Prologue

“Mm…”

Rona stirred in her sleep, letting out a pained whimper.

It felt like she had been suffering from pain in her ribs, but now, it only tickled.

Something felt off.

She was clearly asleep, yet her consciousness was awake, and her body felt like it was floating.

Her toes curled instinctively at the ticklish sensation. A wave of heat rising from below made her back arch and her mouth fall open.

“Haa…”

Slosh, slosh—the sound of splashing water.

A dampness between her legs, as if she had wet herself.

And over the most sensitive part of her body, she could feel warm breath.

It felt like… someone was licking her down there.

“You’re drooling even in your sleep.”

“……!”

Before her thoughts could connect, a deep voice rose from below, and Rona’s eyes flew open.

She slowly lifted her head, blinking in confusion.

Her chemise, which had once reached her ankles, had been pushed up to her thighs, exposing her pale legs.

That alone was shocking enough—but atop the sheer fabric of her chemise, she saw a rounded head.

Someone had buried their face between her legs.

The lewdness of the scene, so early in the morning, left her mouth agape.

“W-What is this…?”

Her thighs were being held firmly. Her panties had been pulled down to her ankles. Her lower body was wet.

The man had been licking her v*gina while she slept.

Am I still dreaming…?

The surreal sight froze Rona in place. She even forgot to breathe as she stared blankly.

The man didn’t seem to hear her and showed no intention of moving from between her thighs.

Slosh.

Then a thick tongue slowly dragged up her entire slit again.

“……!”

With a sharp cry, Rona scrambled up in a panic.

“W-What are you… What the hell are you doing?!”

As she trembled violently, the man raised the white chemise and revealed his face.

It was her husband, Anach.

Hearing her stunned voice, he tilted his head slightly.

His calm expression and neat appearance didn’t match the man who had just been licking his sleeping wife like a dog.

Only his glistening lips betrayed what he had been doing.

“What am I doing? Saving your life, obviously.”

“…What?”

Rona blinked, unable to comprehend. How on earth did sticking his tongue in her relate to saving her life…?

Then Anach slowly licked his lips and explained.

“I have to wet you first. Your hole’s too tight. If I go in dry, it’ll tear.”

Rona stiffened, falling into stunned silence. What… what did he just say? He has to wet her before putting it in…? So he’d been planning to sleep with her while she was unconscious?

“You… You’re insane!”

She cried out, pushing his head away in alarm. But he didn’t budge. His eyes narrowed, staring back at her like he was the one confused.

Rona flushed and shouted, eyes locked on the clear liquid glistening on his thick lips.

“You’re supposed to ask before doing something like this!”

Anach smirked at that.

“You’re dying, and I should ask for permission before saving you? That’s what’s really insane.”

His absurd logic left Rona speechless. Now she understood why he’d crawled between her legs at the crack of dawn.

She must’ve started moaning in her sleep again, unable to bear the pain.

“B-But still, this is too much…”

“How would you know? You collapsed just because I was gone for a day.”

“That’s…”

Rona lowered her gaze.

Even she hadn’t expected what had happened that day. Back then, she hadn’t known that… her husband’s body was the cure for her illness.

And yet—

Even knowing that her husband was the key to saving her life, Rona didn’t want to rely on him.

Maybe it was pride. Maybe just stubbornness.

Either way… she didn’t want to be saved like this.

However—

“We… agreed to get divorced. And yet, this… this kind of thing…”

She’d asked for a divorce—how pathetic would it be to ask her husband for help now?

Everything about this situation was difficult.

‘I finally made up my mind…’

A shadow fell over Rona’s face as memories of her married life with him briefly passed through her mind.

People mocking her for being a woman unworthy of her husband.

Servants who ignored her as the lady of the house.

And worst of all—

…a husband who refused to sleep with her.

Only after she’d finally come to terms with it and decided to divorce him… did he start sleeping with her.

The excitement had long faded from Rona’s face, replaced by conflicted emotions.

‘If not for this illness, I never would’ve ended up in the same bed as him…’

Rona turned her gaze toward her husband, who was now showing her an unfamiliar side.

His face, composed entirely of arrogance, looked like that of a true nobleman. There wasn’t a single trace of his past; his noble bearing showed clearly on his proud features.

If he had been born into nobility, he never would’ve even looked at someone like her.

Maybe that still held true, even now.

‘That’s probably why he never once asked to sleep with me.’

She simply wasn’t enough for him.

Rona’s gaze dimmed. Ever since her illness had been discovered, she’d ended up sharing a bed with him every day—though surely, that hadn’t been what he wanted either.

And that made sense.

“After all, our marriage only happened because of my parents’ request.”

He’d only married her to repay a debt.

Back when the war had yet to end, he’d been just a young child, wandering alone.

It was her parents who had taken in that street urchin and given him work as a servant. Thanks to them, Anach had survived without fear of starvation.

To repay that kindness, he married Rona.

But honestly, it could hardly be called a marriage.

Her parents had passed away in a sudden accident. None of her relatives had been willing to take her in. And she’d been far too young to live on her own.

Her parents, foreseeing what would happen, entrusted their only daughter to him before they died.

‘Back then, the only way for me to avoid being sent to an orphanage was to become his wife…’

That decision had stretched into years of pretending to be husband and wife.

As a child, she’d been happy to marry him, knowing they would stay together. She’d been excited at the thought. But with time, she realized the truth:

To him, their marriage had been nothing more than a burden—a nuisance forced upon him.

“I know I owe you a lot.”

He’d been saddled with a young girl simply because of a dying couple’s final wish.

How could he possibly have welcomed that?

And now, to top it off, he was being forced to sleep with a woman he didn’t even want…

Rona fought the lump rising in her throat and forced herself to speak.

“…But I’m grown up now. There’s no need for you to honor my parents’ last wishes anymore. So I want a divorce—”

She believed she was speaking calmly. But her hands wouldn’t stay still, and her lips trembled.

There was no way Anach, a man trained to observe others, would miss such details.

After a long silence, he finally spoke.

“I told you—I’d consider a divorce if I agreed with your reason. But you haven’t given me one.”

“I just did! We were never meant to get married in the first place—!”

Their relationship had only ever been one-sided, born of his sacrifice.

But she couldn’t finish. Anach cut her off firmly.

“That’s not a valid reason for divorce. I already took responsibility for you. From then until now, nothing has gone wrong. And now you want a divorce? Not happening.”

Rona thought she’d given plenty of justification—but Anach didn’t see it that way.

He ran a hand through his hair and frowned in irritation.

Unbelievable. She was talking about divorce even when she might be dying.

She only acted so brave because she had no idea what life or death really meant.

‘Maybe I should just tie her down so she can’t even leave the house.’

A dark gleam entered Anach’s eyes as he sank into thought.

That didn’t sound like such a bad idea.

‘I’ve let her have her way for too long.’

That must’ve been why she ran off without a single word, not even understanding the danger outside.

Even now, she lived a life not so different from being tied down—but for some reason, it didn’t feel like enough.

Ever since the day she slipped from his grasp, something inside him had been restless.

Anxiety? Maybe it was that emotion people often talked about.

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