“I’ve been through battlefields for four years. Despite how I look, I’ve contributed quite a bit to expanding the empire’s territory.”

“Really?”

“Yes. I’ll even be receiving an award from His Majesty the Emperor soon. Wouldn’t that make me one of the strongest people in the world, if not the strongest?”

With a look that said ‘don’t be afraid, tell me everything you know,’ Lime stared intently at Kale’s hesitant lips.

“The, the truth is, I was trapped in a mansion where a monster lives, and Olivia came and rescued me. She said she’d return soon and told me to go ahead, so I, I left alone, but Olivia still hasn’t come back……”

Stuttering in a small voice as he shared the story, Kale couldn’t finish and eventually began to sob. Lime moved closer to Kale, who was rubbing his eyes with an expression full of guilt, and kindly offered him a handkerchief, gently steering the conversation to get Kale to reveal everything he knew.

“So you’re saying there’s an enormous beast that can talk, and even disappear and reappear?”

The boy, having told everything he knew, nodded with puffy eyes. Having grown up in this village, Lime was of course familiar with the story of the cursed duke. He wasn’t sure if the beast Kale mentioned was the duke from the legend or just some monster living there, but if all this was true, he needed to check inside the thorn bushes quickly.

“Thank you for telling me. I’ll check it out. By the way, have you told anyone else about this?”

“No. Olive said not to tell anyone else because they might be in danger too……”

“Then let’s keep what you told me a secret too. I agree with Olivia on this.”

Putting a finger to his lips and smiling with a “shh” gesture, Kale nodded in agreement. Still, he felt more at ease having shared the story he had been keeping to himself. Believing that Lime, who claimed to be strong, could help more than himself, Kale looked at him with desperate eyes.

“Will Olivia be okay? Please save her.”

“Don’t worry about that. No one in this world wants Olivia as desperately as I do.”

He had endured those harsh battlefields by occasionally exchanging letters with Olivia. Having never once imagined a future without her, Lime answered with a terrifyingly serious expression.

* * *

Alois, who was half-sitting, half-lying on a wide bench reading a book, flicked his eyes upward at the shadow blocking the sunlight. Olivia, who had returned at some point, stood before him with her hands on her hips, looking down at him. Despite deliberately casting a shadow over his book to interrupt his reading, her expression remained cheerfully confident. Still, she looked brighter today than yesterday, so Alois closed the book he was holding without complaint.

“I see you’ve finished your tasks.”

“There are no newly injured animals today, and all the medicinal herbs I planted are growing well!”

“Then why are your hands like that?”

“Oh, I made a new vegetable garden, would you like to see it?”

Though the sentence ended with a question mark, it was clear she wasn’t really asking for his opinion but rather saying ‘right now, hurry, come see it with me.’ Knowing this, Alois stretched and got up from the bench. As soon as he stood up, his height rose dramatically, naturally causing Olivia’s head to tilt back slightly.

“After healer and apothecary, are you now trying to become a farmer too?”

“For now, I’m just trying a few simple vegetables and fruits, but I’m not particularly confident.”

Even though there are already lots of fruits in the forest, some cooking ingredients need to be grown directly…… The chattering voice beside him was neither noisy nor annoying. He was simply glad that Olivia, who occasionally looked depressed after that incident, seemed to have recovered to almost her previous state.

Walking side by side, Alois grabbed her shoulder to stop her. As he gazed intently at her face, Olivia’s eyes wandered uncertainly before she gently closed them. She slightly raised her chin like he’s expecting something, which made Alois smile slyly.

He carefully brushed off the dry soil on her cheek with his finger, causing her face to instantly turn bright red. With a face as red as a ripe strawberry, Olivia chewed on her lips in embarrassment.

“There’s no need to be so embarrassed.”

“I don’t have any strange misunderstandings, umm.”

He gently captured those pretty, chattering lips that had been catching his attention. Pushing heat between her parted lips, he wrapped his arm around her waist and pulled her into his embrace. As she blinked rapidly in surprise, he stared directly into her eyes until she gently closed them again.

The intimate contact, where their soft skin brushed against each other, grew longer as they shared their body heat. A finger, which had been aimlessly wandering in the air, lightly gripped Alois’s shirt. The hand that had been resting on his waist slid slightly lower, gently rubbing the area near his hip with the thumb.

