“Wh-What! You’re not letting go?”

Melanie shouted as she pushed away Catherine’s hand gripping her chin.

“Listen carefully. Broken gold coins can be melted and used again. Gold coins are gold coins. They’re on a different level from silver coins.”

Catherine spoke in a chillingly arrogant voice.

“What nonsense are you talking about?”

Melanie’s irritated voice echoed through the bridal waiting room.

“Pecilini next to you seems to understand, but you don’t seem to get it at all?”

Pecilini, who had been standing timidly amidst the tense atmosphere between the two, flinched at Catherine’s sharp gaze.

As Catherine said, Pecilini immediately understood what she meant.

It meant that Catherine’s position was now different from Melanie’s.

“What’s with her?”

Melanie whispered, poking Pecilini in the side.

“W-Well…”

Pecilini trailed off, glancing nervously at Catherine.

Catherine, who had been watching this, took another step towards Melanie and looked her up and down.

“Melanie, I’ll explain it simply to match your level.”

“Huh?”

“I’m the First Concubine. You’re the Second Concubine. You understand this much, right?”

Though irritated, Melanie couldn’t refute this obvious fact.

Melanie just tightly gripped the skirt of her wedding dress with both hands, trembling.

“Even if I broke up with His Majesty, now I have the chance to mend that relationship. So someone like you was never a match for me to begin with.”

“Wh-What did you say?”

“You and I had different values from the start anyway.”

As Catherine calmly unleashed her venom, the atmosphere in the bridal waiting room instantly turned cold.

“Catherine! You seem to think you’ve become the Empress just because you became the First Concubine?”

Melanie grabbed Catherine’s arm as she turned away, shouting irritably.

At that moment, the door to the bridal waiting room opened.

“The ceremony will begin soon.”

It was Raphael, the Emperor’s secretary.

After delivering the message to the concubines, Raphael sensed the unusual tense atmosphere in the bridal waiting room.

“Concubine Ladies, please prepare to enter now.”

“Alright.”

Catherine responded to Raphael with a relaxed smile.

“Yes, then I shall take my leave…”

A few minutes after Raphael left the bridal waiting room, organ music began to play from inside the chapel.

“Melanie, why don’t you brighten up your face? Frowning like that makes you look even worse than the Empress.”

Catherine sneered, brushing off Melanie’s hand that was still gripping her arm as if dusting off dirt.

Melanie’s eyes widened as if they would pop out, her lips trembling.

Seeming pleased by Melanie’s anger, Catherine burst into laughter.

“Shall we go out now?”

Catherine said to her attendant.

As she walked towards the bridal waiting room door first, she turned to look at the concubines.

“From this moment on, it would be best to show proper respect to me, the First Concubine. Unless you want to find out how harsh my hand can be.”

Catherine warned, looking at each of the three concubines in turn.

[This is the timeline separator]

‘Sigh, they’re all formidable. I’m worried about Her Majesty the Empress.’

Rosie Adelrid was quietly observing the chaotic situation from a corner of the bridal waiting room.

She was the concubine chosen last after Catherine, Melanie, and Pecilini.

Moreover, like Melanie, she was also one of the young ladies chosen as the Empress’s lady-in-waiting.

Rosie was a young lady who liked to spend all day reading books and studying healing magic alone in her room at the Adelrid Count’s mansion.

But after seeing the Empress’s face for the first time at the Emperor’s wedding, she decided to become the Empress’s lady-in-waiting.

Rosie had been working in the dispensary of the ‘Proud Night’ clinic run by the healer Big, hiding her noble status.

She made various magic potions at the clinic besides the virility enhancers they sold.

The night before the Emperor’s national wedding, she was working in the dispensary as usual.

Healer Big’s consultation room had a door leading to the dispensary, with a small window in it.

Rosie first saw Empress Zelda’s face through that small window in the middle of the dispensary door when she entered the consultation room.

And the burn scar on her right side.

Rosie was greatly surprised by that burn scar.

She had once seen a picture similar to Zelda’s burn scar in a book about wyverns written in the ancient language of the Southern Continent.

Though she didn’t know the ancient Southern language and couldn’t understand what that mark-like picture meant, it was clearly related to wyverns.

Moreover, the energy emanating from the Empress was clearly special.

Though not yet perfect in skill, Rosie had developed the ability to sense others’ energy while studying healing magic.

The Empress possessed an aura not felt from ordinary people.

Among all the people Rosie had met in the Rafion Empire so far, only one person exuded such a strong aura.

Emperor Rinel Gardion Edfa.

Now there was one more person.

And they had become husband and wife.

Rosie was both worried and excited about how those two people with different powerful auras would get along.

Standing in the banquet hall with the other ladies-in-waiting, watching the imperial couple dine together, Rosie couldn’t take her eyes off them.

As their different auras met and mixed, a new energy was created, and the two opposing auras clashed and intermingled, swirling around the couple.

Rosie’s desire to become a lady-in-waiting wasn’t just due to curiosity about the Empress’s burn scar.

Throughout the national wedding, despite the disdain of the arrogant Rafion ministers and prickly noble ladies, the Empress remained dignified.

Rosie felt a strange satisfaction at that sight.

Even in a situation where she could have easily felt intimidated, surrounded by unfriendly people of the Rafion Empire, the Empress did not lose her grace.

Zelda’s bright pink eyes looked both warm and resolute.

Rosie wanted to become friends with Empress Zelda on a personal level.

But it seemed she had already failed at the first impression as a lady-in-waiting.

Even during tea time, she hadn’t received a glance from Empress Zelda.

‘If I take time to build trust, she might open her heart to me.’

Rosie comforted herself like that.

But then she received unbelievable news from her father, Count Adelrid.

