OPDPS 109

‘Why is the Grand Duke here?’

Aeryl froze mid-turn, staring at the Grand Duke. He too was silently watching Aeryl. No words were exchanged—only a heavy silence settled between them. Yet something was clearly wrong with the Grand Duke.

Without hesitation, Aeryl ran to him. The Grand Duke wasn’t breathing.

“Breathe!”

Aeryl shouted and slapped the Grand Duke’s cheeks with both hands. At the impact, the Grand Duke gasped sharply and collapsed to the ground. He started inhaling and exhaling rapidly. Sensing that he was still in a confused state, Aeryl wrapped his arms tightly around the Grand Duke’s shoulders and released his pheromones.

“You’re alright. I’m right here with you. You’re safe, Your Grace.”

While trying to soothe him, Aeryl covered the Grand Duke’s nose and mouth with one hand, releasing the pressure and checking his state bit by bit. The Grand Duke couldn’t regulate his breathing on his own, so Aeryl guided him.

“Slowly in… good. Now out. Slowly. That’s it.”

Thanks to the immediate intervention, the Grand Duke’s breathing gradually returned to normal. But he was still trapped in a daze. His heart was pounding furiously and his body was drenched in cold sweat, yet his hands were icy cold. Normally, this would have been enough to calm him, but his condition was worse than usual.

‘I need to get him out of here.’

Maybe the place triggered some traumatic memory. In situations like this, getting away from the location was the best course of action.

Aeryl moved to open the door, but the Grand Duke clung to him, refusing to let go. It wasn’t easy, but Aeryl mustered all his strength to open the door and nearly tumbled out while dragging the Grand Duke along.

Click.

The door shut behind them. Darkness swallowed everything. Their eyes hadn’t adjusted after coming straight from the brightly lit room.

Aeryl checked on the Grand Duke. It seemed like the darkness was actually helping. The distinct scent of taxidermy was gone, leaving only their mingled pheromones. Though the Grand Duke was large and heavy, Aeryl held him tightly with all his might.

Even though this body was far bigger and stronger than his own, it felt heartbreakingly fragile. He gently stroked the Grand Duke’s back and whispered again and again, “It’s alright.”

Gradually, the Grand Duke calmed down.

Aeryl waited quietly beside him. After what felt like a long time, the Grand Duke finally lifted his head. He scanned Aeryl’s body to confirm he wasn’t injured, then finally said just one word.

“…Sorry.”

Aeryl blinked, surprised that the first thing he said—with gritted teeth no less—was an apology. But he quickly answered calmly.

“You didn’t do anything wrong, Your Grace.”

“…You almost died just now.”

“Me?”

When was I ever close to dying? Aeryl tilted his head.

“There’s a trap down there. Anyone who tries to access the basement gets killed.”

It was a trap the Grand Duke had commissioned right after taking the title. He’d called an inventor and ordered him to create a trap that would kill anyone who approached the basement. That included himself—he’d told the inventor to handle it however he saw fit.

He’d left everything to them and never visited the room even once. He had no idea what it even looked like now. If it hadn’t been for Aeryl, he probably never would’ve returned there.

***

That morning, the Grand Duke had gone on a sudden business trip due to a disruption during a supply transfer. Recently, the Emperor had been acting suspiciously, and there were reports of imperial knights sneaking into the duchy. The Grand Duke had no choice but to act. It turned out to be a minor incident caused by monsters, so he resolved it quickly.

‘That shouldn’t have gone so smoothly.’

It was the sort of issue his subordinates should have been able to handle without him. Uneasy, he’d rushed back to the estate. Because he had traveled far, it was already deep into the night when he arrived.

Entering the central hall, he tried to sense Aeryl’s presence. It was past ten, so he expected him to be in the infirmary or his room. But instead—

‘Third floor… the exhibition room…?’

Why was Aeryl there?

The exhibition room had been built by the former Grand Duke. It was where he’d displayed the monsters and animals he’d hunted. And it also contained the hidden entrance to the basement.

The Grand Duke immediately rushed to the third floor.

‘So he found the basement after all?’

He’d told Aeryl it didn’t exist. He hadn’t believed him. Even though the lie was his own, he still felt betrayed. That Aeryl would dig behind his back while he was gone—it made him angry.

‘That place…’

And at the same time, he remembered the basement trap. He had to stop Aeryl before he went down the stairs.

He’d been determined to rush in and drag Aeryl out.

That was before he opened the door.

When he did, he was hit by the overwhelming sight of dozens of taxidermied creatures and that distinct scent. Then came a flood of buried memories.

Back before he became Grand Duke, one of his attendants had once told him a ghost story. The attendant had been genuinely terrified, and the young Grand Duke had been curious to uncover the truth.

