The dark passage remained eerily silent. The cold air brushed against Elliope’s body once more. It would have been easier to bear if it was just a breeze coming from somewhere, but all she could smell was the musty smell of mould and the heavy, oppressive atmosphere. Pain began to seep into her feet. Numbly, Elliope reached down to touch them. 

As she looked, she realised that the heel of one of her shoes was completely broken off. It seemed almost absurd that she had made it this far without noticing. She could feel something trickling down from the cut on her calf that the dagger had hit earlier. It was probably blood.

“…”

She had worked so hard to get this far.

‘And now I’m stuck, unable to move forward or back.’

As the cold swept over her again, Elliope wrapped her arms around herself. She needed a heat far more intense than that. A heat that would press down on her, suffocate her, swirl around her with a fury. A heat that would rip through her insides, break her, but still care for her, make sure she didn’t get hurt.

‘I guess I’m not as strong as you.’

Then, as she closed her eyes, she heard it.

“…Pae.”

At the faint sound of a voice from beyond the wall, Elliope’s eyes snapped open.

“…Ope!”

The voice she had so desperately longed for finally reached her ears, and without noticing when her strength had drained away, she jumped to her feet and began pounding on the wall. Her fists felt like they might break, but she couldn’t stop. 

“Kallian!” 

At that moment, as she kept hitting the wall, light suddenly poured in, illuminating her surroundings. After being surrounded by darkness, the light made her eyes jump. Her vision was flooded with white and the brightness stung her eyes.

“Elliope.”

Even in that blinding moment, her body moved instinctively towards the voice.

“Lady.”

A warm voice, filled with warmth, embraced her. It was the warmth she had longed for all this time.

“Aah.”

Elliope groaned unconsciously, reaching desperately for Kallian’s back. Kallian held her tightly in return. Even though her ribs were squeezed so tightly that it was hard to breathe and her chest was compressed, she didn’t utter a word of discomfort or ask to be released.

“….”

“Lady, I…”

“Kallian?”

As she ran her hands down his back and embraced him, Kallian continued to speak, his words tumbling out without coherence.

“I had a feeling you’d be there. So I went in, but you weren’t there.”

“Kallian…”

“…I knew you had entered through the passage.”

“….”

“…Because of the heat, the passage was blocked.”

As he spoke, the hand pressing down on her felt strangely sticky. Elliope quietly shifted her gaze to Kallian’s hand wrapped around her shoulder. His hand, covered in blisters from burns, was torn in several places as he held her. Despite the blood oozing from the blisters, she didn’t feel the urge to pull away or find it repulsive. Instead, the thought that he had endured such pain just to find her made her heart ache.

“I thought I would lose my mind.”

“….”

“I thought I would lose you.”

Kallian’s words trailed off. It was the moment when Elliope let out a long sigh and leaned against Kallian. There was a commotion outside.

“Sir!”

“Sir Kallian!”

The retainers from the Duke’s household who had rushed in with the knights were startled to see them. They were particularly startled by Elliope’s sudden appearance, as if she had risen from the ground.

Elliope belatedly became aware of her surroundings.

*No wonder this place looks familiar.

They were in the Duke’s office, located in the main hall of the Duke’s residence. Nearby, Theodor’s desk and various documents were scattered about, indicating where he carried out his duties.

The place where it had come from was the wall opposite the original fireplace in the office, and it appeared that the passage was designed so that when it was opened, the wall of the fireplace would slide away. However, the mechanism that allowed the door to open had been jammed with a poker, preventing the wall from opening. It looked as if Kallian would have to break it down.

‘At least it’s done now.’

Then she leaned against Kallian, numb.

“How could this happen?”

A trembling voice cut through the air.

The head maid, Baroness Taleon, who had entered late, contorted her face in shock and pointed at Elliope.

“Now I understand.”

“Head maid?”

Then came a statement that no one could ignore.

“This woman is Seor’s spy!”

A moment of silence fell over the room. Soon, astonished voices could be heard from all directions.

“What do you mean?”

“Head Maid!”

Before anyone could fully comprehend the situation, a knight with a pale face ran up and shouted.

“This is bad! All the masked men we captured are dead!”

“What? How did that happen…?”

“I don’t know! It seems they committed s*icide by poisoning… but we found Seor’s seal on them!”

The air around them was charged with tension. Elliope’s brow furrowed.

“Seor?

She couldn’t make sense of it. Why would Seor be involved in this?

‘And besides…’

If it was Seor, they would have used a bow, not something like this.

