Episode 10: The Beast of the North Wraps Its Wraps Around Her Waist
The central hall of the Foundation Ball.
Beneath the golden chandelier, Eleanor and Liliana were drawing the attention of hundreds of people simply by standing still.
"Look over there. Is she really the daughter of Count Werner? Did Castillo cast some magic?"
"Magic? What magic? Look at that relaxed posture. The class of the nobility was different from the start. The only fool in the world is the Young Duke who fell for some slacker while overlooking such a gem."
Whispers mixed with praise and awe filled the hall. Just then, Vivian, dressed in a gaudy pink dress, pushed through the crowd and approached confidently, arm in arm with Claude. Behind her, several young ladies of lower nobility followed with smug expressions, flattering her.
"Oh, Lady Liliana!"
Vivian raised her voice as high as she could, feigning delight. It was a voice so repulsive and sharp that it seemed to pierce through even the music in the hall.
"It is such a relief. You have no idea how worried I was that you might be crying alone in a corner as usual. No matter how lavishly you dressed her up out of pity, it is ultimately I who stand by His Excellency the Young Duke of Castillo's side."
At Vivian's blatant provocation, the surrounding nobles held their breath, their faces filled with intrigue. It was the ultimate gossip of high society: a mistress openly making threats in front of the fiancée, who was to become his wife.
However, Liliana remained unfazed. Just as Eleanor had taught her, she unfolded a softly glowing fan and covered half of her mouth. Then, piercing precisely into Vivian's brow with her cool, pale green eyes, she spat out a sharp rebuke that was soft yet felt like it would break bones.
"Good riddance. It seems the Lady Baroness has not even learned the basic etiquette of a ball."
"What, what? What do you mean..."
"According to the laws of the Empire, it is proper etiquette to bow your head and reveal your family crest when speaking to the betrothed of the official heir. How dare you hold your head high and speak of 'you and me' like a rootless illegitimate child? I have no recollection of ever forming a sisterhood bond with you, Young Lady."
"...!!"
Vivian's face instantly turned bright red. The word 'illegitimate child' was the most fatal trigger for Vivian, who was the illegitimate daughter of a Baron.
"Li-Liliana! How dare you insult me?!"
Vivian clung to Claude's arm, tears welling up in her eyes.
"Your Excellency! Did you hear that? That lowly woman is disrespecting me!"
Seeing his mistress insulted, Claude, intoxicated by a pathetic sense of heroism, stepped forward.
"You insolent bitch! You seem to think you are the real mistress of Castillo just because my mother is looking out for you, but you are nothing but a shell sold out to debt! How dare you... my beloved woman...!"
"Ah, Your Excellency the Young Duke. You have arrived at just the right time."
Liliana smiled elegantly, not even blinking at Claude's shout.
"Did you finish your confinement at the annex well? I heard that the family ledgers were completely frozen, leaving you in a state of anxiety, unable to even pay for Lady Vivian's tea. I hope you brought a generous amount of personal spending money today. If you were to be kicked out again for trying to run on credit at the ball, it would be a disgrace to Castillo."
Pfft!
At Liliana's elegant revelation, uncontrollable laughter erupted among the surrounding nobles.
"Good heavens, the Young Duke of Castillo was locked up because his cash flow was cut off!"
"Why did you come to the ball when you don't even have the money to buy a single jewel for your mistress? How disgraceful!"
The nobles' blatant mockery slapped Claude's ears mercilessly. Not only did he dig his own grave, but he also ended up being treated like a complete beggar in front of the entire social circle.
Claude's eyes rolled back in extreme shame and rage.
“This... this vulgar little bitch has finally lost her mind!! How dare you humiliate me?!”
Claude, having lost his reason due to extreme shame, raised his hand high.
It was a crazy act to attempt violence against a woman, and in the middle of a ballroom where hundreds of nobles were watching.
Vivian inwardly rejoiced and clung to Claude's arm, pretending to cry, while the surrounding nobles gasped in shock.
However, Liliana, the target of violence, did not even blink. For the sturdiest shield in the world stood behind her.
Sure enough, it was before Claude's hand could even cut through the air. Eleanor's red eyes, which had been watching him, grew cold.
How dare you think you can scar my puppy, the face of my perfect hunting dog?
Cool, red mana began to coalesce at the tip of Eleanor's right hand. She intended to sever that parricide's wrist entirely. Whether the ballroom turned into a sea of blood or not, she was determined to make him pay with his life for insulting the future Duchess of Castillo.
It was the very moment she snapped her fingers to unleash the blade of mana.
Kwaaah-!!
Along with a heavy vibration that felt as if the ballroom's massive glass windows were about to shatter, a suffocating pressure weighing down the entire hall overwhelmed us.
Before Eleanor's mana could even reach him, Claude's wrist, which had been raised in the air, was crushed by an invisible, massive force and twisted as if to break.
"Aaaargh!!"
Claude screamed in bone-crushing pain and knelt on the floor like a beast.
"W-what! What's going on!"
"Th-that man is... the Grand Duke of the North...! His Highness Caeln?!"
The place where astonished nobles parted to the sides to make way.
There, a huge man, looking as if he were a mass of deep darkness, was walking in with slow, heavy steps.
It was Caeln Argentus, the strongest sword master on the continent and ruler of the North.
