I Will Disappear, Grand Duke

At the servant's words, Fernan quickly hurried to his feet and headed for the castle.

 It had just been a week since Julia drank holy water.  Kalosa had clearly said she wouldn't wake up for two weeks.

 He said that she was recovering quickly, and it seemed that she woke up sooner than expected.

 He climbed the stairs across the lobby at once and entered the hallway where the bedroom was.

 The servant who was standing in front of the bedroom found him and hurriedly opened the door.

 Fernan passed the servant and strode through the open door.

 Then, Julia, who was leaning against the head of her bed, immediately caught his eye.

 “… ”

As he appeared, Julia, who slowly raised her eyes, blinked slowly.

 Her blue eyes that shone in the dark reached him. Fernan swallowed his turbid breath and slowly approached her.

 Julia had a somewhat blank face.  At the same time, questions gradually arose in her gaze as he approached her.

 Standing next to the bed, Fernan looked at her condition without saying a word.

 There seemed to be no pain thanks to Kalosa's anesthesia, and she didn't feel pain or uncomfortable.

 Her pale complexion was also noticeably improved.

 After a belated relief, he lifted his gaze again and looked directly into her eyes.

 When their gazes met, Julia's eyes began to tremble slightly.

Even before Fernan could say anything, Julia spoke first.

 "I….”

 Julia, who muttered small, gently grabbed the hem of her blanket that covered her body.

 She fell silent and wiggled her fingers slightly.

 Perhaps because of her lack of memory, she seemed confused by the situation, precisely as she was feeling confused by Fernan who approached her.

 As Fernan contemplated how he might explain the situation, Julia spoke again.

 “Your Highness."

 Fernan's eyes slowly widened at the new name that came out of her murmured lips.

 “…  Why am I in your bedroom?"

 In her subsequent words, Fernan looked down at her with his perfectly hardened face.

 She called his title and she seemed to know that this was his bedroom.

 All of them pointed to one.  Julia did not lose her memory.

 Fernan, who had been frozen in the unexpected situation, let out a small sigh, feeling relieved.

 He was nervous that she wouldn't recognize him.

 Julia, whose gaze trembled while looking at him, spoke again with a restless expression.

 “I’m sorry.  I must have mistaken the bedroom ….”

 At those words, Fernan slowly raised his gaze, which had been lowered slightly.

 His brows twitched and began to narrow slightly.

 “What do you mean… .”

 Before he could finish his words, Julia closed her lips and gently crouched on her shoulders.

 It was as if she thought he was going to be angry, and she was nervous.

 Her stiff, slender shoulders and her gaze slightly deflected without making eye contact.

 Fernan, who was watching them one by one, tried to grasp the situation.

Julia didn't completely lose her memory.

 But those words from a while ago. She thought she'd mistaken their bedroom… 

 Fernan, who had been silent for a moment, asked the question in a voice as calm as possible.

 “Julia, do you not remember at all that you collapsed?”

 "Yes?"

 At that moment, Julia looked at him with her eyes wide open.

 Julia, who looked down at her body, muttered afterward.

 “I don’t remember at all……  ”

 In her confused voice, it was clear that she was completely unaware of her situation.

 Fernan felt a sense of dwindling and opened his mouth again.

 “Then, what is the last thing you remember?”

 At least, it was self-evident that all of Julia's memories had not disappeared.  But it wasn't perfect either.

 What was important for now was how far Julia remembered.

 She still didn't seem to understand her situation, yet she slowly opened her lips.

 “My father went to the castle during the day.”

 “…  ”

“He told me that he was going to see Your Highness…”

 As she continued her words, Julia tilted her head slightly as if she felt something strange.

 After a long silence, she spoke in a tone of uncertainty.

 “After that, I think I fell asleep right away…  ”

 Her words were blurred as her memory was not clear.

 Fernan, who was listening to her calmly, slowly grabbed her hand.

 When the Marquis came in and out of the castle, it must be around the time they were recently married.  In the end, what Julia remembered was the time before she ran away.

 In other words, everything after that has been forgotten.

 Fernan just stared at her silently, like someone who didn't know what expression to make.

