There were even rumors that those red eyes were stained with blood from that time that wouldn’t wash out.

Returning from the battlefield, he cut down his own brother who sat on the imperial throne and personally took the seat.

No one could blame the treacherous usurpation. From the moment he returned victorious from the battlefield, the Emperor was a tyrant reigning over everyone.

That man was now stopping her bleeding.

Her heart felt like it would burst from fear and confusion.

Lucretia unconsciously trembled her hand slightly.

Because of that, a drop of blood pooled in her palm fell onto the Emperor’s wrist.

“Oh my, oh my! Blood on His Majesty!”

Someone cried out dramatically.

Everyone in the hall watching them also gasped.

To dare stain the Emperor with something unclean like blood! Even Marquis Zepher, who had been watching the situation with bated breath, made a flustered expression.

Lucretia was also shocked at her blood spreading over the Emperor’s skin.

“I’m, I’m sorry, Your Majesty. I’m sorry……!”

Her face drained of color, Lucretia apologized desperately.

A maiden’s blood had been considered ominous since ancient times. Having dared to drop such a thing on the Emperor’s skin, the Emperor was more than justified in punishing her.

‘He might k*ll me right here……’

Recalling the Emperor’s infamy passed down like ghost stories, Lucretia bit her trembling lips.

Then the Emperor looked down at his wrist.

“Hm? Ah.”

Discovering the blood, the Emperor made an unexpectedly leisurely sound.

The next moment he raised his hand and put his lips near the blood-stained wrist.

The Emperor raised his gaze again and met eyes with Lucretia, stained with fear. Even terrified, she couldn’t turn her head away from that captive gaze.

‘Ah……’

Her heart beat strangely, helplessly.

At a speed far too fast to be just from fear.

Unable to breathe even once, her gaze entangled with the Emperor’s, when suddenly he opened his lips. The moment she saw his bright red tongue inside, her cheeks flushed as if she’d seen something she shouldn’t.

Within Lucretia’s frozen gaze, the Emperor lifted the corner of his mouth. The Emperor, who stuck out his tongue secretly as if only for her to see, slowly licked up his wrist.

“……!”

Lucretia’s eyes widened.

Though the tongue touched the Emperor’s wrist and not hers, strangely her wrist burned as if scorched. Her heart also pounded.

Licking blood!

It was an action street thugs might do, not something a nation’s emperor should do. Yet somehow it suited the man perfectly, like a painting.

“Is that better now?”

“Yes, yes. Your Majesty.”

Lucretia hurriedly nodded. Embarrassed by her flushed cheeks, she bowed her head without raising it after nodding.

“But, my lady.”

“Yes?”

“Do you have a hobby of harming yourself?”

Lucretia’s face turned deathly pale this time.

Self-harm.

The Emperor spoke as though he knew nothing, but he had been watching from the moment she wounded her own palm.

He had witnessed everything. Her failure.

It might really be over now. Her lips trembled faintly. She felt the Marquis’s gaze piercing her cheek.

She had to salvage this situation somehow. With that thought, Lucretia hurriedly opened her mouth.

“No, Your Majesty. It’s not like that—”

“No need to make excuses. I was quite impressed.”

“……Pardon?”

When she looked up at the Emperor in confusion, he slowly lifted the corner of his mouth. It was a playful smile hard to believe was drawn by those cold lips.

“By how you devoted yourself to training even while wounding your own body.”

“Ah……”

“You might have the qualities of a warrior, my lady.”

Lucretia blushed. A warrior, to her so thin and frail. Was the Emperor teasing her?

“Well then, everyone.”

The Emperor’s voice descended on her ear like wind.

“Have a good night.”

Saying that, the Emperor departed as suddenly as he had appeared.

The remaining nobles stared at Lucretia repeatedly with dumbfounded faces.

“Goodness. It’s the first time His Majesty has spoken to a noble lady.”

“What is happening……”

“Could it be that His Majesty fell for Lady Larenne at first sight……?”

“Goodness. He didn’t even take the supposedly beautiful Princess Lariana.”

After the banquet ended, Marquis Zepher didn’t punish Lucretia. Instead, he gave a long speech about how to captivate men. Along with words that she had talent.

Since it wasn’t something to hear from a biological father, Lucretia had to hide her nausea throughout.

“The courtship seems to be going more smoothly than expected. Well, no matter how great he is, how could he break an imperial family’s promise?”

The Marquis rubbed his palms together with a smirk.

“Lucretia! You must do it properly next time.”

“Yes, Marquis.”

“You still can’t even use that simple healing art properly? I’m working so hard to make you this nation’s greatest woman, yet you’ve been neglecting even your training!”

“That’s not true, Marquis…… I’ll devote myself more.”

The Marquis clicked his tongue, glaring at Lucretia who answered flatly like a wind-up doll.

But soon he brought his head close and whispered secretly.

“You know well how excessive the position of Empress is for you, don’t you? Considering your lowly bloodline, it’s something you couldn’t even dream of.”

Lowly bloodline.

At those words, Lucretia bowed her head silently.

Half of Lucretia was the Zepher family’s bloodline.

