Dorothea stared blankly at the man lying limp in the dark prison cell.
The bread and water given to him as a meal remained intact before him.
Dorothea, who had been observing the man breathing faintly, opened the tightly closed prison door.
Wood, who was standing behind her, flinched and reached out his hand to try to stop her, but then quietly put it down.
The reason is that he knew from experience that his mistress was very stubborn and would do whatever she wanted no matter who tried to stop her.
Instead, he followed Dorothea with his eyes without fail.
So that he can react quickly no matter what happens.
“Lily.”
The water spirit popped its head out at Dorothea's call and splashed cold water on the man's face.
“Phew!”
Dover Spencer, who had just woken up, saw Dorothea looking down at him and tried to get up but stumbled and fell down again.
Dorothea gave some cool advice to the man writhing on the floor.
“You’d better not do that. Luke doesn’t seem to have the situation in his hands as much as you might think.”
“This fucking dog...”
A potion bottle fell with a thud in front of Dover, who was gnashing his teeth and swearing harshly.
Dover's eyes widened as he saw a bottle containing a liquid that gave off a brilliant glow roll into his hand.
“If you drink it, you’ll be able to properly raise that weak body.”
Dover looked up at Dorothea with suspicious eyes, unable to easily pick up the bottle.
“What are you thinking? Why are you doing this to me...”
“Well, you don’t know what I think. If I had to say something, I would say it’s because you have a good uncle.”
“Uncle? Could it be that he is...”
When Dorothea mentioned Kiel, Dover, who was rolling his eyes to understand the situation, stopped and soon muttered in a voice full of emotion.
“You did it for me!”
The hand holding the potion bottle tightened as if it was Kiel Spencer who personally took action to get him out of prison.
Dorothea, who half intended to make him think that way, was looking at the man with a faint smile.
“I have to see my uncle.”
Dover's throat was in terrible condition because he had been lying on the cold floor the whole time.
Although his voice was very hoarse, his attitude in making his demands was so confident that it was almost absurd.
He's not very greedy.
Dorothea tried to give him a piece of rice cake out of pity, but he asked her to give him the whole basket.
There was no way Kiel would meet Dover, who had failed miserably by being greedy for work that was not ordered and had even been caught for it.
Instead of harshly rejecting his request, Dorothea gently and roundly rejected it.
“He’s busy right now trying to fix what you did. You should be grateful that he’s giving you this chance to leave.”
As soon as she finished speaking, she leaned down and put the key in his palm, which showed a somewhat dissatisfied expression.
“Get on the horse at the rightmost door of the stable and go out the back door. That’s all I can help you with.”
As Dorothea raised her bent body with a short whisper, Dover blinked at the key placed on his palm.
She took two steps back, slightly bent her knees, and gave a polite greeting that one might expect to receive in a formal setting.
“I hope you have a safe return, Lord Dover.”
Dover, who had been staring at the girl's back as she left the prison without any hesitation as if her work was over, poured the potion he was holding into his mouth.
He wiped his mouth with a determined expression, got up, and went through the open door towards the stable.
Dorothea, who had been standing by the window in the hallway and quietly watching Dover enter the stable, raised her head at the sound of someone.
She noticed Luke coming towards her from across the hallway.
The moment the distance between the two people narrowed to a few steps, the sound of a horse galloping could be heard from afar.
Luke turned his gaze away from the window.
In the distance, the silhouette of Dover was visible, taking advantage of the darkness to escape.
Dorothea opened her mouth to Luke, who was just watching Dover Spencer disappear into the distance in silence.
“Aren’t you going to chase him this time?”
“Wasn’t it you who freed him?”
“Yeah, it’s me.”
It was a clear admission without a word of excuse.
Luke simply looked at Dorothea's face from side to side without a trace of annoyance or anger.
As if trying to figure out what she was thinking.
“You said so. Even the smallest favor must be repaid in full. I don’t engage in such foolish dealings, but at least I have not forgotten that I owe you my life.”
This time, instead of moving rashly, he meant to move as she wished until the picture she was drawing was complete.
Dorothea nodded, her face beaming with admiration as if she were an adult looking at a child.
