’t even known existed because he had only enjoyed what was given to him, was now on high alert.

‘This is the man who holds the secret of the magic stone!’

But that was as far as Leonhardt could discover with the money he had on hand.

The closer he got to the truth he wanted, the scarcer the information became and the higher the prices soared.

The deeper he dug into Helmut, the more painfully aware he became of how poor he was and how complacently he had lived.

The guild master immediately saw through Leonhardt’s naivety. He asked with a meaningful look:

“Didn’t the Duke teach you about me?”

“What do you mean?”

“Buying and selling information is the most basic of basics.”

Before Leonhardt could ask what basics he meant, the man answered:

“I’m talking about the practical education you should have received as an heir. Haven’t you learned it?”