Daisy's behavior had been strange—cutting off their conversation so abruptly and fleeing as though pursued by demons. Wasn't it customary to inquire *why* in such situations? And those deliberate words about "protecting privacy"...
_Too calculated. Too suspicious._
Perhaps Rafaella was hiding his true intentions behind that cheerful facade? He feigned friendship now, but if Gabriel ever considered her an enemy, Rafaella would be the first to rush forward and destroy her. The thought made the paladin's perpetual smile seem suddenly sinister.
Evangeline had always disliked people who smiled constantly. It felt like a mask—and masks always hid something.
"And... this young gentleman?" Rafaella asked, gesturing toward Jelly.
Jelly's golden eyes darted to Evangeline with barely concealed panic, silently asking what he should say.
_So what do I tell him?_ she wondered. _"This is my fallback romance option from the novel"? "A magical werewolf"? "My pet"?_
"My bodyguard," Evangeline replied smoothly.
"Ah! A knight!" Rafaella nodded with apparent satisfaction. "I didn't notice the sword at his belt."
_Exactly. What sword?_ Jelly was a werewolf mage. He used magic and claws instead of steel. She needed to come up with something more convincing—but while Evangeline was still scrambling for an explanation, Jelly shrugged with impressive nonchalance.
"Well... I can handle things just fine without a sword."
He answered with such aplomb that Evangeline actually felt a flicker of pride. Rafaella glanced at the ten vials of holy water that Jelly held effortlessly in one hand and nodded, clearly impressed by the display of casual strength.
"Are you heading to the Order's reception room? Then allow me to show you the way."
Rafaella and Yuriel walked ahead, their white cloaks swaying with each step. Evangeline and Jelly followed at a more leisurely pace.
"How do you know Daisy?" Evangeline asked quietly.
"Who? Oh, that nun?" Jelly's brow furrowed. "Hmm... we helped each other out once."
"You didn't hurt her?"
"No, of course not!" He sounded genuinely offended. "I *told* you—I helped her. We escaped together."
Jelly muttered something resentful about being the one who'd been mistreated, his voice dropping so low that Evangeline could barely hear him. It seemed he didn't want to speak openly with strangers nearby.
But Evangeline already understood.
When she'd first met Jelly, he'd been gravely wounded—barely clinging to life. How could a werewolf sustain such injuries? And he'd said they *escaped* together...
_It all makes sense now._
Daisy and Jelly had been captured by slave traders and escaped together. That's why Daisy had been so terrified when she saw him—he reminded her of that nightmare. Post-traumatic stress disorder. Classic symptoms.
_So Jelly isn't a romance fallback at all—he's part of a second couple? Toward the end, he switches from Kanna to Daisy. And there, too, I'm cast as the villain._
_Why does this story have two couples but only one villain? That hardly seems fair._
"I covered my tracks well," Jelly added, a hint of satisfaction in his voice.
_He even dealt with the slave traders._ Well done.
Evangeline reached up and patted his head in approval. His dark hair was surprisingly soft.
Rafaella, noticing they had fallen behind, stopped and waited. As they approached, he looked at Evangeline as though he'd witnessed something improper.
_Of course._ His commander was courting this woman, and here she was caressing some strange man in broad daylight.
"You seem to be... very close with your bodyguard?" Rafaella asked, his smile slightly strained.
"That's because Jelly is my pet... He usually goes around in wolf form..." Evangeline stopped herself mid-sentence. She didn't want to be mistaken for a slave trader who abused animals.
"Not at all," she said curtly instead.
She hadn't intended to pursue an affair with Gabriel, but she needed to maintain his favor—at least for now. So she played along with the charade. Who would have thought she'd end up navigating love games in a fantasy world?
---
## — Rafaella's Observation —
Rafaella watched Evangeline and Daisy's entire exchange with careful attention.
He pretended to chat with Yuriel about trivial matters—the weather, the upcoming feast day, the quality of the Temple's holy water—and any outsider would have believed his sincerity completely. But Yuriel was too trusting, too straightforward. He never noticed anything suspicious.
Rafaella knew far more than the other knights of the Order, Gabriel excepted. If Rafaella had been as simple and naive as he appeared, Gabriel would never have made him second-in-command.
Rafaella had seen Donau's body and the strange symbols carved into it. He knew about the magic circle. After visiting the Lohanson estate, he had begun studying ancient spells and forbidden texts, searching for answers.
It was Rafaella who had recorded Daisy's testimony and passed it directly to Gabriel.
At first glance, there had been nothing unusual in her account.
Daisy claimed to have witnessed Priest Berg summon a creature. It resembled a demon. The demon's victims had their throats slit and then *stitched back together*. They looked alive—perfectly alive—and only a thin red scar across their necks revealed their true nature.
