Unlike Romei, who stood with a stiff face from humiliation she had never felt in her life, Barmas greeted her with a rather cheerful expression.

“You’ve arranged payment faster than I expected. Was the journey here quite enjoyable?”

“…I know you deliberately kept me waiting outside, pretending to think about it.”

Romei said this instead of answering Barmas’s welcoming greeting. Then she recalled how endlessly long the path from the bedroom to here had felt, and the humiliation she had to endure while walking that path.

Without clothes, underwear, socks, shoes—without anything at all—the shame of taking her first barefoot step outside the bedroom made her feel like her hair was standing on end.

The servants treated her n*ked appearance with complete indifference. They even guided her to the office with perfectly composed faces.

But that was what made it more degrading. She felt like someone whose dignity no one cared about, even when unclothed.

They said nothing and thought nothing of it because they believed nakedness suited Romei.

When she finally reached the office and sensed his base intention to keep her waiting outside instead of letting her in, she felt not just shame but a touch of anger.

Nevertheless, she found her situation utterly lamentable—ultimately having no choice but to dance in Barmas’s palm.

Unlike herself, who had entered with such complex emotions, Barmas looked amused. She found him so irritating that she felt compelled to say something.

Barmas quietly observed Romei as she calmly protested while staring at him with defiant blue eyes mixed with resentment. Soon he snorted mockingly and shook his head, seemingly offering insincere sympathy.

“My, my. So, are your feelings hurt?”

“…”

“If I’d known you’d be this insolent, I would have made you go back and forth between the office and bedroom several more times. Then you would have been too docile to speak such petty words to me.”

Despite Barmas’s threatening words, Romei tried to maintain her composure.

She needed to get used to the overwhelming pressure emanating from him and the words he spoke to intimidate her.

Otherwise, she would spend her remaining life helplessly controlled by him until her death. No matter how overwhelmingly disadvantageous her situation was, a submissive attitude would be of no help now.

Romei blinked her eyes slowly a couple of times, like releasing a deep breath, to calm her rapidly beating heart before answering.

“Even if you had tormented me that way, I would have said the same thing. I know you’re doing this deliberately.”

“…”

“I have no intention of behaving like an obedient dog just because you threaten me. Whatever you do, you’ll end up eating my soul anyway.”

“So you mean you’ll live however you please since you’ll die by my hands no matter what. Is that it?”

“…”

That wasn’t what she meant at all, but Romei didn’t answer. Sometimes silence was a better response than words.

Barmas continued, seemingly bewildered yet curious.

“Usually humans have an incredibly strong will to live. I’ve lost count of how many people have clung to my pant legs, saying they’d do anything if I spared them.”

“…”

“But you’re strangely insolent to me. I hold your lifeline, yet you have no intention of trying to impress me?”

“Sometimes a predetermined death can make life more liberating.”

When Romei responded calmly yet naturally, Barmas grimaced with disgust and let out a hollow laugh.

“Dealing with believers is always frustratingly impossible.”

“Shall we move on to why I came here?”

At Romei’s question, Barmas glanced at her sideways.

Her unclothed body revealed her true emotions without filter.

Throughout their conversation, her toes fidgeted, and goosebumps covered her arms upon closer inspection. Her ribcage rose and fell visibly as she tried to regulate her breathing.

The woman clearly felt humiliated about being n*ked and afraid of him. Yet her face remained excessively composed and calm. Her eyes, though clearly reflecting emotion, conveyed a quiet but firm resolve.

Combined with her curly blonde hair, which she had let down to cover her body, she appeared strangely sacred and elegant despite her nakedness.

This puzzled Barmas and simultaneously stimulated his competitive spirit—that she could maintain such nobility even after experiencing the most vulgar pleasures.

“…?”

When Barmas simply stared at her without answering, Romei looked at him with an expression that seemed to ask why he had stopped mid-conversation.

After moving her lips several times as if choosing her words, Romei finally asked:

“Have you decided not to speak because I’m frustratingly impossible to deal with?”

“Aren’t you afraid of me?”

Barmas abruptly asked.

After organizing her thoughts briefly, Romei answered, “I am afraid.”

“…”

“I’m afraid, but I’m just doing what I can.”

After staring into Romei’s eyes for a long time as she answered, Barmas changed the subject.

“So, you came all this way having thought about what payment you could offer for clothes?”

“…”

“What will you offer as payment?”

“Nothing.”

“…Have you come to beg for clothes without payment?”

Barmas asked incredulously at Romei’s confident answer. Romei quietly shook her head.

“That’s not it.”

“…”

“Just to be clear, I remember perfectly well that you said I need to pay a price if I want clothes.”

“Was your statement just now about offering nothing as payment nonsense?”

Barmas precisely pointed out the contradiction in Romei’s conversation. His observation was valid, but Romei’s purpose in coming to the office wasn’t to pay a price.

“Currently, I have nothing to offer you as payment. But as you said, my life is in your hands, and there’s no more precious payment than that.”

“And so?”

“I wondered if your underlying message was that you wouldn’t give me clothes and would do whatever you wanted with me while I’m alive.”

“You came to my office knowing that?”

“I still thought I would need clothes regardless.”

Romei calmly replied to Barmas’s sarcastic response, then continued:

“So I thought I’d make a proposal.”

“A proposal?”

“Let’s make a bet.”

Barmas raised one eyebrow at the word “bet” that suddenly emerged from her lips. He couldn’t understand why she abruptly suggested a bet in the middle of asking for clothes.

As if reading Barmas’s thoughts, Romei explained:

“If I win the bet, give me clothes. If I lose, I’ll do one thing you want from me.”

Only then did Barmas realize why she had proposed the bet.

The woman herself had nothing to offer as payment. And the most useful thing she could offer was already in Barmas’s hands.

Since the normal transaction method of paying a price for clothes wouldn’t work, she cleverly changed the format to a “bet” to create a situation where she could offer something she could actually pay.

‘Not bad for something thought up in such a short time.’

Thinking this, Barmas asked:

“If I win the bet and ask for your soul, will you give it?”

“I will.”

“You’re the first human I’ve met who treats their life like some insignificant fly.”

“That’s because I’m certain you won’t demand my soul right now.”

“How can you be so certain?”

“It hasn’t even been half a day since I ate.”

Romei answered Barmas’s question matter-of-factly, then added:

“If you really intended to kill me early, you wouldn’t have bothered feeding me. You could have simply killed me and consumed my soul without going through such trouble.”

“…”

“If you set obedience to you as a condition, I can do that. If you’re going to raise someone anyway, wouldn’t you prefer an obedient human rather than one who doesn’t yield to threats?”

When Barmas didn’t answer, Romei suggested that such terms could be wagered in the bet.

It was certainly an appealing option and proposal, but there was a major problem with it.

“…Why should I agree to your bet?”

Barmas had no need to make a bet.

The woman needed clothes and was desperate enough to try getting them through a bet, but Barmas was different. He had no reason to go through the trouble of making a bet to get something from her.

“Don’t I have many ways to make you compliant without a bet? Why should I bother with the effort of betting with you?”

“That’s…”

Romei, who had been eloquently making her case since entering the office, was at a loss for words. Caught completely off guard, she couldn’t think of any plausible excuse. Her mind felt like a blank white sheet.

‘And I had wracked my brain to come up with this…’

As she stood there speechless with darkness before her eyes, Barmas suddenly proposed:

“But I’ll agree to the bet if you accept one condition.”

“What condition?”

“We’ll bet according to the method I propose. That’s the condition.”

Barmas smiled as he said this. It was a smile of unparalleled wickedness.