“I love you, Lord Cedric.”

Cedric’s lips twisted slowly. Looking at the cufflinks gleaming on Kale’s sleeve behind Amelia, Cedric let out a hollow laugh. His eyes shone piercingly cold.

Ah, Amelia, you shouldn’t have said that.

The more Amelia smiled brightly like a girl in love, the deeper Cedric’s twisted smile became.

‘You can like Kale. Yes, you can like Kale.’

A young, frivolous lady could fall in love with another man even when her engagement was in limbo. Cedric wasn’t young or sentimental enough to be upset about such things.

‘But you shouldn’t have said you love me. Just yesterday, you were sharing cufflinks with Wayne, showing such passionate love, and now you say you love me, Lady Leverun?’

Even now, one of Kale’s sleeves was empty.

The more Amelia smiled with an innocent face, the more disgusting it felt. Revulsion rose from deep within his stomach.

Cedric twisted his lips as he looked at the two women before him.

‘One pretends to want me when she doesn’t, and the other says she loves me while loving another man. They’re desperate to deceive me.’

As Cedric roughly ran his hand through his hair and was about to open his mouth, Amelia smiled brightly.

“I don’t mean for you to answer right now. I just meant that’s how I feel.”

Amelia had read Cedric’s momentary sharp gaze. She knew that this man, with his high walls, wouldn’t speak of love to her, whom he met due to family interests.

That was a word meant to shake off Arne, not Cedric. And simultaneously to test Cedric.

“I’d like to gift you cufflinks as thanks for preventing an unpleasant incident today. Is that alright? I mentioned it last time.”

Amelia took out a small box from her handbag. The noblewomen made a fuss.

“What did they discuss so much?”

“I heard it’s fashionable for couples to share cufflinks these days. Even watching makes me flutter.”

However, Cedric’s gaze as he looked down at the box was utterly cold.

‘What trick is this now?’

Amelia slowly opened the box while looking at Cedric. They were cufflinks in exactly the same shape as Kale’s.

But not just one, a pair.

“I happened to pick up a cufflink on the street, and it was so pretty that I ordered the same design, which took some time. If you feel uncomfortable because I found it on the street, I can have a different design made.”

“……”

“Will you accept it?”

Amelia felt Arne’s hand tremble momentarily.

When Cedric picked up the cufflinks, Arne’s pupils shook.

Cedric immediately looked at the back of the cufflinks. The Leverun family crest was embossed on it.

‘It’s not made by Ella.’

Cedric’s fingers trembled slightly. Watching this, the corners of Amelia’s mouth rose wickedly.

‘So you did look at the back that day. I prepared well.’

After visiting the Ipellita Garden, Amelia immediately summoned merchants and craftsmen from the Leverun family. For Leverun, the Empire’s top bourgeois merchant family, it wasn’t a difficult task.

‘It’s a very simple matter.’

Soon, Cedric’s sharp gaze softened. Although still confused and suspicious, what could he do? He had suspicions but no evidence.

‘Now, Lady Ronia, shall I shake you off? You’re the Empire’s mad villainess. Will you act up a bit today?’

Amelia deliberately smiled freshly and pressed Arne’s wrist subtly so no one would notice.

“Hup.”

Arne, who had been looking at Cedric, distorted her face at the sudden unexpected pain. Amelia immediately released her hand and put on a surprised expression.

“Oh my, I’m sorry. I’m so clumsy.”

“It’s alright.”

Amelia smiled brightly and turned the topic to another noblewoman.

“By the way, I heard Marchioness Asili has seen her grandchild recently. Congratulations. You must be delighted.”

“Oh my, you knew? Only you. How kind and thoughtful.”

“It’s nothing. I prepared a small gift, and I’ll visit you later.”

While engaging in conversation that Arne couldn’t join, Amelia again slightly pressed Arne’s wrist.

Biting her left lip due to the sudden pain, Arne pulled her arm away. Amelia deliberately knocked over the medicine box, causing scissors meant for cutting bandages to fall onto Amelia’s wrist.

Small beads of fresh blood formed over the small cut made by the sharp scissors.

“Goodness, is Lady Leverun alright?”

“What are you doing, Lady Ronia!”

“She’s bleeding!”

Arne was caught in a strange feeling. Clearly, she was the one who had been hurt. Yet Arne became the wrongdoer.

“I’m sorry. The wrist that Lady Leverun was holding was so painful that I rudely……”

“Are you saying Lady Leverun deliberately hurt you, Lady Ronia? When Lady Leverun has been thinking so much about you, how can you say such things?”

