Tanya’s face, which approached urgently, looked full of anxiety.

Though Tanya’s demeanor exuding anxiety with her whole body was puzzling, Erina deliberately ignored it.

Erina and Tanya’s gazes met.

Faced with Erina’s vividly shining golden eyes, Tanya suddenly began to tear up.

Just as Erina was about to say something at that sight, Tanya deeply bowed her waist before Erina.

A bewildered Erina called out to Tanya.

“Young lady?”

“I’m, I’m sorry. Countess.”

With a thoroughly cracked voice, Tanya began to apologize incoherently.

“Truly, sincerely, I apologize, Countess. Please forgive my immature actions, my foolish past behaviors that I failed to see properly.”

“Lady Papia.”

“I’m sorry for not seeing the truth and causing trouble for the Countess, as if I was possessed by something.”

Tanya continued to apologize with a tearful voice while keeping her waist bowed before Erina.

“I will never let this happen again. Please forgive my thoughtless past actions.”

As if she was dropping tears while bowing, the carpet where Tanya stood became gradually wet.

Erina stared blankly at Tanya for a moment, flustered.

She doubted if Tanya might be standing here acting with some ulterior motive.

But it felt too genuinely sorrowful and apologetic with her whole body to be that.

Then she doubted if Tanya had come here again at Rose’s instigation.

But Tanya’s trembling words and deeply bowed waist made it impossible to think of Rose at all.

Erina was rather confused by Tanya’s apology.

She felt frustrated, unable to discern what intentions Tanya had in apologizing to her.

“It’s alright now, please rise, young lady.”

Sensing the hesitation in the reply, Tanya raised her bowed waist but still couldn’t lift her deeply lowered head.

“To be honest, I’m a bit taken aback, Lady Papia.”

“…I understand, Countess.”

Her voice, still trembling with remnants of tears, sounded pitiful.

But Erina had too many doubts to believe only in the emotions she could see and hear from her.

Just a few days ago, she had been obsessed with finding fault with her.

It was strange that she suddenly came and apologized like this, putting her emotions first.

“If Marquis Papia sent you, I will politely tell the Marquis that you apologized…”

“No! That’s not it!”

As Erina was about to say not to worry about future consequences and go back, Tanya denied it with a wave of her hands before she could finish speaking.

Just as Erina was about to speak again, not knowing why she was denying it, Tanya shouted even faster.

“Father didn’t send me!”

“Pardon?”

Erina found that statement even more suspicious.

If she wasn’t sent, why did Tanya come here herself?

As Erina sank into thought to deduce the reason for Tanya’s visit, Tanya bit her lip hard and said.

“Actually…, I really agonized over where to start explaining, Countess.”

While Tanya was choosing her words, Erina observed her.

Tanya, who had been busy glaring with a crooked posture just at the tea party, had changed.

Her politely clasped hands, trembling lips, and eyes that couldn’t look up.

Her attitude was so clearly different from before that it would be believable if someone said a different person had come.

“After the tea party that day, I met Lady Asila.”

After pondering her words for a long time, Tanya abruptly began to speak about her actions after the tea party ended.

“I went to her recklessly to inform her about the rumor circulating that Lady Asila was Count Iolls’ mistress.”

“Ah.”

“But… when I asked if she was his mistress, she neither denied nor confirmed it. She only said something that felt like asking why that was a problem.”

As if remembering that time again, the area under Tanya’s eyes darkened gloomily.

Erina thought Tanya’s words were unexpected.

Erina had actually expected Rose to strongly deny the rumors if they spread.

Rose had been distancing herself from Peiron as if she had been waiting for Erina to establish herself with the mana stone mine.

It was clear she did so to watch until the situation settled somewhat and attention dispersed.

She had expected it to be the same this time as well.

She thought Rose would refrain from meeting and keep some distance, then quietly meet again when the rumors died down.

Erina also found Rose’s actions towards Tanya unexpected no matter how she thought about it.

It was different from her expectation that Rose would keep Tanya by her side, acting like a pitiable woman to the point of disgust in order to gain a follower.

What interrupted Erina’s train of thought was Tanya’s next words.

“And what I encountered was the truth.”

“The truth?”

“Yes. As soon as I realized Lady Asila was the mistress and began to doubt everything about her, her words that had enchanted me slowly faded from my mind. Strangely.”

