The Devilish Duke Can’t Sleep

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Tea time in early summer

After listening to the story carefully, Fabian wept silently, thinking of Heila, who must have been afraid of being alone.
Her twin sister who was abandoned just because she was a little weaker.
It occurred to her that Heila might have been the child who should have been chosen as Queen.

“Thank you for coming in time, Lena.”

Fabian held an informal ceremonial succession to the throne with Count Melix, the chairman of the nobility council, and the supreme priest at her bedside and other nobles at her feet.
Fabian couldn’t get out of bed, but she was still able to give a final blessing to Lena, who was kneeling beside her.

For the next two days, Lena spent a confusing time arranging her randomly mixed memories, her instincts as a Queen, and her attitude as a ‘Lena’ that she had been living with.
But contrary to her concerns, two days was enough.

Lena herself was surprisingly able to take to her instincts as the ruler as if she had been the Queen’s heir from birth.
But her time as a maid also made up a large part of Lena, and she couldn’t let go of those days.
Even if she had searched for memories of her past, her present most intense feelings were towards Kahel.
If Kahel had not been in danger, her awakening would have been delayed.

Meanwhile, Liddell was completely deprived of her magical powers by the ‘Queen’s Sword’.
It wasn’t that it was sealed, but that her magic itself had completely disappeared.

Liddell was, in a way, a child victimized by the greed of her predecessors.
What the head of the Santella family studied from generation to generation was the ritual to produce blood close to the first ancestor, and Liddell was born on this earth as a pure evil without any room for her own choices to interfere.

They believed they could devour the country if only their instinct to obey the Queen was suppressed.
At the time when the powers of the Queen were waning, she might have succeeded if Lena had not been born.
However, God did not want to see the return of evil on this earth.

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“What about Liddell?”

With the cold tea in front of him, Kahel asked.
They were in the garden of Regina Palace in the sunny early summer, long after the funeral of the previous Queen and a month of mourning had ended.
At the tea table were Kahel, Lena, and Lian, the new Duke Santella.

“She feels like a ten-year-old child.
When she first opened her eyes, she could communicate and know very basic etiquette, but she didn’t really remember anything.
But after her thoughts and feelings settled down, she began to learn noble etiquette and culture, and she quickly recalled what she had learned before.
However, she still can’t remember anything related to that day.
Ironically, after losing that memory, she really looked like an angel.”

“Maybe, she should have been born as an angel.
It’s all because of a curse that’s been going on for Liddell since she was in the womb.”

It was, to be precise, a kind of curse that caused Liddell to not obey the Queen and possessed high-purity magical powers.
Leonard may have called it a blessing, but looking at the basic structure of the magic, it was a curse similar to what was entangled in Kahel’s body.
And it was the curse that was cut by the Queen’s sword.

In any case, Leonard lost his life to his daughter, whom he had raised so dearly, and Liddell lost her magical powers and some of her memories.
All the people of the Santella family involved in this incident were executed, and the temples that had been bought by the Santella family were trying to save themselves.

In this case, there was no need to punish the warlock Margella, who was as close to the mastermind as Leonard and Liddell.
This was because a body with only the upper body left was found near the border of the capital.
She squeezed out all her magic in order to pour out the magic needed to summon monsters, and it was speculated that she was eaten by the monster that has gone crazy from side effects of black magic and the magical energy emitted by the monsters.

Recalling what happened that day, Lian smiled bitterly.

“Your Majesty’s grace for covering up the truth of the incident and saving a family that deserves to be destroyed will be engraved on our bones for generations to come.”

Lian’s words were sincere.
Even though they were the Duchy, they wished to overthrow the Royal Family.
Moreover, they used the forbidden black magic as a means to release the monsters of the underworld to the ground.
No matter how much Kahel stopped it, there couldn’t be no loss of life.
Even Kahel, Duke Luave, and the predecessor, Damien, were nearly killed, and the Queen’s successor, Lena, was also in danger.

But Lena decided to leave Duchy Santella.
No one knew who summoned the monsters anyway.
Some people questioned Liddell’s actions, but they couldn’t argue further that it was Kahel and Lena who were the victims.

“It’s not for Miss Liddell or Duke Santella.
It’s hard to say that I turned a blind eye to anyone who was involved in this anyway.
Of course, it was important to protect, and it was an important matter to punish as well, but if the Santella family collapses, half of Logos will collapse.
I don’t want innocent people to struggle to make a living to establish the Queen’s authority.
I’m just telling the truth.”

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Lena answered Lian with a smile that seemed gentle, but it didn’t just look soft.
Lian thought that was the Queen’s authority.
She had a firm belief that ‘my authority will not be shaken even if I do not punish you.’

Every time he saw Lena like this, Kahel would also be captivated by strange feelings.

