"Your Highness. It"s not Lord Andre who I yearn for, it is Your Highness…"
"You are Andre"s fiancée, right? You shouldn"t make such frivolous remarks."
"My, to say frivolous. Of course I am serious. If Your Highness desires me, I will always…"

Her amorous gaze felt creepy.
Fed up with the woman who obstinately tempted me, I shut myself in the office for days at a time.
But one day I perhaps lost my temper and returned to my room, only to find Leitis in the bedroom.
She was slovenly lying on the bed with a seductive smile.
Seeing her face, I understood the soldiers" strange look as I"d entered the room. Leitis is known as Andre"s fiancée. Firmly asked by her, they couldn"t resist. I understood the situation, but I couldn"t help but find it irritating.
However, rather than staying in the main room, she willfully entered a royal"s bedroom.
I wonder if Leitis understands the significance of that. Anyway, I must hurry up and kick her out.
Even though she"s Andre"s fiancée, if I allow her to overstay here, it"ll be a display of favor. I couldn"t stand having to take her as a concubine despite my unwillingness.
Since she forced her way inside my bedroom, I of course shouted at her.

"Do you truly understand what in the world you are doing? You will marry Andre, right? To willfully trespa.s.s into my room despite that…"

Wearing transparent night clothes, Leitis sat up and flaunted her voluptuous body. Her big b.r.e.a.s.t.s looked like they"d spill out. Men will fall with this. It was obvious she thought so from her att.i.tude.

"I should have said that I yearn for you. I will not regret it. Please, have mercy…"

I only felt nauseous at her att.i.tude familiar with tempting men.
Is such an awful woman my cousin"s mate?
I thought so, but it"s not an issue I should interfere in. But my disdain showed both in my eyes and the emotions that I couldn"t help from leaking. I spat out words at her.

"For the sake of my cousin, I"ll pretend not to have seen anything. Please leave quickly."

I guess Leitis didn"t think she"d be rejected. Her moist eyes widened in surprise, but she immediately showed an obscene smile.

"No way, Your Highness. In what respect are you not pleased with me? I am confident I will be adequate as Your Highness"s princess consort."

Princess Consort? What is this woman saying.
At those words I reached the limit of my patience. Disgusting.
I don"t want to a.s.sociate with such a woman. I coldly told Leitis.

"… Didn"t you hear me say to get out? If you don"t want to be imprisoned for lèse-majesté, disappear immediately."
"Ah! Y, Your Highness."
"I have no interest in you. I"ve said it many times, so you should understand. I endured because you are Andre"s fiancée, but this time you went too far. The next time you do something similar, I won"t be so lenient."

The tone and temperature of my voice changed. Sure enough, Leitis sensed I was angry from that. She made a vexed face, and while glaring at me put on a gown and left like she was running away.
The door closed violently. I breathed a deep sigh and with a thud sat down on a nearby chair.

"I"m tired…"

Since I spoke so firmly, she shouldn"t come anymore. Although I was fed up, I decided to keep this matter in my chest. The day of Andre"s Royal Flower ceremony is drawing near. Andre insists Leitis is his mate, so I don"t want to create unnecessary discord.

"Disgusting…"

The bed where Leitis had lied like she owned the place looked extremely disgusting, so I summoned Clara with telepathic communication.

"Your Highness. Have you called for me?"
"Yeah, change all the bedclothes."
"All of them?"
"That"s right."

Perhaps Clara sensed something from my clear tone, as she bowed her head saying, "Certainly".
I opened the windows, aired the room, and changed the bedclothes.
After all that, I felt like I could finally breathe comfortably.

"Aah…"

I have to endure a little longer. If Andre marries Leitis, he"ll receive a new territory and leave the castle with her. Until then I have to endure.

Fortunately, Leitis stopped approaching me since then.
I wonder if she understood her seductive techniques wouldn"t work. If so, then I"m grateful.
If she obediently marries her fiancé, I also won"t say anything else.
That"s what I thought.
And then, the night of the Royal Flower ceremony finally came.
In the dead of night Andre suddenly forced his way into my room without permission and, as soon as he saw my face, he harshly accused me.
He said I stole Leitis"s virginity.
I wished he"d stop joking. Who"d embrace such a woman?
Certainly, on that day Leitis rushed out of my room wearing a gown over her night clothes.
It might have led to a misunderstanding.
But afterwards I strongly reprimanded the royal guards who let Leitis in my room, so he should understand that nothing happened during her stay.

"Andre, I haven"t embraced her. I"ve never felt s.e.xual attraction to her."
"What was that!?"

Andre lost his temper, but I firmly insisted. I absolutely don"t want to look like I did something to that woman.
And then I realized.
The Royal Flower ceremony failing means Leitis――.

"Andre. You were deceived by her. She hadn"t been a virgin from the start."

