A month has passed since then.

The Pelton Mansion still gazed down upon everything below with its elegant and dignified appearance.

Just as it did when the Duchess was there.

“What happened to the documents replying to the Imperial Palace?”

“They should have arrived by now, Your Grace.”

“What about the commission for the Bled Guild?”

“They proposed a 10% rate.”

“Cut it in half. If they refuse, tell them we’ll switch to the Graze Guild.”

“But we haven’t yet…”

“It doesn’t matter whether it’s true or not. What matters is making them believe it’s true.”

Edric’s handling of affairs was no different from usual. No, he had become even more brilliant and cold-blooded than before.

The servants clicked their tongues at his behavior.

“It seems he doesn’t care at all that the madam has been missing for a month now.”

“How can a husband act like that? Poor madam.”

Criticizing him behind his back had become their daily routine.

His refusal to place missing person ads for Melly in the special editions also played a part in this.

Even the butler couldn’t help but say something about this matter.

“Your Grace, wouldn’t it be better to place an ad looking for the madam in the special edition before more time passes…”

“What good would come from letting people know that the mistress of the Pelton Duchy is missing?”

Edric said indifferently as he flipped through documents.

“Would it be good for Mellisa, or beneficial for our family?”

“…”

“It would only be good for those obsessed with slandering our family. I don’t want to give such people any excuse. We can find her just fine by moving quietly like now.”

“Yes…”

The butler wanted to say that searching secretly had its limits, that though their reputation might be slightly damaged, finding the madam quickly was more important, wasn’t it? But he refrained.

Because it didn’t seem like Edric would change his mind even if he said so.

The butler obediently complied and withdrew.

The door closed with a click. At that moment, Edric’s hand, which had been busily flipping through documents, stopped.

Recently, he would occasionally fall into a state of suspended animation, as if time itself had stopped.

He wasn’t particularly lost in any specific thoughts.

He just stopped what he was doing and remained still, not even blinking, as if his soul had left his body.

One day, such a moment came while he was pouring wine. He didn’t realize that the wine had overflowed and stained the documents red until much later. Even when he discovered it and realized it was quite an important document, Edric didn’t get upset.

He just crumpled up the purple-stained document and pushed it aside before focusing on the next task.

Other than that, his life was perfect.

He was as calm as if Melly had never left, or rather, as if she had never appeared in his life at all. He carried out his duties without the slightest error and entertained people.

Melly’s disappearance seemed to have no effect on Edric.

Until the documents fell from his hands with a rustle.

At that moment, with his suddenly empty fingertips, Edric awoke from his reverie. And realizing that he had once again fallen aimlessly into the abyss, he smiled self-deprecatingly.

“I’m really no different, am I?”

He organized the scattered documents, discarding what needed to be thrown away.

He crumpled them up ruthlessly, almost to the point of being excessive, and threw them on the floor. That was always how he disposed of things that were of no benefit to him.

The documents that weren’t discarded earned the honor of being stamped with the precious seal of the Pelton family.

Edric opened the first drawer.

There, in the upper compartment, lay the seal with an intricately embossed anchor-shaped emblem, commemorating the ancestor who had dominated maritime rights and contributed to the empire’s prosperity long ago.

Edric picked it up. Then suddenly his gaze fell to what was beneath it.

He pushed the upper compartment of the double-layered drawer inward.

This revealed a document that had been trapped in the drawer’s shadow.

It took a moment for him to recognize what it was.

‘Why is this here?’

It was the divorce petition he had written up as a test long ago.

He thought he had thrown it away.

Clearly, it must have been mixed in with a pile of documents that Wilson had brought and organized here.

The feeling when he had written his name on it came back vividly.

He had thought he could cleanly end things with her just as easily as he could ruthlessly crumple up unnecessary documents.

But that wasn’t the case. It had all been an illusion created by familiarity. Documents and Melly were not at all the same.

He only realized this after she left.

He took the hideous divorce paper out from the shadow of the drawer, intending to tear it up.

He gripped the top of the document with his fingertips. But just before tearing it, he hesitated.

Melly’s signature was written at the bottom of the document.

The very signature he had personally created for her to match her status as a duchess, and made her practice countless times, was written there next to his own.

“…”

Once again, a moment came when all thought stopped for Edric.

But his eyes were no longer empty now.

