Clea regretted it.

She should have completely ignored it instead.

She thought she should have gotten away from Oberon’s presence sooner.

At least while she was conversing with Admund, her condition was at its best.

Clearly, she felt less dizzy, and warmth could be felt in her once cold hands and feet.

But after exchanging a few words with Oberon, her mood, which had been at its peak, completely plummeted.

She belatedly managed to escape from that place.

But she was the only one who thought she had escaped. Somehow, Oberon was behind her.

“Since when have you been like this?”

Clea sat down, finding it difficult to walk further. She and Oberon were in a secluded spot.

Clea looked at Oberon before her.

Oberon’s gaze had changed from before.

The cold and fierce aura had somewhat softened, one might say.

‘Should I be glad?’

It seemed he wouldn’t press for more evidence. It might be better to take it positively that they had moved away from an uncomfortable topic of conversation.

After all, this was Oberon, who was notorious for never letting go once he became suspicious.

However, her mood was already at its worst.

“Would anything change if you knew?”

She never wanted to show such a side of herself to others again.

Although this was the first time she had shown blood like this, when she first showed weakness in front of others, she too had harbored some hope.

Perhaps their gaze towards her would be mixed with pity. She had hoped they would recognize that she too could feel pain just like anyone else.

But what came back was an even colder response, a seemingly delighted mockery.

Since then, Clea never showed weakness to others again.

She had learned that even if she showed weakness, others would never pity her.

“Is that what you should be saying right now?”

Oberon showed anger again.

It was a different kind of anger from the contemptuous gaze he had when they first met.

“Then what should I do?”

“I’ll call for the imperial physician immediately.”

“Bothersome.”

“Don’t end it with ‘bothersome.'”

Oberon had already taken out a white handkerchief and was wiping the blood from her mouth.

The blood she had spilled on the floor could be cleaned up by someone else later.

For now, prioritizing her, Oberon looked at Clea.

But Clea met Oberon’s gaze and asked.

“You mean it’s a waste to use high-quality personnel because of me?”

“What do you mean?”

“I wonder why our esteemed Philip, who’s been hailed as a genius, is pretending to be stupid.”

Oberon frowned.

His hand, which had been wiping her mouth, fell limply.

“Don’t worry about it. It’ll disappear on its own soon enough anyway.”

A moment of silence followed. Although they were just looking at each other without saying anything, a suffocating atmosphere was created.

As Clea had said, Oberon was no fool.

After mulling over her words, he soon realized what they meant.

“Is that why you left the Odoi family?”

“Odoi, Odoi. I’m tired of hearing that name now.”

She was sick of hearing that name constantly, even after leaving home to shake off her weariness.

She smiled brightly, along with the blood stains that hadn’t been fully wiped away.

Oberon’s heart sank at that smile spreading across her pale face.

“Tell me.”

Still, he was curious.

Nobles want to be valued in their families.

They hope to be recognized as members, receive appropriate treatment, and ultimately die bearing the family name.

At least, that’s how all the nobles he had seen were.

But Clea before him was different.

“Isn’t it cruel to be controlled by that damned family until the moment of death?”

“…”

“Think about it. Being manipulated like a doll by others and dying in a way that has nothing to do with my own will.”

Despite knowing her own physical condition with death looming, she seemed as relaxed as if it were someone else’s affair.

Although Oberon had received an answer from her, his curiosity was still not satisfied.

Rather, the more he heard, the more his mind seemed to fall into a complex maze, to the point where he wondered if he shouldn’t have asked at all.

“I should at least make one good memory.”

“…So that’s why you left the Odoi family?”

“You believe it now?”

Clea had been making consistent claims all along.

But it was only now that he heard the supporting evidence for her claims.

In fact, there were still many parts that Oberon couldn’t understand.

Nevertheless, his mind slowly began to accept it.

That this woman, Clea, was facing death and had truly abandoned the Odoi family.

“The person you loved was Lloyd Percy, wasn’t it?”

To this final question, Clea decided to answer kindly, just for today. More precisely, with the implication not to ask again.

“People aren’t such perfect beings. The Crown Prince over there, me, and you too, can all break down at any time.”

Broken down.

She described herself as having broken down.

“I’ve answered everything, so I suppose it’s alright if I borrow this?”

