Unlike the disheartened Jack, Khan’s eyes lingered on the phrase ‘deposed empress’ written in the report.
His longing for the person named Rose grew stronger, to the point where even his last hesitation disappeared.
He didn’t care if he had to wage a war to obtain this woman.
He couldn’t afford to lose the ‘person who fit his purpose’ that he had barely managed to secure through such effort.
Khan let out a faint chuckle, set the report aside, and turned his attention back to the documents he had originally been reviewing.
What he needed to focus on now wasn’t Rose but the feudal nobles who had reached a dangerous level of defiance.
It might have been caused by his grandfather, the former Duke, who had been excessively lenient, but that was merely an excuse that suited their agenda.
‘They must think I’m an easy target.’
They were not satisfied with forming a new faction, they also saw Khan as nothing more than a young, inexperienced figure they could manipulate.
Until now, Aytan had been an untouchable presence.
However, the weakened old Duke, the long-vacant successor’s position, and the presence of Duke Ducan, who had the central nobles and the Emperor in his grasp, had led the feudal forces to entertain other thoughts.
Perhaps they could replace Khan’s position with their own ambitions.
Or perhaps they could use Khan to become the second-in-command of the North and solidify their shaky foundation.
Whichever it was, it wasn’t particularly surprising that the nobles, who had once fought alongside the Aytan Ducal House under its shadow, had now transformed into plunderers.
Humans are bound to change depending on circumstances.
But this couldn’t be left as it was.
Ruling the North was his duty and the responsibility of his family.
‘I’ll need to investigate this more thoroughly.’
Hyde, who had been carefully observing the Duke, began to show signs of strain on his tired face.
Sensing the threat of overwork, the man cautiously moved toward the window.
By the time Khan turned his head, Hyde had already thrown himself toward the window and disappeared.
Jack, who had been preparing tea by the Duke’s side, shouted in disbelief.
“Hyde! How many times have I told you that’s not a door! Get back here immediately!”
When Jack tried to climb out the window to retrieve Hyde, Khan stopped him.
“Leave him. There’s someone else to bring back.”
Jack, who seemed about to ask who, sighed and resumed preparing the tea.
Khan could sense Rose’s presence, which had been beyond the wide-open window, fading away along with Hyde.
Her diligence, going straight to the intelligence unit after claiming she was tired, was both absurd and amusing.
‘Is she trying to probe me?’
That wasn’t necessarily a bad thing.
Suddenly, he recalled Rose’s face, who, despite trying to leave no openings, had done something absurd earlier in the day.
Khan unconsciously touched his lips with his hand.
The sensation of her nape against his lips had been unlike anything he had ever felt before.
It was strange and peculiar, but not entirely unpleasant.
Jack, who had been watching his master, quietly called out to him.
“Um, Your Grace.”
The elderly butler, wearing a confused expression, asked a question he would never normally dare to pose.
“I don’t understand. Why her?”
“It seems Aytan has never been one to discriminate based on a woman’s status.”
“That’s…”
“If she’s bold enough to act like that, shouldn’t we be grateful instead?”
When Jack fell silent, Khan’s self-deprecating voice filled the study.
“Whoever it is, the danger is the same, isn’t it? In fact, I think you should be more worried about her than me.”
Khan was the one carrying a ticking time bomb, while Rose, completely unaware, had been dragged into it.
The butler, uncharacteristically persistent, pressed on.
“Your Grace’s mana is incompatible with divine power, yet you endured the pain to obtain her. You had to rest for days because of it. Even though you’re a Sword Master, you feel pain like anyone else when injured. Is she truly worth all this effort?”
“Perhaps.”
Jack, finding a glimmer of hope in Khan’s uncertain response, cautiously asked another question.
“If she proves to be of no help, what will you do?”
Khan fixed Jack with a cold, piercing gaze.
“I suppose I’ll live alone for the rest of my life. Tediously, like this.”
Jack, not expecting such an answer, widened his eyes before lowering his gaze to the floor, his shoulders slumping in despair.
As Khan skimmed through the reports on Rose that Hyde had left behind, he quietly muttered.
“It doesn’t matter either way.”
Whether he came to love her or she remained merely a contractual partner, neither path stirred much emotion in Khan.
At this point, his capacity to feel human emotions was so diminished that even the faint interest he felt toward Rose seemed remarkable.
Khan placed his hand over his left chest.
The sound of his heart, beating slower than that of an ordinary person, resonated faintly through his fingertips.
“Even in the worst-case scenario, a woman like her wouldn’t succumb to the madness flowing through my blood.”
He wanted to hope she wouldn’t betray him, but Khan was too weary to trust people.
Still, if life was so precious to her, perhaps a life-binding oath was worth relying on.
It was truly laughable.
Who could be more ridiculous than himself?
Born with a body stronger than anyone else’s, he had easily risen to the pinnacle with his sword and was the sole heir to a prestigious family with immense wealth.
But who would ever know?
The men of the great Aytan family feared nothing more than themselves, even in the moments leading up to their deaths.
Khan clutched his chest.
“Why does this heart… desire love?”
He couldn’t understand it at all.
What value could there possibly be in emotions steeped in madness, obsession, and possessiveness?
To Khan, love was like fragile, thin glass that seemed perilous to even touch.
Once the men of the family realized their true nature, there was no chain strong enough to hold the women they married.
Mothers, wives, family.
Even when all those titles were combined, they couldn’t outweigh the yearning for freedom.
‘Mother, just like you.’
Khan could recall a day from his past, a day that had set his standards for women and humanity, without even needing to search his memory.
