The Prince had practically established a harem in the Hebeta Palace. Even then, perhaps worried about criticism if he did it in the Prince’s Palace, he had brought many women and stuffed them into the Hebeta Palace.

Suddenly, Elizabeth found herself living in a place crawling with women like a marketplace.

“Ha…!”

She was furious.

Rumors filled the entire Imperial Capital.

They said the Prince was acting out because he couldn’t produce an heir.

Prince Gillian had been suffering from controversies regarding his qualification for quite some time.

His lack of intelligence shown at state council meetings he attended as the Emperor’s representative, the uncertainty of succession due to frequent changes of Hebetas, and rumors about him frequently harassing maids and court ladies in the Prince’s Palace.

And now even a harem.

As a result, the controversy had evolved from questioning his qualifications to questioning his eligibility.

The Emperor had sky-blue hair and silver eyes.

The imperial bloodline had always been inherited through princes with sky-blue hair and silver eyes.

However, Prince Gillian’s eyes were not silver but ash-colored.

But since he was the only prince, everyone had kept quiet and seen the possibility, yet as the Prince failed to show results, those doubts were gradually growing.

To make matters worse, at the recent banquet, many nobles (in other words, almost all nobles of the Imperial Capital) witnessed the incident between the Prince and Darielle.

Though there had been no official announcement, it wasn’t difficult to guess the situation from Darielle’s scream at the time.

The position of an Oathkeeper was supreme in the empire.

The fact that he had tried to touch even such an Oathkeeper had caused public opinion to simmer quite negatively against the Prince, though under the surface.

In fact, Constantine had secretly encouraged more of the Prince’s anger. Though his usual conduct was so poor that even a slight push had an excessive effect.

Eventually, the rumor spread that the reason the Prince’s eyes weren’t silver was because he wasn’t actually of imperial blood. Hearing this, the enraged Prince grabbed some loose-tongued nobles to vent his anger, but the rumors didn’t die down and only grew stronger.

The Prince raged and then shut himself in his room. He began to focus solely on women again, using succession as an excuse.

“Stupid……”

Elizabeth also became the subject of rumors.

They said the Prince had grown tired of his Hebeta. No, actually, she had entered not as a Hebeta but to provide women to the Emperor. She was receiving enormous amounts of money per woman.

Crash!

The vase she threw in anger shattered mercilessly.

In truth, Elizabeth becoming a Hebeta was close to an impulsive result.

She had received an enormous shock when she saw Saena, whom she had secretly extremely looked down upon and also secretly greatly hated, become a duchess.

In reality, what central noble would want to become a mere Hebeta? But the only position higher than a duchess was becoming the empress.

In the midst of this, Elizabeth heard rumors that the Prince would seek a Hebeta from among the central nobility, and decided to try it.

But she got better results than expected in the spirit power test. Seeing the Prince brighten up and rejoice, she had secretly expected. She thought she could accomplish what no one else had managed to do.

At that time, it seemed like she would quickly succeed in conception, quickly become the Crown Princess, and soon become Empress after the Emperor, who could pass away any day, died.

But look at the current situation…

‘You incompetent fool. You’re no different from those other useless ones!’

Elizabeth was furious at the Prince’s groundless criticism she had heard recently.

‘Oh my, these days His Highness the Prince… they say he’s working hard ‘day and night’ for succession? Are you alright, Lady Hebeta?’

To add insult to injury, she was even mocked at yesterday’s tea party.

She wanted to strangle her past self who had trusted that stupid Prince and entered the Imperial Palace, if only she could.

‘Ah, what to do……’

Currently, she heard the Princess was so busy she couldn’t even catch her breath, handling minor state affairs and internal affairs due to the absence of a Crown Princess.

Yet the Prince spent all day holed up in his bedroom.

Even aside from that, the Prince was seriously stupid and had such vain pride that he kept trying to assert his authority against those he shouldn’t challenge.

Elizabeth thought perhaps the rumors that the Prince might not be of imperial blood could be true.

