Chapter 251: Endure It!
“Hm?” Hearing what Armand said, Evelia tilted her head in confusion. “I was complimenting you. Aren’t you happy?”
“Who would be happy about something like that…!”
“Really? If you praised my body, I’d be very happy.”
As she said that, Evelia tugged at her maid outfit again. Since Armand wasn’t in a position to stop her, it wasn’t long before Evelia was left wearing only her white lace-trimmed underwear and a pair of white, wet thigh-high stockings.
Out of politeness, Armand didn’t want to look at Evelia when she was only in her underwear. But his damn eyes just wouldn’t listen to his brain. Even though he tried to look away, the next moment, his gaze involuntarily returned, taking in Evelia’s form by the edge of the bath.
Maybe because the temperature in the bathroom was rising, Evelia’s cheeks were a little flushed. Her fair, full chest was half-covered by fabric and half exposed in the steamy air, with faint marks on her skin where the fabric pressed in. Each breath made her chest quiver slightly, and the droplets of sweat on her skin made people instinctively want to reach out and wipe them away.
Sweat trickled down from between her breasts. Armand’s gaze followed that single drop as it slid downward, over her rarely-seen stomach. When it passed her navel, Evelia flinched slightly at the ticklish feeling.
Normally, she looked slim, but now that more of her body was visible, it was clear that she had some softness to her figure. After all, to support a chest like that, the rest of her couldn’t be too thin. When she leaned forward slightly to adjust her sitting posture, the soft flesh on her lower belly folded gently, which didn’t look unattractive. If anything, it seemed a little cute. It made you think that touching it might feel pretty nice.
That drop of sweat finally got absorbed by another patch of white, probably because she was sitting beside the wet edge of the bath. Not only were her stockings soaked, but the white fabric just above them also showed watermarks. The fabric soaked up the moisture like it was being slowly dissolved, and the wet marks spread little by little.
The white thigh-high stockings below fully proved that purity and allure can exist at the same time. White was supposed to be the purest color, but now, soaked with equally “pure” water, it looked incredibly tempting. The garter straps and the tops of the stockings left clear marks on her thighs, and the damp fabric even outlined each of her toes.
But looking at Evelia’s thighs, the first thing Armand thought of was her powerful “scissor kick” legs. It kind of ruined the mood, but that incident had just left too strong an impression on him.
In his heart, Armand was shouting, “No, I can’t fall like this!”—yet at the same time, he couldn’t help but admire Evelia’s figure, while also grumbling to himself, “Who would’ve thought she was wearing garter stockings under that maid outfit…”
“Mr. Armand?”
“—!”
Only when Evelia called his name did Armand snap out of it. He had been trying so hard to control himself, yet in the end, he had completely lost focus. His eyes had even gone blank.
A man and a woman alone in a room, especially in a bathroom, and one of them not wearing clothes, the other only in underwear… For a man like Armand in his late twenties, this was nothing short of a hellish test.
Although he hadn’t lost his mind and done anything impulsive, he had definitely lost on a physical level. His body’s natural reactions had betrayed him completely.
Feeling embarrassed, Armand covered half his face with his hand and scolded himself in his mind for being a pervert. This time, he turned his whole body away, refusing to look in Evelia’s direction again.
“Do I… not look good?” Evelia glanced at the clearly “rejecting” Armand, then looked down at the underwear she was wearing.
This was something Anna had specially picked out for her. That’s why Evelia hadn’t taken it off when she removed her maid outfit. After all, Anna had confidently told her before, “This set will absolutely knock your man off his feet.”
But now, seeing that Armand didn’t react like a character in a romance novel, he didn’t gasp or get amazed by Evelia’s underwear, he simply turned around silently, which made Evelia feel a little disappointed.
It wasn’t that she thought Anna’s choice of underwear was bad. She just felt upset because she didn’t get any kind of positive reaction.
—‘I even complimented him earlier. Shouldn’t he say something nice to me too?’
But Armand didn’t seem to have the energy to deal with a question like that. He turned around not only to avoid looking at Evelia, but also to calm his body down. So he focused all his energy on thinking about things that disgusted him, like the Second Prince. Just thinking about that guy made him feel like everything inside him went cold.
But then, when he remembered that Evelia was originally from the Second Prince’s side, a strange feeling of wanting to “win her over” excited him again.
Ahhh—damn it, what’s wrong with me? Am I some kind of weirdo?!
Whatever… just forget it. For now, I need to get Evelia out of here—
“Mr. Armand?”
“—?!”
Just as Armand turned his head, Evelia was already standing behind him without him realizing it.
He had been so focused on trying to calm himself down that he didn’t even notice the sound of her stepping into the water.
Evelia wasn’t wearing anything waterproof like a swimsuit. Just regular fabric clothes. So when Armand looked down at her, he immediately saw that her outfit was soaked. Just like the white stockings before, her clothes had become slightly see-through.