“I’ve prepared a more interesting pursuer than you. I didn’t release him without thinking, so don’t worry too much.”
Luke's gaze, which had been scanning Dorothea, who always spoke ambiguous and difficult-to-understand words, stopped at the object in her hand.
It was a sturdy leash worn around the necks of the hunting dogs that chased Luke and his companions through the forest.
Dorothea, who had been fiddling with the iron joints, stared blankly at the place where Dover had disappeared.
“He said that he enjoyed driving those who had wronged him into the forest and having dogs chase them. He was notorious in the neighborhood.”
“...”
“He was a beggar who enjoyed inflicting pain on others without lifting a finger, playing hunting.”
“So that’s why it’s unpleasant.”
Before long, the smile had disappeared from Dorothea's face.
She looked at Luke with expressionless eyes, then closed and opened them.
“These dogs existed solely to satisfy his greed. From birth, they were grafted with dogs of good bloodlines to produce offspring, and they were continuously given drugs so that they could not feel pain. They were continuously starved and whipped so that they would show aggression toward their opponents.”
“...”
“It is so easy to abandon a dog that has been raised as a hunting tool for his pleasure from the beginning to the end of its life.”
Dover Spencer, returning to his territory with a cheerful face, probably never thought about the dogs he had abandoned.
He is a person who thinks of other people as 'prey', so how can he be so foolish?
“So this time, he has to give in.”
It was a somewhat random statement, omitting all the intermediate steps.
Who should Dover give something to?
Instead of prying into the meaning of the enigmatic words, which would have been a natural thing to ask, Luke reached out and lifted the shawl from below her shoulders.
“Go inside and sleep.”
As Luke passed by with a soft greeting and completely disappeared into the end of the hallway, Dorothea slowly threw the leash she was holding out the window.
The two leashes thrown between the open windowsills turned into two hunting dogs with shiny fur the moment they touched the ground and ran out of the garden with great momentum.
Deep in the night, in the thick darkness, Dover Spencer whipped his horse.
The horse, which had been repeatedly hit on the buttocks, went wild, but he didn't care.
'We must hurry and return to the Count's residence.'
The uncle he knew was never a merciful man who offered second chances.
Even though his uncle may have helped him out at the last minute, if he doesn't find a chance to make up for his mistake, he may be kicked out very coldly.
'Damn. Nothing is helping.'
The assassins who had been moving together were all killed or captured, and even the hunting dogs that had been raised with great care were all killed.
Hunting dogs can be raised again with time, but it was a waste of resources to raise them again.
“I need to increase the intensity of my training next time.”
Dover muttered as he mercilessly struck the staggering horse's rump.
Even though he had clearly chosen the finest-looking horse in the stable, he was still not satisfied.
After running for a while, Dover realized at some point that the surroundings were excessively quiet.
The pitch-black darkness that fell in front, behind, and on both sides made him lose his sense of direction.
“What is this again?”
It was at that moment that he muttered annoyedly and grabbed the horse's reins to stop it.
Before he knew it, the entrance to the forest he often visited as his 'hunting ground' appeared right in front of him.
“Here...”
The quickest way to get to the Count's residence was through this forest, but it was now dark.
There was no reason to cross the forest swarming with nocturnal beasts.
It was at that moment that he frowned and was about to turn the wheel while holding the reins.
In the quiet space where not even the sound of grass rustling in the wind could be heard, the sound of a dog barking could be heard from far away.
A loud, threatening sound gradually approaches.
When he finally turned around at the sound of something close enough to pinpoint the target, he saw clearly in the darkness the sight of his 'dogs', once leashed and used for hunting, closing the distance.
A slender body, gleaming eyes, and sharp teeth all designed to chase down prey.
Dover, his face crumpled, pounded the horse's rump.
The poor horse began to run again, struggling deep into the forest, without even having time to catch its breath.
How far did I run through the forest?
Dover bit his lip as he heard the barking sound that seemed to get closer again when it seemed to get farther away.
The dogs chasing him were driving him in the desired direction while maintaining an appropriate distance, as they always did when cornering their prey.
“I told you, it’s not this way!”
