Kaella was the so-called easy woman. For Peon, she was easier than anyone else, so easy to ignore.

She never hid what she was thinking from him, in fact, she couldn’t hide it. Sometimes she was worryingly honest. How ridiculous it is to have to worry about honesty.

Rightfully, in the land Peon ruled, the honest should have been the freest, but he was a cowardly, stupid, and incompetent ruler, so he couldn’t do that. That’s why the honest Kaella was the first to suffocate and die.

“Come on.”

Kaella, who couldn’t hide her emotions, would take his hand with such joy when he reached out. It was a very natural thing for Peon.

If he reached out, she would take it. It was as natural as the emperor being a lunatic, Peon being a dirty mongrel, the sun setting in the west, and Lucenford’s winter being exceptionally long.

However, Kaella, who was now walking naturally into the duchess’s bedroom that had never been slept in, Kaella who was still the Austene princess with her father not murdered, did not immediately take his outstretched hand.

She clearly hesitated. When taking his hand, there should be no hesitation and it should be immediate for Kaella de Chaser, but she hesitates.

“My lady?”

Somewhere, fear was baring its teeth and laughing. Though they called her the precious Austene princess in words, in fact, knowing well that she had been emotionally superior all along, he had been piling up arrogance.

Now, no matter how hard he looked, there was no guarantee that she would always immediately take his outstretched hand and unconditionally listen to his words.

Then what should he do?

Instead of seeing an answer, he had an extremely irrational but certain thought that he might lose his mind to this endless vague anxiety.

“Ah, I was mistaken.”

And what extinguished all those thoughts was Kaella’s voice. She murmured softly and placed her hand on top of his. Peon hurriedly grasped that hand in return while forcibly suppressing the trembling of his own hand. She clearly hesitated.

It couldn’t be, but she clearly hesitated.

“Now that I’ve recovered this much, I should go to that room and Your Highness should use the bedroom.”

Kaella, who unconsciously showed familiarity with the geography of Lucenford Castle, changed the subject.

Having forgotten and only now realizing again, the place where Kaella was staying was Peon’s bedroom. Whatever the reason he put her in his bedroom, now it was time to properly return to the right place according to the rules.

Flawlessly, cleanly performing the role of duchess as if all the anger would go to Lucenford, not Austene, when she dies. Kaella was carefully laying out her strategy.

Not dying is good. Who would want to die? But as someone who had already experienced it, rather than looking for a possibility to quietly slip out of Lucenford, she chose to increase the certainty of dying.

“I’ll return today.”

“No.”

Peon, who had been walking to his bedroom while firmly holding her hand, firmly stopped those words.

“Don’t do that. You haven’t fully recovered yet.”

“But…”

“A patient shouldn’t rashly move places. What if you catch a new illness?”

“I just need to be careful with food.”

“Not just food, you need to be careful of the cold weather and changed climate too. You need to eat better.”

The corpse of Kaella, left with only bones and skin, glaring with her eyes, can still be seen when he closes his eyes. Even if all the truths he believed in now were overturned and Peon’s world completely collapsed, Kaella had to eat well and be healthy for life.

“Besides, as I said earlier, it’s absolutely unacceptable for you to stay in a room arbitrarily decorated by a criminal.”

Was that against the rules? Thinking in the always practical Lucenford way, Kaella said the correct answer.

“It doesn’t matter. I’m fine. Spending the castle’s finances to change it again would be wasteful.”

If there’s money for that, it should be invested more in the military. The duchess couldn’t waste a single penny.

Though in fact, there was no money to use because the head maid and butler held tight to all the finances, but still. They were too stingy about the money spent on the duchess who didn’t bring any money. From then on, there was no proper order and discipline in Lucenford.

“My lady.”

However, Peon, who entered the bedroom and turned to look at her, was serious.

“That’s not a waste.”

Ah, is that so? In this case, it’s not a waste because it’s erasing the traces of a criminal. So in Lucenford, for the duchess to use finances, this much justification needs to be built up.

Kaella newly realized and understood this, then felt a familiar fatigue. To think that even a duchess needs to risk her life to renovate shabby castle decorations, Lucenford was truly an extraordinary place.

At the same time, how stupid was she to dare claim that the castle needed to be expanded.

“Even if you want to gild the walls, that’s not a waste.”

