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Chapter 2
Yuri lightly ignored Heina’s trembling words and flopped down on her bed.
His expression, which raised the corners of his mouth and smiled at her, was as cruel as when he beheaded Arzen in her country.
“Oh. Sadly, you’re trembling. But what about it? I came here to sleep today.”
As his cool voice cut through the air, the maid, who had her head bowed behind, without hesitation left the place.
“Huh… Where are you going? Come back!”
Heina yelled at the closed door, but the maid had already disappeared. A thick cold sweat ran on her hands. She didn’t like the maid, who watches over her 24 hours a day, but she hated the fact that she was left alone with the devil in this space even more than death.
She didn’t want him to touch her body by any chance, so she moved her body to the edge of the bed as far as she could and opened her eyes towards him, looking as defensive as possible.
“You seem a little thin.”
Yuri, who was lying at an angle on the bed, supporting his head with his arms, narrowed his eyes and looked at her. Heina frowned and tried to hide her trembling voice.
“… What does that have to do with you?”
“The rain festival will start soon. A sacrifice with a poor appearance is likely to offend the gods. If it doesn’t rain, the people of Nike will be more angry, and the arrow will of course go back to you.”
Yuri chuckled, revealing his pointed fangs. The wind swayed his shoulders, and the white cloth that was barely draped across his body slid down. His naked torso, covered in scars all over his body, was revealed in the air.
Heina frowned and hurriedly turned her head away. Seeing her like that, Yuri suddenly raised his body, grabbed Heina by the shoulder, and knocked her down.
“Aack!!”
Heina was pushed by his hand and collapsed on the soft bed. Her bountiful blonde hair flew across the gorgeous bed.
Heina’s shoulder that Yuri touched was hot as if it was on fire. She wanted to avoid him, but his cruel gray eyes were in front of her. She had nothing she could do but close her eyes tightly in front of him.
“But you have long hair, so I’ll forgive you.”
Yuri put her face into her neck, or to be exact, her rich golden hair, and took a deep breath in.
Yuri had almost strangled Heina when she cut her hair with a piece of glass a year ago without the maid’s knowledge.
─ “I’d rather just kill you.”
Yuri told herself in a cruel tone, clutching the nape of her neck.
─ “I will kill your parents first in front of you, and then I will kill you. No, maybe the opposite would be better. The choice is yours. Either live as my slave or die with your parents. So, choose. Princess of Constance, Heina.”
The maid carrying the tea has not been seen by her since that day. Afraid to ask if he killed her, Heina didn’t know her own life or death yet.
“… You’re going to kill me in the end, aren’t you?”
Heina looked at Yuri sitting on top of her body and bit her lip.
The pale light of the moon floating outside the window shone through the curtains. It was the most important ceremony in Nike, where rain was rare, and the rain festival was after a week when the moon was full. She knew all too well her own destiny to be offered as a living sacrifice in the rain festival.
─ “When the rain festival begins, I will offer you as a sacrifice. The day will be even more beautiful if the god sees the beautiful sacrifice and sends rain to the desert.”
He has told her that in her captivity countless times. Heina can’t even slash her wrist with a broken teacup anymore at his threat that he will behead the Emperor and Empress of Constance if she commits suicide.
Rain festival.
It was also the cause that Yuri had kept her alive and not killed her all this time. Yuri slowly raised his head from Heina’s nape and looked at her piercingly. His face shone paler in the faint moonlight.
“Why? Did you suddenly have the thought of wanting to live here?”
Heina’s golden eyelashes that had been lowered over her eyes fluttered slightly, and the emerald-colored eyes hidden in them looked straight at Yuri.
“No, you’re going to kill me anyway, so what does hair have to do with it?”
There was silence between the two for a moment. A smirk flowed from Yuri’s mouth. Heina shivered and shook her body as his large hands gently wrapped around the nape of her neck. His body temperature was terribly cool.
“Why don’t you just beg for me to save your life?”
A little force entered his hand. Her fragile neck twitched in his hand.
“… I never beg the devil for my life.”
