Chapter 83: A New Direction

The knight tournament concluded with a festival. The excitement that had built up while watching the knights’ battles was calmed with drinks, and a ball was held at the imperial palace. Those who ranked were congratulated, while those who didn’t were consoled with hopes for next time.

As people entered one by one into the ballroom prepared in the imperial palace’s grand hall, Leonard headed to where Duke Blast was. The duke’s family knight guarding his room stopped Leonard.

“The Duke does not wish to see you.”

“I know he doesn’t want to see me, but I have something to say.”

“Please leave.”

“If I see him now, I won’t appear before him again.”

Leonard needed to relay to the duke what he had heard while crossing swords with Caelan. However, having already fallen from favor, the knight’s attitude remained unchanged, suggesting the opportunity was lost.

“Please don’t be any more discourteous.”

“…You’ll regret this.”

“I wonder who will regret it.”

At the knight’s obvious sneering mockery, Leonard glared at him while taking a step back.

He knew he had fallen from the duke’s favor the moment he lost in the finals. But to be cut off so abruptly… Leonard took a deep breath where he stood and turned around.

‘Since you rejected me, handle it yourself.’

Leonard’s eyes grew cold.

You’re next after the duke.

That’s what Caelan had said when their swords crossed and they were close.

He kept mulling over what that meant even after the finals ended. It could be words to brush off, but one corner of his mind warned him not to ignore it.

But trying to cling to that meaningful single line by himself yielded nothing, so he went to see the duke… and was rejected.

Though understandable given the duke’s current state of mind, it wasn’t pleasant to feel so low.

“There’s nothing gained from this.”

Not only had he lost the duke’s trust, but he had also become irreparably estranged from Bliss.

When the sword she had prepared came into Caelan’s hands, something burst inside Leonard.

“If I can’t bring it… I’ll have to take it.”

His thought that he could somehow salvage things even if his planted Jackie’s existence was discovered by Bliss had already crumbled. Since she had given her heart to Caelan, there was no use asking Bliss to look at him anymore.

Leonard glanced in the direction of the duke’s room before leaving.

***

To attend the ball, the two went straight to the imperial palace from the arena. When Caelan came out after washing his sweat-soaked body, Bliss tended to his wounds as the doctor had taught her.

She didn’t want to show his wounds to anyone else.

“Now I understand how cruel it is to hold a ball right after the knight tournament ends.”

Though she knew it was meant to keep the excitement going, it was too much for someone who had just fought in the finals.

After treating all his wounds and bringing his shirt, Bliss hesitated for a moment before getting scissors. She cut vertically from the sleeve and helped him put it on his arm.

The reason Bliss was helping him without a doctor or servant was because Caelan had said he would do it alone, and she had at least offered to help.

She didn’t understand why he refused the usual attendance he normally accepted well. She could only step in since he insisted.

Placing the uniform on Caelan’s shoulders, Bliss muttered with a troubled face.

“Because of the bandages on your arm, I had to split the shirt, and the jacket has to rest on your shoulders.”

Bliss adjusted it several times to keep it from falling off his shoulders and stepped back. Though she felt complicated every time she saw the bandages peeking above his collar and wrapped around his arms, overall it didn’t look bad.

“You look very handsome.”

“Is that all?”

“If you’re expecting comments like ‘you look like a sculpture carved by God’ or ‘beloved by all creation’… I really can’t do that.”

Her fingers were curling just imagining it. After helping him dress, she turned to change her own clothes, but suddenly an arm came around and blocked her waist.

Pulled close enough to feel his chest against her back, Bliss put her hand on his arm to stop him but then relaxed. The moment she touched the bandages, any thought of resistance vanished.

Completely embraced, Bliss lifted her head. Though she couldn’t meet Caelan’s eyes like this, the back of her head touched his shoulder.

“How did you read me?”

It was a continuation of the conversation she had with Echo when Caelan couldn’t open his eyes.

“You heard it all then. A husband who killed his wife.”

“You must have been scared.”

