It had been a week since the second Cold War began with the arrival of Patrick and Dante.
The one who brought a change to the seemingly unending fight was not the Duke and Duchess, nor Diane, but Dante Knightley.
Since that day when he had misbuttoned the first button, Dante had been watching Idel, waiting for any opportunity she might give.
“Don’t call my name. And don’t look at me like a puppy needing to go out.”
“What’s wrong? Why can’t I go over there?”
Whenever he got a little closer, Idel would always put up her guard, but Dante didn’t give up. To be more precise, he couldn’t give up.
At first, he was just being cautious not to make another mistake, but the more he watched, the more Idel’s actions caught his attention.
As he gazed silently at her holding a wooden sword in the corner of the training ground, he tightly closed his mouth.
‘Something is definitely off.’
The Idel he had seen at Café Florent didn’t feel like this.
Her direct speech and attitude were the same, but there was something…off about the Idel he saw here.
‘It’s like she’s wearing uncomfortable clothes.’
The fact that Dante could sense things that Duke Clementine and others couldn’t was largely related to the environment in which he had grown up.
From the moment he was born until now, many titles had always followed Dante like labels.
‘The Guardian of the Empire, Heir of the Knightley Family’
‘The Empire’s New Shield’
‘Future Swordmaster’
All were excessively good titles, but Dante had never been arrogant about his abilities.
Having grown up watching his mother protect the borders, he realized early on that none of this was solely due to his own merit.
‘These titles were given to me to be a hope for someone.’
For the soldiers willingly shedding blood and sweat on the battlefield, and for the locals endlessly cultivating life from the broken remnants.
‘And my mother said that to inherit the Knightley name, one must also bear the weight of hope.’
So Dante decided to keep his mother’s words in mind. He would take on the titles that others expected of him.
The problem was “how” to bear it.
He lacked the confidence to reassure people with words like his father.
After much contemplation, Dante chose to silently wield his sword and show through action.
He proved himself through actions, conveying his sincerity by confronting challenges repeatedly until his feelings were understood.
‘That’s the only way I know how.’
Was it because he had built his foundation in this way?
In Dante’s eyes, Idel resembled him in some way.
If his own disparity was between goals and reality, Idel’s dissonance felt somewhat peculiar.
As he leaned his head to the side, thinking, he gazed at Idel, who was leaning on her sword.
‘Why do Idel’s words and actions not match?’
Her expressions seemed to somewhat follow her words. She would furrow her brow, pout her lips, and sometimes raise an eyebrow.
‘But her body?’
While Dante was lost in thought for a moment, Idel, sensing his gaze, shot him a sharp glare.
“Hey, what are you staring at? Take your eyes off me!”
Despite her irritated voice, Dante was unfazed.
‘Her slightly puffy chest, hands clenched as if by habit, subtly trembling eyelashes, and the saliva she hastily swallowed.’
Those weren’t behaviors that would typically arise in a casual confrontation. Analyzing Idel’s actions with eyes reminiscent of lush greenery, Dante approached her and spoke.
“Why do you say one thing but mean another?”
“What? What kind of nonsense is that?”
“The words you said to me earlier, weren’t they calculated to provoke me rather than coming from genuine annoyance?”
Suddenly struck at her core, Idel fell silent for a moment. Unconsciously blinking, she tightened her jaw and retorted.
“No, that’s not true! Hah, seriously! What are you even saying? Have you finally lost it?”
Despite Idel’s desperate denial, it was pointless. The moment she opened her mouth, Dante noticed the slight tremor in her eyes.
As he observed Idel’s strange behavior, a plausible thought struck Dante’s mind.
‘Perhaps it’s something hard to express in words?’
Grouping himself and Idel into a somewhat similar category, Dante wore a serious expression.
It was a reasonable thought. He himself had many things that were difficult to express in words.
‘If that’s the case…’
Having drawn the most likely conclusion, Dante didn’t hesitate. Instead of wavering, he raised the wooden sword and aimed it at Idel.
“Come at me.”
“…What?”
“If words are difficult, we can understand each other through actions. I’ll show you how.”
“I don’t need that!”
Despite Idel’s protests, Dante remained unfazed. He had anticipated such a reaction from her.
Taking a proper stance, Dante suddenly swung the wooden sword toward Idel.
Sometimes, there were people who refused even physical communication. They tried to express their hearts through actions, but it didn’t work.
‘Most of them had given up from the start, thinking it wouldn’t work.’
And when his mother faced such people, she would…
Clang!
She would read the other person’s true feelings by clashing swords ten times. Remembering this, Dante confidently used the same method with Idel.
Because that was the most effective way he knew.
However, what he didn’t realize was that, unlike the people he had encountered before, Idel was a novice who had been holding a sword for less than a month, and at the same time, she was still a child.
“Ah!”
With a heartfelt scream, Dante’s face turned pale with shock. Idel, unable to react in time, had taken the blow from her wooden sword with her face instead.
“Idel!”
“Ugh, ugh…”
Dante was caught off guard by the unexpected situation and hastily lowered his sword. He rushed towards Idel, but his movements came to a sudden halt.
Idel was curled up on the ground, with blood dripping from her nose.
“…Ugh…”
Dante was frozen in shock, and at that moment, a light brown head of hair appeared at the entrance of the training room.
It was Gianna who had come to practice.
Unaware of what had just transpired, Gianna’s eyes widened in disbelief as she stepped into the training area.
‘What, what is happening right now?’
Stopping in her tracks just as surprised as Dante, she glanced around, trying to grasp the situation.
‘…Right now, did Dante Knightley hit Idel?’
Gianna couldn’t believe what she was seeing. She knew that Dante wouldn’t do something like that. She remembered Idel’s words from their first meeting.
‘Could it be true that Dante Knightley picked a fight with Idel on their first meeting?’
Logically, she knew he had no reason to do that, but the scene before her was painfully clear.
Dante was standing there with a wooden sword, and Idel hunched over, bleeding, with the wooden sword lying far away.
In this undeniable situation of violence, a surge of anger flared up in Gianna’s blue eyes.
‘…I don’t know what happened between them, but still, how could he strike someone who isn’t even holding a sword…!’
The fact that Dante had fought with Idel had long been erased from Gianna’s mind. No, it wasn’t just erased; she was furious with herself for not being on Idel’s side.
‘No matter how much they were invited by Dad, Idel is my family!’
Even her own words sounded somewhat questionable to her.
‘I’ll reflect on that later.’
With a frown resembling that of Duke Clementine, Gianna quickly stepped between the two.
Standing in front of Idel like a protective mother bird, she puffed out her chest and stood even straighter than usual. It seemed she was trying to hide Idel from Dante.
A firmly angry voice burst out from Gianna.
“Dante Knightley, did you just hit my sister?”
Despite Gianna openly growling at him, Dante couldn’t utter a single word.
It wasn’t because he was admitting his fault, but because he was still in shock.
Finally managing to catch his breath, Dante gazed at Idel, who was hidden behind Gianna.
‘…How can a person be so weak?’
