Her brow furrowed involuntarily.

Though she knew such an expression wouldn’t look pretty, that wasn’t important right now. Melissa’s mood was far messier than her expression.

“Where were you last night?”

She finally asked that question.

Melissa wanted to hit herself for letting those words leave her mouth. What good would knowing do? It was a question that would make her miserable whether he told the truth or lied.

She bit her lip hard.

The man’s smile faded as he looked down sensually and answered casually.

“At a bar.”

“And there?”

“What did I do? Drank. Like a whale.”

This is maddening. Was this twenty questions or what? There was no need to ask who he drank with. She had seen with her own eyes who he was with anyway.

Melissa nodded.

“Yes, that answers it.”

She didn’t want to hear any more.

Melissa quickly turned her back again. But Reizen stubbornly turned her body to face him once more.

“Want to know the truth?”

Melissa bit her lip and avoided his gaze.

“Not really…”

She meant to answer curtly that she didn’t want to know. But when Reizen bit her protruding lips, the words were stopped in their tracks.

Chu, chu. After kissing her lips deeply twice, the man smiled enchantingly with curved eyes.

“Listen even if you’re not curious. There’s really nothing between Florence and me. We were in the same academy back then but, well, as you know I majored in military studies so we didn’t share many classes.”

“You seem to know quite a bit about someone who’s supposedly nothing…”

Melissa spoke with surprise at the unexpected explanation.

“Jealous?”

“No.”

She shook her head.

“Now you’re lying.”

“I’m not.”

Melissa suddenly sat up. As their eyes met while sitting with Reizen, he slowly caressed her pajama-clad form and said.

“Then you’ll come with me this time too?”

Melissa’s round eyes blinked. Seeing her clear face full of confusion, Reizen whispered in her ear.

“To the capital.”

“Ah.”

“I told you I had things to do.”

Melissa stared into space for a moment as if considering. At any rate, being together would be better than taking medicine with severe side effects, so she nodded.

Though her heart wasn’t completely healed, it was a rational choice for both of them.

The pain seemed to improve with intense physical contact and arousal, so it was good even if they didn’t go all the way.

Reizen slowly bent down to explore Melissa’s lips. As he embraced her with both arms and caressed her as if she were precious, it felt genuine rather than because of the seal.

‘Who’s really the liar here…’

Melissa frowned sadly as she parted her lips. Reizen’s hot tongue pushed in and tickled the roof of her mouth.

* * *

Three days later.

Protests were in full swing in the capital.

“Investigate the truth behind the commoner’s murder!”

“The council must immediately abolish the law protecting murderers!”

The central avenue with its fountain was so packed with imperial soldiers and commoners facing off that carriages couldn’t pass through.

Selheim stared out past the curtain with an expressionless face. So many of them. He had no idea where these humans had crawled out from like cockroaches.

“My apologies, Your Highness. It seems the carriage cannot pass from here.”

The coachman fretted helplessly. It was his duty to take him to his destination, but he found it difficult to suggest walking.

The guard knight said, “It might be better to wait in an alley until nightfall before moving.”

He meant it would be more troublesome if someone recognized him while going out in this chaos.

Selheim blinked once with a stiff expression. Usually he would wear at least a slight smile, but now his face was terribly cold.

The knight was about to say more but ended up bowing his head and retreating.

“…”

Selheim jumped down from the carriage.

He borrowed the knight’s hat to cover his long silver hair, put on the robe the coachman had set aside, and walked steadily forward.

His destination was the pleasure district, in front of Marita Loge’s shop.

Marita Loge’s shop was in shambles from the protesters’ invasion. The sign sparked on the ground, and all the tables and chairs were broken and scattered.

Broken bottles and cigarette ashes stuck together filthily on the floor, giving off a musty stench.

“…”

With each step Selheim took, broken glass shards clinked and shattered even finer. He turned the corner of the stage and headed for the dressing room.

The messy dressing room was filled with various props including cosmetics and stage costumes. And there he found a woman sitting carelessly on the floor drinking.

The woman with a bob cut was beautiful even with her smeared makeup. Her eyes were unfocused, perhaps from mixing alcohol with drugs, and she smiled as if she was delighted to see Selheim.

“Selheim!”

How many people in the Sys Empire could casually call the Crown Prince’s name like that?

Rael staggered to her feet, grabbed a bottle and came to embrace him. Selheim didn’t smile. He couldn’t smile even with a woman who had the exact same face as Melissa before him.

“Why did this place end up like this, Elly?”

He asked while holding Rael in his arms and stroking her hair. His frighteningly calm blue eyes gazed coldly downward.

Rael answered with a loose grin.

“Dunno. Ask Marita.”

“Where is she?”

She shook her head.

“Dunno. Somewhere around here probably.”

At those words, Selheim’s lips curved up viciously. His hand that had been gently stroking Rael’s hair roughly grabbed it instead.

Ugh, Rael grimaced briefly before meeting his eyes and smiling tearfully.

“Baby, you seem to be… in quite a bad mood.”

Selheim let out a short “ha” and dropped Rael. She staggered back several steps before finally losing balance and collapsing in place.

The man irritably brushed back his long silver hair and snorted at Rael.

“I told you not to live like that with that face, Elly.”

“Why? Because I look like my sister?”

“Such provocations were only cute when you were young, pretty one.”

“But you’re still happy to see me.”

Rael giggled as she gulped down the alcohol straight from the bottle. Of course she wasn’t in her right mind, drinking 40-proof whiskey like water.

The smell of alcohol radiated from her entire body.

Selheim laughed helplessly watching the whiskey flow down her neck to her chest. Rael lowered the bottle and asked with unfocused eyes.

“Why? If you’re in a bad mood, want me to suck you off, baby? I’ll forgive you for calling me Melissa just for today.”

“Ah, you will? How kind.”

Finally hardening his expression, the man jerked his chin downward and spoke lowly.

“First crawl over here, then.”

The drunk Rael couldn’t even crawl to his feet. She couldn’t even support herself on hands and knees to crawl on all fours – it was so pathetic he wanted to kill her.

Selheim walked over steadily and lifted her face, pressing hard on her cheek. Then he spoke, packed with contempt.

“This is why you don’t even come close to your sister’s feet. Men, you see, have something called a conquest drive, Elly.”

“What’s that…”

“F*ck, rather than eating something easy, stealing and devouring it tastes better, you know. So, Elly. If you want me to f*ck you, you need to play hard to get sometimes.”

The man struck her cheek and smiled sadistically as he trampled her hand.

“Learn more from your sister, pretty one?”

“Aagh! Get off, you son of a b*tch!”

Rael grabbed Selheim’s pants leg and struggled. But the cold-faced man crushed that hand that had held the bottle under his shoe without blinking an eye.

“Ahh, ugh, you f*cking…”

Rael sobbed while trembling with her crushed hand.

Selheim looked down at her and commanded sharply.

“I’ll give you two days.”

When Rael tried to reach for the bottle again to forget the pain, the man kicked the bottle into a corner and smiled palely while blinking cutely.

“Don’t you want to make the bastard who did this to the shop roll his eyes?”

Rael, her face turned pale from blood loss, trembled violently as she lifted her chin sharply.

“Who is it?”

“My brother and your brother-in-law.”

“F*ck, Reizen?”

“Yes. f*cking Reizen.”

Selheim spat it out one more time so it would be clearly etched in Rael’s mind.

“Two days. If you don’t bring your sister within two days, it won’t be that bastard’s eyes rolling but mine going crazy, and I don’t know what I might do, so make sure to keep the promise. Understood?”

He made the promise while linking his pinky with Rael’s crushed and broken little finger.

“Promise.”