12. Touching Lips

It happened in an instant.

With her cheeks held, Adeline had no way to avoid Casis’s gaze.

Before she could feel discomfort from his red eyes, something touched her lips and then pulled away.

“What is this……”

Adeline looked at Casis with eyes clouded by confusion.

When their gazes met directly, Casis raised the corner of his mouth in a slight smile.

“Now you’re not avoiding me.”

Adeline couldn’t take her eyes off the duke.

The duke’s red eyes seemed to have embers rising from within.

The small embers gradually expanded at Adeline’s direct gaze, until they appeared to be burning.

“Never avoid me again.”

His already bright red eyes shone mischievously toward Adeline, as if they couldn’t possibly become any redder.

The duke slowly lifted Adeline’s chin, tilted his head slightly, and approached.

As his face gradually came closer, Adeline unconsciously squeezed her eyes shut.

Eventually their lips met, and Casis invaded through the gap in Adeline’s teeth.

A hot breath rushed in. Bound by that hot breath, she couldn’t move a finger.

Her mind became distant.

The two focused on each other as if they had lost their reason. Even the merciless sound of pouring rain seemed inaudible to them.

Just as the kiss was becoming more intense, lightning flashed, illuminating the bedroom brightly before disappearing.

The flash, almost blinding, snapped Adeline back to her senses.

“Ah!”

Startled, Adeline pushed the duke away with her hands pressed against his chest.

At her urgent gesture, the duke obediently stepped back from Adeline.

“Um……”

Adeline couldn’t finish her sentence, not knowing what to say or how to say it.

Looking at Adeline’s endlessly trembling eyes, the duke raised his hand and rubbed her reddened lips.

“Go wash up now.”

The heat in his red eyes hadn’t cooled at all, but he smiled gently and slowly moved away from Adeline.

Adeline, seemingly embarrassed by the situation, hurriedly entered the bathroom.

Leaning against the bathroom door, she clutched her heart, which was pounding as if it might burst at any moment.

Why had he become such a different person!

She never expected that simply helping with a zipper would lead to a kiss.

‘What should I do……’

Adeline gently touched her reddened, swollen lips. Her mind was completely filled with the moment her lips had touched Casis’s.

Adeline’s face burned hot. Even after splashing cold water on it, she couldn’t calm down at all.

Adeline hadn’t realized it. That looking into Casis’s eyes was no longer as frightening as before.

⁕⁕⁕

The sky outside the window was clear, as if heavy rain had never fallen.

After finishing her shower, Adeline left the bedroom and encountered the duke standing in the hallway.

Meeting his red eyes, she began to remember what had happened earlier.

Adeline hurriedly lowered her head to hide her flushing face.

“Mel, I’m going to town for a bit!”

“Now? Why suddenly go to town……”

Casis naturally seemed to intend to accompany her.

But Adeline had no intention of waiting for Casis to prepare.

“I’ll be back soon. Don’t follow me. Just guard the house well!”

Without even waiting for Casis’s response, Adeline hurriedly left the mansion after saying what she needed to say.

If she stayed in the same space with Casis, thoughts of earlier wouldn’t leave her mind.

It seemed impossible to stay together.

While she was embarrassed about the kiss with Casis, she also truly had business in town.

The broken window. If she didn’t fix it, Casis would inevitably call a repairman.

So Adeline headed toward the town.

She was on her way back after stopping at a hardware store to buy simple tools.

A boy selling newspapers in front of the store caught Adeline’s eye.

‘I wonder if there’s any news?’

For some unknown reason, the empire’s only duke was in this remote village, injured.

Surely, quite some time had passed since the duke disappeared from the capital.

It was practically the same as the duke being missing, so she thought there would be a huge article in the capital’s daily newspaper.

“Boy, give me a newspaper too.”

Adeline called the boy over, gave him one copper coin, and received a newspaper.

Contrary to her expectations, there was nothing about the duke written anywhere in the newspaper.

The headline of the newspaper covered the disappearance of a marquis’s daughter in very large letters, not the duke.

[Special Report! Beautiful Daughter of Marquis Credion. Missing]

[The Marquis Credion’s daughter has wheat-colored hair and gray eyes……]

Detailed descriptions of Adeline’s appearance were listed on the front page of the newspaper.

‘Why are they publishing an article about me only now?’

Adeline couldn’t hide her bewilderment. Quite some time had passed since she left home.

Marquis Credion, who had been quiet despite surely knowing she had left home, why was he suddenly starting to look for her now?

