She tilted her head at the words Klaus, who was sitting casually across from her chewing on jerky, suddenly blurted out.

“What?”

“Your Highness must not be accustomed to long carriage journeys, yet you’re keeping up quite well.”

“It’s certainly… a forced march. Looking at how Margaret’s face has become so thin.”

As Donovan said, Margaret’s cheeks had become very gaunt over the past few days.

Although her conscience stung every time she saw her, Adel was barely hanging on.

After all, she couldn’t honestly tell them that she was receiving help from magic.

“Do you have some sort of trick?”

“Not really… I guess I’ve just built up a bit more stamina.”

At that moment, the sound of someone letting out a scornful laugh came from nearby. It was Joachim.

The knight, who had been cold since they first left Ansgar Castle, had been increasingly losing his manners whenever he encountered her lately.

Sometimes when their eyes met, he would even frown and avoid her gaze.

Although Donovan and Klaus glared at him, blaming him for his rudeness, Joachim passed by them with a cold face.

“With that temper of his. Don’t worry too much about it, Your Highness.”

“Thank you for your concern. I’m fine.”

She answered with an unperturbed face, but inwardly she was quite anxious.

Joachim was the eldest son of a family that had produced a High Priest.

Needless to say, he would have deep faith, and would have grown up familiar with holy power.

Being such a man, he might have noticed something about the recently changed Adel.

‘It doesn’t seem like he knows I’m using magic. If he did, he would have reported me to the Inquisitor in the villages we passed through already.’

But the thought of having to face that man all the way up to the capital made her heart sink.

Even if it was fine for now, there was no telling when she might be discovered.

For now, she had no choice but to believe Valentin’s words. That holy power and magic have the same origin and are difficult to distinguish…

‘Right. There’s no point in worrying about it now anyway.’

She blew on the warm herbal tea Donovan had handed her to cool it down, then took a sip. She immediately almost spit it back out.

“Ugh…”

Adel groaned, frowning intensely. It was good that her mouth felt warmed up, but it was so bitter it was hard to drink.

Seeing her expression, Klaus nodded as if he understood.

“It’s certainly not a tea meant for human taste buds.”

“It tastes terrible, but if you drink it consistently, it helps relieve fatigue and prevent colds. It’s a bit better with sugar or honey. But those aren’t items easily obtained at a campsite.”

Donovan added matter-of-factly.

“Even if it’s unpleasant, drinking it all will be helpful.”

It seemed the same tea had made a round among the soldiers sitting far away. The fragrant herb scent wafted over the campsite.

She took a few more sips out of courtesy and then put down the cup.

That’s when it happened. Suddenly, Donovan and Klaus quickly stood up from their seats.

Adel turned her head curiously, following their gaze. Emerging from the frost-covered forest was Valentin.

“Adelheit.”

He seemed to have returned from the forest bringing a cold chill with him. As Valentin approached, an eerie wind blew.

“You’re back?”

Valentin raised his lips as if he liked that greeting.

He looked at each of the people huddled together once, then lowered his gaze back to Adel.

Valentin’s cold hand touched her cheek, which had warmed up from the bonfire’s heat.

“Are you feel, ing alright? There’s somewhere I’d like us to go, together for a bit.”

“Somewhere to go?”

Adel looked around quickly. Where could they possibly go in this place surrounded by dark forest?

She continued in a reluctant tone.

“But I heard we have to leave as soon as the road is cleared. Is it alright to leave now? If it takes too long, it’ll delay everyone’s departure…”

“It won’t take long. There’s just something I want, to show you. No need for escorts.”

Donovan and Klaus, who had been gathering their weapons, put them back down at those words.

Adel looked once at the dark forest path he had walked from, then carefully took the hand he held out.

“The forest will be, cold.”

As he cupped her cheek with his rough hand, she felt the temperature around her suddenly rise. It was magic.

She wanted to look back to see what expression Joachim had, but instead she grasped Valentin’s hand and entered the forest.

He skillfully led the way. His figure striding through the dark forest path was both fascinating and chilling.

Adel, who had thoughtlessly been thinking he looked as if bewitched by some terrible monster, suddenly remembered Valentin’s true identity and let out an awkward laugh.

“Why?”

“Pardon?”

“What were you think, ing to laugh like that?”

“It wasn’t an important thought.”

“It’s import, ant to me.”

He continued again with a slightly gloomy face.

“What you’re thinking, if there’s any discomfort… if you’re in pain… I’m always anxious.”

“That’s.”

“Once this is over, we’ll shut ourselves away in that tiny fief you like.”

“Ansgar?”

He nodded his head heavily. Adel swallowed a laugh inside her mouth.

It was surprising enough that he could call the vast Ansgar a tiny fief, but it was even more surprising that Valentin’s plans had become so lazy.

She had thought he would be busily running around battlefields to be freed from the ‘deal’.

