Since that day, Seyerd visited the Vanspelt mansion two more times with some interval in between.

There were superficial reasons such as wanting to see Kisa in her altered wedding dress or having something to discuss with Count Vanspelt, but the real motive was clear as day.

He was under the impression that spending intimate time with Kisa would dissipate the ill feelings between them caused by the incident a few days ago.

However, contrary to such expectations, Kisa found it increasingly suffocating to spend time with him.

No matter how kindly Seyerd treated her with a smile, she was wary of his mood and constantly reflected on her own behavior.

Worrying if she had gotten on his nerves or fallen short of his ideal love.

It was only natural for Kisa to feel that way, as she had no confidence that he truly loved her genuine self.

She couldn’t help but constantly doubt. What if the one he loved was not her, but a girl from his own ideals created based on past memories?

Thus, one day, as she was returning to her room after seeing Seyerd off, Kisa suddenly muttered to herself.

“This can’t go on…”

Even if they couldn’t go back to how things were, she had hoped they could at least maintain a somewhat amicable relationship.

But that was merely a vague wish, and Kisa grew more fearful of Seyerd’s visits with each meeting.

She was afraid of him. She couldn’t tell what sinister intentions he harbored behind that gentle facade.

Just how long did she have to endure this desperate unease?

Would things improve if they got married and lived together? Would she get used to it?

‘What if it doesn’t get better?’

What if it only gets worse?

Would she then have to bear with it for the rest of her life?

Until his interest in her faded, or until this life ended?

“……”

Kisa, who had been standing still in a daze for a moment, suddenly turned around.

Her destination was not her own room, but somewhere completely different.

“It’s unusual for you to come all the way here.”

A while later, Kisa was facing her father, who was sitting at his desk in the Count’s office.

“What is it that you need?”

His gaze, looking at his daughter as if she were a stranger, remained unchanged, but Kisa did not find herself shrinking endlessly in front of her father as she had before.

Having already known a more frightening existence, even the Count who had oppressed her for so long now seemed like an ordinary person.

Kisa, slightly amazed at her own change, put on a bashful expression as if she were shy.

“Do I need a specific reason to come? Between you and me, Father. I just wanted to come and have a cup of tea while chatting with you.”

Of course, she knew better than anyone that this was an awkward excuse, so she added a few more words.

“… I’ll have to leave this house and your embrace soon. Once I get married and move to the Hilan estate, I’ll only be able to see you very rarely, so I want to minimize any regrets as much as possible.”

Marriage was quite a convenient excuse.

Perhaps thinking it wasn’t strange to behave differently before a major life event, the Count did not inquire further about the reason.

“Sit down.”

He simply pointed to a low table and ordered tea from the secretary beside him.

Not long after, a maid who received instructions from the secretary brought black tea, and only then did the Count put down his documents and get up from his seat to sit across from Kisa.

As the secretary also left to allow the father and daughter to converse freely, the Count told Kisa to speak if she had something to say.

“The weather has gotten quite warm lately, hasn’t it? Spring will be here soon.”

Kisa started the conversation with an everyday topic first.

As much as she wanted to get straight to the point, she couldn’t be that reckless.

‘If I say I want to reconsider the marriage or postpone it, it’s obvious how Father will react.’

She recalled the time when she had asked him to break off her engagement with Daniel.

The Count had ignored his daughter’s plea and absolutely refused to allow the engagement to be broken.

If he had been like that even for breaking an engagement, how would he be for a marriage?

Moreover, this time, the other party was not Daniel Lowens, but the Duke of Hilan himself.

Objectively speaking, the chances of him agreeing to Kisa’s wish to reconsider the marriage with Seyerd seemed extremely slim for a man who valued the family’s position a hundred times more than his daughter’s happiness.

‘But I can’t say there’s no possibility at all.’

She had once had a conversation with the Count about the new Duke of Hilan.

At that time, he had clearly shown signs of finding Seyerd’s behavior distasteful.

He seemed to feel a hard-to-define sense of dissonance toward a man who was just like the cold and sharp Bisherk Hilan, yet acted like a frivolous debauchee.

Back then, Kisa had only held goodwill toward Seyerd, so she had brushed off the Count’s subtle hint, but thinking about it now, his intuition had been very keen.