Even though he shouted annoyedly and turned the reins the other way, the horse that had already lost its senses did not listen.
The horse's buttocks had swollen from being beaten so many times that it writhed as if it was going to faint when he put his hand on it.
It's hard enough to just hang on, so there's no way he can control the direction.
'Oh my God, oh my God!'
The sound of barking grew closer again.
The savage hunting style of cornering an opponent until he is exhausted and then sinking his teeth into their neck at the last moment was something he had been trained to do.
The dogs' prey was varied.
Deer and wild boars are several times larger than them, and even bears and leopards are classified as carnivores.
And sometimes, perhaps more often than he might think, they hunt humans.
Just for his enjoyment.
The hunting dogs, who had almost caught up with the horses, jumped up with a thump.
Dover swung his whip and yelled at the dogs circling around his feet.
“Get out of here! For the life of me, get out of here!”
The eyes of the hunting dogs that chased after him with their tongues out and their barking furiously lit up in an eerie way.
Dover's back was soaked with cold sweat.
He knew better than anyone how vicious those 'dogs' could become.
When he stood back and watched, he would applaud the hounds, hoping that they would become more ferocious, rough, and cruel and that it would stimulate them even more, but now he couldn't do that.
That's understandable because the prey these dogs were chasing this time was none other than Dover Spencer himself.
'You damn dogs who don't even recognize their own master!'
A cool breeze blew across his back, which was soaked with cold sweat.
Dover Spencer, shivering from the cold that penetrated his entire body, gritted his teeth and made his final decision.
He stabbed the horse's rump with the dagger he was holding in his bosom.
The horse, which had been excited all along, began to gallop madly through the forest.
Because of this, the surrounding tree branches scratched and hit Dover's face and body without mercy, but there was nothing he could do.
Dover, who was clinging to his horse while holding on tightly to its mane, closed his eyes tightly.
After some time, the surroundings became quiet again and the air became cool.
When he opened his eyes which had been closed slightly, the exit out of the forest appeared right in front of him.
It was a moment when he stretched his body out with eyes filled with joy.
The dogs, who had not even made a sound as they ran through the bushes, let alone barked, bit his ankles as if to deceive him who was filled with hope.
Dover screamed in agony as sharp teeth dug into the flesh of his ankle.
“Ahhhh!”
As the horse that had escaped the forest collapsed, Dover fell off its back and rolled across the grass.
“Hey, save me! The dogs, the dogs...!”
“Are you all right, Lord Dover?”
A man with a familiar face extended his hand.
He was one of the knights of the Spencer family who followed Kiel's orders.
When he, who knew Dover very well, reached out his hand, Dover grabbed his ankle and shook his head madly.
He rolled around in the grass without a care in the world, and his fancy linen shirt had long since become stained with weed, but he kept struggling.
Bloodshot eyes. Disheveled hair. And a mad writhing.
The knight, who had been trying to calm him down somehow, began to suspect that Dover Spencer might have lost his mind.
Dover opened his bloodless lips and cried out again and again.
“The dogs bit me! Those damn dogs bit me!”
Eventually, the knight gave up trying to calm him down and looked around awkwardly, tilting his head.
Contrary to Dover's words, there were no dogs or other animals of similar shape or size around.
Compared to the loud screaming, the ankle that Dover was holding in his hand looked perfectly fine.
Instead, the horse that had carried Dover here was lying dead with a dagger stuck in its rump.
'You still treat animals roughly.'
Dover, lying at the feet of the knight with his brows furrowed, muttered feebly with a wickedly distorted face, as if he had no strength to struggle any longer.
“Those crazy dogs dare to... me!”
The knight lowered his body toward Dover, who had stopped struggling, and carefully removed the hand that was holding his ankle.
Soon, contrary to Dover's claims, a clean ankle was revealed without a single scratch.
There was no sign of bleeding, no bite marks, and no swelling.
The knight looked down at Dover, who was lying helplessly, mumbling nothing but what he wanted to say, and then carried him on his back with a short sigh.
As Dover dangled from the knight's shoulder like a load, a bruise appeared on his white ankle as if something had bitten it, but it soon disappeared.
