Riana could not give any answer to Eclas’s question.

She just wanted to escape from all the gazes.

“I’m sorry. I’ll be…”

Riana bowed her head deeply.

And went straight to her room and locked the door.

Eclas tried to follow Riana, but again shifted his gaze to the Duke’s bedroom.

There was no doubt that the serious problem he had been worried about had occurred.

Eclas clenched his fist once and headed towards the Duke’s bedroom.

“Duke Lester!”

Bang bang bang, he roughly knocked on the closed door.

There was no answer from inside.

Eclas broke the silence and barged in, flinging the door open.

As soon as the door opened, a thick musk scent and hot air rushed in.

‘This scent, could it be…’

Just as Eclas flinched at the terrible fragrance, a large hand grabbed him by the nape of his neck.

“Ugh!”

Bang, as Eclas’s back hit the wall, a frame hanging on the wall fell to the floor.

Eclas, his neck being strangled, met fierce eyes glaring at him.

“You’ve deceived me well.”

“Du-Duke Lester…!”

“Giving me fake sedatives, were you planning to put me in a predicament?”

Sched growled like a beast and pressed his neck again hard.

Thick veins stood out on Eclas’s neck, and unable to breathe, Eclas opened and closed his mouth, shaking his head.

“Wh-What…!”

As he gasped for breath like he was about to die, Sched threw him down onto the messy floor.

Crash! Roughly tumbling down, he curled up, barely catching his breath.

A red scratch appeared on his white cheek from the broken porcelain pieces scattered on the floor. A dull pain spread through his bruised back.

Sched approached Eclas again, crushing the broken porcelain pieces on the floor.

The tip of his black shoe lifted Eclas’s head, which had been stuck to the floor.

“Why did you give me fake medicine?”

Sched asked him threateningly.

The shrewd merchant realized that the ‘medicine’ he was referring to meant the sedative.

“Fake medicine? I certainly gave you the highest grade sedative among…”

“Damn it, you call this trash the highest grade sedative?”

Along with an irritated voice, a medicine bottle rolled in front of Eclas.

Inside the bottle, only one or two pills were left, rolling around.

“…Don’t tell me you took all of this?”

Eclas picked up the bottle and asked.

Sched didn’t bother to answer, but Eclas realized his silence was an affirmation.

“And yet you’re still like this…”

Eclas looked alternately at the medicine bottle and Sched, forgetting the situation he was in.

There must have been thirty pills in there originally.

For a normal Lupus, one or two pills were enough, and three or four would make them too drowsy to function normally.

Five pills would dangerously weaken them to the point of losing control of their body.

Ten pills could even render a beast helpless enough to be captured, but this man…

“Are you in your right mind to have taken all of this?”

Eclas staggered to his feet.

To be standing on two feet after consuming that much sedative…

“Damn it, no matter how much I take, it has no effect!”

Bang! Sched raised his voice and raged.

“Shh…! Lower your voice! Are you trying to spread rumors that you’re in heat?”

Eclas furrowed his brow and tried to calm down the agitated Sched.

If it became known that he was in heat, moreover that he was in such strong heat that even sedatives didn’t work, many things would go wrong.

Eclas came to his senses and checked Sched’s condition.

Though he had taken all the sedatives, it seemed there was still some unabated excitement left in his body.

The veins bulging on his neck were visibly throbbing even to Eclas’s eyes.

There were scratch marks all over his body. Judging by the size of the wounds, they didn’t seem to be inflicted by Riana. They looked like self-harm marks from trying to control his urges alone.

“There’s definitely no problem with the sedative.”

Eclas confidently stated that he could even feed the remaining sedative to other Lupus to confirm.

If rumors about Sched’s heat spread, the damage to the Bitel family would also be enormous. There were quite a few business ventures in preparation with the Lester family.

So why would he have prepared fake sedatives?

At Eclas’s innocence, Sched gritted his teeth and clenched his fists.

“Then why on earth…!”

He recalled the lust that had dominated him.

He felt horrible and disgusting for being unable to control himself no matter what.

The image of Riana crying wouldn’t leave his mind.

“If it’s about Lupus, don’t you know better than me? You must have talked a lot about heat issues too…”

Eclas was rather frustrated.

But Sched also knew nothing about this situation.

Until now, the Lupus he had met would take sedatives and rest or carry on as usual when signs of heat appeared.

