That was not the end. Her hand quickly removed his gloves.

He recoiled belatedly, but the gloves were already in her hands.

On his defensively clenched fist, a ring with a purple gem glowed ominously like a beast’s eye.

The veins on the back of his hand were already bulging and pulsing red. The uncontrollable demonic lust had already been triggered.

Leon’s face turned pale.

But Kasha’s impulsive actions did not end there. Her ice-cold hand rose to his cheek.

Her white hand slid over his skin, roughened by harsh training. She caressed his cheek as if soothing a frightened child.

Leon painfully swallowed his breath.

Disregarding him, she lowered her hand to his hot cheek and sharp jawline.

A sound like a moan escaped his lips. She quietly observed him like that.

Finally, as her hand was about to touch the strong column of his neck, Leon coldly slapped her hand away.

“What are you doing?”

“……”

“Is this mockery instead of sympathy?”

His tone was cold and full of contempt.

But none of those sharp attacks hit Kasha.

Kasha looked down at her wrist where he had slapped it and slowly rubbed it.

Though he had used very little force by his standards, Kasha’s soft and weak hand quickly swelled red.

Leon’s eyes also turned dangerously red as he looked at it.

After breathing roughly for a moment, he turned his back. As he was about to leave the balcony without lingering, Kasha finally spoke.

“It’s painful, isn’t it? Right now.”

“……”

He stopped but did not turn around.

Kasha continued speaking slowly.

“Your eyeballs… an intense heat so hot it… stimulates every corner of your body, your head feels dizzy… your sense of smell, sight, hearing, all… terribly, sensitive.”

“…!”

As if struck by lightning, Leon’s shoulders stiffened. Reading the fear and shock in that rigid back, Kasha continued speaking.

“A certain… part of your body is, even at this moment, in an uncontrollable state.”

“You….”

A voice like a growl.

Leon slowly turned around.

Kasha was surprised. And at the same time, pleased.

Where had that noble, upright and polite holy knight from just moments ago gone?

His eyes were now shooting sparks.

His jaw muscles stood out from clenching his teeth, and his body seemed to have grown larger from anger.

In fact, this was a more familiar sight to Kasha.

“What are you?”

“Kasha Lyuschino.”

“You. What do you know?”

The polite speech was gone. A beast whose weakness had been discovered. Only a beast remained, cornered and ready to tear out the opponent’s throat at any moment.

It was not just an illusion that even his pupils seemed to turn red.

In the ruined sanctuary before the regression, she had seen his eyes turn red when he was in heat.

Evidence that he had entered an excited state.

Kasha slowly turned her body. To avoid making eye contact with him.

Stimulating him further now could be disadvantageous.

She had stimulated him enough, now it was time to soothe. While tempting with an appetizing bait.

“Did you think… that no one, would notice?”

As she said that with her back turned, suddenly a searing heat touched her neck.

Leon had grabbed her neck forcefully.

A scorching heat. As if it would leave a burn mark in the shape of his hand gripping her neck.

He grabbed her neck and turned her around.

Eyes burning with a temperature that could not emanate from an ordinary human glared at her. He demanded in a hoarse voice from anger:

“You. Do you know… why I’ve become like this?”

Resentment was evident in his voice.

After all, he must have been suffering for months now, not knowing the reason for this terrible and filthy pain, nor how to cure it.

Kasha managed to speak with her throat constricted.

“Cu…curse… cough.”

Curse?

As if hearing something unexpected, he paused for a moment.

“If it’s a curse, that means there’s a caster? Someone intentionally made me like this?”

Blink. Blink.

Unable to nod due to her neck being held, Kasha blinked twice.

Understanding her answer, his anger reached its peak.

“Who? Who sent you? The one who made me like this? Huh?”

His hand grew hotter and hotter. The purple stone on the ring on his finger glowed dangerously. Kasha felt it becoming increasingly difficult to breathe.

He made no effort to hide his killing intent.

But he didn’t press down on Kasha’s neck either.

As if knowing full well that her slender neck would snap if he applied just a bit of force, he simply held it tightly with his burning hand.

Kasha closed her eyes.

Perhaps someday.

After retrieving all the magic stones released into the world, and after Simon and the unknown mastermind have paid the price. Maybe then I can confess everything to you.

But not now.

“I don’t… know who… cast the curse… cough.”

Her voice came out haltingly due to her constricted throat.

