In the bed, Cedric, who had fallen asleep, and Roberto, who had been sitting and guarding in front, came into view.

“Madam. Are you okay?”

Approaching, Roberto asked in a low voice.

“Yeah. I’m fine.”

“I’m worried because you must have been very surprised.”

“Thank you for worrying. But now, I think you should be more concerned about Cedric than me.”

With a strained voice, Roberto looked at her with a sympathetic expression.
“He has a bit of a fever. Despite taking medicine, the fever didn’t go down, so I’ve been keeping an eye on him.”

Her voice, more subdued than ever, flowed.

LaMain, who had been staring fixedly at Cedric on the bed, met the serious gaze of Roberto.

“I’ll be here, so Roberto, go and rest.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yeah. If I get tired, I’ll call you.”

“Yes. Please call me anytime.”

Roberto left the room, and LaMain approached Cedric.

Reaching out slowly to his forehead, covered in sweat, she withdrew her hand.

Understanding why Roberto spoke so seriously, even the residual heat spread to her palm.

As she removed her hand, she scanned her husband’s body from the forehead down.

His white shirt was soaked with sweat.

“This won’t do. I can’t leave it like this.”

Hastily leaving the room, she asked Roberto for lukewarm water and several pieces of cloth.

Standing by the bed, she slowly wiped her husband’s face and neck with the cloth soaked in lukewarm water.

Only his tightly closed eyelids twitched, but fortunately, Cedric didn’t wake up.

After repeating the same action several times, she looked down at her husband’s shirt, drenched in sweat.

“I have to wipe off the sweat a bit.”

Then, starting from the top, she unbuttoned his shirt one by one.

Having unbuttoned three buttons, she cautiously began to wipe away the sweat with the cloth.

The cloth that touched his body quickly warmed up due to his fever.

The person who saved her, the one who took an arrow for her, faced death because of her.

Unable to erase the sorry feeling, separate from the gratitude that felt tearful.

Where did it all go wrong?

She thought she could just live like others and get a divorce.

The situation where she was increasingly afraid that the arrows meant for her were falling towards him.

Trying to dispel the thoughts that started to entangle her again, LaMain lowered her head briefly.

Although regret is useless, she knows.

“It would have been better if I suggested divorce back then, rather than contracts or anything.”

In the midst of rising frustration, she mumbled with a voice mixed with a sigh.

Suddenly.

The force that gripped her wrist made LaMain open her eyes wide.

Blue eyes, which she didn’t know how long they had been staring at her, flashed menacingly with heat.

“LaMain. What did you just say?”

“… What? Ah!”

In an instant, she sprang up, startled by her husband’s sudden action, who blocked her path in front of her.

His eyes, intensely staring at her as if he would devour her, were filled with heat.

“LaMain.”
With a voice containing hot breath, he barely called her. A heat that is utterly unbearable pierces through the body. ‘My body is too hot.’ Though he wants to see her face clearly, everything before his eyes seems blurry. Unable to endure the oppressive feeling and the heat that feels like it will burn him, Cedric unbuttoned his shirt one by one.

In the moment when he slightly woke up just now, he distinctly heard the word “divorce” flowing through her lips. He forced his strained eyelids to flutter.

“I just don’t understand.”

Even in this situation, where she speaks of divorce, he can’t comprehend. With eyes forcefully focused, he met her gaze directly.

“C-Cedric. What on earth don’t you understand?”

With a bewildered tone, she looked at him with a gaze that truly seemed to know nothing. As if she were looking at him as if he were the strange one.

“Aren’t you curious why I find you strange whenever I see you?”

With each uttered word, his breath became intense. Filling his lungs as if it would reach the floor, he struggled to straighten his body as he took a deep breath. His large chest, soaked with sweat, heaved, and he exhaled hot and thick breaths.

In that moment, when she stretched her hand forward, trembling, Cedric, with an impulse as if to stop her, grabbed her outstretched wrist tightly.

“Wait! Cedric! You seem too excited!”

He tightly gripped her outstretched wrist.

“Excitement is something you ordered, and now you’re telling me not to get excited.”

Even in the moment where she considered divorce, faced with her painful self, she felt resentful.

“Was I wrong?”

However, as if prompting her to answer, his mocking eyes stared straight into hers, beautiful even at this moment.

She wished more than anything that she would disappear from in front of her eyes. Uncontrollable emotions, like the heat of her body, even frightened herself.

‘This won’t do. If it continues like this, I don’t know what I might do.’

At that moment, when she was trying to forcefully divert her persistent gaze.

“Haa…”

Her exhaled breath grazed his lips sensationally. For a moment, every nerve was on edge, and there was an impulse to swallow up the reddened lips that dazzled in front of him in an instant.

Now it seemed like her mind had gone awry.

“LaMain. It seems you lack self-awareness.”

“…What?”

He slowly scanned her face with round eyes that opened wide.

“Every action of yours creates this effect on me.”

The fact that she shakes me with everything she does. She wished that she had acknowledged this by now.

“Cedric. You’re in pain right now. Seems like you’re misunderstanding because your body and brain are malfunctioning!”

Cedric let out a helpless sigh at her futile explanation.

“If you don’t understand anyway. If the conclusion is already set. There is no need to endure or wait any longer.”

She couldn’t bear it anymore.
Cedric let out a hopeless sigh. If she won’t understand, if the conclusion is already set, the thought suddenly rushes in that there is no need to endure or wait any longer. Now, he couldn’t bear it any longer.

“If that’s the case, then every time I see you, it hurts.”

Cedric’s voice, growling through his lips, flowed out.

“…What? What on earth are you talking about?”

Her confused pupils were covered by fluttering eyelids, seemingly without focus.

“Come to think of it, it seems like I’ve been delusional, just as you said.”

Deciding to accept everything, even if you dislike me after today.

“You haven’t done anything. Instead…”

He tightly pulled her body, which had no place to retreat, into his embrace.

As if determined not to give her any chance to escape, he deeply inserted his hand into the golden hair that fluttered like waves above the sea.

As if to say, he wouldn’t allow even a slight gap.

He slowly tilted his head toward her face, perfectly confined within his arms.

The distance was so precarious that a slight movement would make their lips overlap.

The soft breath escaping through her lips and the beating heart tickled her lips.

The heart beats as if it’s about to burst.

Unable to swallow the emotions that have surged to an immeasurable extent.

“I think I’m going crazy for you, LaMain.”

Unable to endure the desire to touch her.

He covered her lips, swallowing the delicate breath hovering around the edge of her lips.