Chapter 5

Today’s inspection did not go smoothly. Perhaps it was because a group of mages had appeared somewhere, but there were too many stray monsters. Kallieon, however, cut them down without so much as a change in expression. With each swing of his sword, ten goblins fell to the ground.  

Green blood splattered, and a nauseating stench filled the air, but Kallieon’s expression remained completely unchanged.  

His mind was entirely occupied with thoughts of Asterope. He needed to return quickly and be by her side. She was unstable right now, and no one could predict what she might do.  

Just as the goblin horde was being dealt with, a scout came running.  

“Grand Duke! It’s golems. Not just one, but two of them!”  

Kallieon turned sharply, his eyes fierce. Then, he gave orders to his soldiers.  

“Everyone, fall back.”  

“Your Grace! Let us go with you!”  

“Don’t make a fuss over two golems. Sommer, incinerate the goblin horde.”  

“But, Your Grace!”  

Sommer tried to protest again, but Kallieon swung his sword as if to say words were unnecessary.  

“If the incineration isn’t complete by the time I return, you’ll burn along with the goblins.”  

At his growling command, Sommer quietly took a step back. On the battlefield, he was not the same as usual. There was a reason he was called the God of War.  

Recently, heretics had been running rampant, and golems were appearing everywhere. But had the Grand Duke ever been injured while facing them? He would mercilessly crush those creatures of earth and stone and return victorious. Today would be no different.  

As the soldiers barely managed to gather the goblin horde and set them ablaze, the distant sound of a golem’s massive roar echoed.  

“Looks like he smashed them in one go again.”  

Sommer shook his head in amazement at his overwhelming strength and speed. Before long, Kallieon, covered in dust, appeared holding a platinum orb that had been embedded in the golem’s head. He casually tossed it to Sommer and turned to walk toward the village.  

“Make a ring for Rope with it.”  

Sommer looked at the platinum orb with a grim expression. It was still warm and coated with a sticky substance. Even for someone like him, who had been on countless battlefields, it was nauseating. Thinking that the esteemed Grand Duchess would surely faint if she knew this came from a golem’s head, Sommer placed the platinum orb into a leather pouch.  

* * *  

Not long after returning from the inspection, Kallieon sought out Asterope. He had summoned her immediately after washing up and reading his letters. Asterope, dressed simply, stood before his door. It was a space she had rarely been summoned to during their four years of marriage.  

Had he never felt resentment toward me?

Asterope found herself laughing at her own thoughts. 

With what right could I…?  

She composed her expression and stepped into the room. Kallieon was seated on the sofa, spreading out a letter. He looked at her with a hardened expression.  

“Rope, why on earth did you show me this?”  

“I originally intended to read it first and then show it to you. But Sir Chester caught me. He doubted me, and I didn’t want to invite further suspicion, so I asked him to deliver it to you, Your Grace.”  

“This is…”  

“This is what?”  

“It’s a love letter.”  

Kallieon barely managed to force the words out. He seemed to have found it so uncomfortable to read that the edges of the letter were crumpled.  

“What did you say?”  

Asterope, flustered, rushed over and grabbed the letter. It contained Villish’s desperate expressions of love, which should have been directed at her.  

[…How wonderful it would be to gift you a dress that highlights your graceful white neck and to spend a midday together listening to birds chirp among the blooming violets. Asterope, you cannot imagine how my heart shatters, knowing I’ve sent you to the cold and sunless Serpiewood…]

Asterope gritted her teeth at the loathsome handwriting. By now, he was already spending sweet moments with his lover. Hayes and Asterope had become lovers shortly after she left for Serpiewood. Over a year later, the two of them were likely laughing at her amidst fluttering violets or whatever else surrounded them.  

Unable to contain her anger, Asterope tore the letter into shreds.  

“Villish Numa, you despicable worm! You filthy vermin!”

A voice full of rage erupted from deep within Asterope’s chest. As if tearing the letter wasn’t enough, she stomped furiously on the pieces scattered on the floor.  

“Die! Die! Just die!”  

Ro-Rope. Rope!”

“You bastard! Die! You vile hypocrite!”  

Kallieon lifted her up in his arms. She kicked her feet in the air, tears streaming down her face. Kallieon knew that the anger she directed at the letter was more genuine than anything he had ever seen.  

