“I’m glad to hear it.”

The Duke of Winfried casually handed his coat to an attendant and took the seat opposite him.

After filling the teacup before the duke, the attendant withdrew.

A brief silence passed before Viscount Ventren spoke first.

“Your Grace, may I ask why you summoned me to the capital?”

Several days earlier, a letter had arrived at the Ventren estate.

Sealed with the blue bird emblem of House Winfried, it contained only a single line.

[I shall meet you at Leazle Teahouse in ten days.]

There had been no explanation for the meeting or any other message.

Only that one sentence.

Yet the name of the Duke of Winfried had been enough to make the viscount abandon everything he was doing and hurry to the capital.

“I assume you must have had an important reason for requesting my presence.”

The journey from Lowell, the territory of Viscount Ventren, to the capital took precisely ten days.

There was no time to send another letter to the Winfried ducal estate to request an explanation or reschedule the meeting.

Consequently, Viscount Ventren had no choice but to board a carriage bound for the capital.

“Your letter placed me in a rather difficult position. It arrived during an exceptionally busy period.”

“I see.”

He made every effort to convey how greatly the duke’s unilateral arrangement had inconvenienced him, but the Duke of Winfried remained impassive.

“However, merely because you found the journey inconvenient……”

No.

If anything……

“……surely you did not expect me to travel all the way to Lowell.”

The duke was looking down upon him.

“Wouldn’t you agree, Viscount Ventren?”

“……You are correct, Your Grace.”

Viscount Ventren bit his tongue to keep his expression from twisting.

But he could not stop the hand resting upon the arm of his chair from trembling.

“…….”

Silence followed.

The Duke of Winfried merely savored his tea.

‘Why in the world did he summon me?’

Cracks began to form in the Viscount’s hard-won composure. His head felt as though it was about to burst again.

The journey from Lowell in the Ventren territory to the capital took ten days by carriage.

There was nothing to do during that interminable journey. Naturally, the Viscount spent the entire time pondering a single question.

‘Why did the Duke of Winfried summon me?’

Did he wish to propose a joint business venture? Or perhaps notify him that an order of knights would be passing through Lowell?

If neither, could he be seeking to purchase wheat for the refugees?

He had considered countless possibilities, but one remained far more likely than all the others.

‘This must be about that brat.’

Near the end of winter, hadn’t the Duke of Winfried visited him and announced that he was searching for Azen’s daughter?

“…….”

‘She cannot possibly be alive.’

It was the dead of winter, when even grown men could freeze to death in the bitter cold.

On such a day, Corbin abandoned a baby who was still being breastfed on a street in the slums.

Meanwhile, Azen and Leira left for war just as it was coming to an end, and all the problems that had festered throughout it erupted at once.

The nobles curtailed their extravagance in an effort to set a virtuous example, while the common people struggled desperately to obtain even a single loaf of bread.

Under such conditions, there was no conceivable way an infant abandoned in the slums could have survived.

‘I dealt with the servant as well.’

Only one person had seen him abandon the child.

Hadn’t he deliberately chosen someone who would be easy to dispose of?

The child could not possibly be alive, and there was no one left who knew Corbin had abandoned her.

That had to be the truth.

It had to be.

“Viscount.”

The Duke of Winfried was staring directly at him.

“……!”

He had been so deeply lost in thought that he had not heard the duke calling him.

“Yes, Your Grace?”

“You appear to be tired.”

The duke slowly continued, tapping his fingers against the table.

“Considering that you failed to hear me despite my calling you several times.”

“My apologies. After spending ten days in a carriage, it seems I have yet to recover from the journey.”

“How unfortunate.”

The Duke of Winfried crossed one leg over the other and smiled.

“Then, for your sake, I should state my business without further delay.”

“…….”

The duke had prolonged the silence until Ventren’s anxiety reached its breaking point, yet only now did he speak of getting to the point.

“I admit, I am curious to hear why you summoned me.”

Viscount Ventren’s fists clenched once more, but his smile never faltered.

After all, the man sitting before him was none other than the Duke of Winfried.

‘The reconstruction of the eastern region will begin soon.’

The war that had raged for over a century was finally over. The vast eastern territories could now emerge from their long period of stagnation and begin to rebuild.

An immense tide of wealth would inevitably flow eastwards.

If Ventren could secure even the slightest connection to this endeavour, he could amass a tremendous fortune.

He might even become Count Leonid sooner than expected.

‘The Duke of Winfried will decide everything.’

The very man sitting before him now.

‘If not for the eastern reconstruction, I would never bother indulging the whims of a brat like him.’

He would have left immediately.

In fact, he would never have come here in the first place.

Then he would not have been forced to endure this unbearable anxiety.

The ten-day journey from the Ventren territory to the capital, followed by every moment of silence since he sat down opposite the duke…

Each passing second tormented Viscount Ventren.

As though he could read his mind, the Duke of Winfried lifted one corner of his mouth in a faint smile.

It vanished as quickly as it had appeared.

“It is nothing of great importance. I merely wished to offer you a word of advice.”