“……”

Amelia restrained Marchioness Asili.

“Marchioness Asili, please don’t scold Lady Ronia too much. Being in such a shameful state, she might be confused.”

“You’re too kind for your own good, Lady Leverun.”

Amelia tightly gripped Arne’s wrist again while everyone’s attention was on Marchioness Asili.

Arne endured, biting down firmly on her lower lip. The pretense of benevolence was gone—this was intentional. She spoke, her wrist trembling slightly.

“Lady Leverun, I’ll treat my wrist myself.”

“What are you saying? You’re still trembling.”

As Amelia’s grip grew increasingly tight, Cedric, who had been watching with folded arms, removed Amelia’s hand.

“I’ll do it. I think I’d be better than the clumsy Lady Leverun. I’ve wrapped bandages daily on the battlefield.”

“I……”

“I’ll do it.”

Hearing his words that were more of a warning rather than a request, Amelia closed her mouth. Amelia smiled brightly to avoid showing her confusion.

“Go ahead. Lord Cedric would do much better than me.”

A strange atmosphere settled. Having clenched her fist as things didn’t go as planned, Amelia stared at Cedric and Arne.

‘What was that just now?’

Clearly, his gaze toward Lady Ronia wasn’t warm, yet Cedric kept hovering around this woman.

Cedric put down the cufflinks he was holding and picked up the bandage.

Cedric began wrapping the bandage over Arne’s wrist without any unnecessary movements. Joints, once damaged, easily get hurt again with small impacts. It was the same spot he had wrapped when she collapsed due to the mana perfume.

‘Just when it’s about to heal, every time.’

As Cedric’s gaze flashed fiercely, Arne’s pupils trembled finely. Arne turned her head away to avoid his gaze, but Cedric persistently glared at her.

Watching this, Marchioness Asili burst into laughter.

“Young Master Renigrad must have disliked Lady Leverun getting hurt. Still, soften your gaze; with such fierceness, ladies’ hearts will stop. I understand you wouldn’t look kindly upon Lady Ronia who hurt Lady Leverun.”

“Oh my, how attentive.”

No matter what the noblewomen chattered about, Cedric glared at Arne. His gaze lingered on her reddened eyes and swollen lips.

The skin reddened from being hit by Wayne and her wet gaze bothered him.

As reason gradually returned, he thought that perhaps some of Arne’s words might be true. The thought that there might be a deal between the Ronia ducal family and the Wayne marquis family.

Even so, the fact that Arne hadn’t wanted Cedric and that the cursed Renigrad was far from a peaceful life didn’t change.

Even now, Cedric was disgusted with himself, faithful to Renigrad’s curse.

Himself, with the twisted desire to make her cry not because of Kale but because of him.

He wished all of it—those wet eyes, those swollen lips—were all his.

Amelia, watching Cedric quickly wrap the bandage, folded her arms.

She had hoped Arne would act up, but it seemed difficult to stimulate her further, so she planned to use another method.

Just then, as a maid approached Amelia and nodded, Amelia smiled brightly and opened her mouth.

“Lady Ronia, I heard the doctor will arrive soon. Do you perhaps have any family history? The doctor who’s coming is of a different species with silver hair and red eyes, which are characteristics of the blood clan disease of the different kind. It’s rare to meet such a doctor, so why not ask?”

“Oh my, Amelia, aren’t you being too considerate? I shudder at the mention of different species. You wouldn’t know, but in our time, different species were lowly war slaves. They didn’t even dare to make eye contact with us.”

Marchioness Asili glared at Arne. She hoped Arne would lower her head in shame, but instead, Arne didn’t avoid the Marchioness’s eyes, looking back at her and smiling slightly as if finding her ridiculous.

“Besides, being with them might spread disease. You wouldn’t have seen it, but there was an incident where Princess Ramona, who was trying to escape secretly, was caught and stoned to death. And then people who were there died one by one mysteriously. The disease spread.”

“Ah, I think I’ve heard of that too. Princess Ramona had a blood clan disease, so she had silver hair and red eyes, right?”

Amelia’s gaze turned to Arne. Cedric’s hand paused momentarily but soon moved again.

The nobles’ gazes, smirking as if they had found an interesting spectacle, gathered on Arne.

However, Arne silently turned her head toward Cedric. She had avoided his savage gaze because it hurt her heart, but because he kept persistently looking at her, their eyes met immediately.