I instinctively flinched, my body trembling.
‘What is this…?’
If I pressed my lips against those of a strange man I had only met today, shouldn’t I obviously feel uncomfortable?
Then why didn’t I feel any resistance at all?
Even as I thought that this was strange, that this situation was clearly impossible, my body reacted in an entirely different way.
To be honest, it felt… a little good.
‘Maybe I was poisoned by something those damned demons spread.’
Yes, I must have fallen into a trap.
‘There’s no other way this could be happening.’
He was doing nothing more than pressing and rubbing his lips against mine, yet I didn’t want him to stop.
When the tip of his tongue even lightly brushed against me, as if teasing me, I instinctively opened my mouth as though welcoming it.
He let out a low, rumbling laugh.
As if he were immensely pleased.
The smooth tip of his tongue slipped inside and climbed over mine, which had drawn back, before wrapping around it.
Our heated breaths quickly became entangled as one.
‘……!’
My mind went completely blank, to the point that I couldn’t even think about clearing up the misunderstanding right now.
‘No. I can’t. We have to stop.’
If this continued, we would really cross the line.
Taking advantage of the moment when he briefly pulled his lips away to catch his breath, I pursed my lips tightly.
Enough to make it obvious that I wanted to stop.
I had instinctively realized that it would be dangerous if we went any further.
“……”
A suffocating silence settled between us.
By the time his saliva-moistened lips had begun to cool, he let out a long breath like a sigh.
“I suppose I really was too inexperienced.”
I had no idea myself since this was my first time, but inexperienced? He seemed anything but. In fact, he had been remarkably skilled….
“Don’t worry. I have no intention of forcing you.”
He gently caressed my cheek as he whispered.
“But… it’s impossible for me to pretend that the kiss we just shared never happened.”
His voice was low and dark.
Whether it was a misunderstanding or not, he sounded as though he had no intention of giving me any chance to escape.
“You promised. You said you would become mine.”
His gaze persistently followed mine as he asked again.
“Isn’t that right?”
‘No, I mean, who the hell are you?!’
I suppose “I’m going insane” was exactly the kind of phrase meant for situations like this.
‘…I absolutely have to keep this a secret from Mikhail and the expedition members.’
If they found out I had ended up having my first kiss because of such a ridiculous misunderstanding, they would tease me for at least a year.
That was why I was startled when noisy footsteps suddenly sounded outside.
“This way!”
‘They can’t find me like this…!’
This was…
This would get me teased for at least three years!
“What’s wrong?”
Seeing me frantically darting my eyes around, the man asked in confusion.
“Does the commotion outside have something to do with you?”
I couldn’t be certain, but I thought there was a good chance it did.
The more complicated the magic, the worse its aftereffects tended to be.
Considering how slowly I was recovering—only now able to move my fingertips—the return magic must have been high-level magic as well.
‘Of course the palace’s defense system would have detected it.’
If the chief mage, Caleb, was staying in the palace, he would have even identified my return specifically and reported it.
‘Either way, no!’
Whether it was Mikhail, Caleb, or any of the knights, I absolutely couldn’t let any of them see me like this.
Even if it were a soldier who didn’t know my face, the same applied.
‘This is so embarrassing….’
I was determined to avoid being seen with my own eyes somehow.
Once again, I tensed my abdomen as hard as I could and tried to force out my voice.
And at last, my desperation bore fruit.
“Help… me.”
“……!”
At the single word I barely managed to utter, his eyes widened.
Following his hurried gaze as he looked around, I also took in the room.
‘What is this room?’
The bare room felt bleak. Apart from the bed, there was hardly any proper furniture, and all the windows were covered with iron bars.
And now that I looked closely, there were even restraints fastened around the man’s ankles.
‘Don’t tell me this is a prison?’
A voice coming from the hallway gave me a clue as to the man’s identity.
“There was a mana explosion in the hostage’s room!”
‘…A hostage? What on earth happened while I was gone for such a thing to be necessary?’
“Open the door! Quickly!”
Before I had time to think, the footsteps stopped right outside the door.
“We have the key here!”
The loud clattering of someone unlocking the door rang out.
“Damn it….”
With nowhere to hide because of the room’s layout, he wrapped me tightly in the blanket like a cocoon.
“Bear with it for a moment.”
