What she feared wasn’t getting beaten. She’d already steeled herself once when trying to save Janna.

Despite her ominous intensity, the Count merely gazed down at her with indifference. He clearly believed nothing she did would matter.

Even meaningless struggle was fine. Being dragged away by the Count or refusing his orders and getting beaten to death—both endings seemed similar to her.

“……This is the Sirente Labor Exchange.”

The Count tilted his head slightly and raised his hand. Everyone around them, including Ribeta, looked where his finger pointed.

At the end of his fingertip hung the exchange’s sign.

“Sirente Exchange.”

The Count’s tone was much lighter as he read each character separately and distinctly, like a child learning letters for the first time.

“Right. So what?”

The Count’s reaction differed from her expectations. Flustered, Ribeta lowered her eyes. To avoid revealing her confusion and appear as respectful as possible.

“The Sirente Exchange doesn’t permit that type of transaction. I apologize, but I’d like a different job……”

“As if you know how I’ll use you.”

Ribeta looked up at him, speechless. When their eyes met, the Count twisted one corner of his mouth into a smile. The sneer added to his cold face made him look even more ‘demonic.’

He’s someone who uses slaves as he pleases and discards them like trash when bored.

“Did you peek into my head or something?”

The Count tapped his temple with his index finger. Though clearly smiling, he looked displeased.

Was it really a futile struggle after all? A faint shadow fell across Ribeta’s pale face.

It wasn’t as if she was trying to protect herself out of noble intentions. However, if she gave up even her body, she’d have nothing left.

The last fragment of Ribeta as a human, not a slave. Ribeta simply wanted to protect that.

‘Let me… try to stall for a little time.’

Such a commotion must have reached the Exchange Master. Someone of the Exchange Master’s position should be able to mediate a conversation with the Count. No, he had to.

Ribeta clung to that thread of hope and forced herself to speak.

“……The transaction I mentioned refers to one that demands something beyond labor from a slave.”

“You certainly know how to dress up the fact that I’m supposedly dying to throw you onto my bed first thing in the morning.”

Ribeta’s cheeks flushed at the Count’s expl*cit expression. Sounds that could be either gasps or sighs erupted here and there. Even hearing those sounds, the Count merely stroked his chin with his long fingers. He was truly an unfathomable man.

Just then, someone rushed through the crowd. The silver badge on his jacket glinted in the light.

“Good day, Count Ruperto. I am Factor, the Exchange Master who manages this place. Thank you for visiting our business.”

“Whether my day is good seems to depend on what you do.”

“……My apologies. What seems to be the problem?”

The Exchange Master asked politely, looking between Ribeta and the Count alternately. The Count merely stared at Ribeta. The Exchange Master signaled Ribeta with his eyes. At his look urging her to speak, Ribeta had no choice but to open her mouth.

“The Count has proposed a transaction that violates the rules.”

“It’s true I said I’d buy you, but.”

The Count paused. Then, instead of the rakish atmosphere, a chilling one settled in. The very air around him seemed to change.

Ribeta, who unconsciously studied the Count carefully, soon found the answer.

His eyes. It’s his eyes.

His gaze was bland, emotionless, and hollow. As if molded from ashes left after everything burned away.

Ribeta suddenly realized. The Count had none of the unpleasant stickiness she’d felt from those who’d been hitting on her until now.

Ribeta felt both frightened and puzzled by his presence, which made the air heavy with silence alone.

‘Is this really the Count from the rumors, who buys slaves simply to indulge in pleasure?’

Just as the heavy air pressing down around them began to feel suffocating, the Count’s mouth opened again.

“It’s not like I always buy slaves for that purpose. And this is the Sirente Exchange. Just as you taught me.”

“……”

“Thanks for the valuable lesson.”

The Count, dripping with sarcasm, lifted his chin slightly. A cold and arrogant gaze befitting his ashen eyes poured entirely onto Ribeta.

“I’ll buy you. Don’t worry. There are plenty of ways to pass the time without rolling around in bed together.”

“I……!”

“You might end up tidying a wrecked bed.”

At the obscene words that flew out with each opening of his mouth, Ribeta was at a loss for words. The doubt that had briefly bloomed quickly withered away.

The Count took a step closer to Ribeta, as if enjoying her reaction.

“You might collect torn clothes and throw them out.”

“……”

“You could select suitable oils and bathe whoever will entertain me tonight.”

The Count raised his index finger and grazed Ribeta’s nose.

“What scent would suit you?”

Ribeta, who had been frozen like ice, flinched and shrank back in surprise. The Count chuckled at her and extended his right hand toward the Exchange Master. The leisure unique to one accustomed to commanding people flowed from his elegantly extended fingertips.

“Bring the contract.”

※※※

Ribeta filled out the daily labor contract and waited for Count Ruperto in front of the Sirente Exchange’s main gate. The pocket containing the neatly folded contract felt particularly heavy—not because the pocket itself was heavy, but because her heart was.

After finishing the contract, the Count left only a word to wait at the main gate before vanishing. With one subordinate stationed to watch her.

Since it was common for one exchange to contract with multiple slaves, Ribeta ended up outside the main gate following the Count’s words.

Where might Count Ruperto’s mansion be? She hoped it wasn’t too far from the Sirente Exchange.

Slaves who found work at the exchange had to find their way to the workplace themselves. Occasionally workplaces hiring many workers sent cargo wagons, but that was truly lucky. There was no way a noble would provide a carriage for a one-day worker.

A carriage stopped in front of Ribeta. She must have been standing too close to the road. Ribeta stepped back to put distance between herself and the carriage. But no matter how long she waited, the carriage showed no sign of moving. When she even heard the door opening, Ribeta finally raised her head. Her eyes widened immediately.

“I thought you’d run away because you hate me.”

“……I wouldn’t break a contract for such a reason.”

It was Count Ruperto sitting inside the carriage.

“Such a reason.”

He echoed Ribeta’s words and suddenly extended his hand. Ribeta couldn’t guess his intention. She had nothing to place in that hand.

Did he want the contract?

Ribeta hesitated, then bowed respectfully.

“If you need the contract, I’ll go fetch it from the exchange.”

“Take it. I already have that scrap of paper.”

“……Do you mean for me to board the carriage?”

“Do I need to say it twice?”

Ribeta found the Count’s intentions increasingly difficult to understand.

Why is he doing this to me?

No master puts a slave in their carriage. If they did put a slave in, that slave would be the master’s mistress one hundred times out of one hundred. And only a deeply favored mistress at that. In other words, riding in a noble’s carriage was a luxury perhaps one or two out of a hundred slaves might enjoy.

“They do that stuff even in the carriage. Can’t even wait that brief ride back to the mansion!”

“My word, how indecent.”

“Is the carriage really that spacious? Doesn’t he deliberately ride around in a large carriage?”

Why did the rumors she’d picked up at the exchange come back so vividly now, of all times?

Ribeta tightened her clasped hands. The Count said he wasn’t buying her time for such reasons, but it was difficult to trust his words completely. No, she couldn’t even begin to grasp what the Count was thinking.

“A lowly worker like myself cannot dare board a carriage with the Count. If you tell me the mansion’s location, I’ll go as quickly as possible.”

“Three times.”

“……I’m covered in filth and reek horribly. If I dirty your carriage, I have no way to compensate you. Please reconsider.”

“Are you insisting I carry you up?”

The Count, who’d already descended the steps, took another step forward.

“I’ll do that if you want. My carriage is sometimes used as a bed, after all.”

He truly seemed ready to lift Ribeta into his arms.