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Chapter 11
“Young Duke, are you alright?”
When Cassian remained motionless for a while, Damia tilted her head in confusion.
She had nearly fallen into the water herself, so she couldn’t understand why he looked so pale.
“What do you mean by ‘you found it’?”
Damia’s worried expression made his heart race even faster when their eyes met.
“It’s nothing.”
Cassian exhaled deeply. After a long while, his heart, which had been pounding relentlessly, finally settled down.
“Really?”
“Yes.”
He averted his gaze from Damia’s steady stare. As his excitement subsided, suspicion began to rise again.
A seemingly ordinary young noble girl was somehow deeply entangled with his curse.
She had created a remedy that even those claiming expertise had abandoned, and a single touch from her had briefly countered the dragon’s curse.
‘She said she only wanted one thing—an engagement with me.’
Looking back, everything about her seemed suspicious. Cassian examined Damia carefully.
Her features were delicately crafted, her demeanor calm yet subtly bold, and there was even a faintly pitiful quality about her.
It was as if she had been designed to weaken his heart deliberately.
‘All of this… is just a coincidence?’
Damia Ponti was only thirteen, far too young for such a responsibility.
Though he had secretly placed people to observe her, she had no contact with suspicious groups.
He had set aside the notion that she might be a spy—but had he been too hasty?
“Are you afraid of snakes, perhaps?”
The word “snake” broke Cassian’s chain of thoughts.
“Don’t worry, Young Duke. It’s a very gentle snake.”
Damia smiled brightly, holding a small white snake in her hand.
“What are you doing? Didn’t it just bite you?”
Cassian’s face stiffened at the unreal sight before him.
Her delicate appearance was just a façade; with that level of courage, she might even be capable of being a spy.
“Oh… I know, it’s usually very tame, but why did it act like that all of a sudden?”
Even as Cassian was shocked, Damia remained calm. Her expression was too innocent for there to be any hidden motive.
She seemed entirely unaware of the changes her contact had caused in Cassian. Could this really be acting?
Amid the vast confusion, one thing was clear:
Whether she was a spy or simply a fortunate coincidence, he could no longer let this unpredictable girl go.
A single touch had calmed the curse.
Such a miracle would never happen twice with anyone else.
“Put it down and come here. We’re stopping the boat ride immediately.”
“Eh? Why?”
“You got hurt, and you want me to just stay still?”
No matter what, he had to keep Damia by his side. Whatever her true identity, Cassian had to ensure her safety.
The boat ride was abruptly halted, and shocking news spread.
“A snake came out of the Young Duke’s boat?”
The gathered boys and girls in the garden gasped in shock.
“And the Young Duke’s fiancée got bitten?”
“Oh my, isn’t that serious?”
“Was it an accident? Or perhaps…”
Voices full of worry and curiosity filled the garden.
‘They didn’t see it, did they?’
In the middle of the crowd, Drury bit her lip tightly.
Her heart pounded madly, but she could not reveal it.
‘I just wanted to see Damia Ponti get bitten by a snake and cry miserably.’
Yet the soft-looking girl neither cried nor screamed.
‘All that effort to sneak my handkerchief in was wasted!’
Perhaps because she had taken out her frustration on them before.
The snakes raised at the Marquess’ estate were extremely wary of Drury.
Even the gentlest snake could become aggressive from the scent of Drury’s heavily perfumed handkerchief.
After all, even they had a survival instinct.
“Lady Drury, are you alright?”
If anyone found the handkerchief, she intended to pretend she had lost it.
She could just blame one of the servants for her usual careless habits.
“Drury!”
Startled, Drury jerked her head up.
The surrounding girls looked at her with puzzled expressions.
She quickly hid her hands behind her back, nails already frayed from biting so hard.
“Oh, I was just so surprised by the snake…”
The girls nodded vigorously.
“Yes, snakes are terrifying.”
In the Velothea Empire, dragons were considered almost a disaster. Snakes reminiscent of dragons were equally abhorrent.
So no one knew that Drury actually kept dozens of snakes.
“Is Cassian alright?”
Tears welled up in Drury’s eyes.
Thanks to a subtle yawn, she looked like an innocent girl worried about the Young Duke.
“The Young Duke… uh? He’s holding his fiancée in his arms?”
What? Drury’s face turned bright red.
“Is the young lady seriously hurt? From what I can see, it doesn’t seem that bad.”
“Even so, couldn’t he have just used a servant? Why go that far?”
She thought it was nonsense—but it was true.
Cassian was carrying Damia straight toward the estate.
As if ignoring Damia and the servants’ protests, his face was tense.
A fire surged in Drury’s chest.
“Oh my, he really seems smitten with Lady Damia Ponti.”
“Indeed. I’ve never seen the Young Duke look so flustered.”
Drury had believed that Cassian would naturally belong to her, as her father had promised multiple times.
Thus, the Young Duke had to fall into Drury’s arms without anyone else touching him.
“Aren’t they much closer now than before the boat ride?”
“Yes! I felt that too!”
The girls whispered, unable to contain themselves even as they kept an eye on Drury.
They had risked danger to play a trick on Damia, yet had inadvertently brought the two closer.
‘How dare that young lady!’
Drury ground her teeth. Her azure eyes blazed with anger.
“Put me down, Young Duke!”
“Quiet. You’re an emergency patient.”
“It was only a tiny bite! I can walk!”
Cassian ignored her and headed straight for the estate, holding Damia like a princess.
“They’re all staring at us!”
“What does it matter? I’m just fulfilling my duties as a fiancé.”
“No, this is just… excessive!”
Damia struggled, but Cassian didn’t budge.
If anything, he held her even tighter, as if worried she might fall.
‘Why is he acting like this!’
Her cheeks burned red with embarrassment.
It wasn’t just being held like a princess. Cassian had even ripped his own shirt to wrap it around her wrist.
“Lady Damia Ponti must be seriously hurt!”
‘No, no she’s not!’
The shirt’s soft texture kept brushing against her skin.
It probably cost more than all of Damia’s dresses combined over the years.
“Y-Young Duke, my fiancée is in critical condition?!”
The attending physician ran up, pale-faced.
“Is it really urgent enough to carry her like that?”
“Yes. Every second counts, so hurry!”
The commotion nearly drove her crazy. And Cassian, adding fuel to the fire, was another matter entirely.
Damia had no chance to intervene.
The Young Duke had always been unpredictable, but since the boat incident, he had become far stranger.
‘He said he found it… or something like that…’
Since then, he had started obsessively protecting her well-being.
Even though Damia kept insisting that the white snake was harmless and she had only been lightly bitten.
‘He can’t possibly have started liking me genuinely all of a sudden.’
After all, this temporary engagement was strictly a contractual arrangement—Cassian had made sure of that countless times.
