Lyssenford was a vast territory mostly consisting of rugged mountain ranges, and being situated in the northern part of the empire, it was extremely cold. Snow would start falling by late October.

That day was no exception. Even sturdy horses were useless for reaching the northern tower far from Lyssenford Castle. The Duke had to climb the tower himself, where the wind was blowing so strongly that snow couldn’t accumulate and was instead being blown about. It was a harsh blizzard.

She must be alive. Even though he had imprisoned her himself, he wanted to believe that woman was still alive. He had never ordered her to be killed, so she should be alive somehow.

That woman. The wife forcibly thrust upon him by the Emperor. The Princess of Ostein and Duchess of Lyssenford, or the Emperor’s spy.

‘She’s not a spy. She wasn’t one.’

The belief, or rather brainwashing, that had clouded his mind for over 20 years was shattered. It was a powerful curse that could only be shaken off when facing catastrophe. His whole body trembled from the belated shock.

He had clearly confirmed multiple times, with all sorts of evidence, that his wife was a spy, and he had personally handed down her sentence. But far too late, only now when the Emperor’s army was at their doorstep, did he finally uncover the truth.

That the real traitors had sold off all the information and pinned all the crimes on that woman. The truth had to be that horrific for the brainwashing to be undone and the curse-like taboo to be broken.

And so he left the burning Lyssenford Castle behind and rushed to at least save that woman. He had nothing left now. He pushed hard against the door that had been tightly locked from the outside. It should have been locked, but now this door opened easily, as if mocking him.

The moment the door swung open, the Duke once again felt that something was terribly wrong.

“…Bi, …Cael, Caela!”

The name he had never properly called throughout their married life belatedly spilled out like pale ash. It was too difficult to call out, but once he started, it was a shamefully familiar name. He must have called it many times in his mind.

“Caela!”

The Duke leapt inside through the open door. Blood dripped steadily following his steps. The worn-out door might as well not have been there. Even a fragile woman, even a chronically ill woman, could have gotten out in this state. She should have already left.

A stench assaulted him.

“Caela…”

He tried to tell the figure lying on what could barely be called a bed to get up. No, if she couldn’t get up, he could carry her.

Caela, the wife he had ignored and disregarded throughout their marriage thinking she was a spy sending all sorts of information to the Emperor, was very small after all.

“Cael…!”

But the woman who didn’t even stir despite the large man entering in clanking armor – that small woman – was staring with wide open eyes. In this cold weather, her exposed arms were frozen blue.

Her once lush platinum blonde hair had fallen out in patches from lack of proper nutrition, and her gaunt face was completely ruined. Caela, only twenty-five years old, lay on her side with nothing left but bones.

It was a corpse he had created. A corpse that had died curled up, staring at the door – the only escape route – after being unable to eat for a long time.

The precious princess of Ostein with noble blood flowing through her veins was dead. Feon, who had seen his fair share of corpses, immediately recognized the cause of death.

She had starved to death. With her weak body, she had succumbed to cold and hunger. Though he hadn’t ordered her food to be cut off, Lyssenford had already completely collapsed, to the point of ignoring even the Duke’s orders.

No, they had wanted to kill this woman even if it meant disobeying orders.

“Oh my. She’s dead.”

Feon turned his bloodshot eyes to look behind him. Beatrice Lavalle, with her silver hair in disarray and eyes just as bloodshot as his, was panting heavily.

She had been his first and only love, a childhood friend with whom he had shared dreams and hopes. And she had been the biggest reason why Caela was ignored. That’s how it had been.

“She starved to death. Poor thing. She was innocent.”

But now Beatrice Lavalle was the vanguard sent to arrest a traitor on the Emperor’s orders. Or she was a pawn the Emperor had thoroughly used and discarded to keep Feon in check and under pressure.

“The noble and righteous Duke starved an innocent Duchess to death? Is this your justice, Feon? Is this righteous? You said innocent people shouldn’t die. What was our Caela’s crime?”

Sometimes words can hurt more than swords or magic. Faced with this barrage of attacks, Feon couldn’t even respond. He blankly looked down at his wife who couldn’t even close her eyes properly before dying. So young and fragile, yet she died without a single part of her body unharmed.

