Epilogue

On a stormy night, news spread that the Madam of the old castle of Tarnu had passed away from her chronic illness. The collateral relatives, who had been scheming to seize Tarnu through Ellenia, smirked at the unexpectedly easy conclusion.

The Madam’s funeral was held at the Tarnu family cemetery at the foot of the mountain, as the rainy season was coming to an end.

“…Opellus will inherit the manor, excluding the castle and the surrounding forested areas. However, I bequeath this castle to Butler Olsen, who has faithfully assisted the young lord for the past ten years, and I hope that the property within the castle and the forested areas behind it will be distributed among the servants at his discretion.”

The Opelluses eagerly gathered the land documents and left the old castle immediately. As the best land in the East had fallen into Opellus’s hands, half of the servants left the castle as well, intending to serve the Opelluses at their new place.

“This castle will truly decline like an island. Are you really not leaving, you stubborn old men?”

The shaggy-haired man who had initially sent a letter to Opellus was at the forefront. The old men who had served Tarnu for a long time were all fed up with the shaggy-haired man, who had caused this mess and made the Madam’s passing so bitter.

Those who remained were the butler, the head maid, the maids who had served the Madam, and the old men… except for Leni and Greta, they were all people who had served Tarnu since Edarson became the young lord at a young age.

They were also the ones who knew that Edan had opened the treasure vault of the old castle where the land documents were kept.

Naturally, Edan stayed in the castle. No one found it strange that he didn’t end up in the underground prison or solitary confinement.

He continued to do all the menial tasks around the castle as he had always done while staying in Ellenia’s room. Even without showing it in front of others, everyone knew that he sometimes stayed up all night crying.

“I found it.”

“Yes, this… here.”

It was a day when the bleak sunlight, signaling the end of the rainy season, shone down. The remaining people were discussing how to manage the castle’s household in the future when the butler called for Edan. After finishing the tasks the old men had asked him to do, Edan went to the study, where the butler handed him the lord’s signet ring.

“Why are you giving this to me?”

“Because you know I have no children to inherit it, and it was something you and the Madam agreed upon. Don’t play dumb.”

“…”

At the words of the experienced butler, Edan’s mouth shut tightly.

All the remaining servants knew about the mystery that had happened to the lord. There was a legend that sometimes the lords who had lost their spouses early would remarry women with the same name.

They had always suspected it, but seeing him handle the Madam’s funeral with a calm face and then bringing out the land documents from the treasure vault confirmed their suspicions.

“It was just that Madam told me about it.”

“Lord.”

“…”

“When I die, someone else will take over anyway. I don’t want to take on a headache in my old age when I don’t have much time left.”

Isn’t it enough that you used my name for your love.

The butler chuckled.

Although only the mountain where the castle stood and the surrounding land were left, Edan thus took on the role of the lord of Tarnu.

With the arrival of spring and the new owner, the old castle gradually regained its vitality. Under the new lord’s direction, parts of the castle that had become gloomy due to the lack of visitors started to regain their former glory, as if welcoming spring.

The new lord utilized his experience of wandering the battlefields from north to south to venture into commerce.

The name of the trading company was Ellie.

Although he couldn’t go directly to the north for fear of being recognized by the foreigners, he was able to recruit those who had shared the burden of labor with him during the years of trial. Most of them were northern serfs who did not recognize the son of the great chieftain, but they became reliable contacts out of loyalty forged over three years of wandering the courts together.

By connecting the barren lands of the north, Anzra at the center of the east, and the southern duchy that had been annexed during the five-year war, the Ellie trading company grew significantly through intermediary trade.

The small but sturdy commercial district in the village below Tarnu Castle, which used to gather people during the rainy season, became its base. This was because the residents of the estate did not leave the village below the castle just because the owner of the manor had changed.

“Lord, as you suspected, it seems the land documents for about five households were handed over to pay off gambling debts.”

“Once you find out who bought them, offer three times the purchase price to buy them back.”

“Yes, Lord.”