That led him to discover a secret space and, through deduction, the hidden basement entrance.

He’d descended the stairs and opened the basement door, only to find—

Something so horrific he never wanted to remember it again.

‘Aeryl…’

The door to the basement was wide open, and Aeryl could see clearly inside. The place hadn’t changed at all, bringing a strange sense of déjà vu, like he had returned to his teenage years.

‘I should bring Aeryl out of here.’

He knew it, yet his body refused to move. It felt as if his body had its own mind, rejecting the thought of going into the basement. It was as if he didn’t want to relive the memory of his first and last visit to that place.

Aeryl was in danger. But his body remained still. At some point, he realized he couldn’t even make a sound.

‘I need to move. But… it’s down there, I need to go, but if I go there…’

He didn’t even realize he was caught in a loop of repeating the same thoughts. His head spun as if someone had shaken it in a barrel. His vision blurred and spun around.

At that moment, Aeryl’s voice rang out, and a sharp slap to his cheeks brought him back to his senses. It was then that the Duke realized he hadn’t been breathing.

He gasped for air as someone embraced him tightly. The comforting scent he recognized as Aeryl filled the air.

After that, he followed Aeryl’s instructions to breathe and clung to him. When his mind cleared, he found himself pulled out of that dreadful room.

Many thoughts swirled in his head, but the first thing that came out was an apology.

The trap he had ordered to be made almost killed Aeryl. He had been right there and yet hadn’t warned him about the danger. After telling Aeryl the truth, he feared that Aeryl would blame him, and once again, he could barely breathe.

“The inventor constructed the basement like this, huh? So those taxidermy creatures and the glass tubes, the inventor made those too?”

Aeryl had been listening carefully to the Duke’s words, his mind deep in thought. Though there were other topics they could have discussed, he noticed the Duke was tense, and out of concern, Aeryl chose a different topic to ease the tension.

“No. The taxidermy and the glass tubes, those were my father’s…”

He hadn’t wanted to think about it deeply, and had only ordered the inventor to work on the trap. He hadn’t expected the exhibition room to remain exactly as it was.

“I see. I thought it wasn’t your taste. Honestly, it’s pretty disgusting.”

Aeryl shook his head. The Duke watched his playful banter before cautiously asking, “Did you turn back after going down to the basement?”

“Ah, yes… I went down about three steps and then thought, ‘This isn’t right,’ so I came back up.”

Fortunately, Aeryl had turned around before falling in the trap. Even though he answered the question, a sense of embarrassment crept over him. Strictly speaking, he had secretly snooped around the Duke’s secrets and gotten caught. He straightened his posture and met the Duke’s gaze.

“I broke the rules and went searching for the basement. I was trying to uncover what you were hiding. I’m sorry.”

He bowed his head, hoping his sincerity was understood. The Duke gazed at Aeryl’s round head. When he first learned that Aeryl had been searching for the basement, he felt betrayed and angry. But in a brief moment, those emotions faded, leaving only questions.

“Why did you do that? Did you suspect me so much?”

“Well… I was suspicious, but more than that…”

Aeryl thought back to the intense impulse that had taken over him at the time.

Now that he reflected on it, the last few days had felt like he was under some kind of spell. Thinking back, it all began with Lady Merel’s words about ‘not knowing the Duke.’ Seeing the Duke act strangely had made him desperate to understand why.

There were many reasons why he had set out to find the basement, but it all boiled down to one thing.

“I wanted to know, Your Grace.”

Everything that others knew, everything they didn’t know. His overwhelming desire to know it all pushed him forward.

The Duke blinked, his eyes slightly widening as he looked at Aeryl.

“You might not understand. I can be a bit single-minded at times… But when I started going down, I realized it wasn’t right.”

“Why?”

“Because you said you were hiding something and that it didn’t exist. I thought it was right to respect that. Everyone has a secret, after all…”

“You think I might be hiding something awful down there?”

“It’s true that it seemed suspicious… but according to my knowledge and experience, you’re not the kind of person who would do that.”

Aeryl frowned slightly, struggling to find the right words.

“Anyway, I didn’t want to force the truth out.”

“Even though you wanted to know?”

“Yes.”

What was he even saying? Aeryl lowered his head in embarrassment.

He knew his words didn’t make sense, but it was the truth. His thoughts and feelings made no logical sense. The Duke would probably be perplexed by his contradictions. At least the pheromones would convey his true feelings, so that was a small relief.

At that moment, the Duke’s hand gently cupped Aeryl’s face. Aeryl couldn’t help but raise his head, but the Duke’s expression was different from what he had expected.

At the same time, the scent of the Duke’s pheromones overwhelmed Aeryl, sparkling like crystal. The Duke’s face slowly descended toward Aeryl.