Tears she couldn’t hold back finally fell, dripping down her cheeks that burned even hotter than her stinging palm.

“You, what do you know? How dare someone like you presume to know me!”

Just as her raised hand was about to strike the man’s already reddened cheek again, Ashar caught her wrist lightly and growled.

“Then why? Why did you make such a reckless move? Why did you act on your own without consulting me? I told you I’d find him. I told you I’d make it happen no matter what it took.”

“If it were that easy, ugh!”

Dismissing any excuses, Ashar yanked Laurencia’s wrist toward him and looked down at the woman who helplessly fell into his arms with contemptuous eyes, speaking through gritted teeth.

“In the end, you didn’t trust me. You made a promise with me, even staking your life on it, and then you stabbed me in the back.”

Only then did her golden eyes, suddenly snapping to awareness, tremble mercilessly.

Honestly, it was true she hadn’t trusted him.

Despite searching for His Majesty all this time, his words that he still hadn’t found him made her think perhaps the emperor wasn’t in the palace at all.

If it were Jedrian, he wouldn’t have left his weakness in a place so easily discovered.

So her heart grew impatient. She felt like she’d only waste precious time if she kept trusting him.

Above all, though they were forced to be in the same boat now, Ashar was clearly an enemy.

If he found His Majesty first, there was no guarantee he wouldn’t kill him immediately.

Looking at the current situation alone, Ashar was more threatening to the emperor’s safety than Jedrian.

Laurencia always kept that fact in mind.

So she made a reckless move.

She felt like she’d create lifelong regrets if she just sat idle.

Besides, it was her country and her father, so she thought it was right for her to step forward as both princess with succession rights and as his child.

But why should she receive such contempt?

‘I only did what I had to do, so why should I feel sorry to him?’

As the flustered look gradually disappeared from her face, Ashar’s eyes blazed at her shamelessness, and he revealed the dark feelings he’d barely suppressed without holding back.

“As expected, the bloodline of despicable Armazéans is all the same. Then I have no choice but to treat you accordingly.”

“Mmph!”

Suddenly devouring her lips, he thrust his tongue into her defenseless open mouth. Then he chewed and coiled around the tender flesh like he wanted to swallow everything that touched his tongue and lips.

Only one thought filled his mind, consumed by rage.

He wanted to make the woman who’d mocked him feel the exact same filthy emotions he felt.

Then, Laurencia, who’d frozen momentarily in shock at the sudden violent kiss, belatedly struggled.

She struck his chest mercilessly and twisted her head. She dug her nails in, ready to claw at everything within reach.

But the more she did, the deeper her body, caught in his large hand the size of her face, was devoured.

Her pale skin quickly turned red from his crushing, kneading touch, and tears naturally formed from the pain everywhere his hands grazed.

Among them, the most painful was the rough kiss that sucked fiercely like it would rip her tongue out.

Eventually her resistance weakened, unable to endure. She felt like her tongue would really be torn out if she resisted more.

As her struggling lessened, fortunately his violence also subsided a little.

However, the kiss was still overwhelming, and Laurencia could only keep her mouth open and clutch tightly at the man’s shirt.

The sound of wet lips tangling filled the intimate space.

Ashar’s blue eyes gradually darkened at her soft moans mixed in between.

Each time he rubbed and pressed against the soft flesh inside her mouth, her slender body flinched helplessly.

At that fragile reaction, Ashar’s body, which had started with the intention of violating her, also heated up rapidly.

Feeling directly the smooth skin he’d only imagined all this time, unbearable l*st boiled up.

He no longer thought about betrayal or anger or anything else.

Only carnal desire seethed—the desire to fully experience the beautiful woman he’d coveted only with his eyes until now.

Eventually, Ashar, intoxicated by the sweet scent of red roses, carried the frail female body toward the sofa with his lips still attached.

Even if he’d be torn to shreds by those thorns, he couldn’t stop now.

No, he couldn’t even think that he should stop.

* * *

Literally a place to rest briefly during a banquet.

Or an extremely private place where ladies touched up their makeup or groomed themselves while chatting.

A space where nobles waited before the banquet started or stayed briefly after meals.

An intimate room where nobles who occasionally couldn’t control their instincts during banquets secretly engaged in trysts.

The lounge prepared next to the grand banquet hall was used for such various purposes.

But while the others were all appropriate uses, only the last purpose was incomprehensible.

Why did they do such beastly things in a place made for comfortable rest?

Wasn’t such behavior too obscene in a public space everyone used?

What if someone saw them—how fearless.

If they were that urgent, couldn’t they go to a place made for that purpose?

At least, that’s what Ashar had thought.

It wasn’t that he particularly abhorred the act, but since he wasn’t one to enjoy it much either, he despised humans who couldn’t overcome their instincts and didn’t consider time and place.

That was proof they were no different from beasts.

