Looking at her, he felt like he shouldn’t just lie on the bed but should move. He felt like a lazy and sluggish human being.

Cascus got up from the bed, turned his neck and shoulders.

“I was trying to rest a bit.”

Artia, who was doing push-ups and clapping her hands, said, “Rest a bit. Who’s going to devour you?”

Cascus thought it wouldn’t work, so he got off the bed.

“If you say that, I can’t rest even more.”

He stood on the mat and started bare-handed exercises.

Seeing someone move like that next to him, Cascus couldn’t just lie still.

Artia, doing push-ups, also turned her body to face the side where he was clearly visible.

‘… It’s scary.’

Cascus swallowed his saliva as he realized that Artia, clinging to the floor like a spider, was glaring at him.

It just made him nervous.
“You’re doing well now.”

Artia stared at his posture with a critical eye and spoke.

“Still, by my standards, you’re a bit stiff.”

“Oh, I guess I need to try harder.”

“Nevertheless, you’ve improved a lot from the beginning. It’s remarkable progress. Or, well, would you like some help?”

Clap!

While doing push-ups and clapping her hands, Artia laughed and said, “Alright. Focus on your exercise.”

Cascus thought he shouldn’t disturb Artia, who was diligently focused on her tasks.

“Okay. Let’s each stretch to loosen our bodies. Since we can’t go to the gym today.”

She managed to gather many members in the banquet hall and ultimately obtained Owen’s approval for the expansion of the gym.

Until its completion, Artia decided to exercise with Cascus in the room.

Artia bent and raised her body, folding her fingers one by one.

“Indeed, there’s satisfaction in exercising even if you’ve been under dark magic. Seeing the feeling of the exercise I did back then.”

“…Even if it’s dark magic, your dedication couldn’t stop it.”

“If I hadn’t exercised back then, I would have died a long time ago. At first, even standing still made me dizzy. How much did I not move?”

This time, while doing push-ups with fingers folded, Artia clapped below her chest.

Clap!

Artia could perform high-level exercises and have a conversation at the same time.

“I wonder when I’ll be able to do push-ups with one finger like my father. It won’t take too long, but still.”

Clap! Clap!

The sound of applause echoed continuously in the room.

“…”

Cascus felt that Artia would catch up with him in terms of stamina and speed.

In his life, he never expected to feel threatened by Artia.

It was something he would experience for a long time.

He had initially taken her words about catching up as a joke and laughed it off, but now, when faced with reality, it was not something to be taken lightly.

“It’s good that your body is getting healthier day by day. I need to be tense too.”

“I should have done this earlier.”

Artia, who was not pleased with the usual gap between her thighs, finally experienced them sticking together.

Now that she had elastic thighs, no one would see her as weak anymore.

“Just by glancing, it seems like a lot has changed. Let’s check your thighs.”

“Th-thighs…?”

“Tense up. I’ll follow along soon.”

With numerous bodies turned into humans, she was transforming her own body into an ideal one.

In a way, it was unknown whether overcoming dark magic with mental strength was possible only because it was Artia.

“…”

Cascus, doing bodyweight exercises on the mat, looked at Artia, who had been doing push-ups for several sets, and thought he should do something more himself.

He spread his legs and started squats.

“Move your butt a bit further back.”

While scrutinizing Cascus’s posture, Artia, doing push-ups, gave advice.

“One, two.”

“I’ll do my exercises myself.”

“Sure.”

“I’m afraid you might get hurt if you’re not careful.”

“No worries.”
Cascus lowered his posture following Artia’s guidance for the proper form of bodyweight squats and went down.

Initially skeptical, he found that following her instructions made his body feel remarkably better.

Now that he no longer had to endure pain alone, Artia was like a benefactor to Cascus.

“It’s been quite a while since you came to the palace, and I still haven’t found the culprit who did such wicked things to your body. We need to find them quickly.”

“Oh, that thing?”

While engaging in exercise, Cascus and Artia conversed with each other.

“We might be able to find it soon. Just wait a little longer.”

“We must find them, no matter what.”

Artia’s dark magic had been lifted, but Cascus wanted to find out who had mistreated her body and give them a piece of his mind.

Although the Harad family, where Artia was born and raised, was suspected, there was still no substantial evidence.

Investigating En and Jay of the prominent Harad family, as well as the Earl couple, had its limits.

“If it were an aristocrat’s matter, I could have caught them quickly. It’s annoying that I have to seek help from someone else since it’s not my territory.”

“Well… I’m satisfied with the fact that the dark magic is lifted. Let’s live happily.”

“I wouldn’t mind tearing them apart.”

“Oh, don’t say scary things.”

“I said it very mild. If I find them, I don’t know what I might do.”

While Cascus enjoyed seeing Artia happy, he couldn’t forgive the one who had ruined her life.

It would have been less painful if she had been in her current state from the beginning.

The years of suffering she endured were deeply felt by Cascus, and it pained him.

“Ah, just live well now. Even if we can’t catch them, I want to focus on the fact that I’ve escaped from dark magic. It would be a waste of the remaining life otherwise.”

Artia spoke positively, but she had a vague confidence that she might find the culprit.

Cascus, not wanting to get angry over that, advised her not to worry about unnecessary things.

“You’re really positive. It must be nice to be at ease. People around you would feel more at ease too!”

“Stop feeling at ease, and let’s do one more set.”

“Sigh…”

“I don’t want to be found by you, you know.”

Before the release of dark magic, Artia, like Cascus, wanted to find the culprit and tear them apart.

However, after the dark magic was lifted, she sometimes felt it was a waste to spend the rest of her life blaming the culprit behind the dark magic.

Opening the gym and gathering nobles served the purpose of finding the culprit, but in case they couldn’t be caught, spending a lifetime fixated on the dark magic culprit would be a waste of time.

Artia’s ultimate goal was to reconcile the South and North.

By doing so, all the troublesome events that would occur in the future would be resolved.

Such events as Cascus dying at Owen’s hands or Heidegger going to war unnecessarily and dying.

There was no need to fight over Hari, who was like a grass in the wind.

Cascus had no interest in Hari.
Since Artia’s body escaped from the time limit, everything was free.

So, in the end, she wanted to make things a bit less awkward between Owen and Cascus.

“Oh, well… Can’t the two of them get along well? They’re not that far apart in age.”

Artia thought of the easiest and most comfortable path.