“You’re a hypocrite. An idiot lacking intelligence. If you were so noble and great, you shouldn’t have kept telling me you loved me after marrying her.”

The woman who had whispered words of love with him now excluded herself as she berated him, then exclaimed, “Oh!”

“Ah, I made it that way, didn’t I?”

Why would a noblewoman seemingly unrelated to the war be in the vanguard? In her hand was a dagger with a blade turned deep blue from being saturated with blood. Bright red smoke swirled around that dagger.

It was bizarre. Bizarre meaning that woman was a sorcerer wielding strange powers. From her mouth dripped the pitch-black poison that had filled Feon’s brain.

“What a shame. You were my first test subject and the spell I put the most effort into. The sturdiest, most foolish and simple taboo I built to never be broken.”

Now that it was broken, he had to agree it was foolish. He should have protected Beatrice.

Why? Because he loved her. Why? She was already the flower of high society, they couldn’t meet often, and every time they did meet she would only say these three things: ‘Feon, you must not betray me. You must protect me. I love you.’ Why?

In the end, those three phrases were a kind of spell that made the taboo in his brain even stronger.

“Feon, you mustn’t betray me. I protected you by sweet-talking Vincent in Kline all this time!”

With those words, black poisonous smoke flowed from her red lips towards Feon. This is how it had always been.

Feon swept away the smoke by creating wind with his sword. The powerless spell and lies disappeared pathetically. Powerless meaning it was completely broken, which in turn meant Beatrice was now powerless against Feon.

Why would the Emperor specifically send her as the vanguard? It meant she had outlived her usefulness and was meant to die by Feon’s hand. Beatrice’s face twisted horribly.

“What was the problem? I even carefully created evidence to make you believe she was a spy and sent it to you myself. So you kept her here anyway. That should have been enough. She should have just bowed her head and stayed quiet, why did she arrogantly prepare for war?”

Beatrice ranted at him with crazed eyes, but Feon was no longer paying attention to her. As the smoke and noise that had filled his mind cleared away, he could now clearly see the desolate and frigid surroundings.

He unwrapped the tattered cloak he was wearing. His seven-year-old wife who died without even closing her eyes was too small. She looked too powerless to be wary of as an enemy.

“Why did you think of rebelling when you’re so stupid! When that woman disappeared on her own, you should have lived like before, like when she wasn’t around! I even pretended to be your closest, only friend since childhood and played family with you, how dare you ignore me?”

Feon reached out and closed Caela’s eyes.

“You should have only looked at me! I told you not to look away! When I even put a taboo on you like that, you should have just shut up and obeyed. Why did you waver because of that stupid woman and rebel against the taboo to end up like this!”

The husband with many sins couldn’t even give his wife a proper funeral. Feon covered Caela with his cloak that was stained with not only others’ blood but also much of his own.

Her dirty and tattered clothes caught his eye. He wanted to at least cremate her body so it wouldn’t fall into the hands of the advancing imperial army, but there wasn’t enough time.

“Like father, like son, even your tastes are cheap. Well, blood will tell. Aren’t you satisfied with just one? You dare to push me aside and turn your eyes to that woman while under a taboo as a test subject? Know your place. You should have been grateful that I deigned to take you, how dare you refuse!”

The man who should never have refused ended up refusing, leading to catastrophe. Only malice remained in Beatrice who was now shouting uncontrollably. It was because she too knew this was the end for her here.

Feon was pleased about one thing – that Beatrice also didn’t get what she wanted.

“Should I have put a stronger taboo since you’re not human? I should have put on more chains since it would end up like this anyway!”

Feon gripped his sword tighter as he watched the imperial forces advancing behind Beatrice who was spouting incomprehensible words. He had nowhere left to retreat anyway, having been branded a traitor.

“Your family ends here anyway. Well, there’s not much of a family to speak of, but the daughter-in-law is already dead, the son will die too, and all this time your father knew nothing…”

Just then, a loud roar of something massive came from afar. Beatrice’s face, which had been rattling off words Feon didn’t understand, turned pale at the sound filled with rage.