After letting her struggle for a while, he sat her down on the sofa and held her hands, pressing his lips to them.  

“Rope, please calm down.”  

Only then did Asterope tear her gaze away from the letter and look at Kallieon in front of her. His cool, gray-blue eyes. But those eyes were looking straight at her with unwavering focus. Asterope, as if entranced, spoke.  

“Villish Numa will kill me.”  

Kallieon’s brow furrowed instantly.  

“How could someone who confesses such desperate love for you ever kill you…?”  

Kallieon spoke in a voice that seemed to suppress his anger. Asterope shook her head violently. She knew better than anyone. Villish’s sweet words were nothing but a means to use her.  

“He’s trying to use me. My affections!”  

Asterope pounded her chest in frustration. Kallieon didn’t even notice that she was hurting herself. He gently stroked her reddened skin and said,  

“I understand your desire to resent Crown Prince Villish.”  

“……”  

“And I know that, deep down, you still love him. But neither the Crown Prince nor His Majesty are the ones you should hate.”  

“……”  

“I was the one who forcibly brought you here to Serpiewood. But I can’t send you back there. And no matter what you do, I can’t bring myself to hate you.”

His hand softly rose to caress Asterope’s cheek. His eyes were filled with sorrow. He misunderstood. He thought Asterope was still grieving over her unfulfilled love with Crown Prince Villish. He seemed to believe that she regretted coming to Serpiewood, that she was trying to make him hate her so he would cast her out.  

Asterope tightly grasped Kallieon’s scarred, calloused hand.  

“Don’t misunderstand. I’m not going anywhere. Even if I die, I’ll die here in Serpiewood as Asterope Lunette Onyx, the Grand Duchess.”  

“……”  

“I don’t love Villish Numa.”  

“Do you expect me to believe that? Rope, I’m not that foolish. Above all, you don’t have to hide such things from me anymore. This marriage began with me knowing everything from the start.”  

Kallieon spoke as if he was ready to accept everything about her. Asterope shook her head. No, she couldn’t find the words to explain the fiery anger burning within her. Asterope pressed her lips against the palm of his hand. Her long, lush eyelashes trembled slightly.  

“Don’t forgive me so easily.”  

“Rope…”  

“Don’t take my betrayal for granted. Be angry, scold me, and show me your fury.”  

“……”  

“You’re my husband. You have that right.”  

Asterope didn’t want to repeat the mistakes of the past, even by accident. If she ever veered toward such a path again, she hoped Kallieon would stop her. She wanted him to firmly rebuke her, reminding her that a Grand Duchess should not act so. She didn’t want to die because he loved her; she wanted them to survive together.  

Tears fell from Asterope’s eyes. They were tears of regret that she hadn’t been able to shed in the face of Kallieon’s death. Kallieon didn’t fully understand the meaning of those tears. But he could tell that she was in pain. Whatever it was, he could feel the intense agony piercing through her heart.  

Asterope had changed. The woman she used to be had completely disappeared, as if she had been reborn.  

At the center of it all, there was an indescribable pain. 

Who had caused her such anguish? Was it Villish Numa? Or was it someone else entirely? 

Kallieon was desperate to know the source of her suffering. But as she pressed her lips to his rough palm and sobbed, nothing else seemed to matter.

Kallieon gently wiped away her tears, pressing his lips to the trails they left behind.

His tender kisses followed the path of her tears. For the first time, Asterope didn’t flinch and accepted his kisses. Even on their wedding night, she hadn’t looked him in the eye.

Back then, Kallieon had known that she couldn’t accept him. Their wedding night had been a disaster. Kallieon, cherishing the fragile Asterope as if she might break at any moment, had been too preoccupied with suppressing his own desires.  

The year that others called their honeymoon was, for Kallieon, a time of torment. It was a time when he had to forcibly suppress his growing feelings for the beautiful woman before him, flattening and compressing them into nothingness. All of it had felt like futile greed.  

He had been convinced that his love was a one-way road he could never reach the end of. And he had thought that was fine.  

But now, for the first time, Asterope was rejecting that notion. She was asking him to feel jealousy, to express his unrefined emotions and love for her. For the first time.