Chapter 10: What Do You Think You’re Doing?

“Where exactly are you suggesting I go?”

“Home, of course!”

“My, I didn’t know I still had a home.”

“Clea Odoi!”

“I’m sorry, Young Master, but you shouldn’t call me that anymore as I’m no longer an Odoi.”

Lloyd ordered Clea to return.

But Clea had no intention of following his command, which wasn’t even a request.

From the moment she discarded the Odoi name, she became a commoner.

Though the gap between her and Lloyd would widen further, she didn’t care.

Beyond the status difference, she felt no need to act according to Lloyd’s wishes.

‘What does status matter? I was living just fine as an ordinary person originally.’

Nothing bound her in this world.

The people she could call family were elsewhere. The home he spoke of didn’t exist here.

Finally, there was no one in this world who wished for her to stay.

‘In this world where everyone exists just to hate me, why should I try to live well?’

She smiled bitterly.

This was no longer a place for her to remain.

After all, no one wanted her to live here.

Clea thought the curse mark on the back of her hand was proof of this.

The second hand of the clock pattern engraved on her hand showed no sign of stopping.

Watching the second hand move felt like being forced to die quickly.

She had considered dying early, like rebelling against her fate to die at a predetermined time.

But that felt like admitting defeat.

Not wanting to do what they wanted, Clea persisted stubbornly.

After glancing absent-mindedly at the continuously moving second hand, she looked at the man beyond Lloyd.

The male lead of this world, watching her and Lloyd with cold eyes.

‘Edmund.’

Edmund Wilhelm.

Though their time together had been brief, Clea could tell.

That short time had been more enjoyable than any time she’d lived as Clea until now.

She admitted it.

There was no need to deny it in the first place.

Seeing Lloyd’s meaningless gaze toward her, she could clearly realize Edmund was a hundred times better.

“What do you mean?”

“Didn’t you come looking for me knowing everything?”

Returning to reality, Clea asked Lloyd indifferently.

Her voice showed no respect for him at all.

Perhaps because he had always reigned above others.

Lloyd began losing his composure again at Clea’s attitude.

But this time, thinking he had to take her back somehow, he endured stubbornly and glared at Clea.

Clea didn’t back down at all from Lloyd’s fierce gaze and said,

“I am no longer an Odoi.”

“If you’re not an Odoi, then what are you?”

“Just Clea.”

“The blood flowing in your veins is Odoi.”

“Then I suppose everyone passing by out there must be Odoi too, since they have the same blood flowing in them.”

“Stop talking nonsense!”

Finally unable to hold back, Lloyd raised his voice first.

Clea actually preferred seeing him raise his voice.

When Lloyd acted nice in front of her like before, she found it somehow disgusting.

So this moment was most comfortable for her.

This moment when he treated her no differently than usual.

“You like Aria.”

“Clea.”

“I have no intention of seeking your attention. I just correctly pointed out who the woman in your heart is.”

Usually, if he’s she provoked this much, he would have tired and withdrawn first.

Clea internally applauded the fact that he still hadn’t backed down.

She had no intention of letting herself be dragged to the Odoi mansion as he wished.

If she was taken there this time, she would have to live imprisoned there until just before her death.

Not wanting such an ending, Clea had no reason to comply. She looked up at Lloyd with a smile.

Lloyd’s expression twisted as if an embarrassing secret had been exposed.

“Why don’t you break off our engagement and have dinner with that duke’s daughter, then whisper serenades while watching the evening moon? Don’t you find even this time you spent with me wasteful?”

To be honest, she found the time she spent with Lloyd too wasteful.

Her time was already set.

No, all humans’ time must be set.

However, her time now was shorter than that of others present.

Though she didn’t know exactly how much time remained, even if much was left, Clea didn’t want to allocate any to Lloyd.

“Why did you suddenly change? You weren’t like this before.”

Clea openly sneered at Lloyd’s words.

