One of the village girls who called out to Nelie carrying her basket winked at her. She was one of those who, along with Tina, tried to introduce new people to her.

“At least meet them, Nelie!”

“…Okay!”

“And we’re also baking cookies, could you help with that too if you have time?”

“I’ll do that!”

Nelie smiled readily, waved her hand, and then went straight home, put down her basket, and opened a drawer. There lay the precious ring she hadn’t dared take out for fear of wearing it down.

Nelie wrapped the ring several times in the best piece of cloth she owned to protect it from damage. Then she placed it in an envelope and sealed it carefully. She also tied the envelope tightly with string to prevent it from tearing.

And she wrote the address of the townhouse she still remembered. She wanted to send it to the Duke’s main residence, but she didn’t know that address.

Afterward, she also wrote a letter to Jerome. Nelie then went to the post office and handed the two envelopes to the postman. The postman looked at Nelie with a somewhat curious expression but thankfully accepted the envelopes without saying anything.

“Please take good care of them.”

“Of course, of course.”

Nelie smiled bitterly as she watched the postman and the mail carriage move away.

‘Yes. This is the right thing to do.’

She deliberately didn’t write her address on the ring she sent to the Duke. She just hoped the envelope would safely reach him.

At one point, she had considered keeping it as a memento. Or selling it to help reclaim the printing shop. The latter was a thought that came when she hated the Duke so much she couldn’t stand it.

But with the printing shop and land already sold to the nobility, it was a futile thought. Now, trying to keep it as a beautiful memory only reminded her of how foolish she had been. Rather than keeping such an excessive item, it was better to return it to its owner.

Nelie shifted her feet with a bitter smile. The smell of baked bread wafting from somewhere felt greasy and burdensome rather than delicious.

* * *

“Your Grace.”

“Report.”

Elroy rubbed his stiff brow as he looked across at his secretary. All sorts of documents were scattered messily in front of him.

“Yes. Then……”

The secretary, watching his mood carefully, delivered his report.

There was much to hear: business and political matters progressing under the Tevant name; the story of the princess who, after returning to her country and observing the royal family’s reaction to the sudden scandal, had set an engagement date with another man yet still occasionally sent him playful love letters; the health report of his grandmother, who had suffered another attack but was now recovering smoothly. After all that came the final, lingering issue.

“We still haven’t found her.”

Tap tap. The tip of the pen tapping on the desk suddenly stopped. The secretary watched Elroy’s reaction more nervously than ever when delivering this report. Elroy leaned back against the chair’s backrest, closed his eyes, and with his hands clasped on his stomach, opened his mouth.

“Leave.”

“…Yes, Your Grace.”

The secretary left his seat while sweating nervously. A long sigh escaped from Elroy’s lips.

‘How is it possible they still haven’t found her.’

No matter how he thought about it, it made no sense, but surprisingly, it was reality.

He couldn’t tell where the problem began. He had rushed to the main residence upon hearing news of his grandmother’s attack and confirmed how critical her condition was. After seeing his grandmother barely survive the crisis, an extra edition he never expected had spread throughout Tevant. It was an article exposing that he had a mistress, while simultaneously revealing that this mistress was actually a smoke screen to hide his secret meetings with Princess Lambert.

‘I should have shut it down earlier.’

“It’s a workplace where many people earn their living, Your Grace. Even if it’s not entirely proper.”

He recalled those words the woman would say whenever he thought about getting rid of those annoying gossip papers. So he deliberately didn’t interfere, regardless of whether he liked it or not, if the woman viewed the place that way.

Additionally, the reason he had proceeded with the storage construction at that newspaper was solely to prevent Annelie from using that place. And what he got in return was that extra edition. The newspaper’s owner had finally crossed the line.

‘Such presumptuous behavior.’

Of course, now there would be no line left to cross.

Not only had he sued the newspaper and shut it down, but he also held individuals strictly accountable, demanding compensation no single person could possibly pay. The owner was dragged to prison while wailing loudly. He had instructed that the man not be released unless the compensation was paid, so he might spend the rest of his life there.

Still not satisfied, he bought the land where the newspaper had stood and completely demolished it, including the storage he had newly built for them. Even the place where the woman had slept.

The newspaper’s employees scattered, wary of the Duke’s mood. That place remained empty. Nothing had been built there yet.