Despite only having bitten and released her lips a few times, they had already swollen to almost twice their normal size. After licking them one last time, he lifted his head. A thin thread briefly glistened between their lips as they parted.

Haah. Exhaling a languid hot breath, Olivia leaned against Alois’s body with a dreamy expression.

“If I do this, it’s not a misunderstanding anymore, right?”

If you’re going to be considerate, just be considerate; if you’re going to tease, just tease. Covering her hot cheeks with both hands, Olivia glared at Alois, who always had to make a mischievous comment, and defiantly stepped back.

“Your personality……”

“Is bad?”

“No. It’s unique.”

There was something cute about how Olivia never used harsh words, even when she was upset or dissatisfied. Alois couldn’t stop smiling as he watched her hurry ahead, fanning her flushed cheeks with both hands. He was surprised to realize how easily he could smile these days. Though the world still held little joy for him and he remained lethargic and bored, when he was with Olivia, he found himself smiling unexpectedly.

Is it because she does unexpected things? She was certainly a type of human he had never encountered before. The path of life Alois had walked was too harsh and treacherous to encounter someone like her. People like Olivia would have either been eliminated by others or collapsed under their own weight. They were so different that they would never have crossed paths in their lifetimes, yet here they were, sharing the same time together—a surprising and fascinating reality.

“Are you good at cooking too, Alois?”

“I haven’t particularly tried it. It’s been so long since I paid attention to food that I barely remember.”

That’s even better. Pleased with Alois’s answer, Olivia proudly shrugged her shoulders. She gently shaped the damp soil that had just been watered. Grow quickly. Crouching in front of the vegetable garden, Olivia’s body swayed cheerfully, following her excited feelings.

“When the little ones I planted today grow well, let’s cook together! I have quite a bit of cooking experience.”

Just trust me. Seeing her proud, satisfied smile, Alois gently stroked her hair and quietly agreed. Very long ago, he had always eaten food prepared by others, and after being cursed, food no longer affected his survival, so he had never taken an interest in cooking. But he had a feeling that watching ‘Olivia enjoying cooking’ might be a bit fun.

As he was about to naturally lead her into the mansion in the peaceful atmosphere, Alois’s eyes sharpened with some irritation. He instinctively hid her behind his back as he glared into the distance.

“After being quiet for a while……”

“What’s happened?”

“Someone has crossed the thorn bushes again.”

After safely bringing the administrator’s wolf-dogs into the forest, Alois had strengthened the forest’s boundaries. The previous thorn bushes could be penetrated by Olivia with some effort. But now, he had reinforced them so that even she couldn’t easily enter without his special permission, yet someone had forcibly passed through that defense.

He had created it to attack intruders autonomously, so the fact that someone had overcome that attack and entered meant they weren’t simply skilled in hunting or gathering but someone accustomed to combat.

“I’ll go check. You go inside first.”

“I’m coming with you.”

Since it was someone who knew how to fight, Alois wanted to leave Olivia safely in the mansion, but it wasn’t easy to coldly reject her as she clung to him with an anxious expression. Knowing that she could lose something regardless of her efforts, she often showed signs of anxiety when animals or Alois were out of her sight. This would improve with time, but it seemed more time was still needed. Not wanting to trigger her fears, Alois couldn’t refuse Olivia as she took hold of his fingertips, and instead, properly took her hand firmly as he headed toward where the intruder was.

His anger toward the intruder who had disrupted his peaceful time intensified for multiple reasons.

* * *

“Wow, this is intense.”

Lime twisted his body and checked the tattered state of his clothes, finding it absurdly funny. He thought he had experienced all kinds of strange weapons and creatures while roaming battlefields, but he never expected thorn bushes to come alive and attack. They were so tenacious that they kept regenerating no matter how many times he cut them, which irritated him to no end and made him never want to encounter them again.

“Did a child really get through that? Olivia passed through here?”

If everything Kale said was true, it meant both the boy and Olivia had passed through these thorn bushes to reach the ducal mansion, which seemed impossible no matter how he thought about it. Those thorns would be difficult to overcome without either several high-level knights attacking together or using human wave tactics to simultaneously burn them down.