Lorirolls took a step closer. Their toes were almost touching. Lorencia stepped back with a bewildered expression, retreating as much as Lorirolls had advanced.
The ballroom dance she remembered didn’t involve getting this close, with toes touching. It starts with facing each other and greeting. Then moving fluidly, almost but not quite touching. Not this blatant embracing and physical contact.
“Lady Lorencia. Ballroom dancing starts with two people this close together. You mustn’t pull away.”
Lorencia retreated whenever he approached. This situation kept repeating. Lorirolls felt his patience wearing thin. He finally began criticizing Lorencia.
“Do you intend to learn how to dance?”
“Doesn’t ballroom dancing start with a greeting? And I’d prefer if you didn’t press so close.”
“You just need to do as I say. Why are you acting like the teacher? I’m the instructor here.”
The blatant reason Anne had assigned this Lorirolls person to her was all too clear. Her lips trembled at the man’s gaze lewdly roving over her not-yet-mature body. Lorencia’s patience had reached its limit.
She felt nothing but disgust for Lorirolls’ clouded eyes brimming with desire. Just as Lorencia was contemplating in her small mind how to kill him,
Lorirolls before her seemed to freeze. Then, like a reflection in rippling water, he began to waver, and a vortex that looked like it would swallow him whole arose. Her surprise was brief.
The vortex soon calmed, and Lorirolls vanished from sight. Instead, a different scene appeared before her.
What appeared before her eyes was a woman. Her name was ‘Sophie.’ She was crying, asking to be sent home, and Lorirolls stood in front of her. He drained the bottle of alcohol he was holding, then rolled the empty bottle across the floor towards Sophie, who was crouched in the corner of the room. Lorirolls’ lips curled up disgustingly as he watched the empty bottle roll.
Lorirolls’ face towards Sophie was filled with undisguised lust.
Lorencia wanted to help the crying Sophie and reached out her arm. She ran with all her might to stop him. But she only seemed to get further away.
Once again, her vision rippled and the scene changed.
Lorirolls snickered, mocking Sophie before him.
Lorencia covered her mouth. Tears rolled down her cheeks. She could see Sophie, already hurt by him. With unfocused eyes, she kept crying.
The image of the two people before her wavered like a rippling water surface. Soon it calmed. The scene from just moments ago vanished as if it had never existed.
“Lady Lorencia. What are you pondering so deeply?”
She didn’t know why Lorirolls’ past had suddenly appeared, but what was clear was that what she had seen wasn’t just his past, but the crimes he had committed.
“You look beautiful even when you’re thinking so intently.”
Lorirolls looked down at her with satisfaction and caressed her cheek. She shuddered.
“This doesn’t seem right, Lord Lorirolls.”
“What doesn’t seem right?”
“I don’t want to learn ballroom dancing if it involves such physical contact with Lord Lorirolls.”
“This is what ballroom dancing is. Don’t resist, just entrust your body to me.”
Lorirolls licked his lips once more. Madam Anne had tipped him off.
That no one would come to this room, that this was no different from a prepared meal.
“Please leave now.”
“Do you know? We could potentially be married. I heard you haven’t even had your first menstruation yet.”
“Did you hear from Madam Anne that I haven’t had my first menstruation?”
“Madam Anne was worried about who to marry you off to. I said I would take you.”
Lorirolls grabbed Lorencia’s thin wrist tightly.
“Please let go of my wrist, Lord Lorirolls.”
It was just as Lorirolls, humming with a vile smile, was about to grab Lorencia’s hair.
The vase that had been still before her eyes moved on its own.
Lorirolls was so startled that he let go of Lorencia’s wrist he had been gripping.
“Wh-what!”
As the vase moved by itself in the air and then quickly fell to the floor with a crash, Lorirolls shook his head and stepped back, then plopped down on the floor.
His eyes filled with shock or perhaps terror.
The vase that had been in the center of the table suddenly moved. In an instant, goosebumps rose on his skin. His body trembled. He needed to leave the room, but his body wouldn’t move as he wished.
“What’s wrong, Lord Lorirolls?”
Lorirolls looked at Lorencia with terrified eyes. Despite seeing the vase move on its own and shatter, Lorencia, unlike him, wasn’t scared at all, but looked down at him calmly.
Lorencia passed by the frightened Lorirolls and picked up the bell on the table to ring it. No one came in. She rang the bell forcefully once more. There was no sign of anyone coming.
It seemed Anne had told everyone not to enter the room no matter what sounds they heard. Overwhelmed with anger, she dropped the bell she was holding onto the floor.
Lorencia walked straight to the door. Each time she took a step towards the door, decorations and clocks hanging on the walls fell and shattered. Lorirolls was paralyzed with fear at the sound of objects falling and breaking for no reason.
Lorencia stood at the door and turned the handle, but it wouldn’t budge. She tried again with more force, but the door was firmly locked. It had been locked from the outside.
She had expected this situation. She was prepared, but actually experiencing it left a foul taste.
Giving up on opening the door, Lorencia walked towards the trembling Lorirolls. She looked down at him coldly.
Anne must have told Lorirolls that she would lock the door, so any ‘incident’ in this room would be fine. That incident would be humiliating for a woman, and surely all blame would fall on Lorencia for seducing the man. She could only scoff.
