“Yes! Do you have any instructions for me?”

Chloe turned around and answered, watching Lord Joyce’s back disappear between the closing doors with envious eyes.

“You handle the request to the Information Guild.”

“Ah!”

It was a situation where she had to make the request to find herself.

“Yes! Understood. Then, I’ll be going out now.”

“By the way, are you feeling unwell?”

“Pardon?”

Chloe’s voice cracked a little.

It was an unexpected question.

Come to think of it, she had forgotten about her physical condition while being so tense.

Now that she was asked, she suddenly realized how much her whole body ached.

In fact, it was fatigue accumulated from rushing to the Duke’s mansion early yesterday morning with an unrecovered body.

But was her poor condition noticeable enough for the Duke to see?

“You look pale. And a bit uneasy too.”

No matter how bad she looked, it was hard to tell whether to feel honored, burdened, or scared that the Duke noticed and even worried about it.

“Ah, I’m just a bit tired after returning from vacation at my hometown.”

It’s because I was tormented by you, Duke, on the last night of my vacation. All night long.

“Ah! That’s right. You said your hometown was far, didn’t you?”

It is far. It’s Bürgen after all.

Thinking of her hometown, she realized that Lord Joyce would soon be going to Bürgen to look for her.

“Clyne?”

Chloe snapped back to attention at the Duke’s voice calling her again.

“Yes. It’s quite far.”

“Where exactly?”

She couldn’t understand why today of all days, he was noticing her physical condition and even making small talk, when they had never really had much personal conversation face to face before.

For the past three months, she and the Duke had been strictly in an employer-employee relationship.

The Duke hadn’t shown particular interest in his employees’ private lives, nor did he ask many personal questions.

Well, it’s not that there were none at all.

When she asked permission to take 4 days of vacation by accumulating a month’s worth of weekend breaks, she did mention that her hometown was far and that she had a sick mother to take care of.

He seemed to remember that conversation.

“It’s Bürgen.”

Chloe answered with a half-resigned feeling.

After all, it was already known to Lord Joyce and the Duke’s household staff that she came from Bürgen, and originally when Clyne was first hired as a servant of the Duke’s household, they had exchanged mail using the address in Bürgen.

Of course, she never told anyone about her family relationships other than her mother.

Having disguised herself as her twin brother Clyne to get the job, she absolutely had to keep quiet about the fact that she had a twin sister, as it posed a risk.

Come to think of it, the Duke was indeed a generous master, living up to his reputation of having an excellent character.

When he heard that her mother was sick, he even gave her extra vacation money.

With that money, she was able to stay at “The Night of Dogs and Cats” every time.

It took a whole day to get there in one go, but on the way back, she stopped there to prepare her mind and body.

She had been grateful for that money, but now it seemed that money was holding her back.

Because she stayed there, she ended up having an accident with the Duke.

He was a good master.

Soon, because of that good master, she might end up being chased out with a mountain of debt at best, or at worst, be branded a fraud and sent to prison.

“Bürgen… I see. How is your mother, who you said was unwell?”

“She’s still the same.”

“I see. Do you take after your mother?”

“Pardon?”

“Is your mother beautiful?”

“Pardon?”

“Hmm. For a man, you’re a bit…”

“…”

The flow of the conversation was strange.

“Ahem! You may go now.”

The Duke suddenly cleared his throat and said sternly.

“Yes!”

Chloe quickly left.

To go from talking about whether her mother was beautiful to saying something like ‘for a man’…

An inexplicable sense of foreboding came over her.

She felt she should at least try to find out from Lord Joyce what the Duke had in mind if he found the woman.

There was no telling when she might be discovered.

[This is the timeline separator]

Hugrey was holding his head in both hands, hunched over.

He must have gone mad.

At a time when he should be rushing out to find his imprint partner himself, all his attention was focused on that attendant, Clyne.

He had completely lost it.

Wanting to spend more time with the attendant, he had sent him on an errand to the Information Guild, and now he was even regretting giving work to the tired fellow!

While listening to Joyce’s report, he was out of his mind, trying to catch Clyne’s scent and expression as he stood slightly off to the side behind Joyce.

It was clearly a side effect of the imprinting.

Quickly, quickly!

He needed to find the woman as soon as possible.

The only way to calm this strange hormonal chaos would be to find the imprint partner and stabilize.

[This is the timeline separator]

As soon as Chloe left the Duke’s room, she dashed towards the entrance of the mansion. The Duke’s residence was so large it could be called a castle, and with the Duke’s room on the fourth floor, she had to run frantically to the entrance to catch Lord Joyce.

“Lord Joyce! Lord Joyce!”

Fortunately, Lord Joyce hadn’t left yet, but he was just about to mount his horse.

“Ah, what is it?”

Lord Joyce pulled on the horse’s reins and looked at Chloe.

“I need to find a woman through the Information Guild, but do you know which guild would be most suitable? I think it would be best to request from the most capable guild.”

Of course, the Information Guild was just an excuse to catch Lord Joyce.

“Ah, for the Information Guild, go to Luciel. They’re the fastest and most accurate.”

“Ah, Luciel…”

“Well then, good luck.”

“Lord Joyce!”

