“You’ve been busy lately.”

I didn’t notice the subtle disappointment in the voice.

“Yeah, just some things here and there.”

“I heard you went outside the castle walls.”

“I can go out if I want.”

I was still indifferent.

The mercenary company was meant to be my source of income separate from Inkhart Castle’s finances, so I had no intention of explaining the details to Darius.

“I see.”

Darius’s smile deepened slightly.

“By the way, Darius.”

Darius raised an eyebrow as if to ask what was the matter.

“Adultery causes many victims.”

“Why bring that up so suddenly?”

“It’s not sudden. My lord needs to always keep that in mind.”

At this point, with the future male lead who will end up with the female protagonist in my room, your trustworthiness is -1,000%.

“I hate men who cheat. That man will ruin my life.”

Get out of my life, you who are destined to meet the female lead and have a happy ending!

“Huh?”

“True love doesn’t appear easily and isn’t shaken by anything. So a man who carelessly throws around vows of love is despicable. Understood?”

“…Do I look like someone who would cheat?”

“It all depends on what you do, my lord.”

Darius and Evangeline meeting and achieving a happy union!
My safe future finally guaranteed!

Darius closed his eyes with an exasperated expression and ran his hand through his bangs, then finally lowered that hand to push my shoulder onto the bed.

“Anette, just go to sleep for now.”

“Always remember! True love will definitely appear! Not now, but in the future! So don’t go looking for it too soon!”

“Alright, and Anette shouldn’t cheat either.”

“Does that not apply to me?”

It’s supposed to be the male and female leads who end up together. I need to naturally find my own love and gracefully exit the picture, right?

At that moment, as if exhausted, my eyes closed like a blown fuse.

“…”

Leaving Darius wondering if he had heard correctly what I had just said.

“You’ll cheat?”

Darius slowly repeated the words as if saying them aloud would help him understand.

His wife, who had been deliberately distancing herself as they grew closer, who had been so busy lately that it was hard to even see her face, now said it undeniably with her own mouth.

You absolutely must not cheat. But I’ll cheat, she said.

“Are you saying you’ll try it yourself and then tell me what the experience is like?”

How should he interpret this?

If these words weren’t meant for him, but were about Anette herself.

“…Someone other than me is her true love?”

Darius’s eyes turned cold as he came to a conclusion.

“Anette, if you answer again now, I can let it go.”

But Anette, already fast asleep, gave no reply. As if telling him to think whatever he wanted.

* * *

“…When did I fall asleep?”

It’s morning before I knew it. I learned for the first time that when a person is too tired, their memory cuts off.

Yesterday I was so exhausted that I fell asleep without realizing when.

“Good morning.”

Seeing Darius smile quietly as usual, it seems nothing unusual happened while I slept.

“Good morning.”

I didn’t notice that Darius was watching me as if observing.

Foolishly, even at this point I was thinking complacently, ‘Everything is going according to plan, I really am an excellent transmigrator!’

A few days later, as scheduled, a territory war broke out in Count Tiberius’s domain. Having barely managed to put together the mercenary company, I had been busy lately finalizing its launch.

After appointing Barbarossa as the commander and hiring other famous mercenaries from the North, as well as persuading some soldiers who needed to be discharged to join the mercenary company, it was starting to take shape.

Since I was busy with personal matters, the days I could see Darius were much fewer than before.

‘If this were the original story, Darius would have officially received Count Tiberius’s request for reinforcements and set out, but now the mercenary company will be dispatched, so I need to prepare more thoroughly.’

Meanwhile, Darius casually asked if I remembered we were supposed to go on an outing, but I was too busy and refused.

Count Tiberius’s envoy requesting aid must be rushing to our territory right now, how could I leisurely go on a date!

“I’m going outside the castle today, want to come along? You’ve been cooped up in the castle since coming to the North.”

I rolled my eyes at Darius’s invitation.

“I have a ladies’ meeting.”

Of course, that was a lie.

* * *

Barbarossa, who had left his back alley life behind, had adapted to his new position but still hadn’t reconciled with Madam Mode.

“So you do have some conscience after all?”

Hearing the whole story from that woman, I thought his personality had long since gone rotten since he immediately went to yell at his adoptive mother.

