48. The Ideal Spouse Qualification Certificate
Most boyars proceeded with marriages without the ‘Ideal Spouse Qualification Certificate.’
Preparing the supporting documents for each requirement was quite cumbersome and strict.
Even after preparing all necessary documents, it took additional time for the Archbishop to personally verify everything.
The Archbishop, being the religious head of the Grand Duchy of Hersen, had many other duties and thus limited the number of certificates issued each year.
Some years it was 1 certificate, other years 5, so no one knew how many would be issued until the Archbishop announced it at the new year.
Therefore, there was never enough time if one started preparing at marriageable age.
The Duchess Smirnov worried until her dying breath about passing her illness to her children.
She felt sorry, again and again, fearing her daughters might not be able to marry their loved ones due to suspicions about their family history.
“I remain an inadequate mother until the end, dear.”
Baptiski Smirnov always carried his wife’s last words as a burden in his heart.
So he stationed a physician at the duke’s residence and collected data by checking the sisters’ health status every year as they grew up.
As a result, many of the documents required for the ‘Ideal Spouse Qualification Certificate’ were already naturally completed.
Katya had known about this very well since she was young.
***
Two days ago…
After promising marriage to Ivan and returning home, Katya immediately burst into Nikolai’s room by flinging open the door.
“Tia, what brings you here at this hour?”
Late at night, Lady Katarina Smirnov of the Grand Duchy of Hersen pushed the Grand Duke onto the bed.
Well, actually, she had merely approached him, but Nikolai had stumbled backward in surprise and fallen onto the bed.
Katya placed both hands on the bed and climbed over him.
“Tia, we’re not yet married…”
“Your Highness.”
“Yes?”
“Let’s register our marriage first.”
Nikolai, who had squeezed his eyes shut at her approaching face, snapped them open at those words.
“Register?”
There were two ways to have a marriage recognized in Hersen.
Registration in the husband’s family registry and a wedding ceremony before a priest.
The immediate effect of marriage before a priest was to legally protect those who had unavoidable delays in registration.
Once the wedding ceremony was performed, they would be recognized as a married couple, retroactively applying to the period before formal registration.
Originally, this law was created for commoners who lacked the time and means to visit government offices, but its convenience spread to nobles, and it became tradition to register after the wedding ceremony.
“Then what about the wedding ceremony?”
She confessed that she had just met with Ivan.
Nikolai, startled by this fearless bride, sat up while holding her.
“Why did you meet that bastard alone without telling me? What if something had happened!”
“Your Highness, save your anger for later. We’re in a hurry now. We need to get the ‘Ideal Spouse Qualification Certificate’ from the Archbishop within two days and use it to register.”
Originally, to become Grand Duchess, one had to be chosen among several candidates through the Grand Duchess qualification test presided over by the previous Grand Duchess.
Katya knew the history of Hersen thoroughly.
In the distant past, during a time of upheaval, the Grand Ducal family had once secured a Grand Duchess by bypassing the formal procedure and using an Archbishop’s certificate instead.
“This will be our only wedding in life…”
Nikolai felt sorry for Katya that they were rushing through the marriage instead of following proper procedures.
If he had known this would happen, he should have just pushed Ivan out the window that day and bid him farewell to this world.
“Your Highness, you just had a bad thought, didn’t you?”
“……”
The Bloody Grand Duke, hit right on target, affirmed with silence.
“Well, killing him would be simple, right?”
“Then how would we handle the corpse?”
“We could burn it, bury it in the lake, or–”
“Stop, stop! We’re not plotting crimes here, you know? How can you say such atrocious things with that face?”
Katya held Nikolai’s chin and scrutinized his handsome face from various angles while speaking as if lamenting.
“I’m trying to take the quick, easy, and sure path.”
“Your Highness, you’re serious, aren’t you?”
“He’s been disowned by his family, so a missing persons report could be delayed for years. And by then, the skeleton would…”
“You’re still serious.”
Katya, who was only called a villainess but had a weak heart, heaved a deep sigh.
She didn’t want to take the path of a criminal.
She also didn’t want to stain her future husband’s delicate hands with blood.
“I want to become your wife quickly. I want to become Katarina de Vasily.”
At these sudden words, Nikolai’s heart sank with a thud.
