“Rose!”

Rose was still collapsed on my lap. If Silphid’s words about time not having passed were true, then Rose must have just lost consciousness.

The green lights that had been tormenting Rose were now gone. Even the forest seemed different from the bizarre atmosphere it had earlier. Perhaps it was the effect of the Spirit King’s magic disappearing.

“Rose, come to your senses!”

Though she had lost consciousness, fortunately, Rose was still breathing faintly.

I looked at the sylph circling around me curiously and called out desperately.

“Sylph, can’t you do something?”

Sylph avoided my gaze.

〈You still don’t have enough spirit power to control even this sylph.〉

Silphid’s words hurt.

“I should ride a horse.”

Now that the magic protecting this forest had disappeared, we should be able to leave normally. So if we hurry to the castle to get treatment…

Ssh-ssh, Rose breathed laboriously. It was frightening how her breath might stop at any moment.

“Just hold on a little longer, Rose Temerly. It’s all over now.”

It was when I was struggling to lift Rose onto the horse.

“Lady Annette! Miss Rose!”

“Annette!”

The voices of the knights searching for us could be heard from afar.

“Here, over here! Rose is here! It’s me, Annette!”

My heart pounded at the sight of the blazing torches. We’re alive. We’ve survived, Rose.

“Annette!”

He rushed through the trees towards me, not caring about the branches scratching his body, driving his black horse like the wind.

“Annette Forche!”

My male protagonist ran to me.

“Darius.”

Darius, Darius. The male protagonist of this novel, who could overcome any dire situation.

The warmth of his embrace was hot. Trapped in his strong arms, I finally felt the long night coming to an end.

“When I thought I had lost you, I was so…”

Whoosh, his scent enveloped me. What a reassuring smell.

Darius, I’ve found the legendary treasure of the North. And I even received a sylph from the Spirit King…

I wanted to say that, but the sylph had already disappeared. I had run out of even the minimum spirit power needed to maintain its form.

“Darius, please take care of Rose. Save her.”

With those last words, I lost consciousness in his arms.

“She’s collapsed! Get a doctor quickly!”

Darius returned, holding Annette. His loud voice calling for a doctor echoed through the grand ducal castle, sounding desperate.

“Lay her here. We’ll take care of her. She should be fine.”

“Her temperature and pulse are normal. The lady has merely fainted from exhaustion. What’s more worrying is Miss Rose…”

Thus passed a chaotic night.

“Your Grace, go rest. We’ll watch over the lady.”

“No, I will take care of her myself.”

Darius took a wet cloth from a maid. Despite being unaccustomed to such tasks, his hand wiping Annette’s forehead was flawless.

“Annette…”

Darius couldn’t bring himself to hold Annette’s hand. After all, he had let go of it when she disappeared into the forest.

〈Darius!〉

Her startled expression was still vivid in his mind.

“This is all I can do for you.”

Throb. Darius’s heart ached.

Chirp, chirp, chirp. I awoke to the sound of birds announcing the morning.

“Lady Annette, you’re awake!”

Apple, who came with a fresh basin, looked at me with tearful eyes.

“I was so worried. You left like that and then came back unconscious!”

As I tried to get up, I realized my hand was being held.

“The Duke stayed up all night taking care of you. We offered to do it, but he wouldn’t listen. He just fell asleep now.”
The hand holding me was tightly gripped, as if vowing never to let go again.

His hand, used to holding a sword, was rugged and calloused in places.

‘There’s a wound.’

A fresh red scratch on his arm, undoubtedly from getting scratched by a tree while rushing to me last night.

“Shh, he just fell asleep. Don’t wake him.”

I carefully untangled our fingers. In his half-sleep, Darius grunted in displeasure.

“I never knew the Duke was such a tender man. He seems to be very caring towards his wife.”

“Is that so? But how is Rose? She was in pretty bad shape. Is she okay now?”

There were two things I was concerned about right now: the status of the treasure we found last night and Rose’s condition. Not wanting to seem like I valued money over people, I first asked about Rose.

“Ah, um, Miss Rose is…”

But Apple hesitated to answer with a gloomy expression.

After a moment, I let out a scream upon hearing Apple’s words.

“What?”

“We’ll start the operation now.”

A doctor with a thick beard held a scalpel, sharpened blue, standing in front of Rose. His assistant stood beside him with a large basin to catch blood.

“We’ll drain the bad blood from her body to revive Miss Rose’s vitality. This is the only option left for improvement.”

Rose’s mother cried out in grief.

“I don’t think this is right, it doesn’t seem right! How can you cut into a young girl’s body, even if it’s the last resort?”

“Calm down, madam.”