Eugene stood up from his seat and looked out the long window behind the desk.

Watching his straight back, Natasha carefully asked.

“Are you saying… that His Grace will go look for the lady himself?”

“Yes. I must leave as soon as preparations are made.”

“Then I…!”

“Please continue as you have been until I return. I trust you, Nat.”

Eugene called Natasha by a nickname he rarely used, imploring her. His tone was quite resolute, sounding more like an order than a request.

Natasha didn’t answer right away and wore a worried expression.

“But… will the aides and servants listen to me? Even though I’ve become Your Grace’s person, I entered the mansion so suddenly, and also…”

“Don’t worry about that. I’ll give strict instructions. No one will be able to treat you carelessly.”

Eugene turned to face Natasha and gently reasoned with her. However, the shadow on Natasha’s face grew even darker.

“Starting tomorrow, I’ll be left alone in this huge mansion. I’m so afraid. Please give me a promise I can be sure of.”

Natasha approached Eugene like down feathers and grabbed his arm. Eugene let out a heavy sigh.

He soon withdrew his white hand briefly and rummaged through the bundle of keys hanging on the desk. Then he held out something small to Natasha.

“Take it.”

“What… is this?”

“It’s the key to the drawer that stores the ledger of the east mansion. I’ll entrust you with financial affairs. Although limited to the east mansion, it will serve as proof that I trust you. Is this enough for you to believe in me?”

Natasha carefully took the key. Her thick lowered eyelashes trembled slightly.

She looked up at Eugene and smiled brightly.

“I won’t disappoint you. Thank you, Your Grace.”

Natasha kissed Eugene’s cheek before turning away.

The corners of her mouth were as straight as if drawn as she left the room.

The next morning. Before leaving the mansion, Eugene made one last visit to Helena’s bedroom.

Since her disappearance, entry had been strictly forbidden even to the servants, so the interior remained unchanged.

The scattered jewelry on the floor, the carelessly thrown dress, the faint lingering scent of her.

“Let’s divorce.”

The words she had spoken, elegantly twisting up her long hair, wearing the dress he had gifted her, looking straight into his eyes, were still vivid.

Yet she was no longer here.

‘What on earth made you decide to leave me? Helen, why…’

As Eugene slowly looked around the room, his gaze suddenly stopped at one spot.

An object that didn’t fit with the antique atmosphere of the bedroom. A disc-shaped object intertwined with colorful threads hung at the head of the bed.

Just then, an elderly maid passing by the bedchamber stopped her steps upon seeing the open door. She was the maid who had been exclusively in charge of Helena since she arrived at the mansion.

Eugene called her over and pointedly gestured with his chin towards the strange object.

“What is this?”

“Well… that is…”

“Madam Tara. You know that my time is not the same as yours.”

When the maid hesitated to answer, Eugene reprimanded her. The maid hurriedly bowed her head.

“The, the lady often had nightmares. It was made by requesting a sorcerer.”

“…Nightmares?”

“Yes, she would wake up as if having a fit, choking herself, more than once…”

Eugene was momentarily at a loss for words.

Reflecting on the past, he seemed to have heard strange noises on occasion when working late into the dawn.

A sound like a young animal whimpering, caught in a trap, miserably groaning.

And the next day, Helena always appeared wearing a dress that covered up to her neck. As if there was something she had to hide.

Now knowing the source of the sound, Eugene let out a bitter laugh.

“Ha…! Helen, you really…!”

She was a woman who perfectly grated on his nerves.

How could she manage to shake him up even at the moment he was leaving to find her?

The maid, sensing Eugene’s anger, shrank her already bent back even more and pleaded.

“I’m sorry, Your Grace. I know it’s improper, but the lady was so desperate… I’ll remove it right away.”

“No. Leave it.”

Eugene stopped the maid as she hurried to take down the object.

“Don’t touch anything in this room and maintain it as is. Clean it daily so Helen can stay here as soon as she returns. Understood?”

“…Yes, Your Grace.”

The maid bowed her head with a strange expression. Eugene turned away, grinding his molars.

‘Helen, I don’t care where you’ve gone. You’re still my wife.’

Even if she didn’t want it, her place was here. Beside Eugene Evergale.

He didn’t understand why he felt such longing himself. He just felt that if he stayed like this, he would keep repeating the same steps without moving forward. It felt like he would rot, stagnant for life.

Eugene didn’t want that. He had to find the missing wheel somehow, put it back in place, and make everything mesh and turn again.

‘Wait, Helena. I need to hear directly from you why you left.’