No, it didn’t stop there—it felt like his heart had jumped out of his body, rolled across the floor, and flown away to another world.
His heart not only fluttered but ached with a tingling sensation.
Though it wasn’t a confession of love, it was enough to make him flutter.
“Say it again.”
“I want to become Katarina de Vasily.”
“Before that.”
“I want to become your wife quickly. This?”
“Ha, I could die tomorrow without regrets.”
The man in love whispered like a sigh.
“Hey. Are you planning to make me a widow? I don’t mind divorce after this contract ends, but I don’t want to be a widow.”
“What should we do first?”
Nikolai asked enthusiastically.
But there was an unexpected obstacle.
Actually, this year’s quota for ‘Ideal Spouse Qualification Certificates’ was already full.
If they revealed it was for the Grand Duchess, it would certainly be processed as a special case, but that would require an official letter from the Grand Ducal family.
That would ruin Nikolai’s plan to proceed with the marriage without Oksana, the previous Grand Duchess, knowing.
There was no proper justification to call the Archbishop here for security, and he was elderly, set to retire the following week.
“Is there no way to meet the Archbishop?”
Katya told her father she needed the certificate to become Grand Duchess without taking the test, hiding Ivan’s lawsuit.
Baptiski Smirnov immediately began writing to the Archbishop of the South after hearing his eldest daughter’s words.
Without revealing that the Grand Duke was here.
“Father, are you close with the Archbishop?”
“I don’t know him personally, but a reply will come soon.”
The next day, instead of a reply, the Archbishop himself visited Duke Smirnov’s residence.
“Thank you for coming despite your busy schedule.”
“How could I not personally help my benefactor’s granddaughter?”
During the religious wars in the Western Continent, there was an attack on the Central Temple in the South where the Archbishop resided.
It was Katya’s grandfather, the previous Duke Smirnov, who had risked his life to rush in and rescue him.
She was benefiting from her ancestor’s good deed.
The Archbishop, who was already willing to verify the qualification certificate specially because of this connection, was moved to learn that Katya’s marriage partner was none other than Nikolai and blessed the couple.
***
“Do you understand now, Ivan? It’s all over.”
Looking at Katya gazing down at him steadily, Ivan felt miserable.
She was now this country’s Grand Duchess.
She had risen to a position so high he could never reach.
But it felt unfair and bitter to end like this.
“Impossible! The Archbishop must have fabricated this under pressure from His Highness’s power!”
“You still can’t accept it?”
“Then why did you try to have a physician dispose of this confirmation document back then?”
Katya bit her lower lip at those words.
However, Ivan had no evidence or witnesses to prove he had witnessed the cover-up attempt that day.
Just as she was about to feign ignorance, Bianca suddenly stood up from among the people quietly watching them.
“Because that medical certificate was mine, not my sister’s. I’m the one who’s infertile.”
Katya turned around in shock.
That had been the secret she had been trying to hide, and the reason she had been helplessly enduring Ivan’s treatment all this time.
How did her sister even know about it?
“Sister, I heard from the physician. You’ve been enduring such humiliation from Ivan all this time to prevent my secret from being revealed to the world…”
Tears began falling like heavy rain from her large, deer-like eyes.
Bianca felt as if her heart would tear apart from the pain.
She had heard directly from her sister what had happened at the Petrovsky family villa.
She thought it strange that her sister, a genius at scheming who would return four slaps for one, had merely endured such treatment.
“Lady Bianca!”
“What do you mean? Why was sister looking for infertility treatment?”
“Well, that…”
As Duchess Smirnov had worried, her illness had been passed down to her beloved second daughter, Bianca.
When the illness was first discovered in Bianca, many physicians gave her a terminal diagnosis.
The disease’s progression was even faster than her mother’s since it had appeared at such a young and tender age.
At the moment the Messenger of Death was about to claim the child, a medical organization that Duke Smirnov had been supporting since his marriage to his wife rushed in with a developed treatment.
Bianca, who had barely survived the critical crisis, grew up well, throwing off her illness though her body remained weak.
It was early this year when they learned of the fatal side effect of that treatment.
During the annual health examination, the duke’s residence physician discovered an abnormality in Bianca.
The treatment’s side effects had manifested belatedly, rendering her unable to bear children.