After whispering that, he pushed me under the bed along with the blanket, then pulled the bedsheet down to conceal me.
Immediately afterward, the door flew open with enough force to seem as though it might break, and several people rushed inside.
“Subdue him!”
The man, who had been standing motionless beside the bed, was seized by the soldiers’ rough hands.
They forced him face-down onto the floor and twisted his arms behind his back, binding them.
‘W-What?’
I was stunned by the completely unexpected situation.
‘He’s not even a criminal, yet they treat a hostage like this?’
Here, in Bardia, ruled by Mikhail?
Throughout it all, the man didn’t resist or even let out a single groan.
“Deposed Crown Prince, what were you doing here?”
After confirming that the man had been completely restrained, a knight approached him and asked.
There wasn’t even a trace of respect for the man in his high-handed attitude.
“Who knows? Nothing?”
The man answered mockingly in a cold voice.
His tone was completely different from the one he had used when speaking to me.
And as though he had been waiting for this very moment, retaliation followed immediately.
The knight kicked him in the abdomen.
“How dare you try something?”
A knight who wielded aura had a body no different from a weapon, and the man coughed up blood from the blow.
“…You’re going too far. Do you really think I could do anything from here?”
“If you don’t know, I’ll make you remember.”
The knight’s merciless violence soon rained down upon the man.
He kicked someone whose hands and feet were already bound and incapable of fighting back, then struck him with the sheath of his sword.
Yet the man simply endured it in silence.
Until another knight could no longer stand by and stepped forward.
“Sir Hamel, that’s enough. He was once the man you served, wasn’t he?”
“The past is the past. I am a knight of the glorious Cradion, not the rotten Bardia!”
The knight named Hamel shouted angrily.
He seemed offended merely by having his origins brought up.
“Hoo… Fine. But we’ll be in trouble if he dies.”
“If he were someone who could die from something like this, Bardia would have fallen long ago.”
Hidden beneath the bed, I watched the scene in utter disbelief.
‘What in the world is going on…?’
From the conversation alone, I could finally piece together the truth.
This was a newly established nation called Cradion, and the man being held hostage was none other than the deposed Crown Prince of my country, Bardia.
It seemed he had been the final line of defense who had held out to the bitter end to keep Bardia from falling.
Yet the country he had risked his life to protect had stripped him of his position as Crown Prince and handed him over to an enemy nation as a hostage.
And in the process, the man had even been betrayed by someone who had once followed him.
Hamel stretched the corners of his mouth into a vicious smile.
“He needs to be properly trained. Make him crawl and obey like a dog.”
…The moment I heard those words, it felt as though something inside me snapped.
The traitor from Bardia was mocking and abusing his former master more enthusiastically than anyone else—even more than the knights of the enemy nation.
If he had been forced to submit in order to protect his family or someone precious to him, he could never have acted like that.
Those were the words of someone who had already sold the lives of countless people for his own comfort and prosperity.
‘You’re the one who should be crawling like a dog.’
I decided then and there to deal with that bastard.
As long as I existed in this world, there could only be one fate awaiting a traitor.
Carefully hidden beneath the blanket, I clenched and relaxed my fist.
‘I can move, but my body is still sluggish.’
It seemed it would take about five more minutes for these damned aftereffects to disappear completely.
‘If I don’t want to be discovered, I’ll have to use my power.’
Even if I hated using the power of those damned demons, I had no choice.
I couldn’t let the man who was enduring violence from his former subordinate just to hide me go through all that for nothing.
‘Servant, answer my call.’
I snapped my fingers toward the shadow cast across the floor, and it began to bubble and churn.
It seemed almost eager to answer my summons, as though it were giggling with delight.
‘Shh. Shut up and do exactly what I tell you. If you fail to prove your usefulness, I might offer you up on the altar of my goddess.’
-……!
Apparently, the threat worked.
Before it could take shape, the thing turned into mist and slowly seeped out from beneath the bed at my gesture.
Then, without anyone noticing, it quietly slipped into the shadows of the enemy knights and soldiers.
And a moment later—
Slash—!
With a chilling sound of something being cleanly severed, the traitor’s head went tumbling to the ground.
“Huh?”
The person holding the sword dripping with blood was the enemy knight who had tried to stop Hamel.
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