He wondered if the current Lena and Lena that was caught as Baron Fidelia’s illegitimate child, rubbing her hands and begging for her life, were the same person.
But if he thought about it, he didn’t even think back then that Lena looked submissive.
She was just pathetic and pitiful.
Maybe, it was because he felt the power hidden within the tight seal.

“Oh, right.
Are your wedding preparations going well? Now, no one opposes the two of you, right? Duke Luave should have used his brain a little.”

Lian smirked, evoking the atmosphere that had been deeply immersed in thought.
There, Lena and Kahel’s cheeks flushed red.
In particular, Lena was so red that she would explode at any moment, so Kahel picked up the fan that was beside her and gently fanned her.

Overshadowing Kahel’s concerns that Santella would object, Lian was not surprised, and he accepted the couple’s marriage.
He knew it would be like this, and he looked at Kahel proudly.
However, as expected, the other nobles were in a sordid atmosphere.
It was an objection, fearing that the position of Duke Luave would become too large.

Interestingly enough, however, the biggest opponent of this marriage was Damien.
He huffed and puffed, saying that there has never been a union between the Royal Family and the Duchies in history.
The Queen may not know a better man because she had only seen his poor son, and even suggested that they hold a banquet with a bunch of young men to find another.

How upset Kahel was at his father back then.

But in the end it was revealed that Damien was highly manipulative.
It was because Lena felt a lot of jealousy when Kahel, who had been freed from all his curses by Lena’s power, attended the banquet.

Lena did not even receive the greetings from the nobles because she was weeping in tears in the corner, and the atmosphere of the banquet became frozen solid.
Kahel, who had been attached to the banquet hall because of his father and others’ attention, could not overcome his concerns and ran to Lena to comfort her for a long time.
Lena was not apart from Kahel until the banquet was over.
Thanks to this, the banquet became a venue to solidify the relationship between the two.

“Really, Lord Damien is not normal either.”

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Recalling that day, Lian shook his head, and Kahel nodded in agreement.

“I had a long way to go to follow my father.”

The three of them shrugged their shoulders lightly.

“It seemed that the marriage of the two would create several unprecedented records in the history of Logos.”

Lian glanced at Kahel again with a playful look.

“It was rare for the former Head to pass the Duchy early while he was still alive, but is it the first time in history that the Dukedom is passed back to the previous Head?”

“That’s what happened.”

Kahel frowned as if in embarrassment, but couldn’t hide the smile on his lips.

It was impossible for the Queen to marry the Duke, so Kahel decided to return the Dukedom to his father, Damien, and to marry the Queen as the Duke’s son.
And the Queen’s first son was promised to become the heir of Duchy Luave.

“Countess Delroot has two sons, so the second, Sir Cesar, could have been sworn in.
Isn’t he quite friendly with Sir Kahel, too?”

“Cesar begged to the Countess that he never wanted to be Duke Luave.”

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“Well, if he grew up watching Sir Kahel from a young age, he wouldn’t covet that position.
He must have known he couldn’t do as much as you.
Anyway, since you two are getting married soon and Duke Luave is still young, it shouldn’t be difficult to pass the title from the grandfather to the grandson.
The Duke will teach them for a long time.”

Damien, who is still 51 years old and looks like he is in his late 40s, will play the role of Head of the family without any major problems until his grandson becomes an adult.

Still, Kahel felt indebted to his father.
Damien could have enjoyed the rest of his life in comfort with his wife if Kahel hadn’t married Lena.
However, Kahel couldn’t miss the love that came only once in his life.
His mother, Evelyn, was also in favor of Kahel’s decision, and she came to Ardennes to help Damien.

“Don’t worry too much, as Mother will be with Father as well.”

“I heard that it is Her Majesty’s miracle that restored the Duchess’ health too?”

“Yes.
Come to think of it, Her Majesty saved both of us, my mother and I.”

At his loving gaze, Lena blushed and tried to scratch the back of her head again, then quickly lowered her hand.
From afar, she could feel the handmaiden looking at her with pointed eyes.

“It was, of course, what I had to do.”

At this time, she was just like the old Lena, Kahel suddenly wanted to hug her and kiss her.
It was difficult to hide the desire to be together quickly even though he met Lena every day.
He had already heard that Kahel Luave, who seemed cold-blooded, was such a love-fool, but he didn’t even listen to the blabbers of others.

Lian seemed to be restraining himself as much as possible in front of them, but a smirk leaked out from the fluttering and warm eyes between them that he felt moment by moment.
Just then, the chief handmaiden approached Lena and whispered something.

“I’ll be away for a moment.
I’ll be back soon, so please wait.”

It seemed that there was an urgent matter that required the Queen’s approval.
It was almost certain seeing Count Melix’s anxious face in the distance.