Though internally she wanted to tell him the person before him now wasn’t the Clea who had desperately loved him,

Not wanting to be branded a witch or lunatic, she answered lightly,

“No one stays unchanged. So I suppose my love for you has changed too.”

Lloyd frowned.

It was a habit he showed when he didn’t get the answer he wanted.

Clea didn’t care whether he showed such habits or not.

She was willing to take a slap if that’s what he wanted.

If only he would stop tormenting her afterward.

“Were you that upset about me being close to Lady Aria?”

Lloyd made another strange assumption.

This time Clea narrowed her brows.

But people see what they want to see, and Lloyd, mistaking Clea’s expression as hitting the mark, smiled and knelt down.

Clea and Edmund who were watching started to get flustered.

Unaware of their feelings, Lloyd declared proudly:

“I’ll only look at you from now on. So stop being stubborn and come back. Stop troubling me and my friend here.”

Looking down at Lloyd making such a shameless lie about never seeing Aria Hersher again, Clea let out a hollow laugh.

‘Might as well leave fish with a cat.’

How many people in the empire would stake anything on believing those words?

Even his parents, the Duke and Duchess, would back out if you ask to put up collateral on that promise.

That’s how low Lloyd’s credibility was in Clea’s mind.

‘You’ll all end up going to Aria Hersher anyway.’

Everything had followed the original story so far.

So that promise would be broken soon enough.

Clea thought that not only Lloyd, but even Edmund, who was standing behind him, would eventually leave her side.

Unlike Clea, Aria was a beautiful woman loved by everyone in this world.

Thinking of Edmund eventually leaving for her, Clea felt the pain in her chest intensify.

‘By then I’ll be dead anyway.’

Already used to the suffocating, tearing pain, she maintained a peaceful expression while looking at Edmund.

Edmund was watching how Clea would act. He wanted to see clearly what choice she would make.

Whether she would completely erase Lloyd as she had told him, or use him as a sort of chess piece to provoke Lloyd.

“I don’t believe you.”

Both men flinched at her words.

Though her gaze remained on Edmund, what mattered to Lloyd who was kneeling and looking up at her wasn’t that.

“Even if you took out your heart and begged me to believe you, my heart has long since grown cold.”

Clea grabbed Lloyd’s chin.

Though he was not as handsome as Edmund, Lloyd was fairly good-looking as befits a supporting male character. Clea grabbed his face and pushed him away.

Never imagining he would be rejected by Clea, Lloyd fell helplessly to the floor in an embarrassing position.

Despite falling so ungracefully, he, who prioritized honor above all, couldn’t get up immediately.

That’s how great the psychological shock was as he stared at Clea.

‘Foolish Clea. Do you still have lingering feelings for such a man?’

Could she still have attachments after all that suffering?

The moment she saw Lloyd fall, she almost instinctively moved to help him up.

But Clea didn’t.

“Would you like to know why I suddenly changed?”

Considering those lingering instincts foolish, Clea shifted her gaze to the man in front.

“Edmund.”

With a gentle voice she had never used with Lloyd.

Apparently truly trying to provoke Lloyd, she called another man’s name as she walked.

Both men in the room had their eyes fixed on her.

But neither spoke.

One sent looks of utter disbelief, while the other showed relief for the first time.

Edmund, who had worried what he would do if Clea decided to return when the proud Lloyd even knelt, felt his tension dissolve.

“The person I love now is this man.”

Clea, who had somehow reached right in front of Edmund, was smiling.

Unlike before, there was no trace of mockery.

She sought Edmund’s lips right there.

Edmund didn’t push Clea away.

He had no desire to separate from her lips that were touching his.

Edmund looked down at her, recalling what had happened last night.

The night they had passionately explored each other.

Lloyd watched his friend and fiancée with a hardened expression.

Clea separated her lips and said to him,

“Since I’ve already discarded even the Odoi name, isn’t our relationship over? Lloyd Persi.”

She saw the dumbfounded look of the man who had always looked down on her arrogantly.

Clea thought the sight was sweeter than ever before.