Lea was so excited with joy that she didn’t even realize she was staring at Terran with a silly expression on her face. She went from disappointment to surprise to tears.

How amusing Terran must have found her mercurial reactions.

Honestly, whatever hurtful words he may have said to her before were now all forgiven.

“Terran is right. People’s outsides and insides are different.”

While outwardly cursing it as vulgar, inwardly they were full of curiosity about the new item.

Terran felt good seeing Grace so happy, but the closer he was to her, the more his excitement grew uncontrollably.

He shuddered with the desire to kiss Grace and do even more.

“Terran, to do business, we need a shop, right?”

“Th…that’s right.”

Terran’s neck turned red as he kept swallowing dryly. The urge to scoop her up and take her to bed right then and there arose, stimulating all sorts of lewd imaginings.

“I’m going to the city center. I’ll look around with Pauline to see if there’s a suitable shop location.”

“Just the two of you?”

“It’s fine. We won’t be back late. And I find it uncomfortable when Luke follows me around.”

“I’ll allow it if you come back early.”

“Okay.”

Lea jumped up and ran towards the door. Suddenly she turned back and walked towards Terran with quick little steps.

“Thank you, Terran.”

Blushing like a young girl, Lea conveyed her sincerity with a thank you and a kiss on the cheek.

Terran looked at Grace with a tingling face. Until now she had always maintained an appropriate distance from him, but when she said “thank you,” her sincerity truly reached him.

Terran stretched out his hand towards Grace as she moved away from him. But he had to console himself with just grasping at empty air.

‘After getting me all excited, to leave like that…’

The heat that had enveloped his whole body rapidly subsided. He felt a bit resentful of the oblivious Grace.

Just then, James came in carrying a stack of documents.

“The young lady seems to be in a good mood.”

“Indeed.”

Terran answered half-heartedly. But suddenly he became curious.

He wanted to know if all men had lewd thoughts like him, or if he alone had such peculiar tendencies.

“James, what do you think of a man who feels other emotions when seeing a crying woman?”

“Pardon…? Other emotions, you say?”

“Well, like if a woman is crying in sorrow, but a man gets lewdly excited because her face looks pretty. Of course, I’m not talking about myself. Don’t misunderstand.”

Even as he asked James, Terran worried that he might realize it was actually about his own situation. He had never asked him this kind of question before.

“It’s an entirely normal reaction.”

The perceptive James knew all too well what attitude to take as a butler. So he answered somewhat formally. That way Terran wouldn’t feel embarrassed.

“Is that so?”

“Finding a crying woman beautiful means there are feelings of affection. And for a man’s body to become excited looking at that sight is a very normal reaction. It would be a different story for a cold-blooded person or an impotent man.”

“I see.”

Terran’s expression became satisfied.

James was pleased as well. It seemed spring had finally come for Terran too.

“Where has Miss Grace gone?”

“She says she wants to do business, so she went to the city to look for a shop location.”

“What? You allowed that?”

James asked, startled. A noble young lady doing business was absolutely unacceptable.

Moreover, Grace was the fiancée of the Courtois Duke, the highest-ranking family in Lubeck. It was something that would tarnish not only her honor but that of the ducal family as well.

“James, the world has changed.”

Terran answered, looking at the pale James.

“But still…”

“I intend to help Grace do whatever she wants, be it business or anything else. You saw it too, didn’t you, James?”

“Saw what?”

“Didn’t you say it was beautiful when you saw Grace skillfully writing a letter to the Turkish Sultan?”

“Isn’t this situation different from that?”

“I know how precious it is to have a dream and a clear goal in life.”

He had wandered through endless darkness, living listless days. A hell without dreams or hope. Even now, though not as much as before, he still occasionally had nightmares.

Mountains of corpses of soldiers, the dead crying out to be saved, and Aiden bleeding from a lost leg – the pain that had not yet healed remained.

“Hell and heaven are not far apart.”

Terran’s expression turned bitter. He had realized all too early that hell was absolutely not a place one goes only after death. It appears in various forms – as spaces, times, people.

And among them, the most terrifying hell was himself.

“I like Grace when she’s dreaming. James, I’d like you to support Grace’s dreams too.”

“Understood, Your Grace.”

With that, James finally acquiesced to Terran’s words.

* * *

Maddox and his subordinates had procured the most luxurious carriage and were lying in wait near the duke’s residence.

“Has anyone seen the duke’s fiancée?”

Maddox asked his men. Neither he nor even Rapha, the organization’s leader, knew what the Courtois Duke’s fiancée looked like.

“How would guys like us ever get a chance to see such a noble lady?”