 Then he opened her mouth slowly.

 “… How long have you and I been married?”

 There was a tension he couldn't hide in his clasped hands.

 Julia gave a puzzled look to his out of the blue question, but she gave an answer obediently.

 "Right now… it’s been three months.”

 “…  three months.”

Mumbling along with her words, Fernan breathed a small sigh.

Three months after marriage.  It was much earlier than he expected.  Julia's memories went back to the beginning of their marriage.

 Fernan quietly touched his forehead.  Confusion crept into his slightly narrowed brow.

 When he didn't say anything, Julia glanced at him with a hesitant expression on her face.

 “… thank you.  Your Highness brought me here, didn't you?"

 Fernan raised his gaze and looked at Julia.

 Julia, who conveyed her gratitude as if it was natural when she did not remember anything, had familiar and unfamiliar eyes at the same time.

It was completely different from the empty eyes she looked up at him for the last time before collapsing.

 Now she was back to long ago when Fernan used to ignore her.

 No matter how much he hurt and pushed her away, her eyes were always shining transparently.

 Fernan looked at her like that without saying a word, and then lowered his gaze quietly.

Among the numerous assumptions Fernan had made so far, there has been no current situation.

Either Julia completely forgot him or hated him to the end, he was prepared for only those two situations.

 There was never any assumption that Julia would look at him with the same face she used to have.

Looking at him, who was silent, Julia grabbed her hands tightly.

 At the appearance as if she did something wrong, Fernan finally spoke.

 “First, rest a little more.”

 Before explaining the situation to Julia, he thought it would be best to talk to Kalosa first.

 Is it that her memories are not coming back at all, or is there another way to find her memories?  When Fernan was about to turn away, Julia got up from the bed.

 “I’ll go back to my bedroom then.”

 Julia, who put her feet on the floor, stumbled.

 It was difficult to balance as she had been lying down for a long time.

 Fernan, who turned around, grabbed her trembling arm, and Julia, who straightened her body, raised her head.

 “I’m here. It’s okay.”

 At his soft touch and low, soft voice, Julia's eyes widened slightly.

 It was because the appearance of her husband, who was always insensitive to her, came to her very unfamiliar at this moment.

 Just as the current situation was sudden for Fernan, Julia was also feeling that way implicitly at the moment.

 His appearance was subtly different from usual.

 The golden eyes that always looked at her without a single ray of light seemed to contain various emotions now.

 Fernan took the dazed Julia back to the bed.  And he looked at her with complicated eyes then walked away.

 Julia stared at his back as he walked out of the bedroom, as if possessed.

 “Her memory went back to two years ago.”

 At the end of the hallway where his bedroom was, Kalosa's muttering voice echoed softly.

 Kalosa, who had been pensive for a moment, continued speaking slowly.

 “It's not completely unexpected. Because your wife has recovered fairly quickly from the start.”

 According to the original theory, holy water permeated into the user's blood and flowed through the blood vessels throughout the body.  In the process, holy water could not reach her brain, so it was difficult to recover her memory system.

 However, Julia's resilience was superior to others.  As a result, the holy water, which flowed faster than expected, seemed to flow a certain amount to the blood vessels where her memory organs were located.

 As a result, the memory of the past had been partially revived.

 “Can the memory ever come back?”

 Fernan, who had been silently listening to his explanation, asked calmly.

Kalosa shrugged his shoulders and looked at the closed bedroom door across from him.

 “I can't be sure, but it doesn’t seem unlikely.  First of all, it would be best to continue drinking holy water.”

 Some of the memories that should have been all gone had returned, so there was no way the rest wouldn't come back.

Of course, overusing holy water would be not good, but it would not be dangerous if taking an appropriate amount while monitoring the condition.

 With his arms crossed, Kalosa changed the subject abruptly after exhaled a long breath.

 "By the way, did you explain the situation to your wife?"

 At that, Fernan looked down without answering.

 He hadn't said anything to Julia yet.

 However, the two-year gap that Julia had forgotten was too big, so she would soon realize the changes around her.

 For example, the changing seasons or the changing atmosphere of the castle.