An overwhelming height of well over 190 centimeters.
Beneath the pitch-black hair that seemed to swallow all light, golden eyes gleamed sharply and coldly like those of a beast.
The finest black tailcoat wrapped around his body could not fully conceal his rough and wild frame.
At the decadent charisma that seemed to be imbued with the stench of deep winter frost and the scent of blood, the noble ladies let out gasps of fear.
Caeln looked down at Claude, who was rolling on the floor, as if he were a bug.
"I thought I heard the howling of a beast coming from the Imperial Palace, but it was just a mutt in heat barking."
"Ugh...! Grand Duke! How dare you... to Castillo's heir...!"
"You'd better shut your mouth. The very thought of hearing that family name uttered from your filthy mouth makes me sick."
Caeln's boot mercilessly trampled Claude's shoulder.
As Claude foamed at the mouth and fainted, Vivian, who was standing beside him, turned pale and fled.
Caeln's golden gaze, having cleared away a piece of trash, scanned Liliana, who was standing stiffly, and then immediately turned toward Eleanor, who was standing behind her.
It seemed like Caeln had saved Liliana, but in fact, his purpose was only one.
Stopping Eleanor's hand as she was about to unleash mana.
"Ma'am."
Ignoring the gazes of hundreds of people, Caelon walked straight toward Eleanor.
As he stood before Eleanor, his massive, beast-like physique became a shadow that perfectly obscured her.
"Just now, I saw you gathering mana at your fingertips."
Caelon's low, deep voice rang in Eleanor's ears.
"Why would you intend to soil your noble hands, Madam, to get rid of such a filthy fellow? I would be deeply upset if you were to get blood on yourself, so I took the risk of being rude and stepped forward first."
Eleanor quietly raised her eyes and stared at the man looking down at her.
The surprise at him protecting her daughter-in-law was brief; as she met his blind and burning golden eyes, a hazy memory from 10 years ago came vividly to Eleanor's mind.
***
[10 years ago, Northern Monster Extermination Battle]
Twenty-two-year-old Caelon was a discarded life, born as the former Emperor's cursed illegitimate child and thrown to the northern front as a human shield.
No one gave him affection, and he, too, lived like a wounded wild dog baring its teeth at the world.
The day his belly was pierced by the claws of a giant manticore and his intestines spilled out.
As he lay buried in mud and pools of blood, agonizingly waiting only for death, a storm of mana redder and more intense than blood poured down upon his fading vision.
The archmage who instantly turned hundreds of monsters into ashes.
It was Eleanor, the young mistress of Castillo.
She walked over numerous corpses and stopped in front of the bloodied Caelon.
People avoided him, considering him an illegitimate child and a bad omen, but she was different.
She roughly grabbed Caelon by the collar, who was soaked in mud, and pulled him up.
That murderous glare was at least useful.
She unhesitatingly poured a top-quality elixir worth tens of thousands of gold into his mouth without mercy.
Toward him, coughing up in burning agony, Eleanor uttered a chillingly cold remark, yet one that perfectly saved his soul.
"Rise, beast. If you still have the strength to send me such a venomous look, you will surely have the strength to bite through the leash of the world that threw it at you."
It was not pity for the poor orphan.
As a human being to human being, it was the roughest and most perfect salvation to survive and prove oneself.
From that day forward, Caelon's world began to revolve solely around her. From trampling on the Imperial family that had treated him like a worm, to ascending to the throne of the Grand Duke of the North, and seizing control of the Empire's dark lords.
There is only one reason why he wielded his sword as the continent's greatest sword master for 10 years, covered in blood.
It was to one day break down the sturdy walls of Castillo where she was imprisoned and take that arrogant woman entirely into his own arms.
However, he had no choice but to wait in the darkness, holding his breath, as he watched Eleanor devote herself to her husband and family.
Waiting for the day she lets go of that rotten rope of her own accord.
And finally today, when she tore off the veil of the suppressed past and appeared at the ball in her radiant and arrogant true self.
Caelon felt the thread of reason he had been holding back snap.
There was no longer any reason to hide and watch.
***
[Today.]
"Ma'am."
Caelon slowly reached out and carefully, yet tightly, grasped Eleanor's right hand, where the mana had condensed and then scattered, so that she could not escape.
And with hundreds of nobles watching with astonished eyes, he lowered his dark, hot, beast-like lips onto the back of her hand.
Kiss.
Silence hung over the ballroom.
It was a massive scandal in which the Grand Duke of the North, the most powerful man on the continent, publicly expressed respect and possessiveness toward a married Duchess.
"...Grand Duke Caelon. What are you doing?"
Eleanor narrowed her eyes and tried to pull her hand away, but he did not let go.
Instead, Caelon raised his head, met Eleanor's gaze, and gave a bitter yet alluring smile.
"I am voluntarily becoming Madam's hunting dog to pay off a debt from 10 years ago.
He cast a cold gaze toward the fallen Claude and the group of nobles frozen in fear behind him.
"So that such vermin can never again offend the Madam or the Young Lady, the heir you cherish... I will gladly become your sword."
It was the moment when, after ending ten years of desperate unrequited love, the beast of the North finally descended to her side and offered an eternal vow.
Deep within Eleanor's red eyes, an intriguing flame began to burn.
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