* * *
I had seen him dressed up before my regression, but the feeling was undeniably different now.
Back then, I was consumed by fear. I had to face him until the very last moment of my unwanted end.
Locke had been searching for something, and he had tried to find the answer through me.
Though I didn’t know exactly what he was looking for, I knew it was related to the secrets of the Allure region—a place only the head of the Hestian family could access.
At the time, my sister had left home to become an archaeologist and was out of reach, and my mother was not of Hestian blood.
Therefore, I was the only one left to inherit the headship, but since I wasn’t the real Cedric, I had no idea how to access the family secrets.
Locke, unaware of these circumstances, tightened his grip on my throat day by day.
Facing that coercive, violent version of him was nothing but terror and despair.
There was no way I could have dared to look him straight in the eye back then, trembling as I was.
The fear that paralyzed my body was sharper and louder than any other emotion.
But now, it was different.
Our relationship had shifted, and so had the feelings and attitudes we held for one another.
Now, I could look at Locke as an equal—as a friend.
And because of that, I could finally see just how dazzling he truly was.
As I admired the man who perfectly embodied the title of “Protagonist,” I realized too late that my gaze was a bit too blatant.
My face grew hot.
I busied my hands by rubbing the carvings on a nearby pillar, pretending to be engrossed.
“Is this… an orchid pattern?” I muttered, acting distracted.
I was standing there in a daze, as if I’d just witnessed a mystical phenomenon, when he stopped right beside me.
“Is it awkward?” Locke asked.
“Yeah, a little.”
“It’s awkward for me too, wearing clothes like this.”
“Oh? No, I didn’t mean it that way. It’s not awkward at all. It suits you. You look great.”
“Are you saying the pillar looks great?”
I shifted my gaze back to meet his.
I could hear my heart thumping against my ribs, but I forced a smile and acted composed.
“I mean you. You look great. The clothes suit you well.”
“I was able to wear such fine clothes thanks to you, Young Master. Thank you.”
I continued to stand there awkwardly before avoiding his eyes and hurrying toward the carriage.
At that moment, Locke reached out his hand, saying I looked pale and offered to support me to the carriage.
I wasn’t sick; I was just starstruck by his face… but saying that would be embarrassing for both of us.
So, I lightly placed my hand on top of his.
I couldn’t tell if his skin was hot or mine was.
All I knew was that every time our hands brushed or separated as we walked, my palms felt damp.
I worried it was my sweat and felt a sudden urge to wipe my hands on my pants.
The distance to the carriage was barely ten steps, yet I don’t know why it felt so long.
“The sword suits you.”
Locke spoke in a low voice, noticing the sword strapped to my right hip.
I puffed out my chest and looked at him, but our eyes met again, so I quickly looked down.
“I think it looks even better than when I first got it. Maybe it’s because of the mana stone you gave me.”
I climbed into the carriage and leaned back against the plush velvet sofa; Locke followed suit.
He sat across from me and watched me silently for a moment.
Then, his eyes dropped slightly.
“One moment,” he murmured, reaching out toward me carefully.
My body, which had instinctively flinched, relaxed as his delicate fingertips brushed the collar of my blouse.
It seemed the collar had been tucked in slightly, but his movements to straighten it were so slow and cautious that my breath hitched.
I watched him out of the corner of my eye, wondering when he would pull his hand away, when I heard Ciel’s voice.
“Where is Cedric?”
“I believe he has already boarded the carriage.”
As the sound of Ciel talking to the servant drew closer, Locke’s hand, having finished fixing my collar, quietly moved away.
“We’ll stop at the plaza for lunch on the way. See you then,” Ciel said through the window.
She had decided to ride in the Viscount’s carriage instead of the Hestian one to keep Eclat company during the long trip.
She gave me a brief nod in greeting.
“Yes, Sister.”
Since it was a celebratory event, we traveled with a minimal escort: one knight for me and two for Eclat and Ciel.
The Hestian territory was so vast it was impossible to see the end of it.
It would take over a day to reach the Marquis’s estate, and we had to drive fast to pass through the monster-infested forest before nightfall.
The two carriages kicked up dust on the dirt road, maintaining a steady distance.
I was excited to chat with Locke during the long journey.
I was secretly hoping he would strike up a conversation first, but his eyes never strayed from the book resting on his lap.
