‘To suppress the sun power, I need the ability that lady possesses.’

He absolutely had to find her. Felix unknowingly brushed away her handprint. Although she had clearly gripped hard, it didn’t hurt. Rather, it was refreshing as if something was being washed away.

Felix rubbed his nape as if thirsty. Suddenly his sleeve caught his eye. Only loose threads stuck out where buttons should have been. They had definitely fallen off during their intense body contact just before. Even looking around, the buttons were nowhere to be seen.

“Hmm……”

His eyes sparkled as he stroked his chin.

⁕⁕⁕

“Ouch, my wrist……”

“Miss, does it still hurt? Shall I bring a hot wet towel?”

“It’s fine, Lecia. Still, it’s much better than last time.”

“I see……”

Several days had passed since she returned from the banquet. Her wrist had been aching continuously since the day she returned from the banquet hall.

‘Somehow I roughly made up that my wrist was sprained…… well, it should be fine.’

In truth, it was because she had forcefully used judo techniques to shake off Felix. Every time her wrist hurt, what happened with him flashed through her mind.

‘I hope he forgot about me…… please.’

At that time, she had rushed in with the thought that she had to save him who was suffering, but coming home and thinking about it quietly, it had really been a dangerous situation.

‘If I couldn’t stop his berserk state, I might have become ashes right then and there.’

To think she thought she could just hug him without knowing how to use water power…… thinking about it now, it was foolish behavior.

‘You, did you play water ghost again?’

If it had been her previous life, she might have gotten another word from the sergeant.

“The sun power is more powerful than I thought……”

When she saw it as a novel, she thought it was just somewhat hot. However, Felix before actually going berserk was at a dangerous level. It was enough to immediately understand why the imperial family regarded Felix’s power like a curse.

“Still, he’s a bit…… pitiful……”

The feeling of pity for Felix began to rise, but soon she shook her head vigorously.

‘No, pitiful? What are you talking about, I almost died?!’

She didn’t know they would be pressed against each other for so long, and she never thought Felix would hold onto her. If she had been caught like that, she would have become a shrimp whose back bursts in the succession struggle. Between the first prince and second prince! At the sudden chill that penetrated, she shivered.

“Phew, really, I shouldn’t even set foot near the imperial family. Get a grip!!”

She would never again help the protagonist with shallow sympathy.

— Slap

She reflexively slapped both her cheeks with her hands. Lecia, who was nearby, was startled and looked at her with a bewildered face.

“Miss……?! Why are you hitting your own cheeks? Is something wrong?”

“Hahaha, it’s nothing. Don’t worry about it. I just thought a bug might have landed on my face.”

“Oh, yes……”

For several days now, since returning empty-handed from the ball, Lecia and the baron couple had been watching her every move. Seeing her have fits and get angry whenever she heard talk of the imperial family, they must have guessed……

‘They probably think I came back having only been humiliated instead of gaining connections with other nobles.’

Their thoughts weren’t wrong. She hadn’t even met the neutral faction nobles she had read about in the original.

Seeing her return empty-handed from the ball, the baron couple seemed to secretly lock themselves in their room and wipe away tears. Sometimes when they looked at her with puffy eyes, they would force smiles.

‘The future looks bleak, so I need to get a grip! There’s no time to be lost in such idle thoughts.’

She sighed deeply and began patching cloth over the broken window.

“Miss. But…… what is this?”

“Huh? What?”

The Enchester family’s last dress…… Lecia, who was mending the dress she had worn to the ball, held out her hand.

On her palm lay a single golden button. It was clearly an expensive-looking item. Small gems were densely embedded around the edges as if flaunting wealth.

‘Uh, wait a minute. This button looks like something you’d see on men’s tailcoats? Could this be……?!’

“Wha, what is this?! Where did it come from?”

“It was stuck between the lace of the dress. But looking at the size and shape, it’s clearly……”

Lecia’s eyes began to sparkle as she looked at her.

“Hahaha, Le, Lecia? Why does your expression look so impure?”

“Impure! It would be disappointing if you distort me imagining your beautiful romance like that, Miss.”

Romance! She almost stepped onto the burning execution ending route, what romance? It’s not even a suffering story. Unlike her horrified reaction, Lecia’s expression grew brighter and brighter.