“That’s a lot of pride.”
Yuri twisted his lips. His fingers climbed up Heina’s delicate face and stroked her bright red lips once.
“Think carefully before the rain festival. If the former princess of Constance, with a noble character, prostrates herself like a slave at my feet, I am willing to give you generosity that does not exist and save you.”
Yuri narrowed his eyes with a look that didn’t expect much. Heina looked at him and smiled lowly.
“Rather than seeing that, the Emperor would prefer me to kill myself.”
It was true. It was Constance who valued honor more than life. Being a slave to an enemy is not enough; to lie down at his feet and beg. If she died, then she dies but she couldn’t throw away her last pride. Yuri’s gray eyes seemed to become cruel, and his large hand covered Heina’s mouth. Her breath was choked with the murderous energy emanating from him.
“You’re spewing words that shouldn’t be in your mouth.”
“Heup… !”
He lowered his face and whispered in her ear.
“Don’t upset me. The moment you do anything nonsense to your body, the citizens of Constance who are living in Nike now, children and adults, I will find and kill every single one of them. It might be good to have companions to go with you to the underworld.”
She knew better than anyone that Yuri’s words were not lies. He was a man with a cruel personality who put a knife in Arzen’s heart and cut his neck for not having enough.
“In the underworld, it will be the former Emperor and Empress of Constance who will be following you right away.”
“Uhpp….”
Heina’s green eyes fluttered and tears welled up, eventually running down her cheeks and reaching Yuri’s hand covering her mouth.
Then he smiled contentedly and laid his fiery red hair down on the bed. He hugged Heina in his arms tightly and fell asleep quickly, letting out wheezes. Heina couldn’t even sleep, as she always does on the day he came after the expedition. The night of fear and disgrace was always long.
***
“What do you mean?”
Yuri raised his eyebrows in the Emperor’s parlor, where the desert sunlight was scorching hot.
“I said that this rain festival will be hosted by the Second Prince, Pesis.”
Second Prince Pesis, who had been bowing his head towards Nike by Yuri’s side, knelt on one knee to the floor as a sign of respect.
“I will humbly follow the will of Nike.”
“Did you forget that the administration of the rain festival is supposed to be decided through a meeting of the ministers after judging how much work has been done for the country each year? I think you don’t seem to remember since these days, Nike is not in good health.”
Yuri made a sharp voice before Pesis could even finish speaking. He ruffled his fiery red hair wildly. The gray eyes embedded in the almond-shaped torn eyes blazed terribly.
“You are disrespectful to His Majesty the Emperor. No matter how young you are, what kind of brazenness is that to your father!”
Yuri put a scorn on his lips as Pesis scolded him.
“For the past five years, I have not had time to properly learn etiquette, as I have been at the forefront of all battlefields and beheading thousands or even tens of thousands of people, Pesis.”
What he said was true.
First Prince Nadine, the prime minister of the country, the Second Prince Pesis, who was flamboyant but weak in body, and the Third Prince Camille, a priest who worships the gods, were unable to leave the country due to their own responsibilities. For that reason, it was all for Yuri, the Fourth Prince, to go to war and subdue enemy countries. He was only fifteen when he first went to battle with Nike.
Nike’s four sons all had different mothers, the current Empress was the biological mother of the Second Prince Pesis, and the Third Prince Camille was the child of a concubine after the death of the First Prince Nadine’s mother.
However, no one could know the birth mother of the Fourth Prince Yuri. There were rumors that the Emperor had a child with a witch, or that Nike had picked up a child born in the sandy desert during the war, but no one knew the exact story of his birth.
When the Emperor brought the red-haired Yuri from somewhere, the ministers cited the prophecy and advised the Emperor Nike to kill his son, saying that he would one day stick a sword in his father’s back and swallow the country whole. Instead of killing the baby, Nike burned all the prophetic books of the country, and the ministers who tried to kill Yuri were later assassinated one by one by an assassin.
The fact that it must have been the young Yuri who manipulated the death of the ministers was a fact known to many in the palace.
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