Chapter 06

“Mr. Gerald!”

Roana happily welcomed Gerald as she opened the door. Gerald’s eyes widened when he saw the basket full of green coffee beans sitting on the table in the middle of the room.

“You harvested quite a lot.”

“It took some effort.”

Roana shrugged and accepted the bundle from him.

“So this is…?”

“Yes. I made all the tools you described.”

Unable to hold herself back, Roana immediately opened the bundle.

Inside were a cylindrical iron roasting machine, a grinder, a dripper, a funnel, a silver kettle with a long spout, and paper filters. The moment she saw them, Roana’s eyes filled with happiness.

“Finally!”

Roana cried out excitedly as she set the roasting machine on the table.

The roasting machine Gerald made was about forty centimeters tall with a radius of around ten centimeters. It was a household-sized machine, not something meant for mass production.

From the beginning, Roana had never planned to produce coffee in large quantities. She only wanted to brew fresh coffee whenever she wished, so she clapped her hands happily.

“What are you going to do now?”

Gerald asked from across the table, clearly curious despite being the one who made the tools.

Ize, who had helped harvest coffee cherries all week, also came closer with interest.

“Now we roast the Adanta fruit seeds.”

Roana carefully filled the roasting machine with green beans. When she activated the magical power source, heat spread through the metal cylinder and the beans slowly began roasting.

“Ah… it smells amazing.”

As the green beans slowly turned light brown, Ize spoke with a dazed expression.

“It smells like toasted bread… and also like wet hay somehow… but strangely comforting….”

“The smell of roasting coffee really is the best.”

Roana nodded with a smile.

She also took a deep breath and enjoyed the fragrance of freshly roasted coffee.

Back when she ran her café, she usually bought already-roasted beans, so she rarely had the chance to smell this scent directly.

As time passed, the green beans turned dark brown and became coffee beans.

‘For today, let’s go with a dark roast.’

There were three roast levels: light, medium, and dark. The one Roana chose this time was dark roast.

Light and medium roasting only heated the beans until they became orange or light brown. Those methods were perfect for bringing out the delicate flavors of coffee, but they required skillful and precise control. Deep knowledge about the coffee variety was also necessary.

Dark roasting, on the other hand, roasted the beans until they became deep brown. While it slightly reduced the delicate flavor, it produced a stable and reliable taste.

‘I still don’t know exactly what kind of coffee this world has. I’m sure it’s Arabica, but….’

In any case, Roana chose the safer option.

She stopped the machine, took out the roasted beans, and placed them on a prepared plate.

“So now we grind them?”

Gerald asked while staring greedily at the pile of coffee beans.

“No, we wait three more days.”

Just like resting meat after cooking, roasted coffee beans also needed time to rest. They had to release carbon dioxide.

“Three whole days?!”

Gerald looked deeply disappointed. He still seemed unable to forget the effects of the green beans Roana had given him before.

“Come back in three days, in the afternoon.”

Roana smiled as she sent Gerald away.

Then she placed the plate of coffee beans in a high place away from direct sunlight.

‘This feels so wonderful.’

Roana held her pounding heart while staring at the neatly piled coffee beans.

She had told Gerald to wait patiently, but honestly, she was just as excited about the coffee as he was.

“The Duke is also coming in three days, right?”

“That’s right. Though I’m not sure he’ll really come.”

In her panic to clear up the misunderstanding, she had invited him, but Roana did not truly believe Klaus would visit her annex himself.

Klaus was the master of the enormous Bruggen family, while Roana was merely a duchess in name living in a separate annex.

Even if it was to clear up a misunderstanding, she doubted he would personally walk all the way there.

‘He’ll probably send a representative or something.’

Without thinking too deeply about it, Roana picked up the book she had been reading earlier.

But in truth, Roana was completely wrong about Klaus.

“This time, the magician visited my wife’s annex?”

Klaus lifted his head from the budget documents he had been reviewing at his desk.

Edward, who had been observing Roana’s movements under Klaus’s orders, nodded.

“Yes. And he stayed inside for quite a long time.”

“What were they doing?”

“We could not see clearly because they stayed out of sight, but… Brook, who was stationed near the annex, reported that a strange fragrance came from inside.”

“A fragrance?”

Klaus frowned. First the magician, then the Adanta fruit, and now a strange scent. His wife truly continued doing mysterious things.

“Are they making magical medicine?”

“That seems most likely. Noble ladies sometimes ask magicians to make sleeping medicine or calming potions for them.”

“And the Adanta fruit is an ingredient for such medicine?”

“Yes, perhaps… something like that.”

Klaus put down his pen and fell into thought.

Sleeping medicine and calming potions.

The image of his wife brightly asking if she could truly spend her life doing nothing came back to mind.

‘She asked so happily that I thought she was doing well… but perhaps not?’

Klaus tapped the armrest of his chair with his finger.

In truth, it would have been stranger if she really were living peacefully. She had practically been sold into marriage, forbidden from even entering the main residence, and forced to live in the annex alone.

For most people, crying themselves to sleep every night would not have been unusual.

‘Now that I think about it, I’ve only received reports about her. I’ve never actually checked how she’s living myself.’

The encounter in the garden had been the only time he saw her personally.

Even though Klaus himself had told Roana to simply enjoy luxury, he did not know whether she lacked anything in daily life or whether she had been assigned proper attendants.

‘Though the head maid should be handling things properly….’

The head maid was Klaus’s subordinate. He had already ordered her to ensure his wife was treated without lacking anything.

When he met Roana in the garden, aside from being nervous, she looked healthy enough. Her violet eyes still sparkled with life just like the first day they met.

Yet no matter how calm he tried to stay, the words “calming potion” kept lingering in his mind.

“…She said to come in three days, correct?”

“Yes. As instructed, I’ll send Brook.”

“No. I’ll go personally.”

Klaus shook his head, and Edward looked surprised.

“You personally, Your Grace? But you have a meeting with the vassals that day….”

“Tell them to wait another day. They’ve become too arrogant lately anyway. It’s time to humble them a little.”

Without hesitation, Klaus postponed the vassals’ meeting by a full day.

“Yes, understood.”

Edward answered faithfully despite finding Klaus’s behavior unusual.

‘It seems he really distrusts that woman. He’s even postponing meetings to personally keep watch on her.’

Edward assumed Klaus was only going because he was wary of Roana.

No one knew what Klaus truly felt as he headed toward Roana’s annex. Not even Klaus himself.

On the morning three days later, Klaus received a letter from Roana asking him to visit the annex that afternoon. The one who delivered it was Ize.

“You are my wife’s personal maid?”

Klaus asked while opening the letter.

“Y-Yes? Yes! Yes, I am!”

Ize answered nervously while trembling from tension.

“I’ve never seen you before.”

Klaus scanned the contents of the letter and placed it on the table.

Ever since the former Duchess died young, the Bruggen household had lacked a mistress for years. Because of that, Klaus knew the faces of most important maids.

Even he could not leave everything entirely to the head maid, so he occasionally checked the household affairs himself.

When he originally ordered the head maid to choose attendants for Roana, Klaus naturally assumed several high-ranking maids would be assigned.

But the girl standing before him was someone he had never seen before. She was young, timid, and clearly not a high-ranking maid.

“There is no one else?”

“Pardon?”

“I asked if there are any other maids serving my wife besides you.”

At that question, Ize stiffened.

Confusion flashed across her face.

‘Why is he asking this?’

Ize tried to figure out Klaus’s intentions, but it was impossible. Klaus maintained a perfectly unreadable expression.

“Answer me.”

“I-It’s only me.”