Before Estelle returned from the auction house.

Johan was looking at a teddy bearshaped cookie.

‘It’s really just an ordinary cookie.’

But he had placed a preservation spell on that common cookie, something he hadn’t even used in a deal with a demon.

‘Because Estelle gave it to me.’

But a demon is evil born from chaos.

It never moves without reason.

‘What in this cookie is…….’

Johan, after analyzing it in various ways, eventually popped the teddy bear cookie into his mouth.

It tastes ordinary.

‘Really nothing[—]’

Then, his vision blurred, and soon it went completely dark.

‘Could it be poison?’

Johan fell asleep on the sofa as if falling into sleep.

Only different sensations were vivid in the pitchblack darkness.

The chill that enveloped his whole body and the sound of chains clashing. He realized where he was.

It was the prison where he had been trapped in his childhood.

‘I’m sorry.’

A gentle voice came to his ears.

‘It must have been painful. Are you struggling too much now?’

The more he heard that voice, the more choked he felt.

‘Hang in there. You can do it. If you endure now, you can surely succeed in revenge.’

Who is the owner of this voice?

‘You can bring down the Libertan Duke’s house, which now looks great, and do what you want.’

The more he thought about the voice, the more his head ached as if shrouded in fog.

‘When you leave this prison, there’s someone to help you. Someone to care for you and stand by you and be loyal to you. So it will be hard, but please endure.’

But one thing came to mind.

‘This is…… what I used to repeat to myself when I was struggling.’

He thought it was a selfconstructed consolation, but it had been someone’s comfort.

‘It would be really good if my warmth could reach you.’

The voice became faint enough not to be heard.

‘Johan. Wait a little. Soon[—]’

That was the last, and the sensation in his body slowly began to return to reality.

Tingling[—] A mysterious heat that started from his fingertips wrapped around his body. But only the sensation came back; the body did not move.

Then something incomprehensible happened again.

‘The ring of guardianship has returned?’

The ring of guardianship he had completely destroyed to save Estelle.

That precious magic that could never be brought back without a deal with a demon was returning to Johan.

Apparently, he was unable to move his body because the ring of guardianship was being restored.

‘Can this happen?’

Johan calmly sorted out what he had just been through.

‘Everything happened with my wife’s cookie.’

It’s not poison or magic or black magic.

It was a feeling as if awakening exactly forgotten sensations.

So the moment he heard the voice, Johan was quite taken aback that he had forgotten such a thing.

Even if it was something from childhood, there was no way Johan could have forgotten the memory of being trapped at that time.

‘Unless an unknown force erases my memory…….’

Numerous questions branched out.

‘……Estelle, you.’

Knock, knock.

“Johan. Are you sleeping?”

Just then, as if she had been waiting, Estelle knocked on his office door.

Johan’s sensations hadn’t returned fully yet, so he couldn’t move.

But he felt Estelle cautiously approaching.

“He’s really handsome…….”

Sitting in front of him, Estelle whispered in admiration.

Johan, who didn’t know he was awake, and was gently touching his face, looked adorable.

‘I want to pounce on her.’

If only he could move, he would have opened his eyes and teased Estelle right away.

‘She would’ve reacted with an incredibly cute expression.’

At the moment when his eyelids began to quiver,

“I missed Johan so much today. Even when I went outside, I kept thinking about you.”

What did she say?

“Johan. Maybe I…….”

Estelle, holding her breath, finally spat out in a soft voice,

“I think I love you.”

His heart dropped with a thump. Johan was very annoyed that he couldn’t move right away.

‘I should have seen her face when she confessed.’

He had to grab her, corner her, and delve into her sincerity right away.

If he missed this moment, Estelle, who thoroughly kept her boundaries, would hide again.

‘Damn it. Why isn’t it moving…….’

The swirling questions didn’t matter at all anymore.
Estelle, who had been fidgeting for a moment, scurried out of the office.

Johan thought about Estelle’s confession.

‘I think I love you, I think I love you, I think I love…’

Barely able to get up, Johan brushed his smooth face.

“…Estelle, do you love me?”

He felt a fluttering sensation for the first time, filling his whole body.

“She says she loves me.”

Johan placed his hand on his pounding heart and blushed.

It wasn’t the first time he had received a confession.

Being the most eligible bachelor in the empire, Johan had been courted by numerous women. This was true even before he became the Duke of Blanchet.

Regardless of wealth or status.

Johan, naturally handsome, was always popular with women.

Honestly, no woman’s confession had ever moved him. It even seemed laughable.