Despite all media outlets being under the control of the marquis’s family, the detailed description of her appearance being published made the meaning clear.

The crown prince had begun to search for her through Marquis Credion.

Adeline was overwhelmed by the feeling that the marquis would soon find her and throw her before the crown prince’s eyes.

‘This is a complete death flag.’

Adeline’s whole body trembled with fear that felt suffocating.

At that moment, magnificent footsteps echoed through the quiet Horn region.

It was the sound of hard shoes, like military boots, stomping on the muddy ground.

Adeline, engulfed by an uneasy feeling, hid her body at the entrance of a small alley.

After some time had passed, several shadows began to appear on the main road beyond the alley.

“Have you by chance seen someone who looks like this?”

“If I’d seen such a beauty, I’d remember instantly! First time seeing her!”

In front of the newsstand where she had taken out the newspaper, a man in uniform among a group was looking for someone.

Even through the narrow view between the alleys, the emblem on the man’s shoulder was immediately visible.

The emblem of the Credion family.

Two pairs of intertwined snakes embroidered on gray epaulettes. The moment she saw that emblem, Adeline felt a chill run down her spine.

The article about Adeline’s disappearance was in today’s newspaper, yet they were already searching as far as the Horn region, far from the capital.

They must have been looking for her all along.

Adeline instinctively hid deeper into the alley.

She didn’t know how many troops had been deployed. Her fear continued to grow.

‘I shouldn’t come to town for a while.’

Adeline turned to the opposite side of the alley she had entered, trying to avoid the troops.

She hurriedly began heading home. As soon as she left town and reached the forest path, Adeline quickened her steps even more.

The forest path leading to the house was silent and desolate. The suffocating quietness fueled Adeline’s anxiety.

Too late.

Although she had said she was going to town, she worried about the duke waiting at home.

When she was about halfway there, the rain that had subsided earlier in the day began to fall again.

The rain gradually intensified and started pouring down so heavily that it was impossible to pass through.

It seemed best to take shelter from the rain first.

Adeline hid under a large tree and caught her breath.

She shouldn’t have gone to town; she hadn’t expected them to search as far as this remote village.

Adeline looked up at the sky.

After gazing at the sky for a while, she thought she saw a large, dark figure in the distance between the trees.

With the thick raindrops pouring down as if emptying everything, Adeline couldn’t properly assess the situation.

‘Surely not. It can’t be someone from the marquis’s family?’

She thought she had escaped well from the town, but Adeline suddenly felt afraid.

The dark figure seemed to be getting closer to her little by little.

“@#$%^&*~.”

All sounds were buried under the tremendously pouring rain.

Yet through the rain, some murmuring could be heard.

She had to escape.

Adeline was certain that the voice belonged to the knight from the marquis’s family she had seen in town.

This was no time to shelter from the rain. Adeline left the large tree and began to run.

She couldn’t be captured and dragged away like this.

“Huff……”

Adeline felt like her lungs would burst. Yet she absolutely couldn’t slow her pace.

Because the dark figure, far from moving away, was getting closer and closer.

She couldn’t head toward the duke’s villa.

She couldn’t let the marquis discover that she was hiding there. She had to flee as far from the villa as possible.

When Adeline changed direction and started running, the dark figure followed.

It was definitely chasing her.

She hadn’t lived her previous life committing any major wrongs.

But,

‘Why do these things only happen to me?’

The sight of herself desperately fleeing, struggling to survive, made her feel so pitiful.

Scratches began to form all over her arms as she fled between trees.

If she were caught here, she would be dragged to the crown prince and killed. In the face of imminent death, scratches were not a problem at all.

“@#$%^&*!!”

No matter how much she fled, the dark figure kept raising its voice, saying something, and narrowing the distance with Adeline.

Adeline ran at full speed with all her might. She couldn’t look back.

Perhaps due to the heavy rain that had continued from previous days.

Everywhere there were piles of mud and entangled trees from landslides. Adeline hid her body among the piles of earth.

She no longer had the strength in her legs to run away.

She barely held onto her consciousness, but Adeline had no energy left. She just hoped they wouldn’t find where she was hiding.

Her breath was choked, and her heart felt like it would burst.

However, as if mocking Adeline’s wishes, the dark figure appeared behind her.

A large hand gripped Adeline’s shoulder.

The strong and firm grip holding Adeline’s shoulder. A severe sense of fear came over her from the irresistible strength.

It was over.