Even if he was the master of her imprint and he was bound to her, even if he was going crazy with desire to possess her, he had to wait. Until she told him herself.

But now, even wishing for her to accept him was a luxury. He would be fine even if she rejected him, he just desperately hoped she would wake up.

To check for any further head injuries, he had to remove her wig, and to treat the bruises on her body, he had to remove her clothes. He wanted to tear out the eyes of the doctor who saw her. But he had to endure, as he was an imprinted wolf, not a mad one.

When the wig was removed, her lush and dazzlingly beautiful golden hair was revealed, and despite the bruises all over, her body was so perfect it took his breath away just looking at it.

Seeing that battered body, he felt nauseous from the mixture of anger at himself for failing to protect her and the dizzying effect of her indescribable beauty.

Truly, was there a greater beast? How could he feel dizzy over a woman who had lost consciousness and was in such a state?

He knew it was close to a reflexive physical reaction to an imprint partner. But he couldn’t shake off the pathetic feeling that he was a trash consumed by lust.

Disgusted by his own carnal desires, he pulled the blanket that had been covering her shoulders up to her neck.

Even though she was already changed into clothes and her body wasn’t visible at all.

“Clyne, Chloe. Please wake up. Open your eyes.”

Hugrey, sitting in a chair beside the bed, muttered as if in prayer.

Why won’t she open her eyes when her face looks so peaceful and clear, as if she’s just sleeping? Could it be that she doesn’t want to wake up rather than being unable to? Wanting to escape from reality.

If that was the case, his decision to pretend not to know she was Chloe until she accepted him might have been wrong.

In fact, when he first found out that Clyne was Chloe, he was angry that she had kept lying and hiding the truth even though she had clearly seen him desperately searching for ‘Chloe’.

However, after spending a whole day holed up in the inn at Voergen thinking during his vacation, he could understand her situation.

The employment conditions of House Ulpaz where women couldn’t get jobs, her mother on the brink of life and death, the salary paid in advance to get medicine, Calcus Trascan to whom she was indebted, the penalty clause for breaking employment conditions, the ongoing treatment costs for her mother who was her only family, the employer’s pursuit closing in.

He could more than imagine the pressure and burden she must have felt. Moreover, yesterday he had glimpsed her guilt. Blaming herself for not liking her brother, saying she was a bad sister, even though her brother’s death wasn’t her fault.

All of that must have been weighing down on this small woman for months.

Despite such burden and pressure, he had hoped she would open her heart to him. He had resolved to wait until she revealed herself as ‘Chloe’.

But seeing her not waking up even though there doesn’t seem to be any major internal injuries, maybe it would have been better to tell her that he knew everything and it was all okay.

Tell me what’s in your heart. Wake up and tell me. I’ll give you anything you want. Even if it’s not accepting my feelings…….

Chloe was waiting for her mother with her brother at the fountain in the square when she started playing tag with a pair of siblings she met there for the first time.

The four children – Chloe, her brother, and the unnamed siblings – were running around the fountain, while the siblings’ mother was shouting at them not to run as they might get hurt.

‘Then let’s play hide-and-seek.’

When her brother suggested it, the four children soon decided on who would be ‘it’ and started playing hide-and-seek. Her brother was ‘it’, and Chloe looked for a place to hide. While watching her brother close his eyes and count with his head down towards the ground, she looked around but there wasn’t a suitable hiding place in the square. Eventually, she ran with all her might and hid in the alley next to the vegetable shop at the end of the square.

Various vegetable and fruit boxes from the vegetable shop were piled up in the alley, and she hid herself between these boxes.

About a minute after hiding like that, Chloe’s ears perked up. She heard her mother’s voice from a little distance, as if her mother, whom she had been waiting for, had finally returned.

Chloe was about to run out towards her mother, forgetting about the hide-and-seek game.

‘Chloe has grown much bigger than last year.’

But because her name came out of her mother’s mouth, she stopped moving. Her mother was talking about her to someone. Somehow, she wanted to hear what her mother was saying.

‘We need to increase the dose. It seems she’ll enter a rapid growth period soon, so when we meet again in three months, bring more suppressants than now.’

Suppressants? What’s that? Ah! Maybe it’s the medicine I take? It seemed to be talking about the medicine that only she had to take, not her brother.