“……Advice?”

“Yes.”

Planting one hand upon the table, Winfried rose to his feet.

‘What……?’

Had he always been this tall?

Ventren had certainly noticed the duke’s imposing stature when he sat down, but he had not seemed quite this overwhelming.

Viscount Ventren swallowed as he stared up at him.

“Viscount.”

Yet the duke’s next words provoked a shock far greater than his fear.

“The rightful heir will soon appear.”

Caught off guard by the sudden declaration, Viscount Ventren could not help but ask,

“What…… do you mean by that?”

But the duke offered no answer.

He merely gazed at Ventren as though the viscount already knew exactly what he meant.

‘Surely not.’

Viscount Ventren’s throat bobbed.

“I have no fondness for sordid affairs.”

At Winfried’s gesture, an attendant hurried forward as though he had been waiting and helped the duke into his coat.

“So I suggest you take only what you are entitled to and step aside.”

That was all.

Winfried left, and after a brief silence, a tremendous crash sounded behind him as something overturned.

Startled attendants hurried past the duke toward the commotion.

“Did your conversation go well, Your Grace?”

As he emerged from the teahouse, the knight waiting outside approached him.

The man’s long brown hair was particularly striking.

The duke gave a slight nod.

“But was it truly wise to provoke him so openly?”

The brown-haired knight frowned as he glanced toward the teahouse, where loud noises could still be heard.

“He will undoubtedly begin preparing for the possibility that Lady Leonid is alive.”

“That is likely.”

“Would it not have been better to conceal Lady Leonid’s existence until our preparations were complete……?”

“The moment he begins making preparations of his own, he will expose vulnerabilities.”

Viscount Ventren was as cunning and elusive as a rat.

Despite taking a reckless gamble, he had left almost no evidence behind. His scheme had only succeeded because both Azen and Leira had died on the battlefield.

Had either of them returned alive, all of his plotting would have been for nothing.

But fortune had favored Ventren.

“…….”

That was precisely why Logan had deliberately unsettled him.

He intended to force the viscount from his usual path and compel him to expose an opening.

“Rio, I’ll leave this matter to you. Pressure the viscount by severing his ties with his investors and business partners.”

The more desperately Ventren struggled, the more clearly his secrets and weaknesses would reveal themselves.

Understanding the duke’s intentions, Rio bowed.

“Yes, Your Grace.”

Winfried nodded, then climbed into his carriage.

***

‘I didn’t sleep at all.’

Irina blinked as she watched the sun rise through the window.

She had never gone a whole night without sleep before. After all, sleep was something she could never get enough of.

Ben’s tavern served alcohol until dawn and started selling food again early in the morning, leaving Irina with only a few hours to sleep each day. This meant that she usually fell fast asleep the moment she laid her head down, no matter where she was.

She never imagined that a bed this soft would be the one place where sleep would elude her.

Sitting up, Irina retrieved the locket she had hidden beneath her pillow.

Where had His Grace pressed it yesterday?

‘Here.’

She pressed the small protrusion, and the lid opened with a click.

Inside was the same portrait of the happy family she had seen the day before.

Irina’s lips moved soundlessly several times before she finally managed to speak.

“……Good morning, Mother. Father.”

It was the first time in her life that she had ever spoken those words.

‘Mother and Father.’

She could not understand why words that came so easily to others were so difficult for her to say.

But after all those years, she could finally say them.

“…….”

Irina stared at the portrait in silence, her lips pressed firmly together. Then she climbed out of bed.

Perhaps it was because today was her first morning since finding out about her parents and reclaiming her true name.

Despite not having slept at all, she did not feel tired.

After slipping her feet into the soft slippers, she surveyed the room.

‘It’s beautiful.’

She had been far too overwhelmed the day before to examine the room properly.

At first, she had mistaken it for a room at Baron Barodon’s estate. Then the Duke arrived and told her about her parents, revealing her true name in the process.

It was only now, a full day later, that she finally began to take in her surroundings.

The furniture, the smallest ornaments, even the wallpaper… Irina knew nothing about such things, yet she could still tell that everything in the room was exceptionally luxurious.

However, something entirely different caught her attention.

‘There’s dust.’

Overall, the room had been cleaned rather poorly. It looked as though someone had hastily swept and wiped only the most visible areas.

Dust was still visible in the folds of the curtains, and there were fingerprints on the edges of the poorly cleaned windows. Even the low table had water stains on it, suggesting that it had not been dried properly.

Irina tilted her head as she examined the evidence of someone who had clearly cleaned the room in a hurry and had little idea of how to do it properly.

“……?”

Didn’t nobles normally employ people skilled at this sort of work to clean their rooms?

Then why had this one been cleaned so poorly?

“Knock, knock.”

While Irina continued rustling around and exploring the room, she heard a voice outside the door imitating the sound of a knock.

It was Delphia.

“Miss, are you awake?”

“Ah, yes!”

Irina briskly dusted off her hands as she answered.

“Then I’m coming in!”

The door opened, and Delphia entered dressed in a light tunic.