However, I couldn’t open my mouth. Felix’s bloodshot eyes were fixed on me.

Perhaps because he had run with tremendous momentum, his body was ominously on edge.

Literally, murderous intent flowed from his entire body.

“Y, Your Highness……”

“Don’t say anything.”

“Huh!”

My mumbling voice was immediately blocked. Seeing Felix approaching with an ominous aura, I grabbed the headboard of the bed as if to raise my body, but he seemed to think that was some meaningful action.

‘W, wait!!’

Felix’s large hand covered my lips. And his other hand grabbed my right wrist and lightly pressed it against the bed.

Unable to speak properly, I was bound by him.

“Haah……”

Power tangled where we touched each other. Whether from anger or from being breathless after running all the way up here, Felix’s massive torso fiercely expanded and contracted.

Bound by him, I looked up at him with pitiful eyes, confused yet feeling the intense emotions from our powers tangling together.

⁕⁕⁕

Felix, who had been listening to Kale’s report in his office, felt a foreign aura and ran through the separate palace. Felix, who had been striding up the stairs toward Marina’s room, suddenly stopped walking.

“Huff, huff…… Your Highness?”

Kale, who had been following him from a distance, shouted. Felix didn’t respond particularly, just raised one hand to signal him to stop.

And Felix closed his eyes.

‘There’s definitely a strange aura circling inside Marina’s room.’

He didn’t know what its identity was, but it was increasingly churning roughly. It was a very aggressive and threatening behavior.

Then he felt it shoot out of Marina’s room like an arrow.

‘Is it trying to completely escape from here?’

Whatever it was, he thought he shouldn’t let it get away. Felix ran up the stairs and opened the window of the corridor leading to the back of the separate palace.

“Your Highness!”

Kale belatedly followed carefully and shouted quietly, but Felix paid no attention.

Looking up at the sky, he discovered a pitch-black bird. Felix, who sensed the suspicious aura he had felt until now from that bird, reached out his hand.

‘I don’t know what it is, but I’ll catch it!’

He swung his arm toward the sky. He made the power of the sun into a small sphere and shot it at that unidentified thing.

— Kek!

Along with a death cry, the power of the sun hit the black bird’s wing. The bird’s body, feeling pain, struggled and crashed to the ground.

“We must capture it alive!”

“I know.”

At Kale’s words, Felix gritted his teeth and controlled the power of the sun. Before the bird fell, he intended to knock down a tree in the garden to catch the black bird.

— Crack

— Kieeeek!

“Ah, no…… the bird!?”

However, before Felix could do anything, the bird twisted into a grotesque shape. The black bird that had been falling with painful screams died instantly.

“Damn.”

Felix withdrew the power of the sun and spat out a low curse. The black bird fell to the ground as it was.

“Though capturing it alive is out of the question, we might still get clues.”

“Right.”

As Kale said, there was no time to feel sorry.

They quickly moved toward the back yard of the separate palace. They ran to where the black bird had fallen.

“Th, this……!! Ugh!!”

Kale, who approached the black bird closely, had no choice but to cover his nose. The wing pierced by the power of the sun actually had a clean wound.

However, for some reason the bird’s body had twisted afterward, and black smoke and terrible stench were seeping from the dead bird.

“It was definitely under some evil magic we can’t understand.”

“Yes, it seems they used a trick to prevent us from capturing it alive.”

“And…… this bird doesn’t seem to have been originally alive.”

Felix, who examined the dead bird, frowned.

“Your Highness, that statement means. If so……!!”

Felix turned away from the black bird with gritted teeth.

Anyway, the unidentified magic power surrounding the bird had long since disappeared due to Felix’s attack. Moreover, since they used a dead bird, no evidence could be collected.

However, one thing had become clear.

“Dark magic……!! It’s definitely dark magic using a dead bird!”

At those words, Felix was startled and looked back at him. Kale explained in a clear tone.

“It’s the power of cursing dead animals or sick people to use them. Your Highness, you definitely sensed this bird with the power of the sun, right?”

“……Yeah, I did.”

“Where in the separate palace did this bird come from?”

At Kale’s question, Felix hesitated for a moment. He couldn’t answer immediately and roughly ran his hand through his hair.

“Don’t tell me, Marina Enchester…… did it come from that lady’s room?”

Kale, who examined the direction the bird had flown from, pressed Felix.

“Didn’t I tell you. Dark magic!! Even after seeing this, can you still say that Miss Enchester has nothing to do with Kervic?”

At Kale’s words, Felix’s eyes became bloodshot. His mind flashed clearly.