“That’s why I trembled so much when you said you’d put the necklace on me. I didn’t know why you suddenly opened your eyes in this body, but I was terrified thinking about what would happen if I died like this.”

Bliss relaxed and leaned against him.

“But since I didn’t die, I kept wondering how I should live now, and whether there might be more danger of death.”

As Caelan’s breath touched her nape, Bliss tilted her head to the side.

“I definitely felt that way at first, but why has it become like this now?”

At Bliss’s laughing words, Caelan relaxed his arm. Feeling his arm loosen, Bliss turned around to look into Caelan’s eyes.

His surprise at her words was clearly visible.

“I never thought about being loved by you. So this is too strange. Or maybe the world is turning strangely.”

Understanding what she meant by asking why it had become like this, Caelan smiled weakly.

“We might have been a perfect match. You should have seduced me and shaken my heart from the start.”

“Don’t you feel embarrassed saying things like that?”

No, how could he mention seduction so openly?

“Then we might have gotten closer a bit faster.”

“I’m quite satisfied with our current pace.”

Bliss responded with a laugh. She had cut off the possibility of him suggesting they speed things up even now.

As if her prediction was right, Caelan clicked his tongue to show his disappointment.

“There’s nothing to be so disappointed about. I’ve shown you all my secrets. Isn’t that enough?”

“It does feel like I fully possess my wife now.”

“Then that’s fine. Will you put this necklace on me?”

Since they needed to head to the ball soon, Bliss turned her back to Caelan again. And when she held out the necklace, Caelan, who had been accepting it readily, hesitated. It was the necklace he had given to Bliss.

From the day he gave this, his new days with Bliss had begun.

“I thought I should wear this today, if no other day.”

“Right, you brought it at just the perfect moment for commemoration.”

Caelan carefully fastened the necklace, holding it in front of Bliss.

Bliss, who had been still since handing the necklace to Caelan, sighed after feeling the cold touch on her collarbone and hearing the sound of the clasp.

Nothing had happened, and that made her feel even more relieved. Though she had known, experiencing it directly felt different.

Bliss raised her hand to touch the necklace. The cold necklace was once again gradually warming to her body temperature.

“Wearing this necklace means……”

They had just had a similar conversation. That she had brought it at the perfect moment for commemoration. But not knowing why he mentioned it again, she stayed still as Caelan’s low voice resonated.

“That our marriage can deepen as much as we want, right? You brought it as a token to say we should become a perfect couple now that the final match is over.”

……She hadn’t thought that far when bringing it.

The necklace began to feel heavier as it took on meanings she hadn’t considered.

***

The moment they entered the ballroom, Bliss shrank slightly at the rush of gazes. It was a moment that made her attempts to enter gracefully seem futile.

It wasn’t easy to handle so many people’s attention.

“Bliss.”

At the large hand that wrapped around her shoulder, Bliss looked up.

“Do you have the luxury to mind them?”

There was no way she couldn’t catch the hidden meaning in Caelan’s words. Seeing him smile with curved eyes, Bliss couldn’t say anything.

“Shouldn’t you be thinking about what’s ahead?”

“…Thank you. Thanks to you, I’m much less nervous.”

As Caelan said, she had no luxury to mind others. Bliss lowered her gaze before raising it again. Caelan turned his head with satisfaction at her firm gaze, as if nothing had happened.

“Yes, I knew you would be like that.”

Now the ball seemed worth enjoying.

As the two entered deeper into the ballroom, people flocked to them like moths. They offered congratulations to Marquis Adrian, soon to be duke, while making their presence known.

The unexpected appearance of a new duke in the empire was quite shocking.

In these peaceful times with fewer opportunities to earn merit in war, the Emperor had presented another way of bestowing titles.

If times were peaceful, one could earn merit fitting for peace. Giving the title of duke to a marquis who had become the empire’s finest sword by winning the knight tournament twice would be the start of that.

Though it also included potential directed at Bliss, that was part of a conversation with the Emperor that wasn’t publicly revealed.

While receiving greetings surrounded by people, Caelan felt something missing beside him and turned around.

Bliss, who had been receiving greetings with him, had disappeared?