Letia thought for a moment before opening her mouth with a smile.

“I need to check out the Grand Duke’s garden too. Would you like to join me, Kiyan?”

“No. I have things to do as well.”

“I see. Then I’ll see you later in the evening.”

Kiyan bowed gracefully to Letia and disappeared, and Letia spoke to the hesitant maids.

“Shall we go then?”

At that moment, Becky, the maid at the front, stepped forward.

“Your Grace. We need to go back and prepare dinner······.”

As Becky trailed off, Annie, another maid, also chimed in as if she had been waiting.

“The sun will set soon. So Your Grace should return as well.”

“Yes. The garden is in the same state, so there’s not much to inspect.”

Becky and Annie took turns speaking, pressuring Letia.

The expressions of the other maids also clearly showed they didn’t want to go any further.

But for some reason, Letia stubbornly insisted.

“I’ll be in charge of running the Grand Duke’s household from now on, so I need to inspect everything.”

“But······.”

“I understand you’re busy. Then I’ll go alone.”

“Pardon?”

“It’s fine. I can manage on my own.”

Leaving their mistress alone was obviously nonsensical, but the maids’ faces brightened. And Becky was the first to respond.

“Yes. Your Grace would be more comfortable alone.”

“Since you’re used to being alone, we’ll take our leave then.”

Becky and Annie subtly disrespected Letia as they added their final words.

“Don’t stay in the garden for too long.”

“The garden is less maintained than here, so it could be dangerous. You need to be careful.”

“Don’t worry.”

The maids ended up leaving Letia alone and quickly walked away.

As they did so, Becky and Annie whispered with slightly uneasy expressions.

“But isn’t the ground weaker near the garden? No one would have maintained that area. Especially that lake that was covered with soil.”

“We told her to be careful. She’ll manage. We clearly warned her.”

“Anyway, she’s wandering around a lot, probably because she was confined in the Marquis’ house for so long.”

Becky and Annie continued to gossip about Letia as they disappeared.

Letia watched the maids’ retreating figures before heading towards the garden.

The garden behind the mansion was in an even worse state than the front yard.

At least the front yard had some weeds and collapsed areas roughly cleared, but the garden was completely untouched, raw as it was.

She felt strangely bitter as she walked around the garden.

“Still, this was once the place where someone who wielded an honorable sword for Elmort resided.”

Seeing the ancient dust, damaged statues everywhere, and the garden overgrown with weeds, Letia closed her eyes for a moment, bowed her head, and paid her respects with a prayer.

She couldn’t let countless glories fade like this just because of one defeat.

‘I think I understand why he wants to perfectly raise the Harenclode family, even through a contract marriage.’

She too didn’t want to bring shame to the Harenclode name while staying here as the Grand Duchess.

Although there were no proper traces of General Takel left here, Letia whispered softly, recalling him.

“Though I am but a dimmed stone, I will do my best to make this place shine brightly again.”

‘You will become a jewel that shines brighter than anyone.’

Suddenly, as Kallion’s voice came to mind, Letia smiled faintly.

“Can I really do that?”

At that moment, she paused in her steps and looked down.

The ground felt increasingly sunken with each step.

As Letia looked around, her gaze stopped at one spot.

There was a small bridge, suggesting that there used to be a lake here long ago.

It seemed they had buried it with soil since they couldn’t maintain it.

‘Judging by the size of the bridge, it doesn’t seem to have been a very deep lake.’

Still, if she kept walking deeper, she could get hurt.

As Letia was about to turn back, she stopped in place, lost in thought.

Somehow her expression didn’t look right, and she turned back towards the bridge. Then her foot sank deeper than before, her body swayed greatly, and she completely collapsed downwards.

“Oop!”

Letia, who had fallen into the lake pit, let out a short scream and raised her head.

Around her were scattered soil and wooden pieces, suggesting they had roughly covered the top with wood and then covered it with soil, as it would take too much cost and time to fill it all with soil.

‘For a place called the Harenclode Grand Duke’s residence, to handle everything so carelessly.’

The pit wasn’t very deep, but it would be difficult to get out in her flowing dress.

“Haa. But there’s no choice.”

As she got up, she flinched for a moment.

Perhaps she had been hit by a pile of stones and wood pieces while falling into the pit, as blood was coming from her arm with quite a painful sting.

As Letia nonchalantly wrapped her arm and was about to look for a way out.

Thud−!

Thanks to someone jumping into the pit, the ground shook greatly once more.

Letia stared with wide eyes at Kallion standing in front of her.

“Your Grace? No. How did you······.”

But instead of answering, he approached her and wrapped one arm around her waist.

“Y-Your Grace?”

“Stay still.”

At his somewhat cold tone, Letia shut her mouth tightly.

As he pulled on the rope tied to his waist, someone above pulled on the rope, and Letia was lifted out of the pit in Kallion’s arms.

“Uuugh. Your Grace. If it’s such a physical task, you should have called someone else! I’m just an advisor! What strength do I have!”