Once outside, he hastily mounted his horse. A few knights waiting on standby uniformly lined up their horses behind him.

Eugene glanced at Helena’s bedchamber with its tightly closed windows and pulled on the reins.

Believing without doubt that when he next set foot in the grand duchy, it would be with her.

Helena couldn’t come to her senses. She couldn’t even tell if she was breathing properly.

Just cutting, falling, cutting, falling, cutting and falling over and over again.

‘Please stop, stop!’

She screamed at the top of her lungs, but the scene didn’t cease.

Her head thudded, rolling around, and her body falling into a bottomless pit, flailing, passing through an ornate curtain to land with a thump on a large bed.

It was a dream where even if her head was cut off dozens of times on the guillotine, when she opened her eyes, she was beside Eugene.

That was all, but it was also everything. It was the only thing she was allowed to see in the world unfolding before her eyes.

It was saying that this alone was her life.

“The execution of Helena Evergale will now begin.”

Execution. Execution will. Will. Begin. Begin. Begin…

The executioner’s voice echoed in her ears. It felt like being trapped in an endless abyss.

When she screamed with all her might, the execution ground finally flipped over. Instead, a boy who couldn’t stop coughing now occupied that place.

‘Basil…? Basil! Basil!’

Helena called out the name, almost like a scream, and ran over. Her beloved brother, whom she could only see in dreams, slowly turned around as if responding to that voice.

His eyes were wide open.

“Sister. Sister. Why did you do it?”

With eyes as black as the darkness covering everything, indistinguishable from it, he asked her.

“Why didn’t you come to see me? Were you happy alone? Were you happy living alone in a big castle? Sister, sister, sister. Why did you do it?”

She wanted to cry out that she was sorry, but no voice came out. Her lips were stuck together as if someone had sewn them shut.

Basil, who had been calling out “sister” incessantly, quickly decomposed, his flesh melting away until only his skull remained.

Shouts to kill the witch appeared and grabbed her ankles, dragging her down. An enraged giant grasped her and flung her down. She rolled back onto the execution platform.

There was no way for her powerless self to escape. Enemies were all around, and everyone was waiting for her death.

In the midst of it all, Helena scratched at the floor until her nails came off. She only wished for the next blade to strike her neck soon.

She desperately wished for this agony to end, even if it meant dying.

But what came down next wasn’t a glinting blade.

“Helena!”

For some reason, it was a familiar voice.

“Helen!”

So familiar and longed for, she just wanted to cling to it like a lifeline.

“Helena!”

So she grabbed it.

Then her vision flipped like a book closing. Finally, everything surrounding her collapsed.

Truly everything.

“Haaah, huh…!”

Helena abruptly sat up and gasped for breath.

Her heart was pounding as if it would burst, and her vision was jumbled.

The heavy sensation pouring over her entire body told her it was no longer a dream, but it was hard to come to her senses.

She just clutched whatever her hands touched and wailed.

No, no, I’m sorry, I was wrong, I was wrong…

She couldn’t open her tightly shut eyes. She was afraid of what she might see. Only gasping breaths mixed with screams escaped her.

Please, I want to die, please, please, I want to die.

In the face of the terrible nightmare, Helena crumbled helplessly.

The monster inside her finally broke through her flesh, tore through her ribs, and burst out. And it devours her alive again. Crunching and chewing.

Stop, it hurts, it hurts so much, it hurts…

‘Just kill me already!’

She only felt a stabbing pain in her throat. Helena grabbed her neck as if choking herself and scratched it roughly. She clawed at it mercilessly as if trying to pull out an embedded knife.

At that moment, someone’s firm hand grabbed her hand.

Those large hands removed the two arms scratching at her neck, placed them around that person’s neck, and finally embraced her. Hugged her so tightly she could barely breathe.

She struggled, gasping for breath, but the arms holding her didn’t budge. Only the now-familiar scent enveloped her entire body.

“It’s alright. It’s okay. I’m here, Helen.”

He kept holding her tightly like that, over and over again. He stroked her back soothingly as if comforting a crying child.

“Nothing can harm you. It’s a dream that will all disappear when you open your eyes. Your reality is here. You’re safe.”

It was a gentle voice enough to cover that terrible nightmare. He kissed her forehead repeatedly and whispered.

“Everything is alright.”

Low breaths poured over her head. The words resonating in her ear were strange.

What could be alright?

When everything was such a mess, what could possibly be alright?

But she was crying. So she just kept crying. Unlike usual, she couldn’t hold it back.

The tears wouldn’t stop.