‘Do you really have to go this far? Shouldn’t the princess develop her abilities and know what bloodline she inherited? Long-term use could have side effects.’

Princess? Bloodline? Long-term use, side effects?

Everything the person talking to her mother said was puzzling. But just one thing, the word ‘princess’, she could understand.

It was something she had always imagined, wanting to be a princess in beautiful clothes like in fairy tales.

‘Shut your mouth! Don’t ever say such things again. I will protect my child in my own way. It’s better not to know about that kind of life-threatening bloodline until death. Even if there are side effects… it’s only that she can’t… Anyway, I won’t let my daughter live like that.’

…?

Unfortunately, the vegetable seller shouted to call a customer at that moment, so she couldn’t hear her mother’s voice.

What exactly couldn’t she do?

‘I’m sorry for overstepping my bounds.’

The adult talking to her mother apologized following her mother’s words.

‘You’re sure no one has caught our trail, right? You just need to focus on not letting anyone find out that I’m hiding here.’

‘Yes. I’ll do my best. Always take care of yourself.’

‘Good, you’ve done well. You can go now.’

Then quietly, footsteps faded away.

Chloe stayed hidden between the boxes for a while, just breathing. She knew her mother and the adult had already gone far, but somehow she kept hiding. It was an instinct that her mother shouldn’t know she had overheard her conversation. Because unlike usual, her mother’s voice was sharp and even a little scary.

‘Chloe, Chloe where are you? Mom’s here! Come out now, I said come out.’

Her brother’s voice was heard.

‘Ah! Hide-and-seek!’

Chloe, who had been crouching, suddenly stood up.

‘Ouch!’

However, at that moment, the wooden boxes piled up beside her collapsed, and Chloe was hit by the falling wooden boxes and fell down.

‘Chloe! Chloe! Chloe! Wake up! Chloe.’

She heard her mother and brother’s cries.

Wake up? Ah! Right. I was playing hide-and-seek? No, I was riding in a carriage?

Chloe opened her eyes wide. Familiar ceiling, wallpaper, and bed. This is… the Duke’s bedroom?

Chloe raised herself and looked around again. It was indeed the Duke’s bedroom, the very place she entered every morning to serve. She was lying on the wide bed placed in the center of that room.

Oh my! How did this happen?

“Ah…”

At last, she felt pain in her head and all over her body. All memories flashed by intermittently.

The arrow, the Duke running out, the carriage speeding, injury, the moment of fainting.

So I fainted again. Like the day my brother died. And like that day I had completely forgotten… when I was crushed by boxes at the vegetable shop.

Why did I dream about that memory then?

When she woke up on the square floor, looking at her mother’s worried eyes gazing down at her, the urge to ask what a ‘princess’ was disappeared like a soap bubble. She couldn’t explain exactly why. It just seemed like she didn’t want to worry her mother.

Who the princess was, what long-term use and side effects meant, who that adult was, what suppressants were. There were many curious things she wanted to ask, but Chloe instinctively seemed to know. That these were all secrets, and her mother didn’t want to tell her those secrets.

After that day, she never complained when taking medicine. Because she knew her mother was secretly getting the medicine from that man. And that it was a dangerous thing for her mother.

So complaints were a luxury. She shouldn’t have brought it up that day either. Because she had completely erased that day’s memory from her mind, she didn’t even know such a memory remained in her head.

“Ah…”

Her head throbbed. Now she seemed to know exactly which part hurt.

She raised her hand and lightly touched a certain point on the crown of her head. Something like a band-aid was attached to that area.

Yes, here. This must be where it’s torn. Ah, it really hurts. But judging by the fact that I remember everything, I guess I didn’t hurt my head too badly.

Chloe’s heart, which had been briefly relieved, suddenly sank.

Head? Did I hurt my head?

Only then did she look down at her hair.

“…”

Long golden hair was curling down to below her chest.

Oh, damn, this is insane!

‘Aaaaargh!’

Even in the face of this shocking reality, she screamed only in her heart. Because right now she was sitting on the Duke’s bed, in his room, with her golden hair fully exposed. If she wasn’t going to be caught, she couldn’t even scream loudly in this situation.