Christoph stood in shock before the shattered pieces hit them again and again with his fists until they could break no more. When he came to his senses, he found himself standing still, staring blankly at the fragments.

“Ah……”

A small sigh escaped from his slightly open mouth.

‘You shouldn’t have done that. You were told not to do that.’

――Who said that?

Christoph didn’t want to think about who had told him those words at this moment.

He curled up, silently clenching his fists. As he looked down at his bleeding hand, the thought rose in his mind again.

‘You were told not to do that.’

Christoph didn’t want to think about who had said it, but he knew someone had.

He began to walk. Christoph thought he should head to the infirmary in the main building to roughly bandage his wounds. If he did that, perhaps the person who had told him not to do this might not be so angry.

On his way to the main building, Christoph ran into an old servant who had worked there long before he left Tarten. He recognized the man’s face and only briefly told him to clean up his room before continuing on to the infirmary.

The doctor, who happened to be there, frowned upon seeing Christoph’s bloodied hand. Though the doctor had been there for a long time and was no longer surprised, he still frowned and shook his head throughout the process of removing the glass shards from Christoph’s hand and performing basic first aid.

He wanted to bandage Christoph’s hand, but that would require touching it. Christoph shook his head. At that moment, he didn’t want to be touched by anyone.

He took the bandage and clumsily wrapped his hand, thickly but unskillfully, then returned to his room.

When he got back, there wasn’t a single piece of glass left in the room as if they had never existed. The large box he had carelessly thrown on the floor was now neatly placed on the table.

It seemed the servant had cleaned the table and floor, then neatly placed the box back on the table.

“……”

Suddenly, Christoph felt tired. Why hadn’t he noticed it sooner? So tired.

He used the back of his hand to wipe the area around his dry eyes. The stiff bandage scraped against his eyelids, making them sting. His hand ached too. But he continued rubbing his tired eyes a few more times.

Leaning back in the chair in front of the desk, he bent forward deeply and closed his eyes. A wordless sigh escaped.

“……Why…….”

Suddenly, a faint murmur slipped out of his mouth. His eyes were tightly shut, so from afar, it looked as if he was talking in his sleep.

“Why can’t I……?”

There was no sadness or anger, only a vague melancholy that filled the solitary words echoing in his ears.

“Why can’t I…….?”

He softly whispered again.

But no matter how many times he whispered and repeated it, there was no answer. No one responded to him. He was the only one who heard these whispers, and he didn’t know the answer.

Just then.

“You seem to be saying something interesting.”

Without a sound, a voice suddenly approached him. Christoph flinched and furrowed his brow before slowly opening his eyes. A familiar face was stepping through the open door.

It was someone he knew but wasn’t particularly close to—Richard Tarten.

“What is it?”

Christoph coldly muttered.

But as soon as he asked, he already knew the answer.

As if he sensed that Richard’s cold gaze held a trace of warmth.

“What is it? I should have said this earlier.”

Richard raised an eyebrow as if wondering why Christoph asked that. Then he unbuttoned two or three buttons at the top of his shirt.

Christoph frowned and glared at him.

Earlier, right after finishing his work and returning to the mansion, as soon as he stepped out of the car, Richard had told Christoph, as if stating something simple: “I’ll finish the rest of the work tonight, so wait for me.”

He didn’t explain why he had to wait. He just said he would come and that Christoph should wait. It was as if to assert their positions: Richard commanded and Christoph had to obey.

“Even so, I was worried you might go off somewhere, but it turns out you stayed put. Good job.”

Richard smiled and spoke as if praising an obedient child. It was a gentle smile, but no one could tell what he was thinking behind it.

Christoph’s frown deepened.

“I didn’t wait because I wanted to.” – His voice grew slightly sharper.

“Oh, of course.” – Richard replied softly, ignoring Christoph’s words.

In fact, he had planned to avoid him. Not for any specific purpose, but the thought of Richard entering this room made him uncomfortable.

So, when the butler handed Christoph a large box of clothes in the afternoon and told him it had just been delivered, he initially intended to go to the garden behind the mansion the next morning to ask the gardener for a beautiful flower and pin it to the ribbon on the box as a gift. But since he wanted to leave the room, he immediately went to Jeong Taeui’s room.