If they wanted an incident to occur in this room as Anne wished.
Then an incident should occur. But the aftermath would be for Anne. She wouldn’t be able to handle it.
Lorencia smirked. She quickly wiped the smile off her face and put on a stern expression.
“Lord Lorirolls.”
“Yes?”
“Marriage might be too sudden, but would you like to start by courting?”
Lorirolls found Lorencia bizarre for proposing courtship without fear of the current phenomena. No matter how much she was his type, he didn’t want to get close to such a strange woman.
“Lady Lorencia. I think it would be better if another gentleman escorted you and shared your first dance at your debut.”
“Get away.”
Just as Lorirolls was expressing his refusal, a loud ‘bang’ was heard at Lorencia’s command to get away. The frame hanging behind him had fallen and shattered.
“Do you think the objects in this room are falling and breaking by chance?”
Lorirolls was so startled that he couldn’t close his mouth and began to stammer.
“You’ll court me, won’t you, Lord Lorirolls?”
Lorencia looked at the pitifully trembling Lorirolls as emotionlessly as one would look at a pebble on the road. She found joy in imagining hitting an enemy’s head with that pebble.
“Lord Lorirolls. You should answer.”
Lorirolls barely managed to suppress his rising fear and trembling by biting the inside of his cheek and his tongue. He nodded and answered to everything Lorencia said. If he didn’t, he felt he might shatter like the frame. He couldn’t understand what was happening to him. He was just being dragged along by the monster before him.
A monster. He had wrongly crossed paths with a monster.
Anne laughed loudly.
“Madam, are you in a good mood?”
“Of course. I’m delighted thinking about that monster suffering a harsh fate.”
Ruans wouldn’t abandon Lorencia just because she experienced some hardship anyway.
Ruans would tenderly embrace Lorencia after she suffered a harsh experience. That’s what Ruans wanted.
More than that, it felt like all the pent-up frustration had been released, as if an unforgettable scar had been etched like a tattoo on Lorencia.
“I think it’s about time to open the door now. Go and see what state they’re in.”
But Lorencia came out looking too composed. It seemed as if nothing had happened. And the atmosphere between the two was unsettling.
“Lord Lorirolls. Then I’ll see you again tomorrow at 10.”
“Understood. Beautiful Lorencia… no, Roa.”
“Yes, Lord Lorirolls.”
When Lorencia extended her right hand, Lorirolls’ lips trembled. Then, kneeling on one knee, he gently pressed his lips to the back of Lorencia’s outstretched right hand with a soft smack. It was a kiss shared only between lovers.
“Madam Anne. Thank you for introducing me to such a fine gentleman.”
Lorencia thanked Anne with a joyful face. It took Anne a moment to understand what Lorencia was saying.
“Lord Lorirolls and I have officially become lovers.”
“Haha. I’m embarrassed, Roa.”
Lorirolls’ awkward smile looked like an act to Lorencia. But to Anne’s eyes, Lorirolls looked like the most bashful man in the world. She had clearly told him to cause an incident.
“Well then, Lady Roa. I look forward to our date tomorrow.”
“Yes.”
“What is happening right now.”
“Lord Lorirolls. I’ll be ready tomorrow, so please come to pick me up.”
“Understood, my fiancée.”
“Then, farewell.”
“I’ll come early to pick you up, Lady Roa. Haha. Well then, I’ll be going.”
As Lorencia watched Lorirolls’ retreating back as he walked away quickly, her violet eyes held no emotion.
“Lorencia! What do you mean you’re lovers with Lord Lorirolls! What are you saying?”
“As you heard. Lord Lorirolls confessed, and I grew fond of him for saying he liked and found beautiful a monster like me. We talked briefly, and it wasn’t bad. I liked his gentle touch too.”
Lorencia blushed and acted shy.
“Do you know what you’re saying right now?”
“Yes. I’m telling you I have a lover. I’m so excited about having my escort and first dance at my debut be with my lover.”
“You have Prince Ruans, don’t you?”
“Do you think a bastard like me could be with Prince Ruans? If the Prince liked me, he would have at least made me his ‘mistress’. I know my place well, Madam Anne.”
Anne’s eyes, beneath her long lashes, stared at Lorencia without so much as a blink.
What they wanted was for Lorencia to be hurt so that she had no one to rely on but Ruans. But now, far from being hurt, she had gained a lover to lean on. If Ruans and they found out. Anne’s position would become awkward.
_____
In This Life I Love You Again (Modern Female-dominant)
Xie Zhi and Fang Xianxing who had known each other for less than three days through a blind date sat in the same car in front of the civil affairs bureau. They had a disagreement and failed to get married.
Xie Zhi immediately took out his phone, slid through his contacts, and randomly selected the next marriage candidate.
The woman snatched his phone and hung up. Looking at his phone wallpaper, she awkwardly changed the subject: “An ancient painting, eh? It looks pretty good, it’s just that the person in the painting looks a bit like me.”
When he heard this, he sarcastically mocked her for being so delusional, completely unaware that, the person in front of him was the reincarnation of Wen Ru, the famous prime minister of Yuan Shun whom he most admired…
The female CEO who doesn’t want to get married with a divorce agreement in hand × The male archaeological researcher who will only get married if he’s sure he can get divorced
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