Though he said that, there wasn’t a single drop of sweat on Kiyan’s face, showing no sign of difficulty at all.

Kallion ignored Kiyan and stared intently at Letia.

Letia felt her whole body tingling from his piercing gaze, even without looking directly at him.

“H-How did you come here?”

“Is that important?”

Though he just said one sentence, Letia couldn’t raise her head due to the chilling feeling. Then she suddenly looked up when she saw blood flowing from his arm.

“Are you hurt? Let me see.”

But Kallion hid his arm and pulled her hand.

There was a fairly deep wound on her arm as well.

“I’d like to know exactly what happened.”

“I was looking around the garden, and I didn’t expect this to happen.”

“Where are the maids? No, no need to say. Kiyan!”

Kiyan, who had been grumbling while cleaning up, quickly ran to Kallion.

“Bring all the maids here.”

“No!”

Letia stopped Kallion with a surprisingly firm voice.

“I’ll handle this myself.”

“What?”

“I have a justification now. A justification to bring in new maids as I wish.”

Kallion’s gaze darkened even more at the unexpected words.

“There are maids sent from the Imperial Palace, but if we say we’re bringing in new maids, they might nitpick that we don’t like the Imperial maids. But with this incident, we can say we lack manpower and bring in my own people to this house.”

“So you went knowing the ground was weak? Knowing you could get hurt?”

“I didn’t think I’d get badly hurt. And I thought I needed to move around this much.”

“Have you forgotten what I said? I told you that from now on, you must never get hurt.”

“It’s fine. It’s really nothing·····.”

“This is still an injury!”

Letia hesitated at Kallion’s unexpectedly excessive reaction. But Kallion gripped Letia’s hand even tighter.

“From now on, even this much is not okay. No matter what happens, never. Never get hurt.”

“······I understand.”

Kallion wanted to say something more, but he just took a deep breath and spoke briefly to Kiyan.

“Take the Grand Duchess back.”

“Yes, Your Grace.”

As Letia followed behind Kiyan, she worried about Kallion’s injury.

‘He’s hurt too. Is this really something to get so angry about? But how did he find me?’

She very cautiously asked Kiyan.

“Did you tell him I was here?”

“No, I didn’t even know Your Grace came here.”

“Then did he plant people around me?”

“I don’t think so?”

“Then how did he come here?”

Kiyan smiled knowingly and said.

“More importantly, take good care of yourself from now on, Your Grace. Your body is no longer just your own now.”

***

After Letia left, Kallion, left alone, furrowed his brow deeply and let out a frustrated sigh.

“She really takes her body too lightly.”

He had been concerned since she tore her dress or cut her hair without hesitation.

‘No. She didn’t care about her body from the first time we met.’

Kallion stared at his arm where the bleeding had stopped.

Letia hadn’t noticed in her surprise, but he had the exact same wound in the exact same place as her.

The moment she fell into the pit and felt pain, he felt the same pain.

This was the hidden secret of the contract between a direct imperial family member and a Gemma.

The blood of the imperial family could prevent a Gemma’s rampage thanks to the power of connection.

An imperial family member contracted with a Gemma could be the first to recognize the state of a rampaging Gemma and command them with the only voice the irrational Gemma could hear, suppressing the rampage.

It was as if they were connected to each other, and while physical pain inflicted on the imperial family member didn’t affect the Gemma, everything the Gemma experienced was transmitted to the contracted imperial family member.

Kallion was hiding the fact that he had contracted with Letia, so of course he had to hide this situation as well.

But in fact, Kallion liked this connection.

From now on, if Letia was in danger, he could be the first to react and look after her.

“I can be the first to protect you.”

Kallion looked at the landscape of the Grand Duke’s residence, which could be called a complete mess.

In fact, not only the residence but also the Grand Duke’s territory had problems.

During the 5 years he was away, the territory had become desolate, and most of the residents had left.

‘The Empress planned to completely crush and eliminate the Harenclode Grand Duke’s family.’

It was understandable that Letia was moving recklessly like this.

If he had his way, he would want to sweep everything away himself.

“For now, let’s watch.”

***

At Letia’s summons, all the maids had gathered in the Grand Duchess’s reception room.

They had heard that she had eventually been hurt in the garden, but Becky and Annie’s expressions were nonchalant.

“That’s why she should have been careful. We told her.”

“Right. We’re not at fault. It happened because she moved around recklessly.”

“She’s just a stone, a scarecrow Grand Duchess. What can she do?”

At that moment, the door of the reception room opened and Letia entered.

Again, Becky spoke first.

“Your Grace, we heard you were hurt······.”

“Wait.”

Letia murmured briefly with a smile.

“I don’t recall giving permission to speak first.”

“Pardon?”

“You can say what you want to say when I tell you to.”

At Letia’s words, which turned cold at the end of her smile, the maids flinched, and Letia sat down on the sofa nonchalantly, still smiling.

“Well then, shall we begin?”