Maybe he shouldn’t have gone.

“……”

Christoph quietly bowed his head in silence. Seeing Christoph like that, Richard, who was approaching, tilted his head slightly with a curious look and suddenly stopped.

Richard stopped about three or four steps away from Christoph. Seeing something, he frowned slightly and wiped the smile off his face. He quietly lowered his gaze and focused his eyes on a specific spot, then clicked his tongue softly.

“Christoph. Give me your hand.”

Richard spoke briefly, extending his palm.

The command sounded like one given to a dog, making Christoph frown as he looked at him. But Richard repeated himself.

“Christoph. Give me your hand.”

Richard, who didn’t like repeating himself, frowned and spoke, deepening the wrinkles between Christoph’s eyebrows, causing him to grumble.

“Why.”

Richard didn’t seem pleased with the short response. He looked at Christoph coldly for a moment. His icy voice rang out for the third time.

“I believe I told you not to talk back.――Hand.”

Richard’s outstretched palm in front of Christoph tightened slightly as if warning that if Christoph didn’t comply this time, he would have to resort to force.

Christoph suspiciously looked at him, but after a moment of silence, he reluctantly extended his hand.

The bandage on Christoph’s right hand had absorbed some blood and dried. Although the bloodstain was so faint it was almost unnoticeable, the bandage was wrapped thickly.

“If the blood seeped through even after wrapping it this thickly, you must have really torn your hand apart.”

Richard clicked his tongue. He tore the adhesive off the end of the bandage and began unwrapping it. When Christoph frowned and tried to pull his hand back, Richard grabbed his wrist tightly, not letting him do so.

The more the bandage was unraveled, the more visible the bloodstains became. When only a few layers of bandage remained, the color of the bandage had turned dark with blood. Once all the bandages were removed, the gauze underneath had hardened with dried blood.

“Hmph…… You’ve hurt yourself badly again. Is there no cure for this psychological illness?”

Richard muttered as he tore off the gauze roughly and discarded it. When the blood-stained gauze fell, the wound reopened. Blood began to ooze from the wound that seemed to have started healing.

It wasn’t just the palm where the gauze had been placed; the entire hand bore large and small wounds. The palm was the worst torn, but there were other large and small injuries all over the hand.

“What did you break this time?”

Richard asked, roughly turning the hand over and glancing at it, which had been ruthlessly scratched by glass or something else. After waiting a moment but getting no response from Christoph, Richard glanced at him and then looked around the room. It seemed he had realized something was missing.

“I guess you broke Benini’s vase. And also Barovier’s. You have no understanding of the value of those items.”

Richard clicked his tongue. He looked down at Christoph’s wounded hand, now freed from the haphazardly wrapped bandage, with dissatisfaction and reached out. He gently touched the wounds on Christoph’s hand with his fingertips.

“……―!”

Christoph flinched, recoiling not from pain but from the sensation of being touched.

Richard noticed his reaction, his face remaining calm, but his elbow trembled slightly. He lowered his gaze from the hand and looked directly into Christoph’s face.

“Self-harm, obsessive cleanliness, and a fear of touch. You really have every type of psychological illness.”

He scoffed, suddenly gripping Christoph’s hand tightly. This time Christoph’s body shuddered, not from pain but from the feeling of his hand being held by someone else.

“What’s the reason this time?”

“―……”

“There must be some reason why you ripped your hand apart like this. Or has your psychological illness progressed to the point where you self-harm without any reason?”

Christoph stubbornly remained silent. Richard looked at him, who was glaring at nothing, his mouth tightly shut as if refusing to speak. Richard clicked his tongue.

He lowered his gaze to Christoph’s hand, frowning. He clicked his tongue again, this time more irritated, then picked up the bandage and began rewrapping Christoph’s hand.

“When you came home, you seemed very happy, but it looks like something happened tonight.”

Richard coldly muttered.

Christoph still said nothing. He just stared intently at Richard’s hand holding his wrist, and every time Richard’s hand lightly touched the back of his hand or fingers while wrapping the bandage, his hand slightly twitched.

A long silence ensued.

Richard continued to wrap the bandage with a look of dissatisfaction, while Christoph only glared at his own hand.