“Do you… dislike it?”

“What about fulfilling the contract? As you said before, you should be raising the name of the Grand Duke of Ansgar, shouldn’t you?”

“It should be fine to do that even when I become an old man. Raising one’s name… can be done anytime.”

He glanced down at her face.

“I want you to fully enjoy… life.”

His voice faded faintly in the sudden gust of wind that blew.

Adel was very curious about the words she couldn’t hear, but the path was too busy to ask about it. She silently followed by his side.

The forest path, which looked very dark and rough on the outside, was surprisingly easy to walk.

Faint fireflies seemed to light up her footsteps, and rocks and tree roots seemed to jump aside on their own.

‘Can magic do things like that too?’

Adel looked up suspiciously at Valentin, who was walking as elegantly as if this were a ballroom.

‘Rocks and trees were blocking the road so carriages couldn’t pass?’

It was hard to believe that the Thulea Road, which was patrolled in turns by three nearby families, could be so poorly maintained.

How likely was it that the only road cutting through Bitzleben would be so neglected in the first place?

“We’re here. This, is it.”

Just as Adel’s worries were slowly deepening, Valentin said as he lifted some withered tree vines.

He stepped aside as if telling her to go through first.

Adel carefully ducked under the vines. As she straightened up, the scene before her made her momentarily forget her words.

“…This is.”

It was a huge lake, unbelievable that such a place could exist here.

At the edge of the lakeshore where clear, clean water rippled, there was a large tree, and beneath it stood a small, old-looking cabin.

The moonlight was almost as bright as the sun.

Looking back, the tree vines that had been withered were now bursting with lush green vitality as if they had always been that way.

“I said it wouldn’t take long, didn’t I?”

He looked strangely excited yet unstable at the same time.

She also felt an odd sense of déjà vu. Some

“Where is this place?”

“It’s wonderful. Isn’t it?”

He evaded answering as if avoiding the question. But Adel was too distracted to point that out.

She carefully walked towards the cabin.

A white fence was wrapped around it like a strict barrier, and beyond it she could see a well-tended vegetable garden.

Greens, tomatoes, grapes and aged pumpkins… Fresh vegetables that didn’t match the season or timing hung abundantly in the garden.

While the rotting tools in nearby sacks and the dust-covered furniture made it look like a long-abandoned place, the plants alone were all lush and vibrant.

‘It’s as if time has stopped only here.’

She carefully walked along the outside of the fence, looking around the cabin.

Next to the garden, on a flat patch of ground, she saw a small grave. Judging by the small mound, it seemed to be the grave of a newborn or at most a two or three-year-old child.

‘It must have happened a very long time ago, but it still weighs on my heart.’

Adel tried to read the writing on the gravestone, but it was difficult to read clearly without crossing the fence.

By this point she should have given up and turned back, but for some unknown reason, an overwhelmingly strong desire to check that grave welled up inside her.

“Take your time, looking around.”

As if guessing her feelings, Valentin gently pushed her back.

Adel bit her lip, resisting the impulse.

“…No. We should go back. What if the owner comes while we’re trespassing?”

“…”

“Valentin?”

When she turned back slightly, Adel met Valentin’s unfamiliar gaze.

He was staring at her with an unusually cool, sunken face, but when Adel turned around, a smile finally returned to his lips.

“I wonder. It doesn’t seem like anyone’s here, so what’s the harm? It looks like it’s been abandoned for hundreds of… years.”

The corners of his mouth turned up into a handsome smile.

Adel felt as if he somehow wanted to confuse her mind with his face.

Knowing that she liked his smile and was weak to his appearance…

“Go in and look. If there’s a prob, lem, I’ll take responsi…bility.”

Strangely, those words made up her mind. Adel carefully reached for the latch on the fence gate.

Surprisingly, as soon as her hand touched it, the latch seemed to undo itself and fell to the ground.

“It, opened.”

“Well done. Go and look as much as you want.”

Adel carefully opened the gate and stepped inside.

Valentin, who she thought would follow right behind, was looking at her with an unfamiliar face from beyond the fence.

“Aren’t you coming in, Valentin?”

“Why don’t you in, vite me?”

He asked lightly as if joking.

“I don’t have that right. I’m not the owner of this place.”

“Still… try it. As if Adel were the owner of this place.”

“You want me to invite Valentin?”

“Would there be any, thing wrong with that?”

There was nothing wrong with it.

It wasn’t her house anyway, and she didn’t want to be alone in such a suspicious place to begin with.

Only then did she recall the superstition in the North that evil things cannot cross the threshold without being invited.

It was a bit silly and amusing.

While you had no problem breaking and crossing that sacred veil of Morrigan.

“If that’s the case, alright. If Valentin wishes, you may come in.”

Laughing like that, she didn’t even realize how completely his demeanor had changed.