This happened without even Dover Spencer knowing.
The bread and water given to him as a meal remained intact before him.
Dorothea, who had been observing the man breathing faintly, opened the tightly closed prison door.
Wood, who was standing behind her, flinched and reached out his hand to try to stop her, but then quietly put it down.
The reason is that he knew from experience that his mistress was very stubborn and would do whatever she wanted no matter who tried to stop her.
Instead, he followed Dorothea with his eyes without fail.
So that he can react quickly no matter what happens.
“Lily.”
The water spirit popped its head out at Dorothea's call and splashed cold water on the man's face.
“Phew!”
Dover Spencer, who had just woken up, saw Dorothea looking down at him and tried to get up but stumbled and fell down again.
Dorothea gave some cool advice to the man writhing on the floor.
“You’d better not do that. Luke doesn’t seem to have the situation in his hands as much as you might think.”
“This fucking dog...”
A potion bottle fell with a thud in front of Dover, who was gnashing his teeth and swearing harshly.
Dover's eyes widened as he saw a bottle containing a liquid that gave off a brilliant glow roll into his hand.
“If you drink it, you’ll be able to properly raise that weak body.”
Dover looked up at Dorothea with suspicious eyes, unable to easily pick up the bottle.
“What are you thinking? Why are you doing this to me...”
“Well, you don’t know what I think. If I had to say something, I would say it’s because you have a good uncle.”
“Uncle? Could it be that he is...”
When Dorothea mentioned Kiel, Dover, who was rolling his eyes to understand the situation, stopped and soon muttered in a voice full of emotion.
“You did it for me!”
The hand holding the potion bottle tightened as if it was Kiel Spencer who personally took action to get him out of prison.
Dorothea, who half intended to make him think that way, was looking at the man with a faint smile.
“I have to see my uncle.”
Dover's throat was in terrible condition because he had been lying on the cold floor the whole time.
Although his voice was very hoarse, his attitude in making his demands was so confident that it was almost absurd.
He's not very greedy.
Dorothea tried to give him a piece of rice cake out of pity, but he asked her to give him the whole basket.
There was no way Kiel would meet Dover, who had failed miserably by being greedy for work that was not ordered and had even been caught for it.
Instead of harshly rejecting his request, Dorothea gently and roundly rejected it.
“He’s busy right now trying to fix what you did. You should be grateful that he’s giving you this chance to leave.”
As soon as she finished speaking, she leaned down and put the key in his palm, which showed a somewhat dissatisfied expression.
“Get on the horse at the rightmost door of the stable and go out the back door. That’s all I can help you with.”
As Dorothea raised her bent body with a short whisper, Dover blinked at the key placed on his palm.
She took two steps back, slightly bent her knees, and gave a polite greeting that one might expect to receive in a formal setting.
“I hope you have a safe return, Lord Dover.”
Dover, who had been staring at the girl's back as she left the prison without any hesitation as if her work was over, poured the potion he was holding into his mouth.
He wiped his mouth with a determined expression, got up, and went through the open door towards the stable.
***
Dorothea, who had been standing by the window in the hallway and quietly watching Dover enter the stable, raised her head at the sound of someone.
She noticed Luke coming towards her from across the hallway.
The moment the distance between the two people narrowed to a few steps, the sound of a horse galloping could be heard from afar.
Luke turned his gaze away from the window.
In the distance, the silhouette of Dover was visible, taking advantage of the darkness to escape.
Dorothea opened her mouth to Luke, who was just watching Dover Spencer disappear into the distance in silence.
“Aren’t you going to chase him this time?”
“Wasn’t it you who freed him?”
“Yeah, it’s me.”
It was a clear admission without a word of excuse.
Luke simply looked at Dorothea's face from side to side without a trace of annoyance or anger.
As if trying to figure out what she was thinking.
“You said so. Even the smallest favor must be repaid in full. I don’t engage in such foolish dealings, but at least I have not forgotten that I owe you my life.”
This time, instead of moving rashly, he meant to move as she wished until the picture she was drawing was complete.
Dorothea nodded, her face beaming with admiration as if she were an adult looking at a child.
