Each time Callisto asked Penelope to give him her hand, and she did without thinking twice: a parallelism of the same occurrence over the chapters
It never failed to amaze me how quick Penelope was on giving her hand to Callisto when he asked her to, despite her viewing him as *the most dangerous one* out of the male-leads.
And in turn, how Callisto wanted to hold her hand to ensure her safety better each time they were in some precarious circumstances.
The scene in the newest chapter looked very familiar to me, so I went back and did some digging. Lo and behold I found the different instances where these happened.
₊❏❜⋮ The first time takes place during the hunting tournament, in chapter 69.
After Callisto gives Penelope his cape (most likely taking subtle notice of her visible apprehension of rain), he suggest they both go back to deliver the head of the bear to the guards (proof of her hunt), and to avoid stumbling upon other dangerous animals while she was in the zone reserved for larger and dangerous animals.
However, Penelope fails to take Callisto's hand in time, and the moment is short-lived when the two are chased down by assassins sent for the Crown Prince’s life once again.
₊❏❜⋮ The second time around is still during the hunting competition (chapters 76/77), while both of them found shelter in a cave far from the hunting grounds, after falling off a cliff at the end of the battle against the assassins.
Later on, deciding to explore further, they come across a powerful breeze that has some sort of magic phenomenon as a source, which Callisto is very weary of.
His senses are on high alert and Penelope is with him, it’s a possibility that whatever they might come across won’t be pretty. It is my understanding that he made it his responsibility to protect her for the moment, as the two might’ve grown closer thanks to the previous night’s interactions with some things being cleared out.
Even as they unravel the source of the wind currents, Callisto still tells Penelope to stand behind him as he takes care of the enchanted seal surrounding the skeleton of a long gone mage, who is holding a magic map, which will be very important later on as the story progresses.
₊❏❜⋮ The third time happens in the most recent release, chapter 116, taking place in the long awaited island arc.
Thanks to the copy he kept of the magic map they found in the cave, Callisto is able to locate Penelope and saves her just in time by aiding her in the defeat of a giant monster.
After Penelope takes care of Callisto’s injury and recovers from the shock, she questions him about his whereabouts and if he was indeed following her.
being the troll he is Callisto says it’s ‘classified information of the royal family’ and that he was monitoring the Archina and Tratan islands in search of suspicious activity caused by the Laila, and Penelope of course hardly believes the lies he’s spewing (ngl I enjoyed Callisto panicking).
When Penelope insists that he followed her, Callisto changes the subject quickly and instead says they should go and find the kidnapped children. As he steps on the corpse of the defeated beast he asks for her hand again and she does so without hesitation.
Penelope looses her balance momentarily and stumbles into Callisto who catches her. Stunned from the close proximity, she misses her chance to check his favorability again like it happened before in chapter 101/102 (where they were rudely interrupted).
The difference is that this time, Penelope becomes flustered because of her closeness to Callisto and not due to some third-party interference.
This part reminds us that from now onwards, Penelope will need to have some sort of physical contact with each of the male-leads to check their favorability, which will also cost either funds or reputation, the price will only increase with every time she checks each of the targets’ percentages.
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