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Prologue

A dim night. Through the half-open window came the blare of raucous music and the boisterous chatter of drunken revelry. The pale moonlight illuminated the faces of a man and a woman who had slipped into the dark room, hiding from the world’s gaze.

It was the night of the royal palace ball. The man—Viern Erkman, the young chancellor of the kingdom and regent of Laurelai who governed in place of the ailing king—gazed down at the woman clinging to him with utterly indifferent eyes, her face flushed with heat.

“Ah, Your Grace….”

The woman, said to be the second daughter of some count, was moderately pretty and had a moderately pleasant figure. Best of all, she was newly arrived from the countryside and lacked the proper fear. Brave enough to boldly follow him here, like a little fox.

“Hn.”

When his gloved hand, cold through the leather, groped her waist, a soft moan escaped her. Yet, despite the woman’s utterly intoxicated response, the man remained strikingly unmoved. Just as he was idly moving his hands, silently counting the time—

A single, sharp scream erupted, and the corridor outside exploded into chaos. As if he had been waiting for it, the man’s movements stopped dead.

“Your Grace…?”

The woman called to him, her face puzzled. For a fleeting moment, a look of profound satisfaction seemed to flit across the man’s features, which had been cool all evening.

Instead of answering, he flicked a glance at the clock on the wall. Two minutes and fourteen seconds exactly since he had entered this room with her. With the time growing shorter each day, should he marvel at such remarkable progress and achievement?

Feeling a peculiar sense of fulfillment, the man peeled off his glove. Then, as if it were something filthy, he tossed it carelessly onto the bed and strode toward the mirror. The woman stared at him, bewildered by the suddenly severed atmosphere, but he acted as if she weren’t there, merely checking his own appearance.

Bam, bam, bam!

“Your Excellency! Your Excellency! Are you in there, Your Excellency!”

Urgent knocks and shouts from those seeking him echoed outside. While the startled woman frantically tried to straighten her disheveled bodice, the man—having completed his adjustments—gracefully moved toward the door.

Squeak—

As the door opened, a flood of bright light revealed the urgent faces of the palace servants who had been searching for him.

“What is the matter?”

At the low, weighty voice that dropped upon them, the servants couldn’t help but flinch. The languid, oppressive air radiating from the man standing in the doorway made them shrink back.

Viern Erkman was generally tolerant, but he was also a man with a razor-sharp temperament. Above all, the man’s loosened appearance and the disheveled atmosphere of the room made it clear—they had interrupted the Duke’s “good time” again. Reading his mood, the servants cautiously reported.

“W-We apologize for the disturbance, Your Excellency. It’s, well… Her Highness the Princess has… enacted another spectacle…”

“Lead the way.”

Before they could even finish, the man cut them off and stepped into the corridor. With sighs of relief, the servants guided him out.

“T-This way, Your Excellency!”

“Has the Princess decided to perform a sword dance again?”

“N-No, not that…”

“Then did she release a litter of piglets into the ballroom?”

“Well, not that either…”

“If not that, then has she gathered the young knights to build a human pyramid…?”

He paused.

A crowd had gathered in the distance outside. Among the fretful onlookers was his youngest brother, Aizen, a mere five years his junior. He had specifically assigned him as the Princess’s knight to keep her in check, and yet, what was he doing standing there uselessly? Tsk.

Just then, a giggling laugh rang out from above. The man’s mouth slowly closed.

He looked up.

There she was—Princess Diana, who he had put to bed not long ago, now throwing a tantrum because she couldn’t sit still for even that short while. Her hair, the color of platinum, reflected the moonlight, and her vibrant green eyes sparkled like emeralds. With delicate, doll-like features, her appearance at a glance was as beautiful and pure as an angel from scripture. But…

For a moment, the corner of the man’s eye twitched minutely as he took in the Princess’s state. He saw her bare, snow-white feet, devoid of any shoes. Dressed only in her nightgown, she was walking along the roof’s edge, performing precarious acrobatics that looked as though a single misstep would send her plummeting. At the sight of this dangerous behavior, the man’s tightly pressed lips twisted into a fierce scowl.

“Huh? Viern!”

Just then, the Princess, having spotted the man, beamed and called out. Her loosely tousled hair fluttering in the night breeze was quite the wild sight, but there were far more pressing matters at hand than pointing that out.

“……What are you doing up there?”

“I couldn’t sleep, so I came out for some air!”