Clea took the handkerchief from Oberon’s hand.

The handkerchief slipped weakly from his hand.

In truth, he wasn’t concerned about the handkerchief at all right now.

Even as she took his handkerchief, Oberon found himself examining Clea’s expression.

“It would be best to keep this matter confidential from everyone.”

Including Admund.

With those final words, Clea moved her feet.

Oberon only followed her with his eyes.

As he watched Clea wiping the remaining blood stains with his handkerchief, Oberon felt something stifling in his chest.

“Can someone facing death be so at ease?”

Oberon was a person who never revealed his inner thoughts, no matter how unpleasant others might be.

Yet, uniquely in front of Clea, he felt his feelings couldn’t be hidden.

Oberon, who had sensed something strange about Clea as she wrote the note, felt the same emotion this time.

Looking at her, she seemed like someone who would disappear soon. Looking into her eyes, he felt an undeniable emptiness that couldn’t be false.

For some reason, unlike his usual self who constantly doubted everything, Oberon found himself naturally accepting it.

He couldn’t understand how she could be so different from the people he had been observing.

Was it because it was realistically impossible to fake coughing up blood with such perfect timing? Or was he instinctively feeling that it was the truth?

Oberon still stood there, unable to find answers to his emotions.

* * *

By the time evening came, almost all the papers that needed to be processed had disappeared from Admund’s desk.

He sighed and thought of Clea.

His mind was still telling him that a relationship with her was dangerous.

As Oberon had said, she was a person with a fiancé.

He could easily imagine someone pointing a finger at him, criticizing how a Crown Prince could steal another man’s woman.

But even so, Admund had no intention of letting Clea go.

‘That night wasn’t a coincidence.’

Meeting her again on the bridge after being drawn to her and going to the bedroom. And simultaneously bringing her into the imperial palace.

Admund could confidently say that these were all his decisions.

He was a person with a sense of responsibility.

He knew that if there was something he wanted to take, he should bear the corresponding responsibility.

“Oberon.”

He saw Oberon enter the office.

Oberon, who had seemed lost in thought all day, raised his head at Admund’s call.

Meeting his gaze, Admund asked him the same question.

Even though he felt the answer would be the same as before. Still, he wanted to make sure to draw in his own people first.

“If she abandons the Odoi name, would there be any problem if I take her?”

What would Oberon say here?

In Admund’s mind, there wasn’t particularly a problem.

If she had been cast out from the family, or if she had abandoned the family name, she would just become Clea.

Just Clea was not a noble, and therefore, the engagement with the Duke’s family would naturally become null and void.

But Oberon, who valued principles, would likely argue that one shouldn’t get close to someone who could potentially cause problems in the first place.

He had always been that way, and even when Clea said she had abandoned Odoi, he had continued to insist that she should be kept at a distance.

So he braced himself for the same answer this time as well.

However, he soon found it difficult to hide his surprise at Oberon’s nonchalant reply.

“If she truly gave up Odoi, who could say anything? However, I’m concerned about others’ perceptions.”

These words came from the mouth of the man who had been adamantly opposed until now.

Admund even doubted if this was the Oberon he knew.

Oberon spoke while maintaining eye contact with Admund.

“Are you prepared to take responsibility, Your Highness?”

There was something empty, yet dark in his eyes.

Admund was immediately concerned about his condition, but he pondered Oberon’s question.

Oberon quietly waited for the answer.

The answer came from Admund.

“I have no intention of letting her go from my arms.”

He had absolutely no intention of letting her go.

Hearing Admund’s answer, Oberon frowned.

Watching Admund smile, as if something was so amusing, Oberon contemplated whether to reveal what had happened today.

Normally, he would have surely told Admund everything he had seen.

However, because Clea had specifically asked him not to tell, he found it difficult to speak.

Even for Oberon, the scene he had witnessed today was so shocking that he couldn’t rashly step forward.

‘If Your Highness has made up your mind like that, I won’t interfere.’

Oberon too changed his mind.

But he could predict how the end would unfold for the two of them.

That prediction was quite tragic, and he bit his lip.

“Your Highness.”

“What is it?”

“…His Majesty has requested to dine together today.”

“His Majesty, you say?”

Unable to make a judgment, Oberon postponed the decision.