Chapter 14
“Second, when the Duke went on the monster extermination expedition, His Highness asked you to prepare some items… secretly, so no one else would know.”
“Then?”
“And also… the day after tomorrow, he asked if I could visit the palace alone. But I had plans that day, so I had to refuse.”
He hadn’t given any specific reason for asking her to come to the Crown Prince’s palace. Sylvia’s hesitation wasn’t due to mistrust but because she genuinely had an important errand from Rossa that day.
The Crown Prince smiled gently and withdrew the request, saying if she was busy, it was fine.
“Hmm.”
If that innocent woman had gone willingly to the palace the day after tomorrow, she’d probably have been sexually harassed or assaulted. Kuinan smiled slantedly, fixing his clear blue eyes on Sylvia’s face.
“What exactly did that guy have you do?”
Sylvia didn’t know the answer, but Kuinan muttered the question while watching her thoughtfully. She looked rather pensive, as if curious herself.
“Maybe… he had you gather something?”
“Gather what?”
“Like monster corpses or something… I heard such things sometimes sell on the black market. It’s just a rumor, so I can’t be sure.”
Having spent over 300 days a year confined in the Duke’s castle, Sylvia was surprisingly knowledgeable. Kuinan admired her silently. Being royalty of a neighboring kingdom, she seemed to have accumulated some decent knowledge.
“Corpses wouldn’t be of much use, though.”
When he responded, Sylvia gave him a steady look as if to say, “How would you know that?” Without realizing it, she cast a somewhat rude glance before quickly dropping her eyes within three seconds.
Kuinan, holding back a smile, kindly elaborated for his wife.
“Like chewing on crocodile leather, the flesh tastes awful. The moment they die, their bodies emit a foul poison that infects and corrupts everything nearby—living creatures or nature alike. Unless you’re a collector with a taste for horrible stench, you’d hardly be interested. Even other monsters avoid the corpses…”
Oops.
Realizing he’d spilled way too much information without meaning to, Kuinan clicked his tongue and shut his mouth.
Sylvia glanced at him with curious eyes, clearly astonished by the detailed knowledge about monsters she was hearing for the first time. He cleared his throat awkwardly and rolled his eyes sideways.
“…”
“How do you know so much?”
“I just happened to.”
“Chewing flesh feels like biting crocodile leather? Who on earth actually ate that and gave such a review?”
Of course, that would be him. When he was young and unable to catch even ordinary small animals, he starved for months until he stumbled upon a corpse of his own kind and tried chewing it. Even a madman never touched a monster’s corpse again.
“…I wonder who that was?”
Trying to change the subject with a cough, Sylvia unwittingly spoke again.
“It seems the extermination squads share secret, lesser-known information. My homeland once had a research team too, but monsters are so rare and dangerous to encounter…”
Before she could finish, her husband’s cold gaze met hers, and she abruptly shut her mouth. She apologized, saying she shouldn’t have brought up her homeland.
“I’m sorry. You repeatedly told me not to mention my homeland, and I said something pointless.”
“…Did I say that?”
The fake Lancart, now fully wearing the mask of a fool, looked puzzled at Sylvia’s sulky mumbling. Her homeland had once been a wealthy nation rivaling the Kolnas Empire but had been entirely swallowed by monsters and lost to history.
“…Ah. You don’t remember that either…”
Just as Sylvia seemed to realize this and opened her mouth, footsteps came rapidly up the stairs. The heavy stomping echoed all the way to the Duke’s bedroom down the hall.
Sylvia panicked and scrambled up.
“Looks like Lady Rossa has returned.”
As she tried to leave, Kuinan called her back, preventing her from escaping. They were still deep in conversation—where did she think she was going?
Curious, Kuinan confidently strode to the door like a protective husband and swung it open.
“Syl…!”
Lady Rossa froze on the spot when she called out her name boldly and saw them together. She was unaware the Duke was with Sylvia
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