It"s that kind of thing.
Being a virgin is an absolute to marry into Wilhelm, but I guess she didn"t attach importance to it and thought she could somehow gloss over it. What a short-sighted thinking.
However, I couldn"t think it was anything else. I could only see Leitis as a woman who tempted me, aware of her s.e.xual appeal.
But no matter how long I explained, Andre wasn"t convinced. He shouted that I wasn"t making sense and finally tried to hit me. Of course, I didn"t intend to silently accept the punch and avoided it, and at that time my uncle and even father came. My uncle seized raging Andre"s arms and shouted at him.

"Andre, stop! Freed is unrelated to it!"
"E, Esteemed Father! That"s wrong. Freed stole my Leitis"s!"
"Calm down. You were simply deceived by that woman."
"That"s wrong. She"s my mate, so… the Royal Flower… Aaaaaaaaa!"

Andre screamed. As Andre began to rage again, my uncle stunned him with his hand.
He entrusted Andre to the royal guards he"d brought with him and told me in a tired voice.

"I"m sorry. Freed. We"ve caused you trouble."
"No…"

I could only say that. While sighing, my father said.

"Here"s what happened. The engagement with Leitis has been cancelled. That woman still insists you"re to blame, but we already understand she had lied about her virginity and wanted to conceal it. We will take it to the other Royal Family and her house. The crime of deceiving our country is heavy."
"I understand."

Seeing my father and uncle"s severe expressions, I nodded. For Wilhelm royalty, the marriage partner being a virgin is most important. n.o.body will want to a.s.sociate with a partner who found it appropriate to lie about it. In other words, it"s like that.
Andre, who lost consciousness, was just like that taken away and placed under house arrest in the suburbs.
Leitis was of course returned to her country and afterwards put in a convent.
It was announced to the public that the engagement had been annulled and that Andre was undergoing medical treatment for an illness.
It"s by no means unusual in this country for a marriage to be cancelled at the engagement stage.
It was accepted without any special chaos, but this matter made me completely sick of women.
Even without it, I distrusted women from the start because of the matter with my mother. And this matter splendidly aggravated it.
Knowing my circ.u.mstances to a certain extent, Alex told me to not mind it, but I couldn"t help but think that I didn"t need a woman.
Considering that, it"s a true miracle that I have obtained Lidi now.

"Keeping in mind that you bring up Leitis"s name at every opportunity, aren"t you quite disinterested in her? Have you even once tried to learn what happened to her after your engagement was annulled? If she was your mate, such a thing would be impossible. You just don"t want to admit you are wrong."

I don"t want to a.s.sociate with him anymore. What if Lidi arrives at a strange misunderstanding?
But Andre frantically denied.

"Wrong! I!"
"It"s easier to push the responsibility on someone and resent them, right? But I don"t want to get involved in such nonsense. I"m fed up with it. The only woman I"ve ever been interested in my life is Lidi alone."
"Fueh!?"

Perhaps not expecting her name to come up here, Lidi made a strange sound behind me. I looked back at her and chuckled.

"Lidi. Could you believe me? That I"m not interested in anybody else but you, Lidi."

Not wanting to be strangely misunderstood, I asked, and Lidi nodded.

"Y, yup. Of course. I"ve heard about Ms. Leitis some time ago, but no matter how I looked at it, I thought it was a lie… Freed… Um, I thought there was no way you"d force her."
"Thank you."

I"m happy that she judged me fairly without being confused by Andre"s words. Just by thinking that she trusts me, I was filled with power.
That said――.

"Wrong… Wrong… I."

When I returned my gaze to him, Andre continued desperately spinning words of denial. His eyes were unfocused. Seeing Andre"s state, I understood it"s pointless to say anything to him.
Words won"t come through to him.
In this case, I have no choice but to stun him and take him away.
I can"t leave him alone. At any rate, Andre is in quite a dangerous state. I have to first bring him back and then have him imprisoned in an appropriate place.
I breathed a sigh and was about to approach Andre to stun him, when I sensed an odd bloodl.u.s.t that hadn"t been present until now.

"Ah!"

I reflexively drew a sword. The black shadow that soundlessly dropped from above aimed at Andre"s neck.
Something like a silver string glittered, and I caught it with my sword.
An astonished voice resounded.

"Waa… I certainly didn"t think somebody other than Cain could stop my attack. You"re amazing."

The man wearing black priest clothes blinked his eyes in surprise. His straight black hair tinged with blue swayed.
On his chest a silver inverted cross rosary sparkled.
Seeing the man who shouldn"t be here, I spoke his ident.i.ty.

"You"re the rumored Apostate, huh…"
"Correct. Really, I"ve become quite famous."

Even though his string was still caught, he was not one bit worked up.
On the contrary, the man - Apostate sweetly smiled.

"But see, I have my orders too. Hey? You don"t need that head anymore, right? I wonder if you could hand it over to me."

And he uttered a remark that made me doubt his sanity.