That explained why Daisy had been so terrified when she saw Kanna, Evangeline Lohanson's maid.
Honestly, looking at this Kanna, one could almost believe she *was* the living dead. After all, Evangeline herself had returned from the grave.
_But on Evangeline Lohanson's neck..._
There were no scars.
The atrocities Daisy had recounted were monstrous beyond imagining. Priest Berg had remained unpunished for so long only because of his secluded life in that remote monastery and the protection of his influential family. How could a priest blessed by the goddess Rael commit such horrific acts?
The full extent of Berg's crimes would come to light once he was arrested and interrogated.
But something about Daisy's testimony felt *off*.
What troubled Rafaella most was *how* Daisy had managed to escape after witnessing the demon's summoning.
It seemed impossible that Berg would have let her go alive, knowing how much she'd seen. So how did she do it?
"Yuriel," Rafaella asked casually, "is it possible to escape from a well-guarded place where you're constantly being watched?"
"From prison?" Yuriel frowned thoughtfully. "No, of course not. You can't escape from prison."
"...I don't mean prison. For example, from a monastery."
Yuriel clearly didn't understand why anyone would need to be locked up in a monastery and guarded, but he tried to answer anyway:
"Jump out of a window? If you climb a tree first, you can jump from the third floor without serious injury."
"...Thank you," Rafaella replied, pressing a hand to his temple. Yuriel's advice was completely useless. Daisy couldn't have escaped that way.
Rafaella focused again on Evangeline and Daisy's conversation.
"———."
"You... You don't know my name?"
"—————————."
"...Daisy."
It was a strange sensation—unsettling in a way he couldn't quite name. They were clearly talking, exchanging words, but Rafaella couldn't hear Evangeline's voice.
In fact, she wasn't even moving her lips.
And yet, it was obvious she was speaking.
Daisy seemed to hear her perfectly well and answered her questions without hesitation.
Rafaella could only guess the content of their conversation from Daisy's replies.
Evangeline Lohanson appeared to genuinely not remember Daisy. Yet when Daisy had given her testimony, she'd acted as though she'd suffered severe psychological trauma at the estate.
_"Lady Evangeline came back to life? I don't know where you heard that, but it's true. Everyone who was at the funeral saw it... the dead girl came back to life."_
_"The priest who conducted the funeral committed suicide? Nothing surprising."_
_"I saw the lady drawing a magic circle. She said she wanted to summon an angel? An **angel**? You wouldn't say that if you'd seen one yourself."_
And what Daisy had witnessed at the Lohanson estate...
She claimed to have seen Evangeline summon some kind of creature. Judging by what had happened to Berg, it was almost certainly a demon.
_"There are too many eyes at the Lohanson estate. That's why I went to the monastery."_
She'd fled to the monastery to escape surveillance—only to find herself embroiled in even darker dealings. The woman had no luck whatsoever.
But what did Daisy mean by "eyes"? Simply a large number of people? Or were all the servants at the Lohanson estate as devoted to Evangeline as the sisters Hena and Kanna?
Gabriel had wanted to question her further, but Daisy had fallen silent the moment she saw Hena and Kanna.
The Commander had ordered Rafaella to escort Daisy, hoping he might extract something useful during the journey. But Daisy had remained utterly mute the entire time, and Rafaella had returned empty-handed.
Meeting Evangeline Lohanson outside the Temple gates had been a stroke of luck. And Daisy's reaction upon seeing her had been... illuminating.
Rafaella had deliberately led Daisy toward Evangeline, hoping they might say something important within earshot. But he couldn't hear Evangeline's words—not a single one.
"...Sir Gabriel knows."
Daisy seemed to panic and confess to having testified against Evangeline. She'd named the Commander directly, which meant she'd told him everything.
Things had only gotten worse from there.
That is, until *this man* appeared.
A man with black hair and striking golden eyes. He moved smoothly and unhurriedly, like a predator stalking prey through tall grass. He positioned himself behind Evangeline as though guarding her—or perhaps *containing* her.
"Who is this?" Yuriel had asked.
"This is Mr. Jelly, Lady Lohanson's companion," Rafaella had answered, testing the waters.
He'd looked at Yuriel in bewilderment afterward. His head ached from the fact that his colleague had taken the absurd name seriously and even called this strange fellow *"Mister."*
"He's so... silent and serious," Yuriel remarked now, watching Jelly with something like admiration.
"Who? This *Jelly*?"
"Yes. While the lady was praying, he didn't utter a single word."
_And she was alone with him?_
Of course, Evangeline Lohanson herself was far more dangerous than any bodyguard. But why had the Commander left her with this suspicious character and the all-too-trusting Yuriel?
Rafaella rubbed his temples, irritation simmering beneath his carefully maintained smile.