Startled, Ruite turned his head to find a familiar face.
“Knight Connor?”
It was Connor, the knight he had met back when they visited this location for the Academy camp.
Connor seemed to remember Ruite as well, approaching with a bright, welcoming smile.
“I wasn’t entirely sure, but it is you! By the way, did you become a knight too?”
In Connor’s memory, Ruite was still a “fledgling” trainee in his Academy uniform.
Now, he stood there in the dignified uniform of the Imperial Knights.
“Yes.”
Ruite took the opportunity to explain that he was currently working in the Research Department at headquarters and was here on a dispatch mission.
“Wow, that’s truly amazing. To think the kid I used to train is now a fellow knight. And a Senior Aide at your age? Your promotion was incredibly fast! I knew my eyes didn’t deceive me back then.”
“I still have a lot to learn.”
Praise was something Ruite could never quite get used to.
As he scratched his head awkwardly, Connor’s gaze naturally drifted to Ruite’s left ring finger.
“Oh? Ruite, are you married? Ah, maybe it’s rude of me to ask so suddenly.”
“No, it’s fine. It’s not exactly a secret.”
In fact, the news of Ruite and Chester’s marriage had spread so thoroughly through headquarters that it was harder to find a knight who didn’t know.
Ruite added that they had held the wedding six months ago.
“Ah, I think I heard a rumor that the famous Commander Chester from headquarters got married, but could it be…?”
“That’s right.”
Connor’s jaw dropped as he nodded.
He seemed genuinely impressed that the Academy students he once knew had not only become capable knights but had also tied the knot.
“So, if you’ve been together since the Academy, you and the Commander must have been dating for a long time, right?”
“Pardon? Oh, no. We were just classmates back then.”
Calling them classmates was actually a generous way to put it.
At the time, Chester didn’t even like Ruite very much.
While his attitude eventually shifted, there hadn’t been a trace of a “romantic atmosphere” between them back then.
“Oh? Really? I was certain you were dating.”
“Why would you think that?”
“Well, I was the one mostly supervising your training during the camp. Every time I did, the student Chester—who’s now the Commander—would glare at me intensely. Whenever I talked to you privately, he’d come over and say another student was struggling with a drill, forcing me to leave your side.”
Connor recalled the past, noting that those actions were clearly born from jealousy.
He added with a chuckle that he found the “cute” student romance heartwarming, so he had pretended not to notice.
“Ah…”
Ruite couldn’t find the words to respond, letting out only a low hum.
He had no idea Chester had acted in a way that looked so obviously jealous to others.
Hearing about Chester’s past behavior from a third party felt embarrassing, yet strangely special.
“But headquarters is too much. Sending a member who’s only been married for six months on a week-long dispatch.”
“It’s work, so there’s no helping it.”
Ruite spoke calmly, but internally, he was thinking the exact same thing.
He hadn’t thought much of it when Vilter first gave him the assignment, but after spending days without Chester, he finally empathized with how much of a fuss Chester had made before he left.
“Isn’t the Commander terribly lonely? Who knows, he might be so lonely he falls into a rut.”
“What?”
Ruite’s eyes widened at the unfamiliar concept, prompting Connor to burst into laughter.
“I’m joking. I’ve been reading a novel lately where an Alpha protagonist loves his partner so much that the loneliness of being apart triggers an extreme rut, making him fall ill. There was an episode like that.”
Ruite briefly thought that Connor and Vice-Commander Vilter might share the exact same taste in literature.
“Fiction is fiction, after all. Even if a rut is influenced by emotions, that wouldn’t actually happen in real life.”
“Of course not.”
A rut triggered by loneliness? Ruite had never heard of such a thing.
“But really, Ruite.”
Connor cleared his throat and suddenly lowered his voice.
“Ahem. How is marriage? Is it good?”
“Huh? Ah…”
Ruite wondered why he was asking so suddenly, but then a memory surfaced.
It was from the time he had entered the “Ghost Zone” forest with Chester during Magnus’s event.
They hadn’t found any ghosts, but they had accidentally stumbled upon Connor and Evan enjoying a secret rendezvous.
It seemed the two were still going strong.
“Yes, I like it very much.”