It was a night when not even moonlight seeped through.
As usual, Khan was returning to his room after finishing his late-night lessons as the heir.
When he passed by his mother’s always-locked door, a faint voice stopped his five-year-old feet.
‘Khan, is that you?’
He stopped but said nothing.
His mother’s voice, growing desperate, continued pleadingly.
‘My sweet child, won’t you open the door for me? Why aren’t you answering? Please?’
Even then, and even now, Khan didn’t know much about his mother, so her voice felt unfamiliar.
Aside from the verbal abuse and hatred she had hurled even during her pregnancy, he could count on one hand the number of times they had faced each other.
But Khan found the key his father had hidden and opened the door for her.
She stood there blankly, her trembling gaze darting around the room.
‘Good, good boy. If your father asks, tell him I was asleep. Understand?’
When Khan simply stared at her, she looked at him, momentarily frightened, before her face twisted, and she pushed her child away.
The boy, who had fallen to the floor, looked up at her, and she hurriedly wiped her hands on her dress and stepped back.
‘How could those be a child’s eyes? I should have believed it when they said this whole family is insane.’
She stepped back as if horrified, then seemed to remember her escape plan and grabbed a bag hidden under the bed.
As her long shadow disappeared hurriedly out of the room, something rolled to a stop at Khan’s feet.
It was his mother’s lace handkerchief.
As if entranced, Khan picked it up and inhaled the fragrant scent of violets, though he still didn’t understand why he had done so.
Then, a scream rang out.
‘Ahhh! No! Let me go! Let me go!’
He heard the sound of his mother being dragged back into the room by someone.
In the room lit only by the fireplace, he saw his father carrying his mother over his shoulder.
The man, who resembled Khan, was beautiful but stained with despair and madness.
‘Was it you? Did you open the door?’
When Khan nodded, his father struck him across the face.
The boy staggered but managed to steady himself and look up, only to find his father’s attention already back on his wife.
‘Where were you trying to go? Who were you planning to meet! Tell me!’
‘Who? Anyone but you! I don’t care who it is as long as it’s not you!’
‘Chloe!’
‘Don’t call my name with that wretched voice!’
The two of them, swept up in anger and madness, tormented each other.
But his mother, who had been confined for so long, was the first to break, overcome by the fear of being locked away again.
‘Let me go. You say you love me. Then, yes, the person you love so much says she can’t live like this. She says she feels like she’s dying, so why can’t you let her go? Please, I’m begging you.’
‘Let you go? Even if you’re a corpse, you’ll never leave me.’
‘You lunatic! Murderer! You’re all monsters. This whole family is insane. If I had known, I would never have married you!’
Even at the age of five, Khan knew the moment he saw his father’s face.
He knew his father wouldn’t be able to endure it any longer.
In the end, his mother’s final words lit the fuse.
‘You’re no different from vampires. No, bloodsuckers are better, they don’t eat away at your mind like you do! Love? Do you even know what that is? A disgusting monster like you pretending to understand love, doling it out like a beggar…’
Without a moment’s hesitation, his father’s hands wrapped around her slender neck.
‘I’m a monster? I gave you my heart! Why are you doing this to me? How could you!’
His father’s madness only grew stronger the more she struggled to escape.
He didn’t stop until her frail arms, which had been flailing, finally lost their strength and went limp.
When his father finally realized she was dead, his eyes met Khan’s.
Without a word, his father smiled faintly.
The next moment, without a shred of hesitation, his father plunged a knife into his own heart.
The hot blood that gushed from his father’s chest drenched Khan’s entire body.
Khan stood motionless, watching as the dark red blood that had once flowed through his father’s body pooled into a puddle.
As he looked at his parents’ lifeless bodies, Khan learned the raw truth of emotions.
Jealousy, contempt, hatred—these raw emotions were ugly and filthy.
Instead of teaching him the emotions a human should learn, his parents had shown him the most horrifying ones.
But there was one thing Khan could learn from them.
Trust no one.
No one will help you.
Until his grandfather arrived to cover his grandson’s eyes and take him away, Khan repeated this reality to himself over and over.
When his grandfather brought the young boy to the study, he was brutally honest.
‘Never forget. This is your fate, and it will be the fate of your descendants.’
Looking into his grandfather’s dry eyes, Khan could do nothing but nod.
After all, no one could help him.
From then on, his life became a series of suppressions and endurance.
He had to exclude all the joys and sorrows of life.
Anything that could evoke emotion was thoroughly pushed away, and only the sword was left in Khan’s hands.
Life was tiresome.
When Rose appeared before Khan, who had grown increasingly weary and was barely holding on, it was simply astonishing.
It felt like witnessing a rare existence that people claimed might exist somewhere in the world but had never been seen.
The women he had met and experienced so far desired him but also feared him.
Desire and fear.
Neither was what he wanted.
But Rose was different.
No matter how terrible the end might be, no matter how much he might feel sorry for her, Khan wanted to end this dreadfully tedious life in some way.
Mocking himself, who was nothing more than a perfect shell, Khan muttered.
“Either I’ll go mad with love and die, or I’ll go mad with love and live. It’ll be one or the other.”
Whichever it was, at least breathing wouldn’t feel like such a torment anymore.
When Khan turned to look at the butler, the old man’s face twisted as if he were about to burst into tears.
“Are you worried about me?”
“I, I always worry about you, Your Grace.”
Khan spoke to the butler.
“Jack, the one in danger isn’t me, it’s her.”
“Your Grace…”
Jack looked at him sorrowfully, but Khan began to tackle the work he had set aside.
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