Peon seated her in the comfortable place prepared in front of the fireplace. Instead of sitting beside her, he bent down and sat in front of her. Suddenly, Kaella was in a position to look down at his large figure.

Peon, who had been counting sins and things to do from Kaella’s velvet dress hem, or from the carpet, or from the abyss of hell below, barely raised his head.

“Even to my untrained eye, the duchess’s bedroom was embarrassingly inadequate for your use.”

Right. That’s where it went wrong. The authority of the absent duchess was virtually reduced from the moment she entered a bedroom arbitrarily decorated by the likes of a head maid. It’s right to tear everything down as Kaella wishes.

“I have even worse taste than Your Highness.”

The small voice and hunched shoulders showed no confidence at all. It was as if she had decided not to do anything.

For the Austene princess, who was flooded with all sorts of rare and expensive items, to have no taste was nonsense. Was it because she received too much shock at the first banquet, or was she like this from before? Either way, it was Peon’s fault.

“Then let’s start by choosing curtains between people with little taste. Not just your room, but this room needs to be completely changed too.”

He tapped the back of Kaella’s hand resting neatly on her knees. The overlapping hands slowly curled up.

*

The duchess couldn’t properly touch the finances of Lucenford Castle due to the appropriate neglect of the duke, and the glares of the butler, head maid, and nobles.

Nevertheless, the foolish duchess dared to argue that the poor facilities of Lucenford Castle should be improved and newly expanded.

Originally, if one lacks ability, they shouldn’t even speak up.

How arrogant for an outsider to disparage the great Lucenford as poor and plot to spend money. Moreover, to mess with the castle design where confidentiality is important? It was enough to make the proud Lucenford nobles rise up.

Yes. Kaella lowered her head as she recalled the incident that rapidly hastened her death. However, even looking down, there were samples of various fabrics cut into small pieces and pasted together, and so-called ‘latest’ curtain catalogs everywhere.

‘How did it come to this?’

Kaella clearly said she had no taste, but somehow the duke had given orders, and even the butler knew that the curtains in the duchess’s bedroom and the duke’s bedroom were being changed.

“Honestly, those hideous and distracting pink velvet curtains are too much. Pink! Bright pink at that!”

Denise shook her head. For Kaella, pink was a color that automatically reminded her of Beatrice’s eyes.

Peon also had a rare purple color, so the two matched well, but she only had an ordinary blue. Did the head maid deliberately hang bright pink velvet curtains to make her know her place?

Those curtains were unnecessarily heavy and had far too many tassels, and above all, they were perfect for creating a bizarre atmosphere along with the dark green and golden, almost yellow, walls.

In a word, they contributed properly to making a tacky and terrible room. Kaella had never loved that room.

“We should just tear it all down and throw it away. Such horrible curtains should never exist in this world.”

Denise shuddered, saying that such a color couldn’t be in the duchess’s bedroom.

“It might be okay if the walls were pitch black or pure white.”

At Cecil’s words, Denise replied in a disgruntled voice.

“‘Maybe’ if you remove all the tassels and decorations. But it’s still too tacky a color. Honestly…, since it’s just us and Her Grace, I’ll say this, but the curtains here are not much better. They’re dull brown.”

“That’s true, Your Grace. Besides, they’re too old and worn out. Is Lucenford’s finances that bad?”

Our precious young lady coming to such a poor place for marriage is really unthinkable. Cecil’s eyes were full of worry.

“Rather than that, His Grace the Duke originally has no interest in such things.”

Although he seems to choose and wear clothes quite well, he’s the type of person who thinks the place where one stays only needs to fulfill the bare minimum function.

“But still, this is too… too…”

Kaella completed the sentence for Denise, who couldn’t continue her words.

“Cheap taste.”

“Yes!”

So she understood that the maids were very worried, but Kaella didn’t say more. Because it was pointless to say that the level of the dukedom had been arbitrarily decided by mere local nobles.

Those with no taste, who dared to subtly think of Peon as a son, thought of the authority of the place where the duke stays just like their own homes.

‘If only Her Majesty the Empress had visited even once, this wouldn’t have happened.’

But the Emperor kept the Empress tied to the imperial palace and didn’t let her go anywhere, so that was impossible.

The people of Lucenford admired Cline all the more because they didn’t know it accurately, and they treated the duke at their level because they didn’t know. The idea of serving more preciously, more without lack of loyalty, had somehow changed to ‘this much is enough’.