But half was also a monster’s bloodline.

Lucretia’s mother, who had been a sl*ve, died giving birth to her. And while disposing of the corpse, it was revealed she had actually been a fairy hiding her identity.

Fairies, called monsters or forest demons, were greatly shunned as they were evil and could even use magic.

The fairies’ greatest characteristic was their bewitching violet eyes. Like the amethyst-colored eyes Lucretia hid beneath brown iris covers.

“Yes, Marquis.”

If this imperial marriage truly went through, it would be a tremendous fraud against the imperial family.

To dare enter the imperial genealogy with fairy blood.

That thought naturally troubled her mind. It was something she could never commit if she were sane.

‘But…… it’s Father’s command.’

To Lucretia, her father’s orders were like absolute imperatives. No matter how unreasonable, they must not be defied.

Feeling her chest grow stuffy, Lucretia only looked out the window.

That night, Lucretia couldn’t sleep easily.

The idle thoughts that started from guilt gradually took the form of a certain face.

「You might have the qualities of a warrior, my lady.」

Red eyes with the power to captivate people, and that low, rough voice that whispered intimately yet directly into her ear. His ebony-like hair looked so smooth it seemed it would slip right through her fingers if she touched it…….

‘What am I even thinking.’

Lucretia shook her head in shock. The handkerchief tied with firm strength showed no signs of loosening even then. Holding the handkerchief with her other hand, Lucretia slept deeply for the first time in a while.

A month later.

Marquis Zepher succeeded in receiving a positive response from the imperial palace regarding the marriage proposal. Hearing the cheers from the Marquis’s office, Lucretia pressed down on her pounding heart.

※※※

The morning of the wedding day, which seemed like it would never come, dawned.

Lucretia looked at herself in the mirror of the bridal waiting room.

A wedding veil hung like butterfly wings beneath a splendid tiara.

Beyond the veil, she could see her face sparkling with all kinds of adornments.

It was an unfamiliar face with no ash and no blood on it.

“You will become the passage connecting the imperial family and the Zepher marquisate.”

The Marquis, who had come to the waiting room, spoke in a solemn voice.

“All men are up to the woman. Even if he’s a nation’s emperor, he’s ultimately a man. If a woman sets her mind to wrapping around him, there’s nothing she can’t manipulate. The family’s fate rests on you! Always engrave this weighty sense of mission.”

The Marquis’s fingers dug firmly into Lucretia’s shoulder.

“Once you enter the palace, focus only on seducing the Emperor by any means. Whether you openly ply him with alcohol or cling to him and spread your legs, use every method! It doesn’t matter if you look vulgar. Men originally drool while pretending to detest vulgar seduction.”

Lucretia’s face turned deathly pale without a trace of blood.

And soon the wedding ceremony began.

Looking at the crowd gathered like clouds, Lucretia felt like she might faint. She could vividly feel countless gazes tearing her apart from all sides, making her whole body sting.

Lucretia walked the long wedding road more tense than ever.

At the end stood the man who would become her husband today.

Lucretia momentarily forgot even her tension and stared at him blankly.

The Emperor she encountered for the second time was still breathtakingly beautiful. His appearance wrapped in pure white ceremonial robes even looked sacred at first glance. It was incomprehensible that such a person had the epithet of murderer attached to him.

Unlike the entranced Lucretia, the Emperor’s indifferent gaze scanning her was utterly cold.

“Receiving the grace of the sublime Earth Mother Goddess, from this day forward you two……”

As the two stood facing each other, the priest recited the marriage vows.

Lucretia didn’t hear that sacred declaration at all. Her consciousness was hazy with all her nerves focused on the man before her eyes.

The Emperor, who had been staring at Lucretia hidden by the veil, opened his lips and declared.

“I, Kyrion Winchester, vow to accept Lucretia Larenne as my lifelong companion from this moment.”

Companion. In other words, spouse. The closest form of family.

That formal word pierced Lucretia’s heart at this moment. Even though they were forming a marital bond, the Emperor couldn’t possibly regard her as a real wife.

She repeated the vow the priest instructed, hiding her trembling.

“I, Lucretia Larenne, vow to accept Kyrion Winchester as my lifelong companion from this moment.”

“Then please exchange a kiss.”

Lucretia’s heart dropped. Even the numerous guests seemed to hold their breath at this moment, and the surroundings grew quiet.

Lucretia squeezed her eyes shut and raised her head so the Emperor could kiss her. Though she couldn’t see ahead, she vividly felt the gaze fixed on her.

Lucretia had been bracing for the touch on her lips, but was suddenly startled.

Because the Emperor’s hand gripped and lifted her chin.

He bowed his head and whispered.

“Are you training well in healing arts?”

At the low voice wrapping around her softly, Lucretia’s heart sank.

The Emperor remembered. That brief encounter from before.

Lucretia forgot even to breathe and looked up at him. The moment she met the Emperor’s gaze, she couldn’t even blink. She felt like a beast captured by him.

“Back then, I never thought I’d end up taking that healer as my wife.”

The Emperor, who muttered as if to himself, used his other hand to lift Lucretia’s veil.