Then suddenly, Christoph lifted his gaze to look at Richard. It seemed that Richard noticed the gaze without even looking at him.

“Is there something on my face?”

“…………I thought you were unwrapping the bandage to sprinkle salt on the wound.”

When Christoph muttered coldly, Richard suddenly looked at him with a hint of surprise, then snorted and smirked, without a hint of humor, before pursing his lips.

“Do you think I’m that kind of person?”

“You enjoy torturing others.”

Richard stared blankly at Christoph. He sighed discontentedly and said: “You’re mistaken.”

In the silence that followed, Richard continued wrapping the bandage skillfully. He only wrapped it enough, not as thickly as before, then tied a knot and cut off the excess bandage. Then he gently smoothed the bandage and let go of Christoph’s hand.

Christoph stared intently at his newly bandaged hand.

“So now tell me why someone who was so cheerful when they came home suddenly became sick in just a few hours?”

“……That didn’t happen.”

Christoph coldly replied. But Richard only looked at him with a mocking gaze.

“What’s this? Are you saying you have bipolar disorder? Your mood soared to the sky and then plunged into the abyss in just a few hours. That’s quite severe.”

At that moment, Richard’s eyes were glued to the large box on the table. He looked at the box with curiosity, then back at Christoph.

“What’s this?”

“……”

“With this size and brand…… is it a suit?”

Richard raised an eyebrow, looking back and forth between Christoph and the box.

“Why did you buy a ready-made suit? You’ve always been extremely picky about clothes.”

When Richard reached out toward the box, Christoph swiftly grabbed it before he could touch it and threw it under the table.

“DON’T TOUCH IT!”

Richard froze for a moment at Christoph’s sudden reaction as he rushed to push the box away, then stared at Christoph, who had just shouted, with a confused look. Soon after, a mocking smile appeared on Richard’s face.

“It seems your obsession has gotten so bad that even clothes are involved. Whatever. I don’t care if your psychological illness worsens.”

Richard withdrew his hand, but just as it seemed he would retract it entirely, the hand stopped, then slowly moved toward Christoph’s cheek.

As the large hand covered Christoph’s cheek, he visibly flinched and reacted by turning his head to one side, but Richard’s other hand also moved in and covered the other cheek.

Richard held Christoph’s face between his hands and leaned toward him.

“You looked very happy this afternoon, Christoph. Yes, after going out during your free time this afternoon, your mood noticeably improved…… Where did you go?”

“Let go of me, Richard. I’m not in a good mood today.”

Christoph’s mood had been unstable for a while. Richard, seeing Christoph’s wounds, couldn’t help but notice that Christoph was in an even more unstable state than usual. But Richard only squinted and didn’t withdraw his hands.

“Too bad. But I’m in a great mood today.”

“RICHARD. LET GO……!”

“If I don’t, are you going to run to mom and tell on me? Richard touched my face, mom!”

Richard spoke in a low, mocking tone.

The moment the word “Mom” left Richard’s mouth, Christoph fell silent. His blue eyes glared at Richard with resentment, and his gaze grew even darker.

“Christoph. Aren’t you going to answer me? I couldn’t stand it all afternoon because I was so curious. This is the first time I’ve seen you so cheerful. What made you so happy?…… Did you happen to meet Jeong Tay?”

When Richard quietly mentioned Jeong Taeui’s name, Christoph’s expression immediately tensed.

Suddenly, the image from earlier flashed in his mind again. The figure of that person hugging Rick’s neck and calling his name.

Richard, seeing Christoph fall silent and stiffen, suddenly smiled. Then one of Richard’s hands remained on Christoph’s cheek while the other slowly slid down.

That hand moved from the neck to the shoulder, chest, and then the abdomen, slowly sliding down as if feeling every inch of Christoph’s skin through the thin shirt, making Christoph’s face turn pale and his body shrink.

“RICHARD……!”

“Shhh. The window is open, Christoph. And Aunt Bianca loves to take afternoon walks. She usually walks around the courtyard beside The East Wing Building, but who knows? What if today she happens to be walking right below this window? Isn’t that right?”

Richard’s gentle voice was like a spell that rendered Christoph mute as if enchanted. No, that name itself was the spell. A spell that had absolute power over Christoph.