Inevitably, I was the one to break the silence.
“Is that the same book from before?”
“Yes,” Locke answered shortly, his eyes still fixed on the pages.
I felt a bit lost.
If the conversation died here, I didn’t know what topic I’d use to get his attention next. I tried one more time.
“Did you figure out the barrier-maker’s psychology?”
Thud.
Startled me. Locke snapped the book shut and finally faced me.
I flinched, worried he’d tell me to stop bothering him while he read, but I straightened my posture.
“I don’t know. I’ve read it twenty more times since then. I’ve read it enough to memorize it, but there isn’t a single sentence saying the barrier-maker felt ‘love’ or any such emotion.”
“You read it that many times…? And you still don’t know.”
As I shook my head in disbelief, Locke looked at me with a serious, steady gaze.
He looked like he was waiting for me to say something.
So, I spoke up again.
“I told you before. Novels don’t describe every single emotion. Everyone starts loving differently, so the author leaves room for the readers to imagine when those feelings sprout. That’s the reader’s right.”
He remained silent for a while, pondering my words.
Then, he stLocked the cover of the book with his palm and handed it to me.
“Didn’t you say you wouldn’t lend it because it’s your only copy?”
“I want to know.”
He continued in a calm voice.
“I want to know every single emotion the barrier-maker felt for the ‘Ruin’.”
For some reason, his voice sounded so earnest that I had no choice but to nod and take the book.
I didn’t even think about the risk of losing or damaging it at that moment.
While we traveled across the long plains, I read the novel Locke had handed me.
It was distinctly different from the books I usually read.
Unlike the fast-paced “makjang” novels that hit you with dopamine from the start, this one built up emotions slowly.
Is this what they call classic literature?
There were many difficult terms I didn’t understand, and the paragraphs were like walls of text.
I hadn’t even read a few pages before my eyes began to flutter with drowsiness.
I had boldly claimed I could understand the character’s psyche; if I started dozing off before ten pages, I was afraid he’d scold me and take the book back.
I bit the inside of my cheek, barely staying awake. I stole a glance at Locke.
He was sitting with his arms crossed and his eyes closed.
In the sweltering summer heat, a breeze flowed through the open window every time the carriage picked up speed.
It was hot inside, and the breeze was gentle.
There was no music to keep me awake, and no conversation.
It was only natural that I was overcome by boredom-induced sleepiness.
I studied his face quietly.
The curve of his thick, black eyelashes against his closed lids was perfectly precise.
His nose looked even sharper because his head was slightly bowed, and it was amazing how he didn’t have even a hint of a double chin even with his head tilted down.
‘Is his skin that firm because he has so much muscle?’
His face was much more interesting than the book.
The moment a smile began to pull at the corners of my mouth—’Crash!’
The carriage jolted violently upward.
“Whoa!”
I had felt the carriage swaying for a bit, but it seemed a wheel had finally caught on a large rock.
I grabbed the leather strap of the carriage immediately, but Locke’s head had begun to tilt toward the window frame.
I quickly lunged forward.
The moment his head hit the thick book I held out, his eyes snapped open.
Startled, I widened my own eyes.
Fearing he might misunderstand and think I was trying to hit him over the head with the book, I explained immediately.
“Uh, so, what happened was…”
“You really do approach me the second I let my guard down.”
“Huh?”
“Is it manifestation pain again?”
As I listened to Locke grumble about how there might be humans more lustful than monsters, I felt my face grow rapidly hot.
In that split second, I hadn’t realized.
I had reached out to protect his head, but that meant the distance between Locke and me had closed significantly.
His warm breath brushed against my lips.
It seems when a person is truly flustered, they can’t even speak the truth.
The words “your head was about to hit the glass” just hovered in my mouth.
As I sat there gawking, the coachman gave me an out.
“I failed to see a rock buried in the dirt. Are you unhurt, Young Master?”
“I’m fine. I’m not hurt.”
“It seems the wheel is out of alignment. We’ll have to fix it before we can continue.”
I pointed toward the coachman as if to prove my point and quickly scurried back to my seat.
Whether the misunderstanding was cleared or not, Locke’s gaze was still fixed on my face.
I licked my dry lips, shrugged once, cleared my throat with a “hem,” and opened the book again.
* * *
