"I must say you’ve truly beco quite the mysterious gentleman, my dear Luka. Perhaps that fierce, unrelenting desire to possess might also be aid toward in the near future?"
The soft tip of her tongue flicked along his cheek, leaving a moist heat after Vivienne’s soft voice lingered in the air before she slowly withdrew her tongue. and tightened her around his neck, almost forcing Galatea to avert her eyes.
’This fiancée of mine is quite different from what I imagined.’
Luka glanced down at the woman clinging to his chest. Vivienne’s arms remained wrapped around him as if she had no intention of releasing him, her cheek almost brushing against his cloak.
"Lady Vivienne."
"Vi-Vi."
"Is this the place to bother with that, Vivienne?"
"Oh my?"
She tilted her face upward, then leaned to the side, watching him with dark, glittering eyes.
"Then, where is the place I can bother you with these things?"
Her lips curved into a deeply childish grin.
"How about my bedroom?" Luka joked, trying to get her to back off.
However, it might’ve been the most retarded mistake he made, as even Luvia gasped from the back of Furia. Let alone Galatea, whose eyes almost looked like they might burst into flas at any mont.
For a brief mont, Vivienne stopped moving.
Her smile and breathing remained soft, yet sothing deep inside her dark eyes cracked open, revealing a frighteningly bright delight that made the air around Luka feel colder.
"Y...Your room...?"
The words left her lips with a hot, almost exaggerated sigh.
’Hm?’
Sothing was strange; he was looking at the sa woman, but Luka just felt as if Vivienne had beco a little different after he spoke.
She no longer bothered with Galatea’s movents or Furia’s strange movents because Luvia sat on her back. What beca clear was that at this mont, only Luka existed in her eyes.
Or rather, she noticed everything and purposely ignored it.
Her gloved fingers slid from Luka’s neck to his collar, lightly pinching the fabric as if afraid he might vanish if she loosened her grip.
"Oh my, Dear Husband..."
Her voice trembled with sweetness.
"Isn’t that rather untoward for a gentleman of your stature?"
She leaned closer, her lips brushing the edge of his ear.
"But if you invite , I will co."
A cold chill shot down his spine from the place where her warm breath should’ve kept him warm.
Her eyes narrowed into curved crescent-shaped moons as a soft giggle followed.
A deep red light shimred in the depths of her pupils as she suddenly yanked him closer by the collar. The thick scent of sumr berries overwheld him as her hair blew in the wind, covering their faces from outsiders.
She appeared elegant, delicate and intensely horrifying.
"If you didn’t invite ... Maybe I would have co without warning, closed the door, then sat beside your bed and watched your face until you woke. But if you’re offering... perhaps I can stop myself, fufufu~ but what if there’s another woman... ah~ oh my what should I do?!"
Her smile beca wider and wider as she spoke.
The hands grasping his body trembled as her eyes remained unblinking.
"I will be very, very sad if that happens."
Vivienne pulled back just enough to look into his eyes.
"So please don’t tease too carelessly, okay? Because when I am sad, we both know I sotis do unreasonable things, right, Luka?"
Then, as if nothing had happened, her expression returned to that flawless, noble sweetness.
Her fingers stroked his chest one last ti before she pulled away.
"Because if you call to your room, I may misunderstand that you’re finally going to accept my proposal from last ti."
’Her proposal?’
Luka’s chest tightened with a tight ache.
He struggled to breathe properly, reaching out as Vivienne skipped toward a beautiful middle-aged maid with silver hair and pale eyes.
’What is she talking about?!’
Luka’s fingers clawed at his chest as he struggled to remain focused.
The fragnts left behind in this body trembled, but the mont he tried to grasp them, pain stabbed behind his eyes.
A room filled with pale curtains, sheets and the scent of dicine and bitter herbs.
A younger Vivienne knelt beside his bed, her small, cold hands wrapped around his. There were faint scars along her fingers, almost hidden beneath lace cuffs too expensive for a child to wear so carelessly.
Her lips ca close to his ear.
"Promise that you’ll get better, marry and then take away... saving from my wretched destiny."
The brief mory cracked into a thousand shards as Luka inhaled sharply, the breath slightly cooling and painful.
’I see... So that was her proposal.’
It wasn’t a simple, sweet childhood promise, though he didn’t know the details. Those scars on Vivienne’s young hands weren’t unfamiliar to him. He then rembered the gloves she wore, which she had only removed for a brief mont...
Their engagent wasn’t a simple engagent between noble houses, and her family likely resented it.
Vivienne had known sothing even then.
She had looked at the weak, dying Luka de Babylon and chosen him not because he was strong, but because he could beco hers, sothing that belonged to her completely. Soone harmless, soone cute and close enough to grab before the adults around her decided what kind of life she would live.
’Within her strike zone, huh?’
He stifled the bitter laugh within his throat.
His eyes were locked on Vivienne, who was slowly touring the manor with her maid.
...
anwhile, Galatea remained stiff beside Furia and Reina.
Her eyes followed Vivienne as the noble lady reached the silver-haired maid and spoke with flawless composure. It was like she had never flirted, and she whispered maddening things into Luka’s ears, creating a tight knot in her guts.
’Who the hell are you to lick him!?’
Over the past few days, the strange thoughts and dreams about another lifeti beca clearer and clearer.
Galatea no longer felt that the other thoughts she had from ti to ti were foreign, accepting them completely as she followed Luka with ever greater devotion.
This made it worse.
Vivienne could be childish one mont, elegant the next, before transforming into a horrifying monster at the blink of an eye.
Galatea’s fingers tightened around her sword with the squeak of leather.
’What did she say to him?’
She had seen Luka’s face change; that wasn’t because he loved her. The previous Luka was gone; Galatea knew that all too well. It was her Luka that reacted to her actions... even though he did such things to her.
He still looked at Vivienne with a yearning gaze.
A pain different from being impaled, burned or stabbed swelled in her stomach as she sank her teeth deeper into her fleshy inner lip.
Luvia leaned against Furia’s side, watching everything with her golden eyes half closed, a mocking smirk on her lips.
"Blondie, your face looks awfully scary right now."
"Shut up."
"Oh gosh~ what happened to our ceasefire? Aren’t we best of friends now... we’ve seen each other’s bare breasts and kissed the sa man’s—!"
Before she could finish, Galatea half-drew her sword with a hiss.
Luka finally snapped out of his daze before the two could continue their little spat.
"Vaun, count the supplies. Galatea, escort Lady Vivienne’s maid to the guest wing and make sure no one from Ironhold wanders freely."
’Why?’
’Why must I guide that woman!?’
’Why can’t you understand that it will hurt ?!’
She wanted to scream these words, but slowly swallowed the bladed vowels and spiked consonants as she gritted her teeth.
And with a nod. "As you command. Lord Luka."
She passed him without another word, or even looking at his face, her steps controlled and asured yet... the heat within her stomach raged like a berserk fireball.
"Galatea."
All of a sudden, the mont he called her na, everything loosened.
The fire died down, her heart fluttered, beating faster, and she slowly turned to see his handso face staring her way.
’Ah... why can’t I just hate you?’
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