‘How foolish of me. Why didn’t I think of that sooner? He’s right. If I can’t have her as a daughter, I can bring her into the family as a daughter-in-law.’

Marchioness Bessler composed herself and voluntarily took Caden from the wet nurse.

“My lady….”

“It’s fine.”

The wet nurse looked genuinely worried.

Understandably so. Despite his adorable face, Caden was quite the tyrant of a baby.

“Gyauu, gyaa, aaaa!”

Nestled in the warmth of his mother’s arms, Caden was thoroughly delighted.

He shrieked and flailed his entire body. He stretched out his turnip-plump legs and kicked his mother’s slender arms with abandon. Hard enough to make a thudding sound, no less!

The wet nurse and the Marquis both drew their necks back like startled turtles.

‘Oh dear, my lady!’

‘That sounds painful just to hear!’

But faced with the baby’s relentless *ssault, enough to make anyone flinch at the sound alone, Marchioness Bessler did not get angry. She didn’t even furrow her brow.

She wore the benevolent smile of a saint who devoted a lifetime to virtue, and whispered in the softest of voices.

“My son, please just grow up healthy and strong….”

This was the thirty-first day of Caden’s life, and the twenty-ninth day of Dorothy’s.

In any case, what followed proceeded without a hitch.

The two families began discussing the betrothal around the time the children started walking.

There was no melodrama of anyone ‘daring’ to covet what wasn’t theirs, or scheming to claim the other by foul means.

Just as the Marquis of Bessler said, the two families were well-matched across the board in prestige and wealth.

Caden and Dorothy were of different genders, but they played together as freely as same-s*x friends.

One day it was tree-climbing, the next it was hosting a doll tea party.

Meanwhile, the two children grew prettier with every passing year.

Caden’s features were bold and striking, while Dorothy’s were delicate and finely crafted.

When they stood side by side holding hands, they matched so well, like a pair of dolls made with a master artisan’s care, that anyone who saw them couldn’t help but smile.

As a few years passed, everyone in the Bessler household came to adore Dorothy, and everyone in the Javier household came to cherish Caden.

Nothing was lacking. Nothing was missing. There were no obstacles, no hardships.

Everything moved smoothly, like a ship sailing on calm water with a fair wind at its back.

Just as if it were all arranged to be that way from the very beginning.

* * *

The children’s informal betrothal ripened without trouble.

At sixteen, after their debutante ceremonies, they held a formal engagement.

At seventeen, Caden and Dorothy enrolled together in the Imperial Academy, and three years later they graduated side by side with outstanding marks.

At the graduation ball, they took each other’s hands as partners and turned around the dance floor together.

The boutonniere Caden wore that day was chosen by Dorothy, and the pale blue organza dress Dorothy wore was sent by Caden.

Once the graduation ceremony was behind them, the patience of both families finally ran out. Unable to wait any longer, they decided to have the two married at once.

Marchioness Bessler in particular was so fond of this future daughter-in-law, her love having doubled since the day Dorothy was born, that she fretted constantly over the possibility of another family setting their sights on her. She was so anxious she was practically eating herself alive.

But compared to the enthusiasm of those around them, Caden and Dorothy, the two people actually involved, felt remarkably little.

Perhaps the engagement had gone on too long. It simply felt like something that was always going to happen.

The sun rises in the east and sets in the west. Water flows from high ground to low. That was the way of the world.

For Caden and Dorothy, marrying each other when the time came felt like just another one of those natural laws.

Not out of excitement, not out of falling in love, not out of some great, firm resolve to become each other’s partner and walk together to the end of this life.

But because it was a truth written so deep in their minds that it simply had to be.

And so they married.

A few months later, a moderately chaotic and tremendously grand wedding was held.

On the day of the ceremony, Dorothy, who always slept late into the morning, nearly died, to put it only slightly dramatically.

By the time they stood before the bishop to receive the vows, the address was long and the delivery was slow, and she was on the verge of losing her mind from drowsiness.

She barely held on by fixating on how funny and unflattering Caden looked when he slid the ring onto her left ring finger, his nostrils slightly flared from concentrating harder than usual.

Having narrowly avoided the crisis of dozing off at her own wedding like a sick chicken.

…The problem of the wedding night arrived.

* * *

Four maids clustered together to prepare Dorothy.

They bathed her from head to toe in a hot tub filled with milk, herbs, and rose petals, then spread a honey-infused moisturizing cream thickly and evenly over every inch of her skin.

Looking at the process alone, it was unclear whether they were trying to make her a bride or a southern delicacy: herb honey steamed chicken.

Finally, the bridal chamber.

Dorothy, now fully prepared, put on the undergarments set out for the so-called “main event.”

Beneath a sheer, rippling muslin gown, a dizzying lace undergarment that barely covered what needed covering lay underneath.

‘What a venomous outfit….’

Catching a glimpse of herself in the mirror was so mortifying that Dorothy kept fidgeting and trying to cover herself with her hands. Even the lightest brush of her fingertips made the freshly waxed skin burn like fire.

Caden, who was half-sprawled on the bed wearing only a robe, spotted her and sat up straight.

“Cay….”

“What are you doing? You look like someone who needs to pee.”

Old habits die hard, as the saying goes. Caden couldn’t help himself and opened his mouth with characteristic carelessness.

Dorothy, caught completely off guard by his words, let out a snorting laugh. “Pfft.”

Needless to say, the modest composure she barely managed to scrape together evaporated on the spot.

“……!”

Dorothy kicked Caden repeatedly. The more she hit him, the more embarrassed and flustered she got, until her cheeks and the back of her neck were completely red.

“You want to die? You, you.”

“Ow ow ow, ow! Ow! That hurts!! I surrender, I surrender!”

Kicked in the side, Caden threw up the white flag without delay.

Dorothy finished her spectacular revenge by delivering a chop to the back of his neck.

“Ugh.”

Caden crumpled like a deflated balloon.

He lay face-down for a moment, then started shaking with barely suppressed laughter.

“Pfft, heh, hgh.”

“Heheh, kkhh.”

Once the laughter broke loose, it showed no sign of stopping.

They shook all over and laughed until tears streamed down their faces.

And eroticism and humor were simply incompatible. An *rotic mood is powerful enough to overwhelm most situations, but there was one thing it could not survive: an atmosphere where everyone involved was giggling like a fool.

After the two of them laughed themselves breathless, not a shred of motivation for a sultry night remained.

Desire? That sort of thing, questionable whether it existed to begin with, had long since burned to ash without a trace.

Dorothy wiped her tears and let out a weak groan.

“Ngh.”

“Well, this is a disaster,” Caden said plainly.

All this time, one of them was barely covered where it counted, and the other had their chest and thighs fully on display.