Three years after the trading company had expanded its influence, the lord began to reclaim the old manor of Tarnu using the funds accumulated from dominating the eastern half of the kingdom.

Thomas, who had played a crucial role in recognizing Edan’s face and getting him imprisoned in the underground cell, was instrumental in this. Driven by guilt towards the late lord and the Madam, he declared himself a loyal servant of the new lord. The old men’s hints that he was actually the lord who had taken on the family’s mystery helped.

Although Thomas struggled to adapt to his new face, he leveraged his seven years of experience in the supply unit to significantly contribute to increasing the old castle’s wealth.

Five years after the new lord took ownership, Tarnu Castle had reclaimed 70% of the manor it had lost to Opellus. Rumors circulated in the territory that the brother of Schultz had squandered the land documents in gambling debts and committed suicide.

The remaining 30% was held by Schultz’s aunt, but since the land she held was relatively unproductive, it was not an urgent matter.

Although the new lord of Tarnu was no longer a Tarnu, the residents of the village below the castle and the serfs whose land documents had changed hands several times soon adapted and were satisfied under the new lord’s rule.

And Lord Edan emerged as the most eligible bachelor in the East. At the suitable age of twenty-six, with a noble appearance that no one would believe belonged to a commoner, wisdom beyond his years, and the wealth of owning the Tarnu manor and the Ellie trading company that was extending its reach across the kingdom, all these factors contributed to his charm.

As a result, there were numerous marriage proposals from daughters of other trading companies, daughters of the great merchants of Anzra, and lords of northern strongholds, as well as many who tried to seduce him with their bodies. However, he never brought a woman to his bed.

During the rainy season, he would shut himself in the Madam’s room, which had now become his own, or sometimes in the hut behind the mountain or the treasure vault inside the study, longing for his wife.

He was originally a lonely boy.

He spent his boyhood as an orphan with no family and was alone most of the time. Except for the years he couldn’t even remember as a child, he had only had a family for exactly four years. Out of the forty-one years he lived as Edarson and the eight years as Edan, it was just those four years.

During those four years, the one who had been by his side was those innocent, water-colored eyes…

Only five years had passed. Considering the years Ellenia had endured, waiting for him in that pain, his five years were nothing.

He was healthy, sometimes sad, always lonely, but generally doing well.

Thinking of his great-grandfather, who couldn’t wait for his wife to grow from an infant to an adult for twenty years and ended up creating Opellus, Edan thought it was easy to say that he still had fifteen years left.

If the distance remained far even after she became an adult, it might take even longer.

‘It would be nice if she could at least send a letter, letting me know she’s alive…’

Knowing that letters didn’t come and go so easily, Edan immersed himself more in the affairs of the Ellie trading company. If the company, named after her nickname, reached every corner of the land, he believed he could hear news of her even a little sooner.

Of course, she could have been born in the territory of a foreign tribe and become a priestess under the starlight, or she could be fighting against the superstition that women can’t be on ships beyond the southern sea… But all he could do was wait. 

To protect himself well for the sake of his only family, her. 

All sorts of scandals clung to the richest bachelor in the east, such as being homosexual, a impotent, or enslaving serfs as s*x slaves, but he never succumbed to the temptations of influential women. 

Several more years passed. To prepare for the rainy season, people flocked to the castle for trivial matters at the base of the Ellie Trading Company’s hub, which spanned the entire continent. 

A woman came to the castle on a day when the autumn sun was shining. 

She introduced herself as the eldest daughter of some lord from a far western country of the continent and said she had come to see the lord.

“Long time no see, Lord. Quite a direct approach, too.” 

“What are you talking about?” 

“A woman has come to see you, Lord. She says she’s from somewhere in the Werbe Kingdom. It’s been quite a while since someone came directly to the castle, hasn’t it?” 

Thomas smiled with interest. He knew that Edan was troubled by the rumors surrounding the head of the Ellie Trading Company, but unlike the other staff, he never suggested that Edan should get married. 

As someone who knew the lord’s mystery, he knew all too well what his lord was waiting for. 

