In response to Charles’s question, which seemed like a misunderstanding, I silently stared at the creature.
With shiny, well-groomed red hair and a perfectly rounded forehead, I looked at Charles’s puzzling question and…
Bam!
I playfully tapped Charles’s head.
“…!!”
Then, Charles quickly backed away, holding his forehead with both hands.
Even the butler of the Cerberus family looked surprised, staring at me with wide-open eyes.
In a shaky voice, Charles asked, “Did you… hit me?”
He seemed quite shocked. Placing my hands on my hips, I responded firmly.
“Yes, I did!”
“Why would you hit me…?”
“Where did you learn to make such nonsense and embarrass the other person?”
Although Charles had said a few absurd things about being my dog a couple of times, I had overlooked them. When we were alone, it didn’t matter what nonsense he spoke. However, that was only acceptable when it was just the two of us. I couldn’t tolerate him confusing others by claiming to be my dog in front of everyone.
I sternly commanded Charles, “Apologize now.”
“I don’t want to.”
Charles replied stubbornly with a defiant look.
He seemed to have no idea why I was angry or why he deserved to be hit.
I quietly called Charles’s full name.
“Charles Ferdia.”
“…”
“If you keep doing this, you’ll regret my decision to bring you along.”
Although I had promised not to get into accidents, insisting on going along with unreasonable words was a betrayal of my trust.
Still wearing a rough expression, Charles briefly muttered something to Cerberus’s butler.
“…Apology.”
“What kind of apology is that? Do it properly.”
I tried to scold Charles for his rebellious attitude, but I couldn’t. The butler, who had been observing our conversation, intervened.
“It’s okay, Lady Ferdia.”
“He showed bad manners for the first time. I’ll apologize on his behalf.”
“No, no. There’s no need.”
The butler, who had clapped his hands as if asking for understanding, spoke again.
“May I inform Count Hicklmayer of the visit and request entry for the accompanying person?”
The treatment was clearly extraordinary in the closed atmosphere of the Cerberus Mansion.
However, I couldn’t leave Charles alone and go in alone. So, I quickly nodded my head.
“Please do so, and thank you.”
“Then, I’ll inquire and come back.”
As the butler disappeared through the main gate, leaving only Cerberus guards guarding the door, besides us, Charles was kicking a small stone against my wishes.
“Charles.”
“…”
Even when I called his name, he didn’t respond. I sneaked up on Charles, but he turned his head away, avoiding eye contact with me.
Squish. His puckered lips conveyed Charles’s feelings.
“Charles. Are you upset?”
“No.”
“No way. You’re acting up.”
Charlotte glanced at me and murmured in a voice that seemed to carry Volmen’s tone.
“No one treats me so casually.”
Well, you are the direct heir of the esteemed Ferdia. Naturally, you would act that way.
I tried to console Charlotte in a soft voice.
“But still, Charlotte, we need to choose the right time and place.”
“Ferdia said it’s okay.”
In response to Charlotte’s firm answer, I sighed and touched my forehead with one hand.
‘The result of a failed upbringing is right in front of me.’
Perhaps it was inevitable. Charlotte must have been raised and educated that way since childhood.
The Ferdia family, the dark imperial family that could explain everything with just its name.
In a household where no one cares how the children grow up, what right do I, who is not even a real child, have to say anything?
Anyway, changing Charlotte’s way of thinking, shaped by a ruined family education, was impossible with just my words.
‘If I solve the assassination and financial issues, he’ll leave. I shouldn’t get attached.’
As I silently resolved to keep a distance from Charlotte, the guy, who had promised to do so, whispered while scratching my head, which was still throbbing from the night’s festivities.
“… This is the first time someone has messed with my head.”
“Speak properly, Charlotte. It’s not messing with your head, it’s just a hangover from a good night.”
“For you, it may be a good night, but for me, it felt like the end of the world.”
Charlotte’s words, claiming the world was ending after just one night of revelry, were absurd. His genuinely hurt expression was even more bewildering.
“So, are you going to avoid my face forever?”
“No.”
While saying that, Charlotte continued to avoid my gaze.
It seemed like I had left a deep wound in the heart of this noble gentleman.
‘It’s both annoying and heart-wrenching.’
Sigh, I’ve never tried to console a sulking kid before, so I don’t know what to do.
As I absentmindedly scratched my cheek, I asked without much thought.
“Why not offer a hug or something?”
“…A hug?”
If Charlotte’s eyes flickered for a moment, was it just my imagination?
While I hesitated, Charlotte took two steps closer.
“Do it.”
“What?”
Bending his knees to align our eye levels, Charlotte confidently demanded.
“A hug.”
“Right here, now?”
Male lead is a Divorced Husband
She said to him: “Tell me, what makes you like me? I’ll change it!”
Liu Changning transmigrated into a female cannon fodder character in a female-dominant novel.
After reading the first half of the novel’s plot, the first thing she did upon transmigration was to divorce the Pan Jinlian-style male protagonist she had just married.
She indulged herself, pretending to be ugly and poor.
But as time passed, the way that man looked at her became more and more unusual…
Liu Changning was dumbfounded: Tell me, what makes you like me? I’ll change!
――
This lifetime, Pei Yuanshao was rejected by the same woman twice!
The first time, she drove him away. Forced by the situation, he endured the waves of anger in his heart, yielding and humbling himself.
That person lay slanted on a rocking chair, her sallow face emotionless: “If you don’t want a divorce, go cook!”
Pei Yuanshao’s face was dark and gloomy: “You!”
The second time, after the crisis in Jinling City was resolved, the new emperor sent someone to pick him up. He turned around, stammering: “I… I have to go. If you keep me…”
That person lay on the kang bed, her back to him, as if she had long anticipated this day, crisp and clear: “Goodbye!”
Pei Yuanshao was so angry his fingers trembled: “You… you!”
The mission of family and country made him restrain himself, averting his eyes and turning to leave this broken household.
Two years later, they met again. Seeing her ethereal face, his body shook like a sieve.
“She was originally a ‘she’!”
At the Qionglin Banquet, the top scholar of the imperial examination, a talented person with exceptional speech and conduct, all the unmarried young gentlemen from aristocratic families looked at her with shy and timid eyes.
The peerless imperial official Pei Yuanshao felt the anger in his heart erupt. He pointed at the woman surrounded by the crowd at the Qionglin Banquet, his thin lips slightly curled: “Little sister, I wants that person to be the wife-master of my Mingde Prince Manor.”
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