His eyes went straight to the part he absolutely should not be looking at. Then, in a hurry, like he couldn’t think of anything else to do, he grabbed Evelia’s long pink hair and pulled it forward to cover that area. He used pink to cover pink.
“—Mr. Armand?”
Evelia clearly didn’t understand what Armand was trying to do. After that, Armand even pulled more of her hair over from the back of her head, like turning her into a ghost girl from a horror movie, covering her face and most of her upper body in a panic.
“There’s a bathrobe by the door, it's for you…!”
Saying that, while Evelia’s face was still hidden under her hair and she couldn’t see clearly, Armand quickly ran out of the bath, wrapped himself in a long towel, left the robe for Evelia, and dashed out of the bathroom.
“...?”
Evelia, still confused, lifted her hair like she was pulling back a curtain. She looked at Armand’s disappearing figure and had a big question mark in her head.
Meanwhile, Armand dried himself off quickly, hung up the towel, and took a set of pajamas out of the wardrobe.
Since the weather had gotten cooler, his pajamas were much warmer than before. Some of the thinner ones were still out and not yet packed away, one of them had even been worn by Evelia.
That was from the time when Evelia got herself drunk and threw up everywhere, and Armand had to help change her into that robe.
Thinking back… he had, by accident, seen all of Evelia before. Now that he had accidentally exposed himself, maybe that evened the score…
Ahhh—what kind of logic is that? Have I been around Evelia so long that my brain is starting to work like hers?
Still, thinking that way helped reduce some of his embarrassment. At least it stopped him from feeling completely awkward all over.
After running out of the bathroom, he started to calm down a bit. As he sat down on the edge of the bed, the effect of the drowsy medicine finally started kicking in.
“Yaaawn…”
Armand let out a yawn and looked at the clock next to him.
In order for the medicine to work on someone like Armand, who had a strong resistance to drugs, it had to be really powerful. Even though it was still just the afternoon, this sleep would probably last until the next morning. He would close his eyes, open them again, and half a day would already be gone.
“...Might as well get some rest now.”
Since he still had some time, Armand chose to lie down on the bed, found a comfortable position, and pulled the blanket over himself.
Even though sometimes he could take time off from his duties with the knights, he wasn’t someone with a lot of free time. So now that he finally had a good chance to rest, there was no way he was going to waste it.
If he missed this chance to recover, he might have to work later while still feeling tired, and that was never fun.
Armand had been through that before, totally exhausted but still having to stand guard outside in the freezing cold. He nearly froze to death.
Thankfully, this time it was only sleepiness. If the poison in his body acted up again, it wouldn’t just be a matter of pushing through it.
If he didn’t rest well now and the poison came back, the side effects would definitely be worse than they were a few days ago.
Even now, Armand wasn’t in great shape. He was awake, but his brain felt like it was still out of sync. He had almost no memory of what happened after he jumped off the cliff. He didn’t even know when or how he got back to the estate.
He only vaguely remembered falling down in the knights’ dorm. He couldn’t remember how he fell, just that it hurt and reopened his wounds.
He didn’t even remember seeing Carle in the dorm, let alone the part where Carle stuffed him into a sack and carried him home.
But there was one thing that left a deep impression, probably because it was too shocking to forget, that legendary "Red Crow"... turned out to be a woman.
It was so ridiculous that even in his foggy state back then, Armand remembered it clearly. The weird feeling of her sitting on his stomach, that memory was still sharp in his mind.
"...I really don’t know what’s going on anymore..."
But since his memory was full of blanks, there wasn’t much else he could figure out now. He just lay in bed, and like many people do before falling asleep, his thoughts started to wander.
After “pushing away” the thoughts about the Red Crow, Evelia’s figure quickly returned to his mind.
Her face, her voice, her clothes, her body…
“…Damn it.”
As Armand kept thinking, he cursed himself for being so weak-willed. He didn’t even know if he was going to have strange dreams because of it.
...But there wasn’t much he could do about it now.
With those thoughts floating around, Armand slowly drifted off to sleep, thanks to the medicine.
A little while later, Evelia appeared outside Armand’s door, wearing his bathrobe.
“……”
She quietly pushed the bedroom door open a little and peeked through the gap. Inside, she saw Armand sleeping peacefully.
Evelia tiptoed into the room and walked over to the bed. She sat down on the caretaker’s chair that hadn’t been taken away yet.
“…Mr. Armand?”
She tried, maybe even tested, calling his name. Normally, just the sound of the door opening would’ve been enough to wake him up. But this time, even when Evelia poked his cheek, he didn’t move. He just kept breathing steadily in his sleep.
Seeing this, Evelia gently lifted the blanket and, like she had done before, slipped inside and lay down beside him.
“…Hoo… Mr. Armand…”
She blew softly on his lips and swallowed her impatient saliva.