Lemetel frowned immediately.

“Princess Ophelia?”

“Please let go.”

“Princess, do you know who this guy is?”

“I do. So please let go.”

“Are you really going to dance with this guy?”

The girl then looked at Lemetel with her bright blue eyes. Idren was amazed at how a girl a foot shorter than him could look at Lemetel like that.

He was always scared when standing in front of his eldest half-brother, but that girl seemed unfazed.

Lemetel spoke without hiding his displeasure.

“Ha, the princess always prefers the inferior ones…”

Then one of the people in the room cleared their throat. Seeing the blood-red eyes, Idren realized that the woman who cleared her throat was from the Luntallis imperial family.

As the daughter of Luntallis would not take his side, she seemed dissatisfied with Lemetel’s words.

Realizing that public opinion was not going the way he wanted, Lemetel scowled. His rough hands squeezed Idren’s shoulders.

Tears welled up in his eyes physiologically. Idren focused his eyes. He didn’t want to cry.

Lemetel growled in his ear,

“Be grateful to the princess.”

And Lemetel pushed him towards the girl in front of him. Idren staggered a little and hurriedly shrank back.

The girl was perfect like sugar art painted in delicate colors. He didn’t want to touch and defile her.

He buried his gaze on the floor and trembled. Now people were very quiet. Even without looking around, he knew everyone was looking at him and the girl.

It was then that the white deerskin shoes moved.

The pure white silk gloves, matching the shoes, took his hand. The hem of a blue dress fell to cover the shoes.

The girl’s warm and small hand, which anyone could tell was preciously raised, covered his hand. The music began to grow louder again.

“Raise your head.”

The girl whispered to him, who had been looking only at the floor.

Idren slowly raised his head as she instructed. A white and clean face, bright blue eyes, and curling silver hair came into view. Idren examined her delicate face with a blank expression.

Even the princess of the neighboring country, with whom there was talk of engagement to Lemetel, was not this beautiful. The girl had the most perfect appearance among the children he had seen so far.

She blinked her large, blue eyes.

“Do you know how to dance?”

With his ears and face already flushed, Idren shook his head.

“I, I don’t know.”

Then the girl told him in a gentle voice how he should move. First, give me your right hand like this. Take a step back, and when the music changes, you have to come forward again.

The whispering voice was youthful, but to his ears, it sounded closer to salvation than any hymn.

Although she led the boy who was a foot taller than her and knew nothing very well, his inexperience outweighed her composure. Idren stepped on her feet three times.

Each time he stepped on the white shoes that must be softer than his hands, he blushed to the tips of his ears.

“I’m sorry.”

To him who apologized with an expression that looked like he wanted to bite his tongue, the girl gave the same answer every time.

“It’s okay.”

When the dance was finally over, she looked at him and smiled slightly. It was a faint smile that didn’t reveal her teeth.

“Good job.”

And the girl let go of his hand. The silk glove slipped off his rough fingertips. Even though he had been blushing with shame the whole time, at that moment Idren thought it was regrettable.

He raised his gaze slightly to capture the girl’s face one last time.

That was when he met Lemetel’s flashing golden eyes in the distance.

Seeing the gold shining with anger and coldness, a chill ran down his spine.

Lemetel had said he would let him go if he danced, but that wouldn’t be sincere. Idren already knew well about the cruelty of his half-brothers.

He had to get out of the banquet hall before they caught him. With anxious eyes darting around, Idren said to the girl in front of him.

“Th-thank you for your help, Your Highness. I’ll be going now…”

Without even properly finishing his sentence, Idren bowed his head and hurriedly took a step back. The girl seemed to be trying to say something to him, but he turned his back and ran away faster.

That was Idren and Ophelia’s first meeting.

The next day, he and his half-brothers returned to Aglante immediately. It turned out that the previous day’s banquet was the last gathering before the talks broke down.

The three princes were very displeased that he had escaped the predicament they had prepared with someone’s help. Idren was beaten by them throughout the returning carriage ride.

“The princess just helped you because she felt sorry for you.”

Especially Sineron, Lemetel’s younger brother, spoke very spitefully.