Ruite decided on a simple answer.
There were no other words that could express it better.
Life with Chester was wonderful.
Adults often said marriage was different from dating—that it was hard because reality differed from the ideal—but Ruite couldn’t relate to that at all.
“Oh, I see.”
“Connor.”
At the sound of a new voice, Ruite and Connor both turned.
Evan was standing there with documents tucked under his arm.
Ruite noticed how Connor immediately broke into a beaming smile the moment he saw Evan.
“You asked me to check these materials.”
“Yes! I’m coming! Ruite, let’s see each other once more before you go. Good luck with the work.”
“Thank you.”
Connor ran over to Evan and practically threw himself at him.
Their proximity was far closer than that of mere colleagues.
Recognizing this, Evan tried to push him away, but a matching smile was spreading across his lips as well.
“…I miss Chester.”
Watching the two of them warmly, Ruite felt a sudden pang of emptiness.
Was this what people meant when they said they felt a chill in their hearts?
He never thought the day would come when he fully understood that phrase.
Wiping his nose, Ruite headed back into the main building.
Time passed, and finally, it was the last day of the dispatch.
Fortunately, no further issues occurred, allowing the team to return after exactly one week as planned.
Before they left, Marcus Derrick—the Northern Branch Commander and brother to the Grand Commander—personally thanked each member of the dispatch team.
Ruite said his goodbyes to Colin and Magnus as well.
They promised to meet again later for a private gathering rather than for work.
Magnus looked a bit awkward when Ruite mentioned he’d be bringing Chester along, as he still wasn’t very close to him.
He also shared a brief goodbye with Evan and Connor, keeping his silent hope that the two would eventually get married to himself.
With the cheers of the northern knights behind them, the carriage carrying the dispatch team departed for the capital.
“Ruite, aren’t you tired? Try to get some sleep. It’s a long journey.”
“I’m fine. Strangely, I don’t feel tired at all.”
A colleague looked at him with skepticism, mainly because every other member of the team had fallen fast asleep the moment the carriage started moving.
But Ruite’s eyes were wide awake.
It was the anticipation.
The thought of seeing Chester soon made his fatigue vanish completely.
The week spent at the branch had felt like an eternity.
He was finally done with the nights spent hugging Chester’s clothes; he was going to see the real person now.
The carriage, which had left at dawn, arrived at the Imperial Headquarters late at night.
The returning researchers first visited Vilter’s office to report their return.
Relieved that everyone had returned safely, Vilter told them he would hear the detailed report tomorrow and ordered them to go home and rest immediately.
As Ruite left Vilter’s office, he suddenly remembered that Chester was supposed to be on night duty today.
‘That means he should still be in the main building.’
Ruite was about to head up the stairs with a light step when he ran right into Varen coming down.
“Oh, Ruite! You’re back?”
“Yes.”
“Are you on your way to see Chester?”
Ruite nodded.
Varen gave a mischievous grin as if he’d expected that.
However, his expression quickly turned serious.
“Chester went back to the mansion around this afternoon.”
“What? Why? I thought he was on duty today…”
“He was, but he looked in really bad shape. I took his shift. You should hurry home. Oh, and tell him I expect to be paid back for this shift—tell him he’s not allowed to stay sick.”
Ruite thanked him for the info and hurried out of the headquarters.
‘In bad shape? Was he seriously ill?’
Swallowing his anxiety, Ruite rushed back to the mansion.
Vilter the butler looked like he wanted to say something as Ruite arrived, but Ruite didn’t have the luxury to stop and chat.
He sprinted up the stairs.
But when he reached the floor where the bedroom was located, something felt wrong.
Not a single servant was in sight on this floor.
Even more confusing was the thick, heavy scent of Alpha pheromones permeating the air.
Ruite instinctively swallowed hard.
The sheer volume of pheromones was extraordinary.
With a sinking realization, Ruite tentatively knocked on the bedroom door.
“Chester, it’s me. I’m coming in.”
But before Ruite could even grasp the doorknob, the door swung open and an arm shot out.
Before he could utter a word, Ruite was yanked inside.
The sound of the door clicking shut echoed through the hallway, leaving only the sound of Ruite’s startled gasp behind.