The people from Seor that Elliope had met so far had mostly used bows, not daggers. The use of daggers was…

…when Kallian captured Seor’s soldiers.

Now that she thought about it, the way the masked men threw their daggers seemed strangely familiar. The way they drew their daggers from the sheaths attached to their harnesses and threw them one after the other was something she had seen Kallian or other knights do before.

It wasn’t Seor’s.

‘It was the Empire’s.’

Duke Ilmos’ method.

‘A trap?’

Elliope realised at that moment and froze. The head maid, sensing the right moment, raised her voice.

“These Seor people dared to plot knowing that Her Highness, Princess Leanne, was here!”

“But, Head Maid…”

“Someone must have given Seor the information! Someone close to the Seor people, someone who was even alone with the Seor ambassador during the recent welcome banquet!”

The faces of those who realised that Elliope had been alone with the Seor ambassador at that time turned pale.

“That…?”

“The lord’s wife is none other than Lady Elsen, is she not?”

As soon as someone finished speaking, Kallian’s gaze slowly shifted to the head maid. Startled, the head maid quickly stepped behind one of the knights to escape Kallian’s gaze, then shouted.

“That’s why it’s suspicious! Of all people, she became Lord Elsen’s wife!”

“Excuse me?”

“She was originally sent to be the Duke’s wife, but she seduced Lord Kallian and ended up marrying into the Seor-aligned Elsen family!”

“….”

“I also heard that something suspicious happened to Zenya!”

Some of the retainers and knights jumped at the head maid’s words.

“Besides, the lady moved alone during the hunt! According to the other noblewomen, when they came to their senses, only Lady Elsen was missing!”

The ladies, including Charlotte standing behind them, nodded in agreement. Some of the retainers, realising that the atmosphere was taking a strange turn, turned pale.

Elliope opened her mouth slowly.

“Well, I was attacked too, Head Maid.”

“You encountered the masked men? Alone?”

The Head Maid, instead of retreating, clenched her fist and shook it, shouting,

“You survived the encounter with the masked men? Alone, Lady Elsen?”

All eyes turned to Elliope. The head maid, seizing the moment, shouted,

“Isn’t that an admission that you had contact with them? And you came from the Duke’s office! This is extremely suspicious…”

“If you’re talking about the secret passage that leads out here, I showed it to her.”

Kallian’s voice, calm and collected, overlapped the heated words of the Head Maid. Despite the lack of emotion, his voice carried a heavy weight that seemed to press down on everyone.

The Head Maid jumped and shouted in response.

“How could you reveal such forbidden information to an outsider of the Duke’s residence…?”

“Well, it seems something like that happened, doesn’t it?”

Kallian smiled, one corner of his mouth turned up. The faces of those who remembered this event turned pale.

It was the time when Duke Theodor had tried to harm Eliope, who had come to the Duke’s residence to meet the Imperial Ambassador. He hadn’t just tried to harm her, he had tried to strangle her in front of his retainers.

Afterwards, he had brought women resembling Elliope Elsen to his chambers. The sequence of events made it clear what Theodor had intended to do before attempting to strangle her.

“That means..” 

“If he reacts like that…” 

Some of the retainers groaned in discomfort. 

Had Theodor not been their Duke, and had he been a noble of similar rank to Kallian, it would not have been surprising if this had led to a trial by combat. Although Kallian could theoretically be criticised for revealing the secret passage of the Duke’s residence to help Elliope escape if necessary, it wasn’t entirely without justification.

“But still!”

“The reason she was with the Seor Ambassador was to discuss what happened in the Nahir Plains.”

The atmosphere grew more tense with each word Kallian spoke. As Kallian embraced Elliope and gently stroked her hair, he whispered softly.

“It seems I was also the one who brought her to Zenya.”

“Lord Elsen!”

“First, I r*ped Princess Elliope and took her virginity when she arrived as the Duke’s bride.”

“….”

“Then I took her as my wife and used that as justification to receive the title of Lord of Elsen.”

The blunt tone made people blush with embarrassment. Elliope looked up at Kallian quietly. Kallian, lowering his lips to her forehead, quietly detonated the metaphorical powder keg.

“It seems that the head maid wants to accuse me not of being my wife’s husband, but of being the man who took advantage of her.”

The deafening silence overwhelmed everyone. Even the head maid, who had initially accused Elliope of being a concubine, was speechless.

“Am I wrong?”

Everyone swallowed nervously. In the midst of this cold atmosphere, someone finally broke the silence.

“So what?”

Theodor, now accompanied by knights and Princess Leanne, walked towards them.