She urgently called out to Lord Joyce, who seemed about to mount his horse again, apparently in a hurry.

“What, do you have something else to ask?”

Lord Joyce slightly frowned at Chloe.

“Actually, as the Duke’s attendant, I’m a bit curious about something too. I think I should know to some extent so as not to upset the Duke’s mood.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Well, I was wondering what the Duke intends to do when he finds the woman he slept with.”

“…?”

Lord Joyce stared down at her.

“Ah, I’m just asking as an attendant for the future…”

“You don’t need to know. Just do your best to keep the Duke’s mood comfortable. He may look fine on the outside, but inside must be terrible.”

“…?”

“To think he was caught by such an unheard-of person… It’s hard to imagine how distressed he must be.”

Person?

“Caught… you say?”

Caught? It was all by mutual consent…

“Yes, there’s no way the Duke would have given himself to such a woman first! You know too, don’t you? The Duke is not the kind of person who would do that to a woman.”

No, what do you mean no… Ah!

Suddenly, the hazy beginning of that night’s accident became crystal clear.

The dark corridor.

The Duke coming out into the corridor, visible to her eyes which were captivated by some strange impulse, whether from alcohol or something else.

The Duke’s frowning face upon seeing her.

Her body unconsciously approaching the Duke.

The Duke trying to retreat back into his room to avoid her.

She followed him into that room before the door could close and embraced him.

The Duke’s desperate cries of refusal hit her head like a huge rock.

That’s right. The Duke had refused her.

With desperate eyes and voice.

But the one who clung to him even more was…

She wanted to die.

It was clearly her.

She had launched a physical assault on the refusing Duke, and for some reason, the Duke who finally succumbed to her changed completely afterwards. He became more than just changed, he became a beast.

But what was clear was that before becoming a beast, he had refused her.

“I’d like to catch that woman and tear her to pieces…, hmm! No. I can’t dispose of her like that.”

Lord Joyce muttered as if talking to himself, then looked at Chloe again as if he had just remembered she was there.

His eyes, still not free from anger, looked as if he would kill the woman if he found her.

To use such brutal words like tearing to pieces and disposing of…

Is sleeping with the Duke such a deadly sin?

It was a situation where she felt her life was threatened.

What Chloe had been worried about was being discovered for lying about her gender to get hired.

Of course, sleeping with the Duke was uncomfortable too, but men and women could engage in such acts by mutual agreement, couldn’t they? She couldn’t understand why he was making an expression as if the world was ending just because of the fact that they had slept together.

“I… I suppose so?”

But in the end, this was all Chloe could say in response. That’s how serious Lord Joyce’s expression was.

Fortunately or unfortunately, Lord Joyce’s expression softened a little.

“There’s no help for it. It’s already happened and can’t be undone. Anyway, take good care of the Duke. I’m counting on you.”

“Yes…”

Chloe barely managed to answer, trying hard to steady her trembling voice.

Leaving Chloe behind, Lord Joyce departed.

Why was Lord Joyce so angry about the Duke’s affair?

Watching Lord Joyce ride away, Chloe fell into deep thought.

Because the Duke had lost his virginity? Is virginity that important? Besides, it wasn’t even Lord Joyce’s virginity. Ah! Maybe the Duke was a virginitist?

There seemed to have been a flicker of fear in the Duke’s expression as he retreated, avoiding her.

Well, it wasn’t unreasonable considering how much the Duke had been avoiding women.

Then, had she really ruined the Duke?

But for something like that, the Duke seemed rather more composed than Lord Joyce.

Lord Joyce’s warning echoed in her ears.

Well, the Duke wasn’t the type to fully reveal his emotions anyway.

What should she do?

Now even the name “Chloe” had been revealed.

Money was one thing, but judging from the atmosphere, she felt it wouldn’t be everything.

A feeling that she would have to take “responsibility” for something of the Duke’s.

Probably, from what she could see now, that something might be his virginity, but there might be something else too, and it was unclear exactly how one “takes responsibility” for such a thing.

If so, there was only one conclusion after all.

When scheming men desperately battle for her favor in the male harem

This one’s also on my reread list! The rivalry, scheming between the men in the imperial harem are just as intense and thrilling as in classic palace drama novels, where concubines fight to the death. Give it a read, girls! I promise you won’t be disappointed.

Synopsis:

“I am not worthy of her… but I still want to be by her side, even if only as a loyal dog…”

Those were the painful whispers of Yue Guanyi – the proud Crown Prince of the Great Qi, who was torn between deep love and a guilty conscience. Despite holding the supreme power of the Imperial Guard, he still could not forget the dark past when he was sold into a brothel.

Fate played a cruel twist when Qiu Shuzhi – a young female official who had just passed the imperial examinations with top honors – stepped into his life. She did not know that she was the one who had saved him from a tragic fate many years ago. And now, her heart was the target of pursuit for both Yue Guanyi and the powerful Empress Dowager Qin Qing.

While Yue Guanyi only dared to silently care for and protect the one he loved from afar, the  Empress Dowager Qin Qing openly expressed his feelings and did not hesitate to take advantage of his power to approach Qiu Shuzhi. The covert struggle between the two most powerful forces in the imperial court began…

Trigger warning: All men in this novel are yandere style.

 

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