“She would have helped anyone, not just you.”

Only later did Idren learn that it was because Sineron had asked Ophelia to dance that day and had been rejected.

And that Ophelia hadn’t danced with anyone else after he left.

The following year, Idren couldn’t go to the talks. It was because Sineron and Rossel insisted they didn’t want to go with him.

Idren had no complaints about that fact, as staying in the castle was better than attending the talks and getting into trouble like last year. When the king and his three sons left, he would be left with Queen Isde, but one was better than four.

Of course, it bothered him that he couldn’t see the girl who had helped him. Around that time, when Idren saw the snow piled up at dawn, he unconsciously thought of the girl. Because the white and bluish snow was clean and beautiful.

Although his hands would freeze if he touched it for too long.

Some days, he tried reciting the name he had overheard. Ophelia. It was a name he couldn’t be granted permission to use, so he had no choice but to hide it in front of others, but that softly ending word really stuck to his mouth.

However, the time he remained in the castle was more grueling than he thought.

While the king and his sons were away from the castle, Isde called him and whipped him.

She didn’t wield the whip herself. The knight who had once thrown him in front of the king took on the role of the executioner.

After a round of whipping, the queen sprinkled water on his wounds and said,

“When the king returns, he will acknowledge you as his son.”

Splash−, the cold and fishy-smelling water stung his sore back.

“Don’t be arrogant. It’s to send you to the border in place of my sons.”

There was no further explanation after that, but Idren understood the words at once.

Aglante had been in a confrontation with Ragal, whose borders adjoined, over territorial issues for nearly a hundred years. It was a conflict of considerable scale, to the point where the king himself had participated in the war.

And Idren realized what the lofty ceiling and the splendid dining table he had faced at the age of eleven meant.

The king was planning to send him to the battlefield in place of the princes.

It wasn’t a shocking revelation. He had guessed from the beginning that there would be a hidden intention.

The whip was swung again before he could think deeply about it.

As the queen said, the king acknowledged him as a prince before that year was over.

Time continued to flow even after that. When he turned fifteen, Idren went to the talks once more.

He still wasn’t treated very well, but at least there was no ridicule like in the old days. They had to give him the title of prince because they had to send him to the battlefield, and once they gave him the title, they had to treat him accordingly.

He had also grown his hair out, so he wasn’t being treated the same way as before.

The more he grew, the more Lemetel and his two brothers disliked him. Even when they hit him like before, his body had grown bigger, so he took less impact, and they seemed to find it unpleasant to see.

And that bullying continued even outside the castle, so at the talks, Lemetel prevented him from attending any gatherings.

So even though Idren wanted to know how the girl whose face he had never forgotten for two years had grown up, he had no choice but to bury his curiosity. It was because Lemetel had the knights block his room.

Idren didn’t bother to resist them. After all, he had the banquet held on the last day of the talks. Lemetel wouldn’t be able to stop him from participating in that banquet.

Not only had his position improved, but the crown prince of Egelbamod, the host of the banquet, had also written and distributed handwritten invitations to everyone.

No matter how much power Lemetel had, he couldn’t stop the delivery of an invitation sent by the crown prince within the empire.

So he couldn’t stop the ‘delivery’ of it.

Lemetel tried every possible way to take away the invitation Idren received. He had the servants search his room and constantly threatened and pressured him.

“If you don’t hand over the invitation now, you’ll have a lot to deal with when you return.”

His half-brother, who was the spitting image of their father, said that in his characteristic soft tone, but Idren had no intention of doing as he wished.

He would be leaving for the border before the next year anyway.

So what was the problem with getting whipped a bit when he returned? He might die when he went to the border.

Idren knew that his chances of surviving on the front lines were very low. He had gotten into a few fistfights, but he hadn’t even learned how to properly hold a sword. He might be bigger than other kids his age, but he wasn’t even twenty yet.

He was just a living sacrifice to avoid sending the other princes to the front lines.

If it were him, he would just leave someone in that position alone, but Lemetel was determined to get his hands on Idren’s invitation. While he was undressing to change into his banquet attire, Lemetel had a servant steal it.