<strong>I thought he was an illusion,</strong>so I touched his cheek with the tips of my fingers.


    As I exerted pressure with my fingers, and his cheeks went in.


    I was still doubtful whether the vivid texture was real.


    This time, I gently stroked his cheek with my entire palm. It was cold, but the soft-touch was vivid.


    He’s real.


    After all, I didn’t speak to him first.


    “What are you doing?”


    stair grabbed my wrist and drew it towards his lips.


    And as usual, he gently kissed each finger with sincerity.


    “Ahaa….!”


    stair yfully stuck out his tongue and tickled me from my palm to my wrist.


    I was taken aback, astonished by the hot, damp sensation, and quickly pulled out the hand held by him and rubbed his saliva off on my skirt.


    “……How did you find me?”


    “I asked your maid because you weren’t in the room.”


    “I never told her where I was going.”


    My body trembled in the cold wind. When I rubbed my shoulders with my hands, trying to gather with warmth, stair took off his cape and covered me.


    Despite hurting him like that, he came first and is worried that I will be cold.


    “I thought you’de this way.”


    “……Why?”


    “Every time you passed this area, you always looked towards the bell tower.”


    “You noticed that?”


    “Yes.”


    Is it because of his obsessive hypnosis stats in this novel?


    He had a very good hunch. He knew where I would be just because I stared at the bell tower.


    stair pulled my body into his arms.


    He changed his posture and sat mefortably down on hisp.


    I was stuck in his arms


    “Did you not hear what I said in the morning?”


    I didn’t mean to do this.


    Contrary to my thoughts, angr words pop out of my mouth.


    I don’t want to do this, but my brain and mouth acted differently.


    “Unexpectedly, you don’t know me. There’s no way I can keep that.”


    stair looked at me with great love.


    He gently swept my hair away and kissed my eyes.


    My eyshes trembled. My reflection was in his eyes unconditionally.


    This man even looked at me as if I was adorable.


    I wrapped my arms around his neck.


    As if prompted, he hugged me tighter.


    “I wanted to give you some time. You said you were sick of me, so I let you spend time without me.”


    As soon as stair sighed, I felt his hot exhale over my head.


    “If you don’t want me within your sight, I’ll do what you say. So I tried to stay out of sight for a few days.”


    “······.”


    “But it didn’t work as I thought it might. When it’s only been a few minutes, I miss you, and after a few hours, I’m going crazy.”


    “……I guess there’s no concept of a yearly rate?”


    I said so. After facing my one-sided anger, he came to me like a bee was drawn to the scent of flowers.


    “Did you not know? Without you, I’m nothing. You are the only thing in my heart. You are all that there is.”


    As he spoke, stair didn’t even bother to keep up his pride with me, even though I had trampled on his heart.


    stair smiled deftly. Destressing me even more.


    “Because you made me that way.”


    Brainwashing.


    It is the only thread that always carries us and connects our rtionship.


    And now, in a way, I was cutting that very thread.


    “Is it bad to live in the way you made it?”


    “That’s why I’ll release you from it.”


    “It’s useless.”


    He fiddled with my silver hair flowing down.


    And he left a deep kiss.


    He might have left a kiss on my hair, but it was as if he kissed all over my body.


    I felt a strange feeling, as if I was bruised.


    “I already love you, even if there was no brainwashing.”


    “Ha …..”


    Please don’t say that.


    I tried to swallow the lumpy words that came to the top of my throat.


    As if dealing with a genuine lover, the words that were sweet and tender but were as good as poison to me.


    I haven’t seen the future directly, but in the future, after I got rid of stair’s brainwashing, there were two ways it could go:


    stair either kills me or doesn’t kill me.


    Our rtionship will be very different.


    Two years ago, if I hadn’t given you that herb— if yesterday you hadn’t attacked me….


    Would we at least be able tough and talk here?


    It is meaningless to have vain hope.


    “Serina.”


    “………Why?”


    “Are you still suspicious?”


    I was certain, I wasn’t suspicious.


    “I don’t know.”


    I heard a low sigh was heard from above me.


    “How can I make you trust me?”


    He phased it like a question, but it was more like a plea.


    I buried my face in his neck.


    Then, this time, a different kind of sigh came.


    stair turned his head and kissed the top of my head.


    “By the way…… Why were you mad in the morning?”


    He knows nothing.


    That’s why… I get angry even though I know I shouldn’t.


    I closed my eyes tightly.


    “If you’re not really tired of me… Don’t say such things, because it makes my heart tremble.”


    I am weird.


    The reason I’m not transparent with stair is because I want to maintain the status quo of our rtionship. I’d rather pretend that nothing happened until I cleared up his brainwashing, so our rtionship doesn’t go south.


    Then I poured out my anger on him…


    “Serina, did I do anything wrong to you?”


    ***