So Kaella, who had experienced the Emperor’s glory and the empire’s prosperity with her whole body in Austene and Cline, felt bewilderment beyond humiliation.

But what could she do? There was nothing she could do. So the duke’s authority had sunk to that state, and the duchess’s authority was buried without even existing.

‘…Let’s stop thinking.’

Kaella quickly rummaged through the curtain fabric samples spread out.

Whether she was crazy, or dead and dreaming, or this was reality, it’s not the fault of the current Lucenford people. Or, they have not ‘yet’ committed such sins. It’s not right to accuse of sins not yet committed.

But the head maid and nobles had already committed sins on the first day she came to Lucenford.

‘Thoughts…’

Wouldn’t stop.

“This would be good.”

Then she should work. Although the result wouldn’t be very good, Kaella focused on the task anyway.

“Let’s use this deep blue velvet. Those old curtains can be torn down and used as insulation covers in the stables, or blankets for children in the castle.”

Originally, it was common sense to change castle curtains every season, but since winter was excessively long in Lucenford, winter curtains had to be prepared first.

Blue for winter, and what would be good for spring? Kaella’s gaze fell on a purple fabric resembling the color of Peon’s eyes. Would it be too heavy? She wasn’t sure.

“Your Grace, then what about Your Grace’s bedroom?”

Denise, who had sworn to tear down those gaudy bright pink velvet and tassels, had madness in her eyes.

“…Well? Wouldn’t this dark green be good?”

“That’s too plain! It’s a new bride’s room!”

“It can’t be helped for winter.”

“Then at least make it light green for spring. Please, Your Grace.”

Kaella just smiled without easily answering.

Bright light green or modest olive green, and dignified emerald green mixed with dark green were all beautiful. Just tying them with golden curtain ties or letting them hang would drastically change the gloomy bedroom atmosphere.

But is that okay? How can we change so many curtains? Can’t we just change the duke’s bedroom curtains? The duchess’s bedroom curtains are new, so changing them would be criticized as wasteful.

Anyway, isn’t her bedroom just a place to stay briefly before leaving? She had already gotten somewhat used to that hideous interior decoration.

No, she had just gotten used to an ugly and painful life. So, is it not possible to just not do anything that could be criticized? What can she do properly anyway?

So Kaella only changed the curtains in the duke’s bedroom. Removing the dull, faded brown curtains and replacing them with a dignified dark blue made the room atmosphere much better.

Kaella was now thinking of withdrawing from the duke’s bedroom. Not only was it rude to stay longer, but she was afraid of being pointed at for changing the curtains in the room where the duchess stays. This was the Lucenford that Kaella had experienced, where she had to fear even such things.

“It’s much better. As expected, your taste is exceptional. But what about your bedroom?”

Peon, who had looked around his room, turned to Kaella. Kaella couldn’t help but be conscious of the butler behind her.

“I think it’s proper to change Your Highness’s bedroom before mine.”

There was no such thing as a duchess in Lucenford. Kaella always had to put others before herself.

Still, she ended up being falsely accused of being the Emperor’s spy. Habits are perhaps scarier than death. Looking once at Kaella, who answered skillfully, and the butler behind her, Peon immediately turned and left his bedroom.

‘Huh?’

Peon’s expression seemed to harden. Kaella, who had observed his expression in that brief moment, quickly grasped her dress hem and followed him.

Peon, who went to the duchess’s bedroom with steps that were neither slow nor fast, immediately pulled the still bright pink velvet curtains as soon as he saw them.

“Your Highness?”

Unable to withstand the strong man’s strength, the heavy curtains fell right down. The sound of them being torn off was clearly heard. The next curtains were also mercilessly torn down.

“Your Highness!”

The butler’s terrified voice was muffled as the curtains crashed down. Although it should be impossible for even someone with great strength to tear down such heavy and thick velvet with one hand, the duke who accomplished this calmly turned to Kaella.

“I thought it might be difficult for you to remove them, so I just did it. It’s cold now that they’re removed.”

In Lucenford, curtains were essential for blocking the cold. Immediately, a chilly air seeped into the room from the windows where the curtains had disappeared.

“Please continue to stay in my bedroom until new curtains are hung.”

Peon said, turning to Kaella and the butler with a very refreshed expression.