‘I wonder if it’s possible to make good use of Father’s suspicions somehow?’

Based on that day’s events and her father’s consistently businesslike attitude toward Seyerd, Kisa surmised that he did not particularly like the Duke of Hilan.

‘Come to think of it, when I first saw him as Bisherk Hilan in high society, I felt something.’

As much as she didn’t want to admit it, the two had some similarities in some ways.

Especially in the controlling aspect of trying to manipulate Kisa as they wished.

The difference was that Count Vanspelt’s method was to suppress her with authority, while Seyerd’s was to cunningly deceive her and elicit the behavior he wanted.

‘… Maybe it’s a kind of intraspecific aggression.’

Both Count Vanspelt and he were too selfish to like someone with a similar personality to their own.

Anyway, with sufficient cause and reason, it was possible that the Count might side with Kisa’s opinion.

So Kisa intended to subtly probe the Count’s true thoughts through this conversation.

But just as she was gauging when to bring up the main topic, the Count struck at the core first.

“Speaking of which, have you heard any news about Daniel recently?”

Kisa blinked in surprise, inwardly startled.

This was the first time that bastard’s name had been mentioned in their conversations since Daniel had gone down to the countryside to recuperate after being injured by bandits.

While suspecting it to be a mere coincidence, Kisa also considered it fortunate.

Apart from being a jerk, Daniel could be used to revive the Count’s suspicions about Seyerd.

If given the opportunity, he would undoubtedly speak ill of Seyerd to the Count without hesitation, insisting that he was a murderer.

Even if the Count dismissed Kisa’s words alone as needless worry, he wouldn’t easily ignore it if Daniel said the same thing.

To the Count, Daniel was the son of a close friend and the heir to the Lowens family.

Moreover, having watched him grow up since childhood, he had a certain degree of fondness for him.

“That’s right, Father. Now that you mention Daniel, you know what? That guy is in the capital right now. I went out the other day and ran into Daniel by chance—”

“Do you know what situation Daniel is in right now?”

However, the next moment, what came out of the Count’s mouth, cutting off Kisa’s words, was shocking.

“I heard he was arrested by the royal investigation team recently. He’s currently undergoing a closed trial.”

After a few seconds, Kisa dazedly asked back.

“What? Daniel?”

The Count calmly responded in the affirmative while sipping his tea.

“Wh-why? Did he commit a serious crime?”

It was a reasonable inference, as the royal investigation team wouldn’t intervene for just any matter.

“You must have read the newspapers, so you should know. The spy incident where someone tried to leak royal secrets obtained from an official to Zak, but was dramatically caught just before making contact with Zak.”

Of course, Kisa was well aware of it, having even discussed it with her nanny.

But why was that story suddenly being brought up here? She was about to ask, but Kisa swallowed dryly.

“Don’t tell me… Don’t tell me Daniel…”

Count Vanspelt nodded deeply.

“Yes, Daniel was that spy.”

At that moment, Kisa involuntarily retorted loudly to her father’s words.

“That’s impossible! There’s no way!”

Naturally, it wasn’t that she believed in Daniel’s morality or humanity.

“It’s true that Daniel was favorable toward Zak, isn’t it? After returning from studying abroad, he even made several remarks about how we should follow Zak’s example.”

“That’s not the issue. You know it too, Father. He doesn’t have the caliber for that in the first place. Daniel.”

No matter how much she thought about it, the Daniel that Kisa knew was not someone who would carry out such a bold act.

Risking his status, position, honor, life, everything for his beliefs to leak royal secrets to Zak?

If he were a great man capable of that in the first place, rather than hatching a sinister plot to bring down Seyerd from behind without revealing his existence, he would have openly challenged him to a duel. Demanding to have his stolen fiancée returned.

Daniel Lowens loved what he had too much, so while he outwardly called for social change, he would never actually take active steps for it.

The feudal class system was the very foundation that made his current superior self possible.

“It must be a false charge, nine times out of ten. Someone must have fabricated evidence and manipulated the situation to bring Daniel down. And that person is probably—”

“Kisa.”

Just then, the Count stopped Kisa from speaking.

“That’s enough.”

The moment she saw that look in his eyes, Kisa realized.

The fact that the Count, like Kisa, had an idea of who was behind this incident.

At the same time, he didn’t want to voice that uncomfortable truth.