“I’ve prepared a more interesting pursuer than you. I didn’t release him without thinking, so don’t worry too much.”
Luke's gaze, which had been scanning Dorothea, who always spoke ambiguous and difficult-to-understand words, stopped at the object in her hand.
It was a sturdy leash worn around the necks of the hunting dogs that chased Luke and his companions through the forest.
Dorothea, who had been fiddling with the iron joints, stared blankly at the place where Dover had disappeared.
“He said that he enjoyed driving those who had wronged him into the forest and having dogs chase them. He was notorious in the neighborhood.”
“...”
“He was a beggar who enjoyed inflicting pain on others without lifting a finger, playing hunting.”
“So that’s why it’s unpleasant.”
Before long, the smile had disappeared from Dorothea's face.
She looked at Luke with expressionless eyes, then closed and opened them.
“These dogs existed solely to satisfy his greed. From birth, they were grafted with dogs of good bloodlines to produce offspring, and they were continuously given drugs so that they could not feel pain. They were continuously starved and whipped so that they would show aggression toward their opponents.”
“...”
“It is so easy to abandon a dog that has been raised as a hunting tool for his pleasure from the beginning to the end of its life.”
Dover Spencer, returning to his territory with a cheerful face, probably never thought about the dogs he had abandoned.
He is a person who thinks of other people as 'prey', so how can he be so foolish?
“So this time, he has to give in.”
It was a somewhat random statement, omitting all the intermediate steps.
Who should Dover give something to?
Instead of prying into the meaning of the enigmatic words, which would have been a natural thing to ask, Luke reached out and lifted the shawl from below her shoulders.
“Go inside and sleep.”
As Luke passed by with a soft greeting and completely disappeared into the end of the hallway, Dorothea slowly threw the leash she was holding out the window.
The two leashes thrown between the open windowsills turned into two hunting dogs with shiny fur the moment they touched the ground and ran out of the garden with great momentum.
***
Deep in the night, in the thick darkness, Dover Spencer whipped his horse.
The horse, which had been repeatedly hit on the buttocks, went wild, but he didn't care.
'We must hurry and return to the Count's residence.'
The uncle he knew was never a merciful man who offered second chances.
Even though his uncle may have helped him out at the last minute, if he doesn't find a chance to make up for his mistake, he may be kicked out very coldly.
'Damn. Nothing is helping.'
The assassins who had been moving together were all killed or captured, and even the hunting dogs that had been raised with great care were all killed.
Hunting dogs can be raised again with time, but it was a waste of resources to raise them again.
“I need to increase the intensity of my training next time.”
Dover muttered as he mercilessly struck the staggering horse's rump.
Even though he had clearly chosen the finest-looking horse in the stable, he was still not satisfied.
After running for a while, Dover realized at some point that the surroundings were excessively quiet.
The pitch-black darkness that fell in front, behind, and on both sides made him lose his sense of direction.
“What is this again?”
It was at that moment that he muttered annoyedly and grabbed the horse's reins to stop it.
Before he knew it, the entrance to the forest he often visited as his 'hunting ground' appeared right in front of him.
“Here...”
The quickest way to get to the Count's residence was through this forest, but it was now dark.
There was no reason to cross the forest swarming with nocturnal beasts.
It was at that moment that he frowned and was about to turn the wheel while holding the reins.
In the quiet space where not even the sound of grass rustling in the wind could be heard, the sound of a dog barking could be heard from far away.
A loud, threatening sound gradually approaches.
When he finally turned around at the sound of something close enough to pinpoint the target, he saw clearly in the darkness the sight of his 'dogs', once leashed and used for hunting, closing the distance.
A slender body, gleaming eyes, and sharp teeth all designed to chase down prey.
Dover, his face crumpled, pounded the horse's rump.
The poor horse began to run again, struggling deep into the forest, without even having time to catch its breath.
***
How far did I run through the forest?
Dover bit his lip as he heard the barking sound that seemed to get closer again when it seemed to get farther away.
The dogs chasing him were driving him in the desired direction while maintaining an appropriate distance, as they always did when cornering their prey.
“I told you, it’s not this way!”
