As I lifted my head, the silvery hair shimmered like jewels under the moonlight seeping in.

Casius’s captivating blue eyes gently curved.

Casius, with me reflected in those eyes, lifted the corners of his mouth in a decadent manner.

It was a dazzling smile I was seeing for the first time since becoming Vivian.

I was confused.

‘How could someone who glared at me as if he wanted to kill me at the banquet hall have such an expression.’

Moreover, what could be the reason he came all the way here alone without even bringing Tikan along?

Marianne, who was waiting in front of the door, also looked startled, merely reading the room.

Though she did firmly close the door with her mouth agape when Casius entered.

In the space where only the two of us remained.

He still faced me with an indiscernible gaze.

It was a completely different appearance from when he was at the banquet hall for the coronation ceremony.

Was it because we were together in an enclosed space? Or was it because his current appearance was totally different from usual?

I naturally recalled him visiting the Crown Princess Palace some time ago.

The image of Casius’s back as he boldly entered the Crown Princess Palace, stirred things up as he pleased, and left as if nothing happened overlapped like smoke.

What kind of ridicule was he trying to pull this time?

I yearned for him to come more than anyone, but Casius being completely different from my expectations suffocated me.

One step.

As Casius narrowed the distance, I reflexively took a step back.

‘If you have something to say, just say it. Don’t claw at me like last time.’

“I thought you wouldn’t come after leaving the coronation hall alone, so what brings you here?”

My leaking voice was firm. It was an instinctive self-defense that was unintentionally executed.

However.

“Why else would I come. I came to see you.”

A voice so affectionate it gave me goosebumps, just like what I used to hear from Rachel.

‘Did I mishear something?’

The doubt was quickly extinguished.

Casius’s gaze as our eyes met was meltingly tender, like how he sometimes appeared in my dreams.

His eyes were saying it. The voice I heard just now was real.

My gaze wandered aimlessly, losing direction.

But like a game of tag, when I ran away, I was caught, and when I ran away again, I was caught once more.

His large hands eventually grasped both my cheeks, lifting my head to look at him.

“Where are you looking? I’m right here.”

Perhaps it was due to the closeness where even the sound of my heavy heartbeat could be heard, but my heart fluttered on its own.

His gaze, imbued with who knows what thoughts, quietly observed me.

Soon after, an unbelievably gentle touch caressed my hair.

That sensation of him brushing it behind my ear sent a tingling feeling shooting to my toes.

An unfamiliar glimmer I was seeing for the first time hung over his neat eyes that held not a shred of hesitation.

A unique sensuality contained within enveloped me.

“Looks like you didn’t miss me?”

How was I supposed to react? In that frozen moment, his low voice coiled into my ear.

“I can’t go a day without you though.”

The moist undertone in his voice seemed so sincere that it constricted my breath even more.

How much was he planning to make me fall this time by giving me such hope?

“Then why didn’t someone like you even enter together with me?”

At my sharp reaction, he slightly furrowed his brows. As if he heard something he shouldn’t have.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

‘He doesn’t know? Then does that mean it wasn’t Casius who made me enter alone?’

Complicated thoughts tangled together, but there was no time to get caught up in them.

My body, gradually pushed back by his predator-like slow movements, crumbled and fell onto the bed.

With his gentle touch, the accessories were unfastened, my hair cascaded down, and my body was laid down.

The cozy blanket enveloping my body felt like a bed of thorns, making me squeeze my eyes shut.

The moment I opened my eyes again, Casius flooded my field of vision.

The affectionate gaze I was seeing after a long time, the softly raised corners of his mouth, the eyes curved as if finding me lovely.

‘What made you like this?’

Nevertheless, the desperation thicker than doubt made me turn a blind eye to the numerous suspicions rising from within.

On top of that, an arbitrary rationalization covered it.

Ah, the rumors about the devil of Winterdell must have finally reached your ears, so that’s why.

Right. You must have been moved a little too.

‘So that’s why you’ve come looking for me only now.’

Because if you were human, you wouldn’t be able to ignore a woman who betrayed even her own family to throw herself at you.

‘The slight intoxication added to your regret and gratitude must have drawn you here.’

That small hope quickly swelled in size within my heart.

Desperation put an end to the many doubts residing in my heart.

Reason blurred, and only emotions that glimmered sadly were piled on top, making me gaze at him.

Desperate sincerity turned into hope at a single touch of his hand, inflating.

That’s how I reached out towards Casius.

Beneath the shirt I stripped off with trembling hands, firm muscles stood out.

Perhaps because of the experience of being rejected before, my fingers shook as I unfastened the buttons.

In the meantime, the pairs of incense sticks Marianne had lit up displayed their true worth, letting me see every detail.

‘My appearance must be this vivid in Casius’s eyes too.’