‘Is it really true? Marina Enchester…… is it you?’

In hot anger, the power of the sun surged up.

Felix raised his head with an angry face. It was to confirm the room where Marina Enchester was staying.

“……!!”

As if sensing his gaze, he also noticed the silhouette visible at the window startling and disappearing.

‘Ha! Are you trying to make excuses now?’

Angry, Felix headed into the separate palace with angry steps, leaving Kale behind.

The black bird. Dark magic. Marina Enchester……

Among all the bewildering events, what disturbed Felix’s heart the most was his own feelings toward Marina.

‘Betrayal……? Am I feeling betrayed by Marina Enchester?’

Hadn’t he decided to suspect her from the beginning? There was no reason to give his heart to Kervic’s spy, nor did he have the luxury to do so.

Yet why was he feeling this way?

‘Did I expect something from her.’

No way.

Felix sneered and tried to calm his heart. However, the clearly established emotion wasn’t easily erased.

⁕⁕⁕

“Haah……”

Power tangled where they touched each other. Whether from anger or from being breathless after running all the way up here, Felix’s massive torso fiercely expanded and contracted.

Bound by him, I looked up at him with pitiful eyes, confused yet feeling the intense emotions from our powers tangling together.

“……Hng.”

I could tell this was a serious situation, but the power of the sun clung so strongly that my tension actually relaxed.

The power of water rejoiced at that persistent and strong power. So I unknowingly let out an aroused sigh.

“Haah……”

That sigh seemed to fluster Felix somehow.

He had covered my lips with his hand to stop me from speaking. He seemed surprised when a hot breath suddenly flowed out.

“Kugh, damn.”

— Thud!

Along with rough cursing, I felt a tremor. When I opened my eyes in surprise, Felix was already away from me.

He seemed to have been frustrated about something, as he appeared to have gotten up while lightly hitting above my bed with his fist.

‘What…… get it together!’

Thanks to that, I could quickly come to my senses too. This was the perfect time that I should claim my innocence that I’m not a spy, I couldn’t be distracted by the power of the sun!

‘I, I….. almost like last time……!’

Suddenly I remembered when I first wrote the contract. Getting caught wrongly for lying on the bed saying it takes time to suppress the power of the sun, and this and that……!! Like a bug biting my left shoulder, that kind of……!!

‘Ugh, uwaah!!’

Remembering that time, I covered my face with both hands. When I peeked at Felix who was standing far away through my fingers, I couldn’t tell if it was my imagination, but his nape seemed to be mottled with red.

“Ahem, hmm!!”

After spending such an awkward time for a while, Felix cleared his throat and glanced at me.

“How long are you going to sit on the floor like that?”

“……Uh, oh. I, I’ll get up now.”

Come to think of it, I was sitting on the floor with my back against the bed. My legs had been a bit shaky from being overwhelmed by Felix’s momentum…… but it seemed the brief contact had been charging, as I could get up lightly.

Ah, right. This is the timing when I should talk about being innocent, isn’t it?

“Felix. I have something to say.”

“I’ll go first. Marina Enchester. What was that black bird? Did you summon it?”

I was about to say I did nothing wrong, but Felix started interrogating first.

The awkwardness between us due to the unwanted charging felt like a lie, as Felix was already showing signs of anger.

‘But I’m confident. Because I did nothing wrong.’

“I didn’t summon it. A black bird suddenly came in and ransacked the room……”

“I definitely felt the suspicious aura starting from this very room. Not from outside the separate palace.”

“……What!?”

At Felix’s words, I was at a loss for words.

Thinking about it, when the black bird first tapped the room window, it looked fine. So…… it didn’t look like it was under magic.

‘Did they make the magic activate after deliberately entering my room?’

I felt this before too, but this was beyond imagination…… an ability that didn’t even appear in the original work.

‘How……? Kervic doesn’t even have the power of the sun?’

He definitely possessed some other powerful force that didn’t appear in the original work, neither the power of the sun nor water. I couldn’t hide my perplexity and froze.

“Are you in the mood to confess? Who is your master?”

He was definitely suspecting me. It was clear he was testing whether I had approached him under Kervic’s orders or not.

However, no matter how much I claimed my innocence regarding connections with Kervic, Felix would obviously only be suspicious.

‘Why? Because there’s no evidence. No evidence that I contacted Kervic, and no evidence that I didn’t contact him.’

Then what should I do. My mind, which had been calculating since earlier, quickly reached a conclusion.

Before my transmigration. Marina and Kervic met and made some kind of contract. That was clearly revealed by this crow incident.