“Knew nothing…”

It was the sound of a wicked dragon rampaging.

The Duke of Lyssenford, who had faced wicked dragons multiple times before, slashed at the enemy right in front of him instead of rushing to stop the dragon. He had nothing left but to fight and die. The sound of the rampaging wicked dragon in the distance was growing louder. Arrows and spears rained down like a storm.

*

“Are you going to see His Majesty?”

It was just something that happened. Something that existed in his memory but that no one in this world knew about, something that hadn’t happened. So this Ostein princess who had jumped in front of him, ignoring all etiquette, was a person unrelated to him.

She was not the Duchess of Lyssenford, nor the Emperor’s spy that his precious Beatrice planted in Kline had testified about with all the information she could gather, nor the wife whose heart was bruised from neglect and contempt.

Much less was she the woman who died curled up and unable to even close her eyes from starvation. The sin of still remembering was his alone to bear, unrelated to the precious young lady before his eyes.

Yet his shameless eyes were scrutinizing her closely. Had flesh returned to her once sunken cheeks, was she healthy as expected, was she alright, but then why was she so pale – he was shamelessly curious about all of it.

“I, I also have urgent business to tell Father. I don’t know what this is, but I’ll deliver it for you instead.”

Her youthful voice trembled. Her small, soft hands clung to the heavy box the Duke was holding. Caela had too little time and no excuses to spare.

The man before her was too frightening and scary. To someone as small and petite as her, a man as massive as a door was threatening by his very existence, but she desperately thought to herself.

‘An excuse. What excuse can I use?’

It would have been better if she had time to prepare carefully, but right now she had no other option but to physically block him without any plan.

Inside the box this man is holding is the gun that killed Father. If this falls into the Emperor’s hands, the Duke of Ostein will die, and Caela will be left powerless, stripped of her territory and titles, and sold off to this man.

Then she’ll suffer all sorts of mistreatment, eventually be falsely accused and imprisoned, and die after drinking poison given by a romantic rival.

“I happened to see Lady Lavalle over by Aquitel Palace on my way here.”

In their four years of marriage, that woman was such a powerful presence that she was all Caela could think of, so she used her as an excuse. If it was that woman, it would be reason enough for the Duke of Lyssenford to turn back, so she made it up. But after saying it out loud, a wave of misery washed over her.

She had always tried her best to look good, to do well. As a duchess, as a wife, she believed that if she did her utmost, she would be rewarded for her efforts. Or she wanted to believe that.

Her feelings of liking him had disappeared, and she just struggled desperately to somehow create a place for herself. So even now, that habit remained, and she felt wretched acting so meekly in front of Feon without any pride.

Well, even if it was somewhat pathetic, it was the right choice. Other than Beatrice Lavalle and his mother the Empress, this man didn’t respond to anything. At least Caela knew that much.

“She seemed to be alone, but there were some gentlemen nearby.”

Caela made up more lies as she grasped the box the Duke was holding with trembling hands. She absolutely would not let him enter alone carrying this. She couldn’t bear to see that again.

So Caela pushed this man, who had never once been her husband, towards the Emperor’s mistress. Whatever happened between them was none of her business. No, this time she just hoped they would end up together and ruin only themselves!

“If you go now, I think you’ll be able to meet her. I’ll deliver this for you instead.”

Babbling like a madwoman, Caela pulled at the box containing the gun and bullets. But the box didn’t come to her easily. Why? She looked up at the young Duke.

“…I saw her just now. Really, it was only a few minutes ago.”

So that woman you’re crazy about is over there. Hurry and go. Saying words she would never have said before dying became somewhat familiar after repeating them several times. I guess I should have said this while I was alive, instead of in a dream.

Why did I put in so much effort for a man who wouldn’t even treat me like a person anyway?

From the first day of their marriage, which he had vehemently refused until the Empress received all sorts of punishments and he was forced into it, he had warned her not to expect anything and not to do anything unnecessary.

That man stared at her without even blinking for a while, as if he would devour her, then slowly replied.

“I’m already on my way back from seeing His Majesty.”

