The tent built from thick mountain goat fur was busy with dinner preparations. Someone lit a fire and boiled hot water in a large pot.

Squire knights began cutting dried meat and hard bread beside the steaming iron pot.

Nearby, knights who scooped up snow to wash their flushed faces and necks settled into their seats.

“This business will be over in a week.”

“Right. I’m starting to forget what my little rabbit’s face looks like.”

The expedition was drawing to its end. The Bliber Knights, worn out from two months of subjugation, spoke in bright voices as they longed for the homes they would soon return to.

Blub blub. The salt-seasoned stew bubbled away appetizingly.

“Is it ready?”

“Yes, Vice-Captain.”

“Bring it here.”

Vice-Captain Sita received the first prepared meal. His large frame stomped through the snowfield as he headed toward the lord’s tent marked with a red seal.

Sita cleared his throat loudly toward the tent, sensing no presence inside.

“Ahem. Your Highness, I’ll leave this here.”

As always, Sita set the meal down in front of the tent without knocking and turned back.

Grand Duke Kahar shut himself inside his tent at night and saw no one. To dare call the Grand Duke out at this hour was the same as saying you were willing to die.

Grand Duke Kahar, protected by the Bliber Knights, was someone capable of infinite cruelty when the need arose. No fool would deliberately provoke him.

When Sita’s heavy footsteps faded away, the man sitting alone inside the tent opened his eyes. Without even a fire lit, the tent held nothing but cold and darkness.

The lord of Sheldon was young, only twenty-six. Ten years had passed since he shouldered the heavy burden in place of his parents, who stepped down and left early.

Sheldon under his rule entered a golden age, nourished by his brilliant sacrifices. What truly wore Kahar down was not the seat of Grand Duke.

This hour when the world went dark. The long, long, helpless nights tormented him and left him desolate.

Lani Deloën. These nights when she grew only more vivid.

He went a full year without a single proper night of sleep. Not a day passed without thinking of Lani. Not a single moment.

Every stretch of time flowed into memories of her.

When everyone finished their meals and fell asleep, and even the night watch went quiet, Kahar lifted the tent flap and stepped out.

Tonight the wind cried out sharply and grated on his nerves.

Then it happened. Not far away, the sound of hoofbeats rang out loudly.

The man who reined his horse to a sudden stop was Mihael, Kahar’s aide, who should have been at Sheldon Castle.

Mihael’s white cloak fluttered like his face as he let out ragged breaths.

Judging by how urgently he rode here, it was clearly a message from the Emperor. He turned off his communication orb to block annoying contact, so it seemed Mihael came in person instead.

“Y-Your Highness! Your Highness!”

“Like a foal with its tail on fire.”

Kahar’s low voice flowed out smoothly.

Mihael pulled the reins to stop his horse and, before he could catch the breath that rose to his chin, cried out almost like a scream.

“Your Highness, why have you been so unreachable!”

“What do you have to say?”

Toward his master, who showed only indifference, Mihael called out in a voice full of grievance.

“If you don’t go to the palace this time, His Majesty says he will come to Sheldon himself!”

“It seems I’ll need to stay here a few more months.”

“No! His Majesty looked ready to chase you all the way here.”

“The emperor of the empire isn’t much. Must be bored out of his mind.”

Kahar clicked his tongue lowly and dismissed the Emperor with ease.

But Mihael was less worried about who might overhear and more preoccupied with figuring out how to get Kahar to the capital.

Kahar rarely visited the imperial palace. But if he failed to go this time as well, the Emperor’s fury would reach Mihael too.

No, it already reached him. It was shaking his safety in a terrifying way.

Mihael’s life goal was to live a long life and raise two sons and two daughters. He had not the slightest desire to die young at twenty-five.

Mihael jumped off his horse and dropped to one knee.

“Your Highness, you must go. You know His Majesty is not the type to give up on your marriage just because of what happened with Lady Viviana. He will push this marriage through!”

“So. Is it the Chloe Ducal House again this time? Aren’t they shameless after what they did?”

“But you absolutely must form a marriage alliance with the Chloe Ducal House. Only then will His Majesty settle down.”

An important marriage to shore up the Emperor’s power was a topic raised several years ago.

