CH 134

It felt strange.

Perhaps because his body temperature felt too hot.

Especially his lips on the back of my hand.

From Johann’s lips came a low, resonant voice.

“As soon as I received the letter, I rushed over. I’m so worried.”

“…It’s fine, I’m fine.”

I pulled out my hand naturally.

…A small amount of ‘Toulouse’s power’ had flowed out from the previous contact, and that was why it felt hot, but Berylia didn’t know that much. She could only assume that his body temperature was a bit hotter than others in the first place.

‘I was told I’m the one who’s trying to convince him.’

‘I’ve probably met Johann quite often.’

Besides, looking at his attitude now, it seemed like he was a very close friend.

‘Or are you pretending to be intimate?’

Since I had already revealed I lost my memory, what kind of relationship we had before this current meeting was up to the other person.

Suddenly, Johann let go of my hand and sat in the chair opposite me.

He knelt down and kissed my hand, and bowed with earnestness and respect. But as soon as he sat down in the chair, he was comfortable, leaning against the chair with his long legs loosely crossed. He spoke with his handsome face smiling like an angel.

‘He is this comfortable with me? Like that?’

* * *

“Your Majesty, do you really not remember anything?”

With those long, sensitive-looking fingers, Johann tapped his lips as he asked.

“…Not one?”

His black eyes twinkled as if he found it interesting.

But besides that, there was only concern in his gentle eyes.

In the face of that whimsical performance, the queen answered meekly.

“Yes, none.”

“…I see. You must be very uncomfortable.”

As Johann spoke, the tip of his lips rose slightly.

‘You forgot everything.’

What difference was that from herbivores who lost their herd and drank water alone at the water’s edge?

If a predator opened its mouth wide and swallowed it, it couldn’t even scream before it was caught.

Her weakened position was very pleasing to him.

He wanted to hug her and fall into the abyss.

What a comfortable hell it would be.

While Johann was pleasantly imagining, Berylia’s eyelashes quietly lowered as she raised her teacup and said,

“It’s not that I don’t remember everything, though. I do remember Spinel’s work.”

“Ah.”

His thick lips parted slightly.

‘She remembers Spinel’s work.’

He casted a spell to forget everything, how?

He couldn’t hide his puzzled expression for a moment, but he felt a gaze from the other side.

“!”

An exhilarating excitement fluctuated behind his spine as he met her eyes.

Berylia was observing his expression sharply.

She asked without missing the moment when he had a questioning look on his face.

“…Why are you looking surprised, Archduke?”

Suddenly, Johann’s heart was pounding.

If you do this well… … I’m going to shave the bottom of my head today.

“It’s nothing. You only lost your memories of Aktoum… I wondered if it was because Your Majesty the Queen was having a hard time here.”

The black eyes had gloom casted over them.

Like he deeply cared about her.

“It won’t be like that.”

‘If it was a memory I lost because of hardship, I would have lost my whole life’s memory.’ Berylia thought to herself as she slowly drank tea again.

Johann couldn’t hide his smile from the intense excitement.

‘I’m wrong.’

He thought she was a deer drinking by the river…

But it was a ‘crocodile’ who pretended to drink water and lurked by the waterside with only a breathing hole.

Even after losing her memory, Berylia was still Berylia.

Exposing her own weakness to the nobles would instead mean watching them.

Far from hiding in her fragile state, she was still sitting on the throne, looking down at the board.

(TL/N: reference to chess.)

‘…I’m going crazy.’

Johann looked at her while stroking his chin.

He thought she was caught in his trap, but she had set a trap and was waiting.

Even contrary to his own predictions, she had some memories. His expectations were wrong. Again.

‘Ha, she’s a really fun woman.’

If that was the case, then he couldn’t help but be obsessed and eager like a dog…

Johann looked at her with admiration.

“I heard you spent time with me often before I lost my memory.”

“We must have spent more time than you’ve heard.”

“……What do you mean?”

He smiled imperiously and shrugged his shoulders.

“I don’t know.”

“…….”

‘Didn’t I just spend time trying to convince him?’ Berylia was slightly puzzled and tried to guess the story behind that. But it was a futile effort since she lost her memory.

“You’ll know when you get your memory back.”

“I will dedicate my body and mind to helping you regain your memories, Your Majesty.”

Berylia refused because it was too much of a burden to give his body, plus she didn’t need it.

“…No, not necessarily.”

Johann leaned forward and said earnestly.

“Please, let me do that. Please.”

“…….”

‘Is he crazy?’

‘Is it something to be so desperate for?’

‘Besides, the eyes that were drooping down like that…’

‘It’s the first crazy appearance of this guy that I’ve ever seen without my memory.’

‘One thing is for sure, he seems to be a little outspoken even before the memories are gone.’

Berylia could tell by looking at the atmosphere in which the conversation was going. She responded, slightly receding the edge she had built up.

“I appreciate the favor, but I’m not in a position to trust ‘anyone’.”

“…Am I ‘anyone’?”

Johann’s eyes trembled with wounds.

Berylia replied without blinking an eye.

“It’s pretty much anyone.”

“Ouch.”

Johann touched my chest and feigned hurt.

