‘I couldn’t believe it. Was it really Victor?’

Eve was happy to see him but also stunned.

“Why are you here without calling first?”

He used to come pick her up occasionally before, but he always contacted her first.
So she wouldn’t be caught off guard like this.

“I just told you. I missed you.”

“Victor.”

Or was something wrong? Their eyes met, but he just smiled gently and stroked Eve’s hair affectionately.

“What’s that?”

“Oh, this?”

She hadn’t managed to hide the partner request cards she’d received.

Not that she had any reason to feel guilty about them.

Victor glanced at them casually and asked nonchalantly.

“You received partner requests?”

“You knew about it?”

“I overheard some male students talking.”

So he had heard everything. Eve nodded and added:

“I already rejected them all.”

“It’s fine. What can I do if they recognize a gem?”

“You’re… not bothered?”

“Of course not. Who wouldn’t love the woman that Victor Mikhail loves?”

“You’re impossible.”

“I’m fine with it, so please don’t worry at all, Your Royal Highness.”

Victor smiled as he interlaced his fingers with Eve’s and swung their hands back and forth.

“Your Royal Highness!”

“Your Grace!”

Students passing by on their way home cheered and waved.

Even as she waved back at them with a small gesture, a corner of her heart felt cold.

It was good that he wasn’t bothered at all, but why did she feel disappointed?

Looking at it this way, I guess she’s impossible too.

Eve soothed her mixed feelings as she boarded the carriage with Victor.

Her excitement about the graduation party deflated like a punctured balloon.

‘I’ll just enjoy myself moderately with my classmates and come back early.’

Victor rested his arm on the window frame, propped his chin on his hand, and asked:

“Eve, how was your day?”

His golden eyes, gently creased in a smile, melted Eve’s heart.

She watched, mesmerized, as Victor brushed back his black hair that swayed in the breeze, and replied:

“Today? It was fun.”

“Would you tell me about it? I’m really curious.”

“Well—”

What followed was a pleasant conversation that flowed endlessly. The carriage soon filled with laughter.

‘I’m already so happy right now. I shouldn’t worry about trivial things. It’s not like this is the only party in my life.’

Eve looked into the eyes of the man filled with love for her and comforted herself with these thoughts.

* * *

‘I wonder if rumors have spread at school?’

Surely word has gotten around that Eve’s husband is alive and well?

It should serve as a warning to those lurking around her.

Having completed his impromptu school visit to favorable reviews, Victor examined the cards spread out on his office desk.

Six partner request letters that Monette had procured for him, plus the five partner request cards Eve had been holding.

He had bribed a maid to secretly take the cards Eve had handed over to be disposed of when she entered the entrance lobby.

Eleven letters and cards in total. The only unusual thing was that there were two identical three-dimensional cards.

“The contents are ordinary. Just asking her to be their partner… such shameless fellows.”

Bang. He slammed his palm on the desk, causing a hot pain to shoot through his hand, but he didn’t mind. Instead, Victor was seized by an urge to tear the letters and cards to shreds.

As he gathered them to rip them apart, he felt something strange on his fingertips.

“Blood?”

No wonder it felt thicker. It was a large blue three-dimensional card decorated with various pretty animals and flowers on thick cardboard. There was a distinct bloodstain on its corner.

Victor examined the card carefully and peeled away the thin cardboard.

Though meticulously glued, the paper came off easily.

Inside the card was another card written in blood.

It sent chills down his spine to think someone might have done this deliberately.

“Selfish woman. This will be your final performance. I’ll make it a bloody graduation party.”

“How dare they.”

Drops of bright red blood formed on Victor’s lips as he bit down hard.

“Chamberlain.”

“Yes, did you call for me?”

The chamberlain who had been waiting rushed in.

“Call my assistant. And the staff.”

However, his department staff didn’t achieve much.

“Profiles can be officially requested and obtained, but changing the education department’s regulations is impossible.”

“Even if we could change them, it couldn’t be done within two weeks.”

“Do you think I don’t know that?” A subordinate’s ability was measured by making the impossible possible.

‘Kay would have managed it.’

Suddenly, he thought of Kay, who had served as his assistant. He realized how capable Kay had been.

‘I should have treated him better. Should I give him more territory?’

Kay, who had become the Duke of Mikhail, was set to receive new territory and a new title from the Mikhail family when Monette came of age, and would then pass the dukedom to his daughter.

“The bonus wasn’t a small amount… and all you got were profiles?”

Only a handful of teams had managed to obtain lists and personal information of graduates and current students.

Tsk, the epitome of incompetence.

“How can Your Grace ask us to break the law?”

A fearless employee complained. His voice was too loud since no one else had spoken.

“Who asked you to break the law? I said to perform legal illegalities. For example, like this team.”

There was a team that had obtained consent forms for information disclosure under the pretext of providing scholarships.

Victor’s eyes gleamed as he examined the profiles submitted by that team.

“Isaac Newt”

“Marin Whale”

“This is… well done. I’m impressed you found even this.”

“Th-thank you.”

“Good job. Issue bonuses to Team A.”

“Thank you!”

The faces of the finance department staff, except for Team A, turned ashen.

“Assistant, have everyone sign confidentiality agreements.”

“Yes, Your Grace.”

Victor quickly walked down the corridor past the bowing assistant and roughly pulled off his tie.

D*mn it. Why are there so many lunatics in this world?

The problem wasn’t predatory men asking for dances.

He could stop the graduation party even now, but Eve had been looking forward to the graduation performance and party so much!

‘I can’t let some lunatic ruin my wife’s dream.’