Thinking that, my face suddenly felt hot.

Casius’s gaze as our eyes met quivered finely. But soon, as if seeing through my shaking heart, those eyes curved like a crescent moon.

“It’s troubling if you stimulate me like this.”

‘What stimulation did I give? He’s the one who stimulated me, so how can he say that.’

Feeling wronged, I opened my mouth to retort, but at that moment, Casius’s lips dug into my parted mouth.

The lips that roughly stirred my insides showed no intention of leaving.

When I panted for breath, he would supply the bare minimum amount of air very slowly, tightening his hold on me.

As if determined not to leave even a handful, his rough movements stirred me to my deepest depths.

A tingling energy whipped through my entire body, making my toes curl up on their own.

Such deep, profound, and rough movements were a first.

It was embarrassing yet felt good, and while it felt good, it was also hot.

Indescribable emotions strangely penetrated and rummaged through me.

The soft and mushy energy churned my insides like a tidal wave, snatching away all my breath.

Only at the end did his lips separate.

Half in longing, half in yearning, I lifted my head, and in that moment, his lips firmly pressed against my neck.

As I tilted my head back, his large hand gently supported it, and his hot breath touched the nape of my neck.

Once again feeling an unfamiliar sensation, my eyes widened in an instant.

He left a long and deep mark, digging into the delicate flesh.

Like a starved beast’s roar, a deep and strong feeling dominated my entire body.

The hot energy that dug in like shackles flowed down my pale nape.

Casius’s hand, coming to a precarious stop, rode up just like that.

At the end of his intently gazing eyes, a deep longing was etched.

“Beautiful.”

‘Beautiful? Where?’

I was genuinely curious but couldn’t ask because my face felt hot.

His eager touch teased me like it was trying to conceive a child, making my body tense up.

As the man’s immense presence touched me, my whole body gradually became tainted.

When the hot sensation brushed past, my legs unwittingly intertwined on their own.

“Wait a moment.”

I was burning up like this, but Casius looked fine.

I crossed my legs even more tightly, afraid that my lonely aching heart would be blatantly exposed.

It was embarrassing enough to drive me crazy, but it wasn’t bad.

He didn’t even retract his teasing touch.

My entire body felt like it was on fire, making it hard to endure.

He cornered me to the end like a predator herding its prey, then stopped doing anything further.

It was as if he was waiting for something.

I wanted to say something, but no words came out.

‘Whether I’m the only one feeling this way, and yet unable to sever this regret here…’

Feeling wronged, I bit my lip hard. The taste of blood came from where I bit.

In an instant, a gentle movement continued as if to wash away all the blood on my lips.

And finally, a hot presence surged in like a tidal wave.

Each time his soft breath, which didn’t suit him, hotly split the air, pain and rapture alternately rushed in.

At last, the end of the early climax.

Casius’s large hand grabbed my chin as if seizing it, making me lower my head.

Naturally forced to face him directly, Casius was clearly captured at that distance.

In his blue eyes rippling like the deep sea, I was tightly packed in.

Like the blue moon illuminating the sky.

*

At the end of the sleepless night, the sunlight seeped in, dazzlingly bright.

Casius looked so pretty collapsed in sleep that it was hard to take my eyes off him.

The eyelids concealing the pupils that persistently followed me, the long drooping lashes, the smooth slope of his nose as if sculpted…

My gaze flowed along them in order, lingering quite a while on his lips.

Then suddenly, one desperate fact brushed my mind.

‘Now I can rest assured looking at you.’

I completed the task of the contract and shared love, so wouldn’t all these curses be lifted?

Thinking about the times my heart had been anxious, nothing could be better.

Perhaps because I was so happy, a sense of unease abruptly rose.

‘Why hasn’t the contractor appeared yet?’

Usually, after fulfilling the conditions of the contract, the contractor would show up to undo the magic.

That guy needed to appear and say that Casius’s terminal illness was lifted for me to sleep with my legs stretched out.

‘Well, that will be resolved soon anyway.’

With that easygoing thought, I lifted my body.

In an instant, Casius’s eyelids lifted, revealing his blue pupils.

*

At the end of the long and deep night, fragmented sunlight stretched long through the window frame.

As soon as Casius woke up, he clutched his head that felt like it would shatter.

Where he lowered his gaze, a body wearing nothing was blatantly exposed.

‘What the…’

Sensing an ominous feeling, Casius’s eyes immediately turned to the opposite side.

There laid a woman peacefully asleep. No, a woman pretending to be asleep.

The intermittently exhaled unclear breaths informed him that she was awake.

The owner of those breaths was clearly the empress he so despised, Vivian Snowfel.

Casius couldn’t hide his anger.

Soon, a chilling voice eventually leaked out of his mouth.

“Stop acting now.”