If You Dare to Violate the Saintess - Chapter 26

That meant there was no guarantee about what lay ahead. Nothing to say Lucian would not lose patience altogether.

But Asteria could not fathom what she might do beyond reading the stars and dreaming her dreams.

For Asteria who believed that losing her virginity meant losing her sacred power, it was an immense source of anguish.

“I’m afraid I’ll lose my sacred power at this rate.”

“But His Majesty believes in your sacred power, so such a thing won’t happen easily.”

“Then what about what happened today?”

Clarisse fell silent. Neither she nor Asteria could dare to defy the Emperor’s will.

“I was told I was born to be the Emperor’s guide. But can something like this really be called the work of a guide?”

Asteria was now questioning her very existence.

In a way, it was the most natural thing in the world. And yet there were no answers to be found.

* * *

Isadora, her slender silver pipe clenched between her lips, furrowed her brow.

“The Emperor went straight to the White Tower?”

“So it would seem.”

Isadora exhaled a long trail of smoke.

“Is that all?”

“According to Sir Ezra, His Majesty believes the Saintess will lose her sacred power if she loses her virginity.”

A small mercy, at least. But Isadora could not shake the feeling that the instinct carved into the men of the Orbien imperial line would not stop there.

“Even the late Emperor was thoroughly infatuated with the Saintess, yet when he wed me in the imperial wedding, he at least devoted himself to me.”

It was thanks to that devotion that Isadora had been able to bear Lucian. But the affection between husband and wife had ended there.

Afterward, rather than sparing Isadora so much as a glance, Franz had come and gone from the White Tower with shameless frequency.

“Every last one of those ‘Saintess’ wenches is a bewitching, wicked creature.”

Isadora had spent long years hating Evangeline, the late Emperor’s Saintess. Had it not been for the unwritten rule that a Saintess could not be publicly executed, she would have dragged the woman to the execution block.

Instead, she had been able to administer to Evangeline a poison said to inflict slow, lingering agony until death.

But even that could not fully repay all those years of hatred and bitterness she had harbored.

“As things stand, there is no one on the continent who can challenge our Orbien Empire. And yet we still need ridiculous dreams and fairytales of the stars?”

The Lumines clan was little more than a thorn in Isadora’s side.

“If you try to dissuade him now, his defiance may only drive him deeper into the Saintess’s arms.”

Sophia offered this carefully.

“No matter what they call her, she’s just a woman, isn’t she?”

“Indeed. But those creatures are no ordinary seductresses. It may be better to act sooner rather than later.”

“If that happens, Her Majesty the Empress could come under suspicion.”

That would not do.

Rosalyn was the one who must bear the heir to the Orbien imperial line. If Lucian were provoked to fury, the entire plan could fall apart.

“Perhaps it would be better for the Emperor to learn that his precious Saintess is nothing more than a w***e.”

Isadora sneered. Of course, she had no intention of actually telling Lucian the truth.

She was afraid that if she did, Lucian would openly make Asteria his mistress.

“A Saintess is nothing to begin with. She’s just a w***e who spreads her legs for the Emperor.”

“That is truly the case, but… for now, there seems to be no recourse. Save for His Majesty’s interest to wane on its own.”

“Yes, men are quick to boil and quick to cool.”

Franz’s love for Isadora had been exactly the same. The moment she bore Lucian, Franz had settled into the White Tower as if relieved of all obligation.

“But we are dealing with a Lumines Saintess. Those women know exactly how to keep a man ensnared.”

“The current Saintess firmly believes that losing her virginity means losing her sacred power. She won’t yield her body easily.”

“And if the Emperor forces himself on her regardless?”

“Then we would have just cause to cast her out for having lost her sacred power.”

That, too, had its logic.

On the surface, the Saintess’s role was to guide the Emperor through her sacred power. If she lost that ability, there would be no reason for her to remain in the White Tower.