Barbarossa, who had come to hear about the mercenary company’s operations, wore an expressionless face, used to my treating him like trash. Right, he should get used to it. It’s true that he’s wasted his life until now.

“I never thought I’d set foot here again.”

It was Barbarossa’s first time back on the training grounds since he quit the knights.

He wasn’t officially an invited guest, and Barbarossa wasn’t of the status to be one, but since Darius happened to be away, I thought it was a good opportunity and called him here. The training grounds wouldn’t feel unfamiliar to him anyway.

The decadent atmosphere had faded quite a bit since leaving the back alleys.

“Doesn’t this make me even more attractive?”

Barbarossa smiled, his eyes curving up to his tear ducts. The red-haired man smelled of roses.

“Did you put on perfume?”

“With flowers around, of course there’s a fragrance. Of course, those flowers are…”

“If I let you in and out of the castle and you try to seduce our maids, you’re dead. No, just don’t come into the castle at all except for mercenary work.”

This guy is only useful as a living textbook when teaching Rose ‘what kind of man is a bad man to avoid.’

“Especially if I hear that a cute fifteen-year-old girl with blonde pigtails says she likes you, I’ll cut it off.”

Of course, Sir Lucian would cut it off before I could.

“What do you take my tastes for? I have standards for the women I touch, you know?”

“I’m not interested in your tastes.”

And I know without asking. The women this guy touches always…

“Anette?”

My head whipped around at the unexpected voice.

The owner of the voice was Darius, who had said he had business outside today.

“What brings you here at this time?”

I asked with wide eyes, startled by Darius’s sudden appearance.

“What about you, my lord? Didn’t you say you’d be away from the castle today?”

“Who is that person? I haven’t seen him in the castle before.”

“He’s, he’s just someone I hired personally…”

Ah, I haven’t separated the mercenary company’s income yet.

I reflexively pulled Barbarossa behind me.

Someday Darius would find out that I have a personal mercenary company, but it shouldn’t be now.

‘I’m in the middle of sweet-talking the young finance officer under Nicola to draw up documents so the mercenary company’s income belongs completely to me.’

“Oh, is this the new Grand Duke Inkhart? You always snubbed me, but he really is handsome.”

Meanwhile, Barbarossa, who should have blended into the background, was tactlessly whistling in praise of Darius’s good looks.

I glared at him, and Barbarossa shrugged with a grin.

“I’ll admit he’s more handsome than me. I don’t usually compliment other men.”

However, the face of Darius receiving the compliment was dark.

“Is that man Anette’s true love?”

“What are you saying! He only likes married women! It’s definitely not me!”

I snapped in response to Darius’s question.

You’re trying to match me up with a man who’s going through delayed puberty big time and only chases after women who look like his mother?

“By that logic, since the Grand Duchess is also married, you’re my type too.”

Hah, really. Barbarossa let out a hollow laugh at my outburst, while Darius looked at me with a resentful expression.

“First it was me, then Daniel and Lucian, and now this man.”

He coldly turned his back.

“Anette, you were a player.”

Even after Darius disappeared with a chill wind blowing, I was dumbfounded.

‘Me? I’m a player?’

‘Why are those names, including Darius, coming up now?’

“I don’t know what’s going on, but he seems angry. Aren’t you going to follow him?”

“…Just take this for now. If things get stuck in Tiberius’s territory, look it over.”

My gaze kept following where Darius had disappeared, but I pretended not to notice and spoke to Barbarossa.

Barbarossa snickered.

“My love life always ends with getting slapped by women, but this side seems no easier.”

I narrowed my eyes at Barbarossa. Who are you to give advice?

“I don’t want to hear from someone who can’t even apologize to his mother because he’s sorry.”

Only then did Barbarossa shut his mouth with a grim expression.

* * *

Darius was sulking. He didn’t even eat dinner and was lying on my bed with his back turned.

‘He’s angry but still sleeping in my bed.’

We didn’t even specify mandatory conjugal nights per week in the marriage contract, yet what a dutiful husband.

“I haven’t been able to pay much attention to you lately, have I? I’m sorry, I’ve been busy. There were a lot of things I wanted to do.”

Last time I had my back turned to Darius and he sat by my bedside, but this time Darius had his back to me and I was the one coaxing him.

Ah, can’t a woman focus on her business without her husband minding?