‘Rosie, you will now become a concubine of His Majesty the Emperor. To think such an honor would come to our family! Ha ha ha, I feel embarrassed for all those years I grumbled about having a useless daughter.’

The Emperor’s concubine?

Rosie despaired.

She thought becoming friends with the Empress was now completely out of reach.

No matter how benevolent an empress might be, there would be no empress in all the continents who would open her heart to a concubine brought in by the emperor.

But she couldn’t refuse her father Count Adelrid’s order either.

There was a threat to burn all the books her mother, who had been a mage, had left as an inheritance.

There were still many magic books she hadn’t even opened yet.

And the treasure her mother had asked her to protect before she died was in the secret room.

These were the most precious things in her life, more important than jewels.

Rosie decided to accept reality and find a way to approach the Empress.

Becoming a concubine would make it easier to get close to the Empress.

Though it was uncertain whether she would like her.

For these reasons, Rosie was lost in her own thoughts even as Catherine and Melanie raised their voices in mutual check.

‘What might Her Majesty the Empress be doing now? She must be feeling unwell?’

Rosie removed the elaborate hairpin her attendant had just put in her hair.

“I don’t want to look pretty.”

[This is the timeline separator]

The ceremony held in the chapel was splendid, but the procedure was simple.

During the bride’s entrance, all four concubines entered together.

Emperor Rinel, waiting in front of the high priest to greet the concubines, welcomed them by kissing the back of each concubine’s hand in turn.

Rinel and all four concubines knelt before the high priest, placed their hands on the altar, recited the words of God’s blessing, and stood up.

The majestic sound of the organ echoed through the chapel again.

The main ministers and attendees from various noble families who attended the ceremony applauded.

Rinel found the ceremony with the concubines much more uncomfortable than the national wedding with the Empress, whom he had married without even knowing her face.

Although both weddings were formed through political relationships, the national wedding with the Kingdom of Shatonil fully reflected Rinel’s will, so he didn’t feel this awkward.

Even as he exchanged cheek kisses with each of the four concubines in turn, he thought of only one person.

‘Zelda, what might she be doing now?’

[This is the timeline separator]

The boring ceremony procedures were all over.

Rinel took a brief rest in the waiting room of the chapel before returning to the main palace.

As soon as he entered the waiting room, he threw off his ceremonial jacket.

He lay down on the sofa, unbuttoning his ceremonial shirt.

Then he closed his eyes, placing one arm over his forehead.

As he closed his eyes, Zelda’s face naturally appeared.

Ten days ago, she had widened her eyes like a rabbit and given a thumbs up while tasting the pie he had given her.

She was cute. No, she was lovable.

His frown unconsciously relaxed and the corners of his mouth turned up.

“You look happy? I feel relieved now that the ceremony is over too.”

Rinel opened his eyes at the familiar yet uncomfortable voice.

Catherine was standing at the door of the waiting room, smiling brightly.

“What is it?”

Rinel asked with an annoyed frown.

His tone was very brusque for addressing his concubine with whom he had just held a ceremony.

“I was wondering if you knew that according to the concubine hierarchy, you should come to my chamber first tonight.”

Catherine’s pride was hurt by the Emperor’s unwelcoming attitude, but she didn’t show it.

“Raphael told me before the ceremony.”

“So you know. Hmm, I don’t know if Your Majesty remembers, but the first place we met when we were 10 years old was a bedroom.”

“Was it?”

“Yes, at that time Your Majesty came with the late Emperor to a hunting ground near our duchy and stayed overnight at the duke’s castle.”

“Ah, I think I remember something like that.”

Rinel replied halfheartedly.

“When you came to play in my room then, you were a young boy, but tonight in the bedroom, Your Majesty will now be…”

His adult gaze looked sexy yet dangerous, like a hungry beast.

Catherine openly stared at his well-toned upper body visible through his unbuttoned shirt, giving a seductive smile.

Rinel glanced down at his body that Catherine was staring at intently, then looked back at her.

His gaze seemed to protest, ‘What are you daring to stare at now?’

Catherine pretended to be shy and averted her gaze.

“If you’re done with the good view, you can leave now.”

“You’ve changed a lot. When we were engaged, your body wasn’t so beast-like…”

“The problem is my patience has become as short as a beast’s.”

He growled as he approached Catherine.

Seeing him approach, Catherine slowly began to lower the shoulder line of her wedding dress.

As Rinel came close to her, she felt like she might melt right there.

Even though it was the waiting room, she wouldn’t be able to refuse if he desired her now.

“Show me here. Your impatient, beast-like… side.”

“I left my sword behind.”

Rinel snorted and picked up the ceremonial jacket he had thrown on the floor.

“…What? No, I didn’t mean…”

“Get out. You’re not interesting.”

He pulled up the lowered shoulder of Catherine’s wedding dress and turned her around.

[This is the timeline separator]

“He must have gone to the concubine’s chambers by now?”

I checked the time and went out to the terrace, standing in the cool night breeze.

Fortunately, there was no order for the Empress to attend today’s ceremony.

I don’t know how I spent the afternoon hours.

I barely ate dinner, just filling my hunger roughly, and came to the bedroom early, moving to the bathroom to let time flow with the water.

Yet time passed slowly.

I kept walking back and forth between the terrace and bedroom repeatedly, but it still wasn’t time to sleep.

Just then, Sharon’s voice leaked in from outside the bedroom door.

−”Right now? Ah, yes. It’s not time for her to sleep yet. Please wait a moment. I’ll inform Her Majesty the Empress.”

Who could be visiting at this hour?

Could it be…

A strange anticipation welled up.

The voices stopped and soon there was a knock.

When I ordered them to come in, Sharon opened the bedroom door.

“Um, Your Majesty the Empress…”

“Who… has come?”