Chapter 75…………………..
“What are you doing out of the blue? Don’t you know this is an important moment?”
I asked in as low a voice as possible. I couldn’t let anyone see us quarreling right now.
“Exactly because it’s an important moment—I stepped in.”
Arpad laughed low in his throat and whispered right in my ear.
“I’m a crazy man devoted to my wife, the type who can’t just stand by when I see tears in her eyes.”
In other words, he was saying this was all just an ‘act.’
I scolded him in a hushed voice.
“And how much are you planning to use this as an excuse to go wild later?”
Arpad’s expression turned oddly complicated.
“What do you mean by that?”
I tilted my head. Wasn’t it obvious?
“Like—killing or expelling a servant you think is a spy, then claiming it was because you couldn’t stand them clinging to your wife?”
“……”
“Or punishing some hostile noble’s young heir, insisting it was just because they tried to approach me?”
Now three lines wrinkled between Arpad’s smooth brows.
Every time he frowned, the same three wrinkles appeared in the exact same spot.
Without thinking, I brushed my finger over those lines—just like in my memories—and muttered,
“Keep frowning like that and wrinkles will settle on your handsome face. You should smooth it out.”
The wrinkles vanished beneath my fingernail on his porcelain-like skin.
Arpad’s red eyes went round like beads.
He stared at me so hard it was as if he’d pierce me with his gaze, then grumbled,
“I really can’t tell if you mean to do it or not.”
“…What are you talking about?”
“It’s like you think if you hurt me and immediately apply medicine, it won’t hurt anymore.”
What kind of absurd accusation was that?
What did I even do?
I was dumbfounded, utterly wronged.
I mean, I was the one in the middle of playing—no, not playing—emphasizing my role as the victim here. So why was he acting like he was the one who’d been wounded?
I wanted to stab Arpad with a sharp glare.
‘Isn’t he just being unreasonable because something about me displeases him? Or is he testing me again…?’
Maybe my expression gave me away, because Arpad chuckled softly.
But when he smiled like that, it only made him less trustworthy.
“You know what? You’re way too suspicious. You think too much.”
“And what’s wrong with that?”
“You overthink so much that you twist other people’s actions and words around all the time. Especially mine.”
His voice seemed to carry emotions that didn’t suit him at all… Was I imagining it?
Resentment. Maybe even sadness.
No way.
Impossible.
‘If that were true… it’d almost sound like he really liked me…’
Just then, Arpad whispered low against my ear,
“Don’t I look like a pitiful husband, so starved of attention that he throws a tantrum just to monopolize his wife?”
“…I know full well that can’t be the case, so you don’t have to be sarcastic about it.”
“……”
Arpad’s brow twitched.
A small sigh brushed my ear.
“What am I to do with my little baby squirrel, being this dense?”
At the words baby squirrel, all the confusing, ticklish emotions that had been swirling inside me vanished instantly.
Only shame remained.
“…Can’t you please stop with that baby squirrel nonsense?!”
I meant that with 100% sincerity.
Sure, sometimes it was to annoy the Empress or Evangeline, or to flaunt how good our relationship supposedly was…
But still, it was way, way too much.
“You don’t cringe just saying that yourself?”
Arpad looked a little surprised, then shook his head.
“Nope.”
“No way…”
What a liar.
“I’m serious. I really mean it.”
“There’s no way you’d seriously call me baby squirrel!”
“Why not?”
He tilted his head, then leaned close to my ear and continued explaining.
“You’re this small.”
His arm tightened around my waist, lifting me slightly off the ground. My feet left the floor. Eek!
“And so light.”
That’s just because you’re tall and ridiculously strong!
“You’re always munching with that tiny mouth of yours, and it’s adorable.”
“…!”
Th-that one was dangerous.
Heat rushed up my face before I could stop it.
His hand cradled the back of my head, fingers gliding through my hair—it was so warm.
“And when I first saw this fluffy hair of yours, it looked just like a squirrel’s tail. I thought I’d like to touch it.”
“Most people wouldn’t… think that when they see my hair.”
That was a stretch, wasn’t it?
“I’m not most people.”
“……”
Well. Fair enough. That much was true.
While the two of us whispered to each other, the people around us only saw a newlywed couple lost in their own world again.
