Ranslet, observing Clad’s expression, which seemed displeased with his wife going out, slowly lifted the corners of his mouth.

Oh, that’s right.

“It seems like Madam feels ‘frustrated.’ It’s time for this mansion to be ‘frustrating.’ How many months has it been since you came here? Judging by how you keep going to the chapel, it seems you want to get some fresh air. A ‘frustrated’ guy. You don’t understand a woman’s heart, considering you don’t know a speck about it.”

“Don’t tease.”

“At least about women. I know better than you.”

Staring at the baggage car heading towards the White Forest beyond the iron fence, Clad, who had been gazing, threw the documents on the table to Ranslet as if he were throwing them into his arms.

“Even if you don’t know women well, I know my wife better.”

“Oh. Wife?”

Ranslet’s face suddenly brightened, and the lips that were smiling brightly split apart on both sides.

“…….”
“Wife? My wife? When did you, like a sick crow… bothersome… say to take me away? And now it’s ‘my’ wife?”

“Noisy. Get out.”

“If you can’t be affectionate at night, treat me well during the day, right? So, we’ve gotten quite close now. Admit that my advice has been quite effective?”

Ranslet, who was trying hard to force a smile with a single smile, turned his head abruptly towards Clad, who seemed to dislike it, and spoke again.

“Don’t you have a gift from Madam? If you come, you should bring something when you go.”

It was about the western annex.

Seeing that Clad, who didn’t respond, had a hint of red energy around him, Ranslet smirked and left the bedroom.

Judging by the reaction, there seemed to be no need to worry.

Ranslet, leaving the mansion, gave instructions to the attendant waiting outside the fence to always check if the Crown Princess was uncomfortable or needed anything at the chapel and then promptly mounted his horse.

Suddenly, looking at the black mansion from a distance felt strange.

Although it was a very small corner on the left, the fact that one place had regained its red color made the hope that something would change in the future shimmer like waves hitting the ankle.

That day’s lunch.

Yuan, who was waiting for Yuan, who had unexpectedly suggested to wait for Yuan, stared at him with wide eyes when he heard the unexpected suggestion.

“Territorial inspection?”

Busy fingers that were spreading newly picked herbs in the western annex courtyard to dry subtly slowed down when Yuan muttered with a blank face.

“Territorial…”

When Yuan muttered with a dazed face, Clad quietly said a word.

“So, don’t go for water tomorrow.”

“Territorial inspection…”

“Lady, Lady, since I sang a song, how about playing the role of a lady once?”

“So, is this our first date… something like that?”

Clad, who had been watching her quietly or snapping at her all the time, looked at Yuan with a sparkling eye that had started to flash subtly.

The face that was raised towards him contained expectations.

… It was a disaster.

Yuan talked all day about the territorial inspection.

Clad, who had always seen her being either quiet or irritable, kept quiet and watched her with a face that looked forward for the first time.

Yuan Pelleas seemed to have greater expectations for his territory than Clad.

“I’ve never actually gone into the village. Even when I borrowed the baggage cart last time, I couldn’t see it because I borrowed it at the entrance to the forest path leading to the village. Actually, even if I could see it, I wouldn’t have had the mind to see it….”

“Do you need to be that excited? It’s just a village tour.”

Yuan blinked her big eyes at his nonchalant reaction.

With a grumbling response, she quickly lowered her eyes.

“I’ve never done something like a village tour.”

The courtyard of the annex, where her rambling voice disappeared, became silent.
Clad, with his fists clenched, stood diagonally, looking down at Yuan, who was already handling the herbs.

“I’ve been at the Pelleasse Mansion since I was very young. Something similar to a village tour was when Compani Marquis gave me earmuffs and gloves because I looked cold when I came here. I stopped by the village briefly to see them. I even stayed at the inn there.”

Yuan scratched his cheek, remembering the day when his consciousness went blank due to Louise’s death, and Clad remained silent.

Although he had evacuated to the black mansion for the past 10 years, Clad, from a very young age, traveled around the country with the men of the Marquis of Lev and sometimes with his father, the reigning emperor.

Since enrolling in the academy, during vacations, he sometimes traveled around neighboring countries with Ranslet Lev.

Although he closed his eyes for 10 years, the landscapes and people he had seen in his youth did not disappear from his memory.

Monsters coming down from the north.

Vast wheat fields to the east.

Endless deserts to the west and warm coastal areas to the south.

Even though pieces of memories of both big and small events from there were embedded in this black mansion, they occasionally brightened his heart.

Of course, not going outside for the past 10 years made the memories hellish at times, but generally, it was like that.

“…Nothing special.”

Yuan raised his head to look at him with a slightly saddened expression at the low voice that cut through the clattering sounds.

“If I had stayed home, I wouldn’t have had to suffer like this. I wish I could go back.”

A very slight sadness appeared in his big, black eyes.

Clad didn’t know why Yuan was feeling sad about his awkward comfort, so he closed his mouth for a moment, swelled up for a while, and shed a swollen tear.

“Still, I want to go…”

The woman, who had been pinching her lower lip and holding back tears, replied in a locked voice.

“Don’t leave me behind and take me with you. You said you’d take me with you.”

A voice with very faint resentment.

Clad slowly blinked his eyes and eventually let out a sigh of disappointment rising from below his throat.

The sound made the woman lower her head again, perhaps interpreting it as something else, even though she was already crouched down.

The white fingertips playing with the herbs trembled.

Clad pressed down the low laughter trying to escape between his lips, suppressed it, erased his expression, and reached out, grabbing Yuan’s wrist and pulling it up.

Yuan, who had been weakly dragged along, didn’t have the courage to look up at his face, so she buried her face deeply in his broad chest.

Instead of pushing her away, Clad made a proposal.

“Tell me what you want to do when you go out.”

The face buried in his chest went deeper into it in response to the low laughter trying to escape between his lips.

Clad made a proposal, holding back the laughter.

“If it’s embarrassing to say it out loud, you can write it down.”

Yuan, who had reddened eyes for a long time, nodded with a very small gesture.
Blushing, Yuan made a very small gesture of nodding her head as she nestled into his arms.

A short and slow breath poured out once again above her clean philtrum.

The low resonance that began from Clad’s chest tapped her cheek.

Yuan momentarily held her breath, slowly lifted her head, and looked up at him.

Clad was smiling faintly.

It wasn’t a coincidence.

It wasn’t mockery either.

For some reason, perhaps because of her, Clad smiled briefly.

Like a child caught doing something wrong, Yuan buried her face in his arms again.

‘The Lord… smiled.’

Her face felt too hot, and her neck felt itchy, making it an unbearable sensation.