“That’s true. I did get a proper look at the Courtois Duke though.”

When he had come to get medicine, how shocked he had been to see the duke.

His first impression of him was that of a massive black eagle.

Normally, one can gauge a person’s emotions by looking at their eyes, but in the duke’s eyes, there was only deep darkness.

So it was absolutely vital that this operation not be traced back to Rapha’s organization.

“Boss Maddox, over there…!”

One of the subordinates pointed at a carriage leaving the duke’s residence. Through the open window, the face of a young woman could be seen.

“Is that her? Follow them discreetly for now.”

“Yes, sir.”

A carriage bearing the ducal coat of arms, and a young, beautiful woman looking out the window.

Though further confirmation was needed, he had a feeling that woman was the duke’s fiancée.

“Boss Maddox, I have a great idea. We can kidnap that woman without much effort, I tell you.”

“What is it?”

The subordinate excitedly explained his plan to Maddox.

Soon, a smile spread across Maddox’s face.

He had been worrying about how to capture the woman who had just gotten out of the carriage in broad daylight without her knowing anything, but now it seemed they could finish the job easily without any ugly scenes.

“You clever bastard!”

Maddox laughed heartily.

* * *

Lea and Pauline alighted in the city center.

“Please come back here by 4 o’clock.”

Pauline made a time arrangement with the coachman and then approached Lea. The two were in a state of great excitement at the thought of starting a new business.

“We’ll make Chainer’s lace into a luxury brand.”

“It would be too unfair if only noble ladies could buy it.”

“Hmm, it should be priced so that ordinary women can buy it if they save up.”

“Miss, what if we put a trademark on the lace?”

“A trademark?”

“Since it’s Chainer, how about a ‘C’ with a sparkling wing-like decoration?”

“That’s a good idea, Pauline.”

Lea and Pauline clapped their hands together and laughed out loud. Somehow, they had a good feeling that everything would go smoothly.

But that feeling was very short-lived.

The two met with a broker and looked at several shops. Since they were starting small for now, they didn’t need a big store.

However, there was no place where the rent, size, and location were satisfactory. Even if they sold the lace well, they would be at a loss after paying the rent.

But they couldn’t open a shop in the outskirts with no foot traffic either. Lea knew that better than anyone.

“If it’s money, the Duke will support you as much as you need.”

“It’s meaningless if I start with Terran’s money.”

Lea wanted to achieve things one by one on her own, even if it was with a small amount of money.

She couldn’t forget what Terran had said when he took her to the chapel and showed her the necklace.

[If you really have confidence, you don’t need this. It probably contains wisdom that merchants have gained through repeated failures. But if you don’t actually face and experience failure or success yourself, this is useless. Just blindly following it won’t lead to success.]

His words were absolutely right. Foolishly, she too had believed that if she just found her father’s memorandum, she would succeed right away.

But as he said, without actually trying it herself, it had no meaning.

‘I’ll take out the memorandum when a crisis hits.’

“Miss, I’m hungry. My legs hurt so much too.”

They had been walking all morning, so of course it was tiring. Lea felt sorry for dragging Pauline around aimlessly.

“Shall we go to a café and have some dessert?”

“Yes! Please!”

Even just finding a shop location takes so much effort and legwork.

‘Nothing is easy.’

Lea felt anew how amazing her father had been. After having tea and dessert at a café, the two came outside.

“Miss, it’s already 4 o’clock.”

Lea looked at the clock on the distant bell tower. It seemed best to finish up for today. Soon, the duke’s carriage would come to the meeting place to pick them up.

Just then, Pauline pointed at something she saw ahead.

“Oh! There’s our carriage.”

“How did they know we were here?”

‘Huff! Terran is too suspicious.’

It was obvious. Worried about letting them out alone, he must have told someone to follow them discreetly from a distance.

“It’s good timing since my legs were hurting.”

“That’s true, but…”

The carriage had already pulled up in front of them, and the coachman hurriedly got down and opened the door.

‘The smell is strange.’

Pauline was startled by the scent wafting from inside when the coachman opened the door.

It wasn’t a smell that had been in the carriage when they rode earlier. But it looked like the duke’s carriage in every way.

“Oh! Wait a moment, I left my parasol at the café. I’ll be right back. Miss!”

Pauline stopped as she was about to get into the carriage with Lea.

“Okay, I’ll wait here, so hurry back.”

“Yes.”

Pauline immediately returned to the café, and the coachman with his hat pulled low opened the carriage door.

“Not yet, Pauline hasn’t come back.”

Lea didn’t get into the carriage, waiting for Pauline to return.

“You can… wait inside.”

“Should I?”

Lea got into the carriage.