‘Yes.’

Only after seeing his own body gradually crumbling down, did he find the answer to the question that had been unresolved.

‘Perhaps, I love you.’

Eventually, Duke Valige threw his body into the abyss where Lina had fallen.

(This is a time separator.)

‘What…?’

Suddenly seeing the fading ground, it seemed as if his mind went blank.

The endlessly tumbling body. The sharp wind brushing against his cheek and the hair flying in it.

Ah.

Only then did Lina realize. She was falling down the cliff. But what was even worse was,

‘I can’t use magic…!’

It felt like the water in a cup, always full, was empty. No matter how she chanted, nothing changed.

‘What should I do? At this rate…!’

The desperate cry of the Duke faintly seemed to reach her ears, but she couldn’t respond. Soon the icecold river water engulfed her body.

Splash.

The sound of cutting through the water was heard, and her body helplessly fell into the water.

A ringing in her ears, along with the icecold water, stabbed into her body like a knife.

‘I can’t breathe.’

Barely flailing, she came up to the surface but, without a chance to take a proper breath, she was submerged again.

The rapid river water, swollen by the rain, was beyond her control.

‘Please.’

She had to get out of the water using magic. But she couldn’t even breathe properly as endless water rushed in every time she opened her mouth.

She tried to struggle out of the water, but as if something heavy was attached to her ankle, her body kept sinking.

‘Someone, please…’

As the last breath she was barely holding escaped her lips, air bubbles rose and disappeared above her face.

Lina thought, with her consciousness gradually fading,

‘Am I dying?’

No. She wouldn’t die. It would just be painful.

Just as it had always been, if she closed her eyes for a moment, everything would end.

As it had always been.

Lina stopped struggling, giving up as if she had abandoned everything. And as she felt her body slowly sinking, the moment she closed her eyes,

‘Light…?’

As if the sun was rising in the water, a small light illuminating her dark vision was gradually approaching her.
Is he seeing an illusion? Somehow, that light feels familiar.

‘Warm.’

The light that approached closely wrapped her body warmly, as if to protect her.

Two firm hands that wrapped her cheeks grabbed her face and lifted it up.

And then.

Over Lina’s lips, pale and frozen cold, hot flesh overlapped.

The warm breath entering through slightly parted lips opened her blocked airway.

With the unfamiliar sensation mixed in her mouth, Lina, whose consciousness had returned, slowly opened her eyes.

‘…Duke…sir?’

Even in her blurry vision, the brilliant eyes of the man were clearly imprinted in her mind, just like the sun illuminating the darkness.

Standing at the crossroads of life and death, she had no strength to refuse. So, Lina closed her eyes, like grabbing a rope descended from heaven, and entrusted her body to him.

In the silence, as if time had stopped.

The two were sharing each other’s breaths.

As if they were the only two that existed in this world. Very desperately.

(This is a time separator.)

“Is it time yet?”

Count Harlen asked the knight beside him, but the answer that came back was the same.

“Yes. It seems like they’ve been swept further away than we thought.”

“Sigh…….”

The count moaned lowly as if he was dismayed.

The Duke was missing.

And they couldn’t even verify if he was alive or dead. The current was too fast, and the Cuerfit River was quite long.

“How could this have happened…….”

“The Duke will be safe.”

Facing Count Harlen, who was clutching his head and sighing, Lawrence spoke.

“He’s someone who has come back alive from war at a young age. He will definitely be waiting for us somewhere.”

During the years on the battlefield, there had been many threats to the Duke’s life.

Enemy blades had sharply grazed the nape of his neck, and people he had trusted for a long time had stabbed him in the back.

And the Duke had bravely survived those moments of crisis, without hesitation, cutting down those who had aimed for his life.

‘He’s so robust, he can’t be in trouble just from falling into the water.’

Lawrence didn’t have a single doubt that the Duke was safe. Rather, what worried him was something else.

‘Why?’

He had clearly forbidden entrance as it was dangerous.

Lawrence could not understand the situation just before. The Duke he had watched for a long time was someone whose desire for life was stronger than anyone else’s.

‘But to jump into the river to save a maid.’

When he discovered the Duke throwing himself off a crumbling cliff to save a maid, Lawrence had shouted at the Duke, but to no avail.

The two of them had already tumbled down into the river.

It was doubtful whether it was the same person he had protected since the battlefield. He already knew that the maid was a special existence to the Duke.

‘But to this extent.’

“Sigh—”

As Lawrence was letting out a low sigh, grappling with a headache of a problem, someone violently stormed into the tent. And Lawrence’s eyes widened when he saw him.

“You…!”