The moment Tanya faced the truth, Rose’s words that had enveloped Tanya began to gradually lose their power.

Rose’s sweet whispers that had been ringing in her ears since the auction had made her believe lies were truth by putting pretty packaging on cunning falsehoods.

Her voice, as if imbued with some unspoken power, tickling the ears, had been etched into her mind.

It made her believe that everything Rose said was the truth.

Her voice, which had settled in every corner, captured even her subconscious mind and shook Tanya’s beliefs.

That’s why Tanya had several arguments with those who opposed Rose’s opinions, and had verbal fights multiple times with those who defended Erina.

Erina could understand the strange experience Tanya had gone through.

In recurring dreams, Rose had awakened a hidden ability of fairies.

It was a dizzying ability to instill obedience by stimulating and shaking people’s hidden desires with a sweet voice.

It was one of the abilities left behind by the primordial fairies wishing for their descendants to survive.

But this ability also had a major flaw – the instilled obedience would all scatter if the person affected learned the truth.

In the regression, it was only long after Erina’s death that Rose became aware of this ability.

It was unknown whether Rose had used the ability unconsciously or learned of it through prophecy.

“And I came to recall my shameful actions again.”

With those words, Tanya deeply lowered her head.

Erina inwardly sighed at the sight of Tanya’s crown before her eyes.

Terik had said he didn’t understand why Tanya followed Rose to such a strange degree.

He had found it odd as it was beyond the level of an ordinary follower, but it turned out Tanya was just another victim.

“Lady Papia.”

Even at Erina’s gentle call, Tanya couldn’t lift her head and hunched her shoulders.

Not knowing about Rose’s ability, Tanya might just think she had been stupidly deceived.

“Raise your head, young lady.”

Only then did Tanya carefully lift her head to look at Erina with tear-filled eyes.

The burgundy eyes that had always looked at her fiercely since the Marquise of Borbom’s charity auction were now powerless.

“Young lady, you were just deceived. So you don’t need to feel this sorry.”

At those kind words, Tanya melted down.

Her father was right.

Erina was excessively kind and gentle.

What on earth had she done to someone who would comfort and consider an opponent she wouldn’t have even met if it were her?

The emotions she had been suppressing and the emotions welling up inside mixed together and burst out uncontrollably.

Tanya looked at Erina with glistening eyes, then began to drop tears.

“…Even if I was deceived, it’s true that I was jealous of you, Countess.”

As Tanya mumbled quietly while shedding tears, Erina smiled and carefully wiped her cheeks.

“I understand. You’ve held Sandes in your heart for a long time, Lady Papia.”

At his name that Erina called gently, Tanya was reminded of her own forgotten feelings.

But rather, it allowed her to be more certain of her feelings.

The feelings Tanya had harbored for Sandes were not love, but mere admiration.

It seems it was just the kind of feeling where you want to possess something, but it’s in an unbreakable glass case, so you feel like holding it in your hands just once.

It wasn’t a feeling that could never be forgotten no matter what happened.

So now she recalled, did I really hold him in my heart?

Tanya gave a self-deprecating smile at the passing thought.

From the beginning, everything had started because of useless thoughts and shallow emotions.

“No. I just…”

“Young lady.”

From Tanya’s bitter smile, Erina could roughly read her thoughts.

She was clearly regretting and agonizing over past events.

But that didn’t mean she could carelessly divulge Rose’s ability to her.

That ability, which even Rose herself hadn’t realized, was currently unknown to anyone in the Asilium Empire except Raharta.

If Rose became aware of the ability due to her own leaked words, things could become even more complicated.

“Emotions are natural.”

“Countess Medelia.”

“It’s because we have such emotions that we think and live like this.”

“But I!”

Erina carefully took Tanya’s hands, which were gripping her dress skirt tightly enough to crease it.

“Don’t be sorry. You were just deceived by Lady Asila’s lies, that’s all.”

Erina soothed her while telling the truth, but Tanya didn’t think so.

She thought it was words said in an effort to forgive and comfort her.

“Lady Asila’s lies only blocked Lady Papia’s ears for a very brief moment, so don’t feel guilty.”

“Countess…”

Tanya, who had come to apologize for her wrongdoings, ended up being comforted instead, and she burst into tears once again at the situation.