However, he still showed no sign of releasing his hand.

“Don’t play games. It’d be better to speak properly. If you want to live.”

“First, let go of… cough. Cough. This. Then I can.”

Only after hearing her gasp as if about to lose consciousness did he slowly loosen his fingers.

Even then, his face contorted. As if trying to suppress desire, or pain.

Despite it being an act of aggression from anger, he had ended up feeling Kasha’s skin, that warm temperature, the pulsing heartbeat, all while choking her neck.

It must have been too much stimulation for him, who had likely maintained strict celibacy since the curse began.

“Haa, ugh. Urk.”

He suddenly panted.

As if struggling to hold onto his reason, to not be devoured by desire.

In the end, did desire win?

Just before completely removing his fingers, he stroked her protruding neck bone as if entranced.

Kasha swallowed and trembled.

But Leon, with a half-dazed expression, simply continued moving his fingers downward.

As if checking each of her vertebrae exposed above the round neckline of her dress, he traced them hotly, slowly.

What finally stopped his hand from delving under her dress was the sound of Kasha’s cough.

Cough. Cough.

A fit of coughing erupted due to the shock of being choked and the sudden stimulation.

Cough. Cough. Cough.

As the coughing didn’t easily subside, the redness in his eyes returned somewhat to normal.

He approached as if to support Kasha, with a slightly dazed expression.

But Kasha stepped back from him.

Stop.

Seeing her gesture of refusal, he immediately stopped.

At the same time, his face contorted miserably as he realized what he had done.

Kasha thought even as she tried to stop her coughing.

‘I’m not avoiding you. I’m just worried you’ll get more excited if you touch me.’

But the coughing wouldn’t stop, and the standoff between the two grew longer.

It was then. The curtain covering the balcony rustled.

“Kasha. Is something wrong?”

Kasha was startled.

‘…I forgot about Daril.’

He must have been guarding outside the curtain all along and heard Kasha’s coughing.

Kasha raised her voice to stop him.

“It’s nothing… cough.”

“Really? I’m coming in.”

“No.”

Just as the curtain was about to open, Leon’s cold and firm refusal stopped it.

“Viscount. Do not come in.”

“What…? Listen here, Sir Leon.”

Before the confrontation between the two could drag on, Kasha quickly intervened.

“Brother. I’m, fine. I’ll be out soon… just a moment. Cough.”

“What on earth are you two doing…”

Daril raised his voice as if declaring.

“One minute. Then I’m coming in.”

Given Leon’s status as the Grand Duke’s son, even Daril seemed to find it difficult to barge in recklessly.

Or perhaps the common knowledge that balconies at balls are used as meeting places for lovers held him back, just in case.

Leon, who had been glaring at the curtain, ground his teeth and whispered in Kasha’s ear.

“Now tell me.”

The heat, as if putting her ear to hot coals, made her earlobe flush.

Kasha blinked a few times at the heat, then slowly opened her mouth.

“Three, magic stones. From the ancient era when magic existed, created by mages… through contracts with demons.”

“Demons?”

Though panting with excitement, he seemed to be trying to understand her words accurately.

“Yes. The owner of a magic stone can… use demonic power… But, a curse as powerful as that power… is placed. You, Sir Leon, are under one of the three… the curse of Onore.”

“The curse of Onore? But I don’t have any magic stone.”

“You don’t possess it… cough. The stone’s power is, with someone else. You only have the curse.”

His furrowed brow, trying to understand her explanation, gradually hardened.

The blazing eyes suddenly lost their light. But that was rather an expression of even greater anger.

His voice lowered further. To a chilling degree.

“So you’re saying. The one who has that magic stone is monopolizing its power, and manipulated the curse to only target me?”

Accurate.

“…I can, help you.”

Leon looked down at Kasha with a coldly hardened face.

“You, help me?”

“Yes. Come… find me. There must be… a medium that directed the curse to you. If we find that,”

“How can I possibly trust you?”

He sneered in a cold voice.

“That’s….”

“Let me summarize what you’re saying. You know I’m under a curse. You even know that curse is from a magic stone called Onore. You know how to cure me.”

“……”

“But just one thing. You don’t know who cast the curse.”

“……”

“Rather, the most reasonable assumption seems to be this.”

“……”

“That the caster of that curse, Kasha, is you.”

His handsome lips twisted.