He thought it was a simple problem that could be solved just by taking medicine.

Eclas saw the confused Sched and set his lips firmly.

“So… what did you do to Lady Riana?”

At the abruptly mentioned name of Riana, Sched looked at him startled, as if pricked by a thorn.

“Did you see… Riana?”

“Did you forcibly assault her…?”

Eclas asked instead of answering.

For the first time, he felt he could understand those who despised Lupus.

Why they were pointed at as beasts, why they couldn’t escape the slave class for so long.

And that applied to Sched himself as well.

When Sched didn’t answer and turned his head away, Eclas’s jaw tightened.

“Answer me.”

“Don’t worry… What you’re concerned about didn’t happen.”

Sched looked at Eclas with a pessimistic chuckle.

Self-loathing was reflected in his faintly twisted lips.

“Don’t worry? After doing that to Lady Riana…?”

Sched reacted sensitively again to Riana’s name.

Sched couldn’t make any excuses in front of him.

He had no words to say with the beastly mouth that had tasted her lips.

Even Sched’s silence felt disgusting to Eclas.

“Send Lady Riana away.”

Sched raised his eyelids with a seemingly fierce light at Eclas’s cold advice.

“Send her away?”

“Do you intend to keep her even after things have come to this?”

Eclas didn’t even blink in the face of Sched’s murderous intent.

He wasn’t afraid of the Duke’s threats. What he feared was not such irrational and stupid threats, but the failure and ruin that resulted from them.

“She will only harm you.”

Sched’s eyes trembled.

Riana harms me?

That can’t be. Harm me? She is… to me…

Sched narrowed his eyes and furrowed his brows like someone who couldn’t remember something.

Just what is she to me?

“Send her to Munher or drive her out to somewhere unseen, dispose of her somehow.”

“That’s not possible.”

Sched shook his head as if confused.

“Then will you do this again when your next heat comes? You want to keep seeing Lady Riana after leaving her in that state? Are you in your right mind?”

Eclas’s voice became more and more agitated as he questioned one by one.

Sched clenched his fist tightly.

There was nothing wrong with what Eclas was saying.

But for some reason, he couldn’t agree.

“Let me advise you once more. Send Lady Riana away from here immediately. Before the tower you’ve built up so far crumbles even more.”

Eclas stood firm, not budging from his position.

Sched looked at the stubborn man.

For advice given out of genuine concern, somehow a different intention seemed to be felt in Eclas’s voice.

“…How strange.”

In all their time together, Eclas had never asserted himself or intervened so directly.

Even when he wanted something, rather than fighting head-on to obtain it, he was the type to create situations and acquire it cleverly.

But… Eclas now is different from usual.

Rather than smartly using his head, he seems emotionally agitated.

“Why are you so obsessed with sending Riana away?”

When Sched asked sharply, the red pupils wavered unpleasantly.

Sched’s eyes narrowed as he witnessed the ripples spreading in those red eyes.

“…Is it because of that bet?”

The bet the maids had made.

That day, Eclas had said Riana’s escape would be faster, and naturally Sched ended up betting on the side that he would get her into bed faster.

Sched believed that bet would never be resolved, that it would be an eternal parallel line.

Riana couldn’t leave this place, and he had no intention of sleeping with her.

That’s how it was supposed to be, but…

“Do you think I’m doing this just because of a mere bet?”

Eclas’s brow furrowed deeply.

“Is that not it? For you, it’s a matter of a million della at stake.”

As far as Sched knew, Eclas Bitel was a man who weighed and calculated everything.

Even when he seemed to act without thinking, all his smiles, gestures, decisions, and considerations were calculated actions.

So Sched thought that even his uncharacteristically distorted expression must be the same.

But the cunning merchant blamed him angrily, turning the tables.

“Duke Lester, after leaving Lady Riana in that state, is the bet important to you?”

“The bet would be important to you.”

Sched was displeased with Eclas’s rebellious gaze, different from usual.

A gaze that seemed to hide some dangerous scheme beyond what he thought.

An unknown uneasiness poked at his sharp intuition.

Then Eclas was silent for a moment before speaking again.

“…Yes. It’s because of the bet.”

Eclas said as he wiped the blood flowing from the wound on his cheek with the back of his hand.

Sched saw the red pupils flashing calculatingly.

As if he had forgotten even to calculate until now, as if he had just realized his true nature, Eclas’s gaze changed.