Caela immediately let go of the box and grabbed her dress skirts, then dashed into the garden. Anger welled up inside her.

The husband she had devoted herself to with sincerity and her utmost effort was still toying with her, and her father’s life hung by a thread. No, perhaps Father was already finished.

“You can’t go in without His Majesty’s permission, Caela.”

But the force holding her back from behind was strong. Did he think she didn’t know that, which is why she was running in? She turned back blankly. She thought there was no need for this dream to drag on any longer. Either way, whether she died like this or that, it would just be a dog’s death.

“It’s alright. I know.”

When Caela said those words with all due respect, even using honorifics, she was probably smiling. No, she did smile. She smiled knowing that the world couldn’t possibly be kind to her, and that death was the only end.

At that bright smile, the arm holding her lost strength for a moment, and she flew off again to go die.

“Caela!”

It was an insolent act. Both forcefully shaking off the Duke’s hand and daring to go without the Emperor’s summons were completely insolent, things that absolutely should not be done.

But Caela ran into the garden of the monster that gaped open its maw, breaking all taboos at once.

Her mind raced quickly. The protective magical item she had earnestly asked her father to take would only protect the wearer once anyway. Even if the gun took time, it could be reloaded, and there would be plenty of bullets.

At best, she could use the time it took to reload to drag her father out and load him into the carriage they came in, but they’d probably both die as the Emperor’s playthings before then. Neither option was bad. A quick death was better.

“Caela!”

Though she heard the voice calling out softly like a cry from behind, it couldn’t stop Caela who knew all too well where her father had been murdered.

She ran wildly through the dense shrubbery. With her hair disheveled, wearing casual clothes she had on at home rather than attire for visiting the imperial palace, with just a shawl hastily thrown over, Caela reached the place where her father had died.

“What’s going on?”

What Caela saw was the Emperor just lowering his gun, and across from him, her father pale as a sheet. He’s alive.

‘The magical item worked properly!’

The Emperor, her father’s half-brother, rolled his piercing eyes and sharply looked at Caela who had appeared unexpectedly.

Despite having just pulled the trigger aimed at Caela’s father, he looked at the uninvited guests as if they were an annoyance, without any guilt.

Those who intruded without permission deserved punishment. The finely raised princess was too out of breath from just running to answer. Or she had no answer to give. She was just thinking that now she must die.

“Your Majesty. I apologize, but this gift arrived a bit late, so I was returning to present it to Your Majesty.”

As her narrow chest heaved like a bird’s, greatly swollen from the unaccustomed sprint, the Duke quietly walked up from behind with the heavy box and answered.

The Emperor’s expression twisted. In fact, the gun he had “test-fired” “aimed at his brother’s head” was empty, with no bullets loaded. The bullets were in that box Feon had just brought.

What an insensitive, boorish fool! How would a guy stuck in the north know that filling a gun with bullets before gifting it was Kline etiquette!

The Duke had always been like that, and Caela? The Emperor looked at Caela, who had almost collapsed, with annoyed and bothersome eyes.

The unremarkable only daughter of his half-brother could be killed just for being annoying and bothersome. He was the type of person who had just pulled the trigger aimed at his half-brother for no reason other than the gun’s arrival, not even because he was annoyed.

“And the princess rushed here with me after hearing urgent news at the entrance.”

The Duke, who spoke of urgent news unknown even to Caela, lowered his head as if reluctant to speak.

Shocking news? The Emperor looked at Caela as if telling her to speak quickly. But the answer came from a servant who ran up from behind.

“Your Majesty, the Empress…!”

At that moment, the Emperor’s face, full of boredom, irritation, and arrogance, changed completely.

“She has lost consciousness!”

The Duke, the Empress’s son, simply watched indifferently as the Emperor dropped even his gun and rushed past them. Caela, who had been ready to die on the spot, furrowed her brow as she watched the Emperor’s retreating back.

‘What’s going on?’

In her memory, the Empress had never lost consciousness. Something had changed.

They say the Empress, whom the psychopathic Emperor loved terribly, or rather had a disgusting obsession with, the Duke’s mother, had lost consciousness.