‘The Hebetas weren’t the problem. The Prince was.’

At this rate, she would become the sixth discarded Hebeta. She had gained nothing and only suffered losses, pushing her life into the abyss.

‘I need some kind of countermeasure.’

What way was there to escape this situation while avoiding being treated as worthless?

Elizabeth pondered seriously again and again.

But no matter how much she thought, she couldn’t see a way out.

‘Ah, I should have become a Duchess too.’

Now that she was here, she saw that even the Prince and other imperial family members couldn’t do as they pleased with a duke. An Oathkeeper’s position was even more solid and noble than she had thought.

‘When there was an unmarried Duke available, why did I approach the Prince?’

She deeply regretted it.

Besides Duke Kramer, wasn’t there one more unmarried Duke? If she had tried to seduce him with all her heart, she surely could have succeeded.

She thought it wouldn’t have been that difficult since Duke Aberdeen liked women.

Men always fell for it when she melted them with seemingly innocent smiles and cuteness, then teased them by seeming to give but not giving.

She thought Duke Aberdeen wouldn’t be much different.

Should she try after stepping down from being a Hebeta first?

‘No, there are too many variables.’

She wasn’t just a fiancée but a Hebeta. Everyone knew that being a Hebeta meant sleeping with the Prince. Generally, men didn’t like taking women who had been touched by other men as their wives.

There was a world of difference between others knowing and not knowing that she had been touched. So it seemed unlikely he would take a woman officially known to have been touched by another as his duchess. That was the nature of men—they could do all sorts of things themselves, but when taking a wife, they cared about such things.

Blood seeped from her fingertips as she started biting her nails in anxiety.

‘Then……’

Elizabeth’s eyes flashed.

* * *

‘The Prince has established a harem.’

Princess Madielle also finally heard this news.

Finding it too absurd and unbelievable, she visited the Prince’s Palace to confirm.

“His Highness the Prince hasn’t woken up yet.”

“What time do you think it is, and he’s still not awake?”

“…He’s tired from focusing on succession efforts…. I’ll inform him that Your Highness the Princess has visited.”

“No, open the door.”

“But His Highness will be angry…”

“I’ll take responsibility. Open the door.”

“…Yes.”

The servant opened the door to the Prince’s bedroom.

“Ugh.”

As soon as it opened, an unpleasant smell wafted out.

The damp, sticky smell of night mixed with the remnants of provocative scents created a slight feeling of nausea.

“…You stay here.”

The Princess naturally stopped Sir Heviathan who was about to follow her in.

His twitching eyebrows showed his displeasure at the decision, but the Princess didn’t withdraw her words. From the looks of it, there seemed to be women besides the Prince inside, and bringing Shapiro in could give them unnecessary excuses.

“You, follow me.”

Instead, the Princess pointed to one of the maids of the Prince’s Palace and took her inside.

The Prince’s bed was very wide. On the spacious bed that could easily fit five grown men, n*ked men and women were entangled.

One Prince and three women.

They seemed to have had quite a night. They were so deeply asleep they didn’t notice anyone entering, either heavily intoxicated or extremely exhausted from overexertion.

Surely the probability of succession wouldn’t be proportional to the number of times or women?

The Princess felt a physiological revulsion and wanted to leave the room immediately, but she endured it.

“Wake the women.”

The Princess ordered the maid.

The maid looked quite anxious but eventually shook the women awake.

“Please wake up.”

One woman opened her eyes drowsily, saw the sky-blue hair, and whined.

“Mmm, Your Highness. Just a little longer…”

The Princess watched this and said to the maid.

“Slap her cheek hard enough to wake her properly.”

At this order, the maid made a tearful face. But finally, with a sharp slap, she struck the woman’s cheek.

“Ah!?”

The woman who jumped up in surprise was even more startled when she saw the Princess.

Wondering what was happening, she looked at the Princess, then looked beside the bed and noticed another sky-blue head of hair, then looked back at the Princess and quickly stood up.

“Gr-Greetings to Your Highness the Princess…”