Yet right now, he himself had become that very beast he’d found so pathetic.

Blinded by l*st, unable to overcome his instincts, he stood er*ect below while panting as he coveted his enemy’s daughter.

Using the flimsy excuse of punishing the despicable Armazéan he scorned as justification, he was busy quenching the s*xual desire he’d accumulated all this time.

He’d long forgotten where this place was. No, even if he’d known, he couldn’t have stopped.

Her damned skin was so soft and sweet that he couldn’t separate his tongue and hands even for a moment. The more he coveted, the more his vision grew dizzy and his mind hazy, like he was poisoned.

Yet he sucked and licked everywhere he saw, tasting her. He kneaded and touched everywhere his hands reached.

Like a beast, he devoured her tender lips, licked her slender nape, and roughly fondled her voluptuous br*asts.

His hands, which had only gripped rough sword hilts, moved ceaselessly, completely entranced by the soft sensation.

“Mmh!”

When her soft moan, which made the beast even more aroused, flowed into his ears, stronger l*st cast over his blue eyes that had been madly licking only her lips and nape.

She no longer resisted. Far from resisting, she even seemed to be enjoying it.

Did that mean she was also intoxicated by him?

Ashar gently sucked her plump, swollen red lips while looking at the woman who trembled with her eyes tightly shut.

Seeing her long wet eyelashes tremble pitifully, a strange elation welled up.

The princess of a great empire, whom he couldn’t even dare to covet.

The flower of Armazé, the great empire where the king of kings once reigned, an empire he once couldn’t even dare to covet.

That flower was now melting under his hands and tongue, lying defenseless and waiting obediently.

For his filthy touch.

Then shouldn’t he gladly pluck her?

When she desired it so much.

“Mmph!”

Twisting up the corners of his mouth, he immediately devoured the lips he’d been gently sucking.

Once again passionately thrusting his tongue in and stirring, he pushed aside the top of the dress that had been precariously covering her full br*asts.

Then, twisting her protruding n*pple, he stopped kissing without hesitation and bit deeply into the voluptuous br*ast that filled one hand.

“Ah…!”

Her ripe body arched like a bow and trembled.

Slipping his hand between her floating waist to support it, he began roughly sucking the pale, perky br*ast flesh.

His thick crimson tongue moved skillfully, sucking and crushing her pink n*pple. Each time the moist flesh grazed it, the pale br*ast mound, coated with more saliva, glistened and turned red.

His rough hand kneaded the other br*ast, then twisted the n*pple, releasing uncontrollable l*st.

The woman’s body flinching and shaking with each touch aroused him even more.

Seeing the woman who had been nothing but arrogant trembling so weakly in his arms was beyond thrilling—it was ecstatic.

“Mmh! Ah, ngh…”

The moment he saw the woman struggling to suppress her moans, the man’s cowardly desire for conquest surged.

He wanted to see the true face of the woman still pretending to be noble.

He wanted to make her realize acutely that no matter how lofty she pretended to be, she was ultimately just a vulgar and weak existence that would crumble before l*st.

His tongue, which had been persistently tormenting her br*asts, slid downward.

Only then did her body, which had been tensely rigid like she could finally breathe, relax.

Looking at her pathetically, Ashar soon wore a sneer, imagining her clinging to his body and crying out in pleasure.

The lips of the beast drunk on l*st passed over her flat stomach and gradually descended, spreading the already disheveled skirt of her dress.

When he lifted even the chemise obstructing his view, the intimate spring with a slightly deeper color than her pink n*pples was revealed within her pale flesh.

Instantly, his brow furrowed sharply. At the same time, he involuntarily swallowed.

Though he’d just swallowed at the fantastically indescribable sight, saliva already pooled heavily in his mouth again.

Was this what it felt like to see fruit dripping with honey?

Ashar kept bobbing his Adam’s apple while staring blankly at the red spring glistening, moistly wet.

Looking at the glistening flesh, it seemed like it would taste of sweet juice sweet enough to melt his tongue if he took it in his mouth.

His heart grew increasingly impatient. A burning thirst rose inside him. He felt like the maddeningly boiling inside him would settle even a little only if he swallowed that transparent water immediately.

His jet-black head lowered like bowing. His rough hands gripped her slender thighs fully.

Just as he carefully spread her defenseless legs and was about to bury his lips between them, an urgent whisper flowing in from outside the curtain brought him to his senses.

“The rat is returning.”

Ashar’s face, stopped just before his lips touched her soft flesh, remained blank for a moment before instantly contorting fiercely.

Then, Laurencia, who slowly sat up, struggled to straighten her ruined clothes and turned the already upset man’s insides over once more.

“All bark and no bite—your skills are utterly pathetic.”

Sneering at him with contemptuous eyes, she roughly fastened her disheveled clothes and left the lounge without lingering regret.