Lea was dragged to the police station by the officers.

No matter how much Pauline ran over and protested to them, it was of no use. They simply repeated that they were following orders from above.

Pauline began to cry as she watched Grace being dragged away by the officers, and Lea tried to reassure her.

“There must be a misunderstanding. Tell Terran.”

“Y-yes, I will.”

With that, Pauline took a carriage and headed to the duke’s residence.

Meanwhile, Lea was taken somewhere in the officers’ carriage. It was a gloomy place with no light, somewhere she never thought she’d have any connection to in her lifetime.

Above the high red brick walls, a haphazard wire fence was erected. It seemed to be to prevent prisoners from escaping.

‘Me, attempted murder? What on earth is going on?’

No matter how she thought about it, the situation made no sense.

However, as she entered the dark, narrow hallway, fear washed over her.

The light bulbs dangling precariously from the ceiling looked as if they might fall on her head at any moment.

Even those were few and far between, so she had to follow closely behind the officer in front or risk getting lost.

“Excuse me, there seems to be some misunderstanding. I’ve never tried to kill anyone.”

Lea kept explaining to the officer, trembling with fear. But the officer gave no reply and just kept walking silently, looking straight ahead.

Lea’s teeth chattered with cold despite her thick coat. The prison was colder than outside, probably due to the distinct chill of shaded areas.

Suddenly, the officer stopped and opened a prison door at the end of the corridor.

“Go in.”

The officer gestured inside the cell with his hand.

Lea was shocked at the sight of the prison. It was like a monster waiting with its mouth open for its prey to enter.

The room was pitch black, with only a candle on the wall for light. Even the small window that let in a bit of light had black iron bars.

“You mean in there?”

Lea asked again in disbelief. Had she committed a crime serious enough to be dragged to such a place? No matter how much she racked her brain, she couldn’t remember anything like that.

“Go in.”

The officer replied in a stiff, businesslike tone, like a machine.

Lea dragged her heavy feet and stepped inside. The door slammed shut, and immediately she heard the sound of a lock being engaged from outside.

“!?”

Lea immediately began pounding on the door and shouting.

“Please! Let me out! I’m not a criminal!”

Lea cried out in terror, but no one listened to her pleas.

Just then, a rat appeared from a corner of the cell, squeaking and glaring at Lea.

“Eek!”

She pressed herself against the wall in shock, as if she’d encountered a monster.

Only then did she truly see the inside of the cell. A narrow plank with a single blanket was all there was. Suddenly, her father came to mind.

‘Is Father locked up in a place like this right now?’

She snapped back to her senses. Perhaps someone was trying to remind her not to lose sight of her goal.

A moment later, there was a commotion outside. The sound of multiple footsteps approached and stopped in front of her cell.

‘Who could it be?’

The loud clanking of the lock being opened echoed. Soon, the door swung open.

Lea instinctively clutched at her coat.

But the man standing in the doorway was none other than Terran. Dressed in uniform with a black cloak, Terran filled the doorway and then some.

“Terran…”

Lea called out to him in a dazed voice. Her eyes shimmered with tears of fear.

He strode towards Grace, looking only at her.

“Did you enjoy running away from me?”

Terran’s voice was icy cold. Like the chill emanating from the prison walls.

“I didn’t run away… I came back, didn’t I?”

“How dare you even think of leaving me behind?”

His anger was so great, he seemed unlike the man she had known until now. The candlelight reflected in his black eyes looked like flames of fury.

“Can you imagine how betrayed I felt, Grace?”

His unfamiliar demeanor was unsettling. At this rate, she might even die by Terran’s hand.

“You were living comfortably at the Brassel Hotel and went to a banquet hosted by Allen MacDowell. Even though I was in Galdensia, you calmly faced that man, ate food with him, and even smiled at him.”

Terran spoke in great detail, as if he had been there himself.

‘He had me followed.’

As expected, he wasn’t the type to let things slide.

She had been uneasy that he hadn’t pursued her, but it turned out he had been monitoring her in other ways.

“You were spying on me?”

“Not spying, protecting.”

In that moment, Lea began to understand the current situation bit by bit. The person who had imprisoned her was none other than Terran.

“You did this ridiculous thing because you’re angry with me?”

If that was the case, he must be out of his mind.

“Ridiculous, you say?”