A woman had come. Feeling a familiar hope and an anticipated disappointment, Edan, the lord of Tarnu and the head of the Ellie Trading Company, left his study. 

“By the way, Madam Opellus seems to be ready to agree to the deal soon.” 

“Yes. I know she’s refusing because of her petty pride, even though we’re offering twenty times the annual yield. How does she think she’ll live until ninety?” 

Just then, there was good news that Tarnu’s old manor would soon be fully reclaimed. 

With the rainy season, the season of rest, approaching and good news coming, Edan decided to raise his expectations a little for the first time in a while. 

There was about a one in a hundred chance that she had finally come. 

Leaving Thomas behind, Edan crossed the castle alone and reached the reception room on the first floor of the east wing, which had been renovated. It had been extensively remodeled, considering that guests were rare since Tarnu’s lineage had ended, and it was mainly used by the Opelluses. 

As the richest man in the kingdom, who didn’t need to observe any formalities, he cheerfully flung open the door to the reception room. 

A woman was standing by the window overlooking the village below the castle. Her flaxen hair, warm and glowing like the wheat that had recently colored Tarnu’s manor, was braided into one. 

“I am Edan. I don’t know if you came to see me as the head of the trading company or as the lord of the castle.” 

One in a hundred.

Mocking the possibility that made his heart skip several beats, Edan stepped into the reception room. As his voice echoed, the woman finally turned to look at him. 

Thud. 

He thought the sound of the door closing came from his heart. 

Her eyes, looking at him through the shattering late afternoon sunlight, were those blue eyes that sometimes shone like bright water and sometimes like the deep sea. 

In truth, blue eyes were common in the world…

“Hello, Lord.” 

The woman said, holding the hem of her dress and bowing gracefully. 

Perfect etiquette. From the aesthetic sense of the head of the continent’s top trading company, the dress, made of high-quality velvet with northern handmade embroidery, was quite luxurious. 

There had been countless women who wrapped themselves in the finest clothes to propose marriage to him. 

But when combined with the dimple on one cheek hooked by a crooked smile and calm eyes… 

It inevitably reminded him of someone without saying a word. 

Edan stood there for a long time, staring at the woman. 

The silent rudeness continued for some time. 

“Um, Lord, I’m sorry, but your hand.”

She had approached him closely without him noticing and held out her hand in front of his left hand, asking him to place his hand on hers. Although it wasn’t a custom of any country that traded with the Ellie Trading Company, Edan unconsciously placed his left hand on top of hers. 

The woman, who had been staring at the adult male’s hand that lightly covered hers for a while, soon turned it over so that the palm faced her. The once soft hand, which had never held a sword, was now filled with rough calluses. 

The sunlight reflected faintly around her eyes, or so it seemed. 

When she lowered her head and kissed his palm, her lipstick left a mark. 

“I have no acquaintances in this country, but being the daughter of a good family in Werbe, I was sickly as a child and almost died. When I said I was going across the continent to find my husband, they made a fuss and cut ties with me, so I was delayed.” 

Looking at the woman’s face as she chattered, Edan didn’t know what expression to make.

Was it true, or was it a coincidence… how should I take this…

On the other hand, the chattering of his young wife, which he had tried not to forget in that terrible battlefield, came to mind, filling him with a deep longing. 

Seeing his crumbling face, the woman gave that familiar crooked smile. 

“So I thought I’d come up with a new name since I dropped my family name.” 

“A name.”

And once again, she lifted his hand and kissed the spot where her lipstick had left a mark. It was the deepest place when he clenched his hand. 

“Ellenia. How about it?” 

His throat immediately tightened. Edan felt all the emotions he had buried in his heart surge up. 

He really couldn’t say anything. There were countless words floating in his head, countless emotions welling up in his heart, and countless words he had prepared for such a time… 

“It looks like the rainy season is coming soon. Is it okay if I stay for a while?” 

“…Even for a lifetime.” 

The words he barely squeezed out soon disappeared into the woman’s mouth. 

It was their first kiss in eleven years.

-fin-