“I think that the loss of my memory was the work of ‘someone around me’.”

“!”

This time, his heart really hurt. Johann’s eyes widened slightly.

“The doctor said there was nothing wrong with my body. But I lost my memory overnight.”

In the end, as Duke Orléans recommended, Berylia briefly met a doctor and received an examination. The doctor carefully determined; 

—There was nothing wrong with her health.

Berylia laid the hand that was holding the teacup on her lap, and looked straight at him and said,

“So, someone must have tampered with my memories with some ‘intention’. Someone with a worthy purpose.”

At Berylia’s gaze, Johann’s mouth became cold.

“Someone who would benefit if I lost my memories.”

On the other hand, his heart warmed.

“There is a high probability that such a person will be around me.”

And it meant that Johann would not be excluded from the potential ‘culprit’.

Johann silently admired.

‘…Much more.’

It turned out to be a much more thrilling process than he expected. To hold her in the palms of his hands.

“So, the Archduke only needs to fill in the memories of what happened with me.”

“…The memories between us, is that what you mean?”

“Yes, well… I have to remember so that I can treat the Archduke the same way I used to. If I collect each and every piece of memory like that…”

Berylia took a slow deep breath, and there was a glint in her eyes.

“One day, my memories will come back completely. I’ll catch that bastard.”

“…Hmm.”

The ‘bastard’ bit his lips, suppressing a grin.

Honestly, he thought she wouldn’t be like this for a few more days. The shock of losing memories, the worry of being in a hostile country… It must have been insane.

However, she was always stronger than Johann anticipated, and when a crisis came, she always got up quickly after hitting the bottom.

In such a way, she touched his own desire to compete, it was a crazy obsession.

His monstrous possessiveness ate his heart and filled his chest.

Johann took a deep breath and then whispered in a low voice.

“First, let all the servants out.”

There was a slight embarrassment on Berylia’s face. ‘Does that mean that there will be stories that others shouldn’t hear?’

But soon after, at his request, she told the servants to leave. 

Eventually, only the two of them remained.

Johann quietly began to continue his speech.

“Your Majesty and I were exchanging secret gifts.”

“….…”

‘What are you talking about?’ Berylia’s expression turned into a curious frown. ‘It must have been that I had paid a bribe. Try to convince him’

“What kind of gift was it?”

However, Johann’s next reply was definitely something that would cause a lot of trouble if the servants heard it.

Much more than a gift like a bribe.

“Your Majesty the Queen has been given the fragment of the tombstone of Zephyross. With it, you went to Yggdrasil, where the dark guild is, and traded with ‘Shadow’. To get ‘Poison’.”

“Wait. Wait!”

Berylia’s eyes widened.

‘With this status, I went to Yggdrasil to make a deal with the leader of the underworld?’

‘Did I get poison too?’

Of course, it was something I might have done. However, the problem was that when anyone heard it, it sounded like a ‘big deal’.

But he knew all about it…?

‘Even if I got something from that man, there’s no way I’d ever talk about the use of it.’

She did lose her memories and was a little confused, but wasn’t there such a thing as a normal pattern?

She never would have done it.

“Lies.”

“It’s true.”

Of course, the ‘poison’ part was just Johann’s conjecture.

When watching the incident where she fell during the wedding, it roughly slapped him.

Berylia looked at him and said,

“I couldn’t have told the Archduke all that.”

Johann sweetly used his tongue with an impudent face.

“We were quite close.”

A little panic crept across Berylia’s face.

Johann noticed it, and raised the corners of his mouth as he spoke.

“Secondly, I also gifted ‘Margot’s Pendant’ to Your Majesty. Though you didn’t tell me how you’d use it.”

‘If it’s Margot’s Pendant…’

It was a holy relic that completely blocked the user’s presence for a short time.

It was also a very precious item, but if it was used badly, it would be infinitely bad.

‘Did I take it?’

‘I must check it out. I do have an idea of where the thing could be.’

She thought that if the archduke lied, she was insulted enough that she could have beheaded him right away.

“……”

Berylia got up and immediately walked to the chest of drawers.

It was a chest of drawers with a design similar to the one in Spinel, but it was usually modified to hide valuables.

Tachak—

Normally, she would not have wanted to be seen by others, but she was in a hurry and thus she quickly opened the drawer.

“!”

It was there. ‘Margot’s Pendant’.

She groaned softly. Was the archduke’s statement true?

‘It may not be true.’

Berylia thought hard, but due to the current circumstances of the mind, her thoughts were easily scattered.

At that moment, she felt a breath behind her back.

Johann, who had already approached her, stood behind her and slowly grabbed her hand, which was holding onto Margot’s Pendant.

A scorching heat rushed through her veins again.

Badump, badump.

A beating heart could be felt in Johann’s ears.

It was lovely.

He wanted to invite her to his own hell and bind her in unbreakable chains, to make her forever his own.

Her two eyes should only look at him.

He didn’t want her cute lips to be able to call anything other than his name.

“The ‘secret’ gifts we exchanged weren’t just objects.”

“….…”

Berylia looked back at him slowly and asked.

“What was our relationship?”

Johann’s lips twisted.

“We indulged in each other passionately.”