The Emperor’s nephew, Grand Duke Kahar, and the Chloe Ducal House were the parties involved.

The union of two imperial factions was a critical undertaking that would solidify the Emperor’s position and press down on the arrogant heads of the noble faction.

But the Chloe Ducal House was Viviana’s roots. It could hardly sit well with Kahar. To be told to marry into the family of the woman who killed Lani made his teeth grind the more he thought about it.

“So which daughter are they planning to pair me with this time?”

“That is for Your Highness to choose yourself…”

“Thanks to Duke Chloe’s busy lower half, I get to pick a wife like choosing goods at a market. How grateful I am.”

Kahar’s hair, carrying a faint sneer, scattered like black wind.

“Your Highness, the… youngest… daughter is said to resemble her.”

“Her?”

Kahar’s voice sharpened, but Mihael pressed on, willing to risk losing his head.

“I saw the youngest daughter’s portrait, and she greatly resembles…”

Mihael raised his head and couldn’t finish. Kahar’s eyes were soaked in a savage light, like he was ready to commit murder.

Kahar let out a scoff and twisted his head away.

“What the f*ck are you saying. You want me to live skin-to-skin with a woman who looks like Lani?”

Trying to soothe Kahar’s fury, he let slip the wrong words instead. Mihael’s shoulders went rigid.

“I’m, I’m sorry. But if you’re going to marry anyway… someone who resembles her… I’m sorry. That was thoughtless.”

Kahar’s eyes went cold as a beast’s claws.

“I’m sorry.”

Watching Mihael’s tearful, foolish face, Kahar felt his entire chest burn like it was set on fire.

Someone who resembles you. If I marry a woman who looks like you, what comfort could that possibly give me?

It’s all just pathetic rationalization.

Kahar’s cloak billowed as he stared hard into the white world.

No one can take her place.

“But if you go through with the marriage now, His Majesty will settle down. You can’t avoid it forever… and Your Highness, you dislike being in debt, don’t you.”

A year ago, he relied on the Emperor’s help to search for Lani after she suddenly disappeared.

With the Emperor’s permission, Kahar took control of every merchant group traveling through the empire, and only then found Lani’s body, already cold.

Those were the days he was a madman. While Kahar was submerged in grief, the cunning Emperor uncovered that the one who drove Lani to her death was Lady Viviana Chloe.

Viviana Chloe. That woman was someone Kahar placed briefly in the position of fiancée for the purpose of conferring a ducal title, a woman of no real significance.

Yet Viviana acted as though she were something, and harmed Lani and the child.

Kahar’s rage at the time nearly touched the sky, and he moved to personally cut off Viviana’s breath.

But Duke Dexter stepped forward first. He abandoned his own daughter, bowed his head before the Emperor, and chose to submit to Kahar.

Duke Dexter personally severed Viviana’s four limbs, then lowered his tail and left the remaining disposal to Kahar.

He wanted to end Viviana’s life, but held back. For her, surviving the rest of her days with her limbs cut off would be more of a hell.

Kahar declared Viviana dead to the world and locked her in the ice tower at the farthest end of the Grand Duchy.

So she would be forgotten by the world. So she would writhe in wretchedness.

He threw the rest of Viviana’s life into suffering.

Of course, keeping Viviana alive was not easy. The urge to wring her neck surged up without warning.

But killing Viviana would not bring Lani back. Would not bring the dead child back.

So Kahar chose instead to focus on cherishing the memories of the past.

And so even now, a year later, Kahar’s heart still bloomed full with Lani.

The beautiful paradise lived in his chest, and the white snowfield held no feeling for him at all.

***

Meliciel dreamed a weary dream. A memory of meeting Grand Duke Kahar long ago.

She was a divine singer who painted, sold to an auction house when her tribe fell.

The moment she was about to be sold as a plaything to a perverted marquis, the building suddenly collapsed.

Fortune or misfortune, she couldn’t say.

She groaned where no one could see her, yet swallowed her cries for fear the perverted marquis might hear.

Lani lay pinned under a massive iron beam, unable to move. The building collapsed and buried her beneath it.

In that instant she tried to protect her hands first, quickly hiding them away, but she couldn’t avoid getting hurt.

She was struggling to pull herself free from the iron beam when a low, clear voice reached her.

“Shall I help you?”