“They really can’t keep their hands off each other, can they?”
“The Crown Prince has some serious possessiveness.”
“Well, he did fall in love at first sight and snatch her away in a forced marriage—no wonder.”
Many were exasperated, but others were already so used to these displays that they seemed enlightened.
That included the Crown Prince’s household attendants.
Since they were used to the situation, Annie stepped forward while the two of us whispered, supplementing Hillia’s testimony before the Emperor and the Archduchess.
“It’s only because I personally begged Her Highness the Consort that I’m wearing this undeservedly fine dress.”
She was simply stating the truth.
The Archduchess’s eyes flickered.
“So it wasn’t the Consort’s own idea to oppose Lady Ruth’s scheme?”
The Archduchess played along, picking up Annie’s lead.
“Yes. The merciful Consort had wished to cover up the schemes of Lady Ruth and Madam Filleren.”
Evangeline and Madam Filleren, already half-stunned, went pale as corpses.
They understood Annie’s intent immediately.
By emphasizing Hillia’s mercy, she made the two of them look even more vile.
“But I couldn’t stand it. I begged Her Highness to let me wear this dress instead. If those two had given up their attempt to slander her, nothing would have happened.”
“But in the end, it came to this.”
“…Yes. Though Her Highness remains composed, I can only imagine how deeply she must be hurt…”
Annie dabbed at her dry eyes as if crying.
It was a strategy she and Hillia had agreed upon in advance.
Thanks to her, sympathy for Hillia swelled among the surrounding nobles.
“She trusted them until the end, only to be betrayed.”
“She even tried to let it go, but they insisted on lying and framing her? Unforgivable.”
“The contrast is staggering, isn’t it?”
Accordingly, the criticism directed at Evangeline and Madam Filleren only grew harsher.
And when the terrified Madam Filleren abandoned Evangeline, falling to her knees and begging, the situation reached its peak.
She dragged Evangeline down with her.
“Please forgive me, Your Highness the Consort! I only did what Lady Evangeline told me to! I didn’t want to!”
Naturally, the onlookers’ reactions were merciless.
“How shameless.”
“She has no shame at all.”
Evangeline, face ashen, swiftly judged the atmosphere.
Realizing that speaking up would only worsen things for Madam Filleren, she held her tongue.
“……”
In this situation, silence was the wiser choice.
When Madam Filleren crawled across the floor toward them, Arpad casually stepped aside.
“A filthy bug dares to crawl closer?”
From Hillia’s position, she couldn’t see the floor at all.
So she misunderstood.
“A bug? There’s a bug? No way! Do you know how much effort I put into keeping this hall spotless? Where is it?”
Arpad chuckled lightly and reassured her.
“Don’t worry. I only mistook too ugly a human for a bug.”
“Oh. I thought you meant a real one—I almost panicked.”
Hillia relaxed and laughed freely.
She didn’t say a word about his comparing someone to a bug.
Meanwhile, Madam Filleren, humiliated by being treated like crawling vermin, burned with shame. But no one paid her any attention.
The atmosphere of the banquet flowed decisively in one direction.
‘Lady Ruth’s position as the darling of the central social circle is effectively over.’
‘Once word spreads of this evening, who would still follow her?’
Those sensitive to power shifts unanimously turned their backs on Evangeline.
Instead, they strove to curry even the slightest favor with Hillia.
‘And the western nobles, who never supported the Empress before, are here.’
‘Clearly they’re siding with the Crown Princess.’
The struggle had become clear: the Empress with her fractured authority versus the Crown Princess on the rise.
There was no one who didn’t know which side to choose.
Especially since the Empress’s representative, Evangeline, had just had her reputation and image utterly destroyed.
Now Evangeline could only stand there, pale and useless as a wallflower.
Madam Filleren, banned from even approaching the Crown Princess, wept pitifully.
“It wasn’t my fault! Sob! I swear it wasn’t! Waaaah! It was all Lady Ruth’s doing…!”
And then something no one expected happened.
A shocked voice rang out from the entrance to the hall.
“Her Majesty the Empress is entering!!”
Before anyone could react, the doors burst open.
And to everyone’s astonishment, Empress Isabel walked in slowly, dressed in immaculate finery.
On her head gleamed the tiara reserved for her coronation ceremony.