Even though he shouted annoyedly and turned the reins the other way, the horse that had already lost its senses did not listen.
The horse's buttocks had swollen from being beaten so many times that it writhed as if it was going to faint when he put his hand on it.
It's hard enough to just hang on, so there's no way he can control the direction.
'Oh my God, oh my God!'
The sound of barking grew closer again.
The savage hunting style of cornering an opponent until he is exhausted and then sinking his teeth into their neck at the last moment was something he had been trained to do.
The dogs' prey was varied.
Deer and wild boars are several times larger than them, and even bears and leopards are classified as carnivores.
And sometimes, perhaps more often than he might think, they hunt humans.
Just for his enjoyment.
The hunting dogs, who had almost caught up with the horses, jumped up with a thump.
Dover swung his whip and yelled at the dogs circling around his feet.
“Get out of here! For the life of me, get out of here!”
The eyes of the hunting dogs that chased after him with their tongues out and their barking furiously lit up in an eerie way.
Dover's back was soaked with cold sweat.
He knew better than anyone how vicious those 'dogs' could become.
When he stood back and watched, he would applaud the hounds, hoping that they would become more ferocious, rough, and cruel and that it would stimulate them even more, but now he couldn't do that.
That's understandable because the prey these dogs were chasing this time was none other than Dover Spencer himself.
'You damn dogs who don't even recognize their own master!'
A cool breeze blew across his back, which was soaked with cold sweat.
Dover Spencer, shivering from the cold that penetrated his entire body, gritted his teeth and made his final decision.
He stabbed the horse's rump with the dagger he was holding in his bosom.
The horse, which had been excited all along, began to gallop madly through the forest.
Because of this, the surrounding tree branches scratched and hit Dover's face and body without mercy, but there was nothing he could do.
Dover, who was clinging to his horse while holding on tightly to its mane, closed his eyes tightly.
After some time, the surroundings became quiet again and the air became cool.
When he opened his eyes which had been closed slightly, the exit out of the forest appeared right in front of him.
It was a moment when he stretched his body out with eyes filled with joy.
The dogs, who had not even made a sound as they ran through the bushes, let alone barked, bit his ankles as if to deceive him who was filled with hope.
Dover screamed in agony as sharp teeth dug into the flesh of his ankle.
“Ahhhh!”
As the horse that had escaped the forest collapsed, Dover fell off its back and rolled across the grass.
“Hey, save me! The dogs, the dogs...!”
“Are you all right, Lord Dover?”
A man with a familiar face extended his hand.
He was one of the knights of the Spencer family who followed Kiel's orders.
When he, who knew Dover very well, reached out his hand, Dover grabbed his ankle and shook his head madly.
He rolled around in the grass without a care in the world, and his fancy linen shirt had long since become stained with weed, but he kept struggling.
Bloodshot eyes. Disheveled hair. And a mad writhing.
The knight, who had been trying to calm him down somehow, began to suspect that Dover Spencer might have lost his mind.
Dover opened his bloodless lips and cried out again and again.
“The dogs bit me! Those damn dogs bit me!”
Eventually, the knight gave up trying to calm him down and looked around awkwardly, tilting his head.
Contrary to Dover's words, there were no dogs or other animals of similar shape or size around.
Compared to the loud screaming, the ankle that Dover was holding in his hand looked perfectly fine.
Instead, the horse that had carried Dover here was lying dead with a dagger stuck in its rump.
'You still treat animals roughly.'
Dover, lying at the feet of the knight with his brows furrowed, muttered feebly with a wickedly distorted face, as if he had no strength to struggle any longer.
“Those crazy dogs dare to... me!”
The knight lowered his body toward Dover, who had stopped struggling, and carefully removed the hand that was holding his ankle.
Soon, contrary to Dover's claims, a clean ankle was revealed without a single scratch.
There was no sign of bleeding, no bite marks, and no swelling.
The knight looked down at Dover, who was lying helplessly, mumbling nothing but what he wanted to say, and then carried him on his back with a short sigh.
As Dover dangled from the knight's shoulder like a load, a bruise appeared on his white ankle as if something had bitten it, but it soon disappeared.
This happened without even Dover Spencer knowing.
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