Instead, Terran shouted at Grace, and she flinched in surprise.

“I almost died because of you.”

“!?”

So that’s why he had imprisoned her on charges of attempted murder. Terran stepped closer to Grace and cupped her face.

“You don’t believe it, do you?”

“Believe what?”

“That I suffered enough to die because of you.”

“I’m sorry, I was out of my mind after meeting the Empress and forgot for a moment that you were ill.”

“The illness doesn’t matter. But you must never forget me. I wanted to die missing you after you left me behind. Don’t you understand yet? My heart was scorched black searching desperately for you.”

Terran’s face was a mix of anger, love-hate, and desperate love.

But Lea shed tears, resenting him for only speaking of his own pain. If they were to talk about unfairness, she had plenty to say as well.

“Don’t you remember how much you hurt me? You revealed all your feelings for the Empress right in front of me. Do you think my heart was intact when I begged the Empress for your sake?”

Lea roughly brushed off his touch. If they were to assign blame, the order was all wrong.

“The Empress is just a friend to me, nothing more. There was talk of engagement between our parents when we were young, but even that wasn’t my wish.”

“You said she was your first love!”

“When I was eight years old. What meaning could those feelings have now?”

“But you kept calling her Vivian and longing for the Empress at every turn!”

As Lea continued to shed tears, Terran embraced her tightly. He should stop using such shallow tricks now.

“I did it on purpose to see if you loved me. If you were jealous, it meant you had feelings for me.”

‘Ha! Just to confirm such a thing…!’

Lea was so angry at Terran that she tried to push him away. But her weak strength was no match for his embrace.

The more Lea struggled, the tighter Terran held her. Then, an incredible statement came from his lips.

“I like you. No matter what you look like. Even if you’re not in your current form. What I want is not your body, but your soul.”

Lea, who had been struggling, suddenly stopped.

To think she would hear the words she had longed for in such a situation.

Until now, she had felt burdened, no, guilty, about being loved as the fake Grace.

But he had clearly said it. That he liked her soul, not her body.

She felt the complicated emotions in her mind disappear in an instant. Along with it, her resentment towards him vanished without a trace.

“Is it okay for me to like you, Terran? Can I like you freely, without feeling guilty or being cautious?”

Terran felt pain in his chest at Grace’s words, as if they were stabbing him. He couldn’t understand why she had been cautious and felt guilty, but it upset him.

It must be because she still couldn’t forget his callous behavior in the past.

“You must like me. Otherwise, I won’t let you out of this prison.”

“Is that a threat?”

“I can do worse than threaten. I almost died because of you.”

Lea’s violet eyes sparkled like jewels, wet with tears. She kept moving her lips silently, then spoke as if exhaling a held breath.

“Kiss me, Terran.”

The woman begging for a kiss with mysteriously shining eyes was so beautiful it felt unreal.

Terran immediately pressed his lips to Grace’s. As her arms wrapped around his neck, the two pressed their bodies closer together.

It was a hot and passionate kiss, as if unleashing all their pent-up love-hate and longing. Lea finally realized.

That love is not an emotion that can be suppressed or refused by enduring or rejecting it.

‘I like your soul too.’

Although he was full of scars, twisted, and sometimes shockingly extreme, she liked him.

Terran devoured Grace’s lips hungrily, like a baby starved for milk.

In truth, he wanted to tell Grace he “loved” her. But it was his last bit of will to protect against those who would envy his sweet happiness.

A happy life that had never been given to him. He had heard that the god of fate is very jealous and always looking for a chance to give trials. So he intended to cherish and treasure it.

At last, the long kiss ended, and the two savored the gentle waves of sensual emotion that followed.

“Don’t test me anymore from now on.”

“I won’t.”

He felt ashamed for naively following Luke’s advice and not hesitating to do such childish things.

“Will we be able to protect this feeling we have in the future?”

Lea felt overwhelmed to the point of fear.

“We must protect it, no matter what.”

In the past, he thought people only died from war, famine, disease, and poverty.

But now he knew that love could devastate the soul and cause heartache from longing. He had experienced it firsthand. In severe cases, one could even die from it.

“Grace, if you want to live, love me.”

This man who could never make a romantic confession, clumsy and rough as he was, she liked him.

‘I want to live too. I’ll do my best, even if I don’t know when this luck will end.’