Tevant’s media subtly expressed dissatisfaction with the Duke’s actions, calling them unbecoming of a family that respected freedom, but they quickly shut their mouths, perhaps knowing what they had done. If they hadn’t, Elroy would have made them shut up himself.

The problem was the woman.

His woman, Annelie Heich, had completely disappeared. Without leaving any trace.

From the beginning, she didn’t have a proper residence except for his townhouse. She didn’t have her identity firmly guaranteed by attending the Academy, and no one around knew her hometown. This was because the woman hardly ever talked about her hometown.

He belatedly checked the train station, but among the hundreds of people who used the large station daily, no employee clearly remembered Nelie. One station attendant barely recalled, ‘Ah, that pretty woman without luggage,’ but didn’t know where she had bought a ticket to.

She had been by his side until just recently. Yet in a single night, she had vanished.

Like someone who had never existed in the first place.

‘No.’

The woman had been here. She had grumbled yet smiled, talked back impudently yet pursed her lips when he stared at her. A woman whose lips, pushed out like a duckling’s, tasted sweet when kissed, who tightly and hotly embraced him when he opened her body and entered. A woman whose every slow sigh carried warmth.

Yet when she left, she was unbearably cold. Without a single word, without giving him a chance to talk or explain.

At first, it felt like a part of the world he knew was collapsing, and then he wanted to go find her and beg her to please tell him what the problem was. Considering he had never felt such emotions toward anyone, not even his grandmother, it was truly a shocking impulse.

But after all those stormy feelings had passed……

“No, Annelie Heich.”

Now pure rage drove Elroy. The world collapsed? Explain and apologize? Ridiculous nonsense.

This couldn’t be anything but anger. Otherwise, why would he feel this furious and irritated so frequently? Why would he sometimes feel unable to bear it unless he broke something or hurt someone?

He simply wanted to capture her. Capture her and interrogate her, get angry at her, blame her, and even shout at her.

Elroy roughly pressed his brow to calm his increasingly throbbing head. He hadn’t slept properly for a long time. When he closed his eyes, clear eyes stared at him with the sound of colliding ice. The eyes of Annelie Heich he had last seen. Those eyes that no longer expected anything from him.

“Ha.”

The headache worsened. His neck stiffened completely. He wanted to return to the townhouse immediately. Once there, he would frantically rummage through the things she left behind, and when he lay down holding her belongings and clothes, sleep would come. He felt as if the woman had cursed him before leaving. This too fueled Elroy’s anger, but he couldn’t help it.

What drove him even crazier was that every time he took out and looked at the woman’s belongings, her scent gradually disappeared from them. He couldn’t sleep without them, yet the more he took them out, the more Annelie’s traces vanished. Either way, he was going mad.

Once, he became so angry that he took out the pigments Annelie often used and poured them over the things she left behind. To somehow preserve the smell of pigments and ink that came from her. Like childishly venting his frustration on a woman who wouldn’t return.

Yes. He felt angry, so he could do this much. With only that thought, he poured pigments over the few clothes, shoes, and the easel and canvas she had cherished and stroked affectionately.

But the smell of the spilled pigment was only terribly pungent.

Even when he gagged, stroked his clothes covered with pigment, and held them close, Annelie’s scent wasn’t there. Though it was clearly the same pigment. The same ink.

‘Why.’

His head kept getting hotter. The next moment his chest burned, and then his neck flushed. Work hadn’t properly occupied his hands for quite some time. Rather, his grandmother, who had collapsed and regained consciousness, seemed much more composed than the current Elroy.

“Y-Your Grace……”

The secretaries stared at the Duke, who lay covered in pigment on the townhouse bedroom floor that day, with thoroughly pale faces.

Then they exchanged glances—faces gauging whether the Duke, who had been strangely out of his mind for weeks, had finally gone irreversibly mad. Though it was obvious what they were thinking, he let them imagine as they pleased.

He ordered to throw away all of Annelie Heich’s belongings ruined by the pigments, but at dawn, he went to the disposal site with staggering steps and retrieved them. The servant guarding the disposal site turned deathly pale seeing Elroy like that, but he had enough discretion not to tell anyone else what he had seen.

Ignoring the servant’s frightened gaze, Elroy searched through the garbage heap and found Annelie’s belongings. The thoroughly soiled clothes and shoes were now barely recognizable. It was hard to believe that Annelie Heich once wore these, fluttering down the corridor of the townhouse.