His gaze gently curved along the lines of Melly’s signature. After rising and falling repeatedly like a whirlpool, his gaze finally came to a stop. And he smiled as he rang the desk bell.

Wilson came running.

“Your Grace, did you call?”

“Place an ad in the special edition.”

“…”

“To find Melly. Right now.”

Melly Enwood was not like the women of high society with their flashy first impressions and eloquent speech that immediately drew people in.

Rather, due to her reticence and strong sense of caution, she often gave off a dark and gloomy impression. But anyone who spent even a little time with her came to like her.

She was a woman with a warm and thoughtful nature. She was the type to speak each word carefully, even if it took a little time, and she never failed to listen attentively to every word others said.

Wilson liked Melly as a person. And for that very reason, he wasn’t as shocked as others when Edric, whom he idolized, said he would marry her.

Surely he must have discovered Melly’s charms, which were apparent even to Wilson himself. He must have found even greater merits in her to use as grounds for his decision. Of course he would. After all, he was the great Duke Edric Ryan Pelton.

But as time passed, Wilson’s attitude towards Melly gradually changed.

It was probably around the time Edric’s indifference towards her deepened.

As someone recognized for his abilities and diligence and made one of Edric’s close aides, he often witnessed Edric treating Melly coldly up close.

‘I wish you would step aside for a moment.’

‘Get out. Not you, Wilson. I’m talking to you.’

He thought the Duke was being too harsh. So he felt sorry for her.

But at some point, when he was in a bad mood or under stress, Wilson unknowingly began to treat Melly the same way Edric did.

‘Would you please move aside?’

‘How should I know that?’

If Melly had said even a word of caution, he wouldn’t have acted that way. But the kind woman would just smile and say things like this to Wilson:

‘I’m sorry.’

‘Thank you for your hard work.’

After Melly left home, everyone probably felt bad, but Wilson felt especially awful.

Though it seemed impossible, he felt as if Melly’s disappearance was all his fault.

If only he had treated her more kindly. If only he hadn’t frowned at her then.

But he didn’t have to dwell on his guilt for long because Edric seemed unaffected.

His idol, Duke Pelton, showed no regret at all about Melly’s mysterious disappearance. He was still devoted to life and duty, no, he even seemed more energetic than when she was around.

Banquets, balls, private gatherings with young noblemen, and so on. He attended every event that required his presence, dressed impeccably and elegantly, gracing each occasion.

He even refused to place ads in the special editions to search for Melly.

His reason was that the disadvantages outweighed the advantages.

While many servants felt regret about his actions, Wilson did not.

He was a man accustomed to aligning his gaze with his idol’s since boyhood.

If Edric wasn’t regretful, neither was he. If Edric seemed unbothered, even appearing rather liberated, why should he feel any regret?

In the end, Wilson even came to think that Melly’s disappearance was for the best. Though he felt sorry for the missing Melly, he even wished that Edric would remarry soon to a woman more elegant and befitting his status.

But.

‘Place an ad in the special edition. To find Melly. Right now.’

When Wilson rushed to the office at the sound of the bell calling for him, he finally realized how greatly mistaken he had been.

The reason Edric hadn’t placed ads in the special editions to find Melly until now wasn’t because he had weighed the pros and cons.

He had been saving that method as a last resort. Because if he still couldn’t find her after that, he couldn’t fathom how broken he would become…

Edric Pelton had married Melly Enwood out of love.

That man with his high standards and pride had loved Melly enough to choose her as his duchess, disregarding her plain appearance, timid personality, and low sociability.

He had filled every spare moment with work or social gatherings to prevent Melly’s disappearance from breaking him. To leave no room for contemplation to creep in.

With such a packed schedule, he had avoided anxiety and emptiness. And he himself hadn’t even realized this.

But now he had realized.

His eyes, facing the abyss head-on, were filled with a strange hope.

He seemed to think that finding his wife would be as easy as eating cold porridge, since the entire empire would know once the ad was placed in the special edition.

“Tell Oz to thoroughly clean Melly’s quarters. Order some of her favorite desserts too. She’ll surely look for them when she returns.”

Wilson gulped at the sight of his abnormally enthusiastic demeanor, which somehow felt eerie.

It seemed like something terrible would happen if they still couldn’t find her after doing all this.

“Y-yes, sir.”

Wilson stammered his reply and hastily withdrew.

He ran down the stairs, taking two or three steps at a time, as if fleeing from the angel of death.