Victor crumpled the papers with the two profiles and stuffed them inside his jacket.

His throat felt constricted.

‘I can’t do this alone. I need them.’

* * *

Eve, who had returned late again after graduation performance practice, came to see Monette sleeping.

She was grateful that her daughter was such a strong child who never complained, but it hurt
her heart even more whenever Monette acted so mature.

‘Am I being selfish?’ She sighed as she tidied up the messy desk and notebooks, looking down
at the child who had fallen asleep with a pencil in her hand.

She looked exactly like Victor. Blood doesn’t lie, does it?

“How cute. You fell asleep writing in your diary again.”

Monette diligently wrote in her diary after returning from kindergarten before falling asleep.

Eve picked up her daughter, who was sleeping with her head on the edge of the desk, and laid her on the bed.

Stroking the forehead of the softly breathing child, Eve whispered:

“Monette, I’m sorry. Mommy is being selfish.”

Monica couldn’t send her to school for fear of being discovered by the nobility.

Her violent, gambling father had neglected her. He hadn’t taught her anything except hunting.

“Mommy always envied children who went to school when I was little. I wanted to do ordinary things, so maybe I’m being too greedy. Our Monette should live doing everything she wants to do. If you don’t want it, Mommy will try to hold back.”

Eve lay down beside the child and gently patted her small chest, but fatigue washed over her and she closed her eyelids for a moment.

After some time had passed, Monette sensed someone’s presence and woke up.

“Mo…mmy?”

Rubbing her eyes drowsily, Monette sat up in bed.

Eve, who had dozed off, gently opened her eyes and met her daughter’s gaze.

“Yes. Monette, Mommy’s here.”

“It really is Mommy.”

“Lie down, sweetie.”

“Okay!”

Monette carefully lay down facing her mother, who was reclining toward her side.

“Love Mommy.”

This beautiful child welcoming her as “Mommy.” Looking at her daughter’s crescent-moon eyes, Eve almost burst into tears.

Barely composing herself, she asked:

“Monette, didn’t you miss Mommy today?”

The child began to gently stroke her mother’s cheek with her tiny hand and spoke softly:

“Monette is okay. I have lots to study, and I have nanny, and grandpa and grandma too.”

“…”

“Not hard at all. Really. Monette thinks Mommy is so cool. Love you, Mommy.”

Monette wrapped her arms around her mother’s neck and clung to her. Seeing the smile on her child’s face as she buried herself in Eve’s embrace, Eve hugged her daughter tightly.

“Yes. I love you, Monette.”

* * *

In the middle of the night, three carriages were parked in the border region between the Kingdom of Aria and the Kingdom of Hessen.

“Your Grace, this is too much.”

“Indeed. For a cousin I haven’t seen in years to treat the princess of Aria Kingdom like this. It feels like diplomatic relations are being severed.”

Duke Kay and Princess Abigail, summoned before Victor, voiced their complaints.

“I apologize for the discourtesy to both of you due to this urgent matter.”

Victor using formal speech?

He usually mixed casual and formal speech with sarcastic remarks outside of official settings.
Abigail jumped up in shock.

“Why, why are you acting like this? You’ve changed since I last saw you.”

Kay, who had served Victor for a long time, felt the same way.

“Your Grace, are you ill?”

Seeing his round, wide eyes, Victor frowned.

“Sigh. I don’t even have the energy for banter, so listen carefully.”

“That’s more like it.”

“That’s better. I feel relieved now.”

Glare.

When Victor shot them a sharp look, Kay and Abigail closed their mouths.
Abigail flipped her palms upward as if to say “go ahead and speak.”

Victor explained that Eve wanted to attend the graduation party, that a bloody card had been delivered, and that he intended to catch the culprit before the graduation party.

“And I need to go to the graduation party too. There might be other dangers.”

“Have you informed Princess Gion?”

“No. If I did, Eve would give up on the graduation party. Her role in the graduation performance would go to someone else. At worst, the party might be canceled.”

Kay, who had been nodding, added:

“Still, it would be better to tell her than to risk her getting hurt, Your Grace.”

“Yes. But…”

Kay was absolutely right. But Victor couldn’t bear to imagine Eve’s disappointed face.

Abigail stomped her feet while sitting, then suddenly asked as if something had occurred to her:

“That card. Eve would know who gave it to her, right? She has a good memory.”

“I already asked her and she said two people gave her identical cards hours apart. Neither had names on them.”

“You are qualified. I’ll support you.”

“Selfish woman. This will be your final performance. I’ll make it a bloody graduation party.”

Victor handed the personal information sheets of the two people Eve had identified to Abigail and Kay.

“One of them is a woman? Marin Whale?”

She was a beautiful woman with dark brown hair and blue eyes.

“Yes. A classmate, apparently. She didn’t have a partner and wanted to become friends with Eve, so she deliberately gave her the card.”

“So this person was a student here? She performed with me last year. She passed the audition.”

“Really?”

“I heard she suddenly developed a spinal problem and couldn’t dance anymore.”

If Abigail knew this woman well, she must be a somewhat known performer.

Kay also muttered while reading the other personal information sheet:

“Isaac Newt. A foreigner. From far away. Delusional disorder?”

“Yes. He has no connections here. He’s talented but has a record of being treated for delusional disorder. And he has a relationship with this woman, Marin Whale.”

“What?”

“Pardon?”

“According to my investigation, Isaac specifically followed Marin Whale around and they dated briefly before breaking up. Marin Whale applied for the lead role in the graduation performance but was rejected and then became ill. Isaac persistently courted her but was rejected.”