The 3cm Grand Duke’s Secret Deal with a Witch - Chapter 13 - III.

III.

“Did that actually happen…?!”

Even after Maximilian left, Elizia couldn’t stop her body from trembling. Tears welled in her eyes for an entirely different reason. She gingerly touched her own lips. I kissed him. Instead of signing a contract… Good heavens.

“I can’t believe it… My dream came true like this. My delusions didn’t get so severe that I hallucinated the whole thing, did they, Nibbles…?”

At her feet, Nibbles, the slime in the form of a cat, meowed while she muttered endlessly. It gestured that it didn’t care and simply wanted food. Pick me flowers. Give me honey. That’s what I like best. But Lizzy was in no state to take care of the crying Nibbles.

At last, she staggered to her feet. Leaning against the wall, she headed toward a small room in the strangely structured house. It was a storage room where all kinds of herbs, mysterious powders, and bizarre ingredients hung from the walls and ceiling. It was also a treasure vault among treasure vaults where Lizzy hid her precious collection.

When she pulled apart the shelves at the very back, a hidden bookcase revealed itself in all its majesty. It was packed with all kinds of limited-edition hardcovers whose spines were decorated with gold. They were special illustrated editions by great authors, won after fierce battles for preorders.

They were the reason Elizia made money by acting as a witch, and also the reason she was always poor despite doing so.

That’s right. The source of her fantasies, and the only pleasure in the life of an insignificant girl.

High-heat romance novels.

“I’m sure I started with fairy tales at first…”

At some point, she had developed an interest in books from the human world. As she secretly read them one by one, the range of genres she explored naturally broadened. Then the owner of a bookstore secretly slipped a high-heat romance novel into her hands, saying it was selling like wildfire lately, and that was where everything went wrong.

Her characteristic tendency toward obsession emerged. By the time she came to her senses, Elizia had already become an outstanding hardcore reader who could rival any enthusiast.

“That man came to me.”

The male lead she had always imagined in her fantasies…

Lizzy carefully took out a book and opened it. A sturdy, handsome man was drawn across one page. The illustration looked exactly like Warden Duke Maximilian.

Once, while receiving a customer, she had happened to meet a noblewoman who shared the same hobby. ‘Why does the male lead have the same face in every newly published book…?’ Lizzy had taken the opportunity to ask, and the woman had answered with an expression of genuine regret.

Now she understood what it meant for him to be forbidden fruit they could never have. The Warden Duke was a tiny-cocked man under a curse. On a continent where there was even a saying, ‘A person can go without food, but not without f*****g,’ he was indeed a man with a serious defect.

“That’s why he came all the way to me…”

In any case, his personality was completely different from the one in the novels.

The Warden Duke who appeared in Lizzy’s reality wasn’t affectionate, nor had he fallen in love with her at first sight. Judging by the way he threatened people as naturally as breathing, he wasn’t particularly righteous either. But she wasn’t disappointed at all. At least his gaze was straightforward.

Besides, he had listened to her nonsense until the very end and finally promised to go along with her request. When she still couldn’t believe him, he had immediately proven it through his actions…

His touch had been rough, but that was more to her taste. Despite claiming he had no experience, he had attacked without the slightest hesitation, and the sheer forcefulness of it had made her heart pound wildly.

“Maybe I have that troublemaker Luca to thank for this.”

Still wearing a dreamy expression, Lizzy buried her face in the book.

In truth, she had known at a glance whose magic Maximilian had been struck by. The dragon that had caused a commotion in this forest more than a decade ago was surely her cousin, Lucadrion.

Ever since Elizia had left Dragon Gorge, insisting that she wasn’t running away but merely setting out on her own, the stubborn dragon had visited periodically and thrown tantrums while demanding that she return. He wasn’t a black dragon, but it was understandable that someone might mistake him for one in the chaos.

Humans actually misunderstood several things about dragon magic.

One representative example was the common belief that only the dragon who cast a spell could undo it. Unless it was magic the dragon had developed independently, no such restriction existed.

Of course, the situation would be different with the magic of a high-ranking dragon, but judging by the residual dragon mana she had sensed around the Warden Duke’s g***n, the spell placed on him wasn’t particularly powerful. She hadn’t sensed any hostility either…

The most accurate guess was that he had accidentally been caught up in one of Lucadrion’s disturbances, since the impatient dragon frequently revealed his true form.

“When will he come again…?”

Ah, she couldn’t contain her buoyant excitement.

An indecent promise truly was sweet. The immoral flavor of a promise based solely on conditions, without love, made an excellent seasoning. Elizia’s hazel eyes glistened with moisture. For a moment, a blue light reflected like a shadow around the clear rims of her pupils, then quickly vanished.

She was no longer afraid of the notice from her father that had dropped down the chimney just before Max arrived and startled her badly enough to bring tears to her eyes.

Even if she was dragged back when they caught her, it would be after she had fulfilled her wish to her heart’s content.

[ The twenty years we agreed upon have passed, Lizzy. Didn’t you say you would find your own husband? I will come and see how that is progressing soon. You haven’t shut yourself away and wasted your time on useless things as you did back home, have you? If so, I will summon you back by force… ]