“It definitely seems like a button from a man’s clothing…… Why would this be attached to your dress, Miss? Could there have been some steamy incident at the ball a few days ago?”

“Ahaha, where else are there broken windows……?”

At the word ‘steamy,’ certain scenes flashed through her mind like a revolving lantern. With a guilty conscience, she hurriedly left the room to escape Lecia’s interrogation.

However, Lecia’s persistence was remarkable.

“I thought bold affairs by noble ladies at balls only happened in novels! Miss, could you have also……?”

“No! How could I?! Hahaha!”

“Then, what age rating would your romance from the ball be? For reference, I turned 19 this year.”

“Ahhh! I said no!”

She vigorously shook her head denying Lecia’s words.

But at her words, Felix’s solid body with his shirt unbuttoned vividly came to mind. The hot warmth, his blazing embrace……

“Ah, damn.”

Blood instantly rushed to her face, turning it red. Seeing her, Lecia didn’t seem to believe her words.

⁕⁕⁕

A separate palace slightly away from the imperial palace’s main building. On the highest floor of that place was Felix’s office, the owner of the separate palace. The bookshelves on both walls were filled only with books, and documents were piled like mountains on the desk, giving a somewhat desolate feeling.

Felix’s aide, Kale Finkler, rushed in urgently.

“Your Highness Felix! What happened?! I heard from the guards. You were found collapsed in front of the railing at the ball!”

Due to Kale’s entrance, the mountain of sharply organized documents scattered slightly. Felix raised one corner of his eye with displeasure and replied curtly.

“I’m fine now, Kale. I got through that day’s incident safely.”

Kale examined Felix with an anxious look. He was sitting at his desk reviewing work to be handled.

“Are you really alright?”

“I said I’m fine. Can’t you tell by looking?”

Even at Felix’s indifferent answer, Kale looked uneasy.

“What happened this time?”

“I definitely received a glass from a guard. The problem is, that fellow handed me a glass with drugs in it.”

Recently, Kervic’s movements had been suspicious, and the root of the problem was that he hadn’t kept even Kale, let alone the elite soldiers protecting him, by his side in order to investigate Kervic’s tracks.

“This is why I told you I should stay. Or you should have posted at least a few guards……! Because you ordered everyone to investigate the first prince’s tracks, this happened……”

“I didn’t know that even the guards had been bought off. There’s no point regretting past events since they can’t be undone.”

“Sigh. Still……”

Felix shrugged and fell into reminiscence. Unlike Kervic, he didn’t easily show his face in social circles. However, since the Empire’s Founding Day was a very important event, he as the second prince also had to attend.

The ballroom was swarming with nobles. Felix, who found none of their longing and jealousy toward the imperial family pleasant, was holed up on a balcony without crowds, killing time.

“Yo, Your Highness. I’ve brought the wine you requested.”

“Good. I was bored, so this works out well.”

The guard handed Felix a glass with a highly tense face. Since it was a face he saw daily at the separate palace, and his tense expression seemed to be due to being assigned guard duty for the first time, it was a mistake to drink the wine without much suspicion.

— Swirl

“Ugh……”

Felix, who was savoring the wine, immediately noticed it wasn’t the taste of the wine he usually enjoyed. He felt someone fleeing and struggled to follow.

Felix, who had been following, discovered that the guard who had brought the wine was collapsed in a corner. He tried to catch the one fleeing in the distance, but the surging sun power grabbed his ankle.

“Ugh…… no.”

The massive sun power stirred within Felix, and he had to use all his strength to suppress the overwhelming power. The mastermind behind the drugging could be easily deduced.

‘Putting drugs in wine…… Kervic, that damn….’

It was definitely first prince Kervic’s doing. The first prince was competing with Felix for the throne. While cursing him for being born with all the sun power.

This wasn’t the first time Kervic had tried to harm Felix. However, there was always only circumstantial evidence without physical proof. No matter how he tried to find evidence through subordinates, he always came up empty-handed, wondering how Kervic orchestrated things.

‘Just like this time……’

Felix, who had been working, let out a groan and straightened his body.

‘But who could she be……’

Thanks to the woman he met that day, he was able to suppress the sun power and recover his strength. It was a first. The feeling of the dangerously boiling sun power quietly subsiding. Like a refreshing downpour on a scorchingly hot sunny day.