Side Story Chapter 1. The Official Couple of the Worldview (Part 5)
Since things had come to this, he couldn’t ignore it. As he had always done, he decided to be swayed by the Seven Virtues and Seven Deadly Sins.
He displayed kindness without heart.
“Do you have business with me, His Royal Highness the Former Prince?”
“……”
The platinum-haired royal, on the border between a boy and a young man, gasped. Then, struggling to fix his tearful expression, he forced a smile and spoke.
“As expected, you won’t call me Riga.”
“……”
“It’s okay. At least you looked back when I called you brother… that’s enough.”
He said it, as if brainwashing himself that it was enough, with an expression that was clearly not enough.
The man who had been so wicked in other timelines was now acting as if begging for every word, every nuance of expression, every flicker of Tesillid’s gaze.
Tesillid still hadn’t adapted to this discrepancy. And he had no intention of adapting.
This indifference, conversely, stemmed from Tesillid’s benevolent nature. How easy would it be to manipulate and toy with someone who would be ecstatic just to be called by their name?
If Tesillid hadn’t been good, he would have long ago used his emotional advantage to drag Ligares through the mud.
“Forgive me, Your Highness, but I do not wish to face you for long.”
“……I came because I have something to deliver. Sister Celestid gave it to me.”
“From His Majesty the King?”
Thinking it might be official business, Tesillid immediately adjusted his posture. Ligares thought he had done well to use his sister’s name and pulled out a luxurious velvet box from his pocket.
“You, brother, give it directly to my sister-in-law. When you two are alone. And preferably, dressed up.”
The reply to his rather earnest request was plain.
“Understood.”
“……Aren’t you going to ask what this is?”
“Is it something I need to know about?”
“Uh, it’d be better if you did.”
Only then did Tesillid realize that this business was a bit far from an official mission.
At Ligares’s gesture, he carefully opened the velvet box.
“This is……”
What was revealed under the sunlight was a ring set with a large pink diamond.
“It’s one of the royal family’s heirlooms. I thought it had to be at least this much.”
“At least this much?”
“My sister-in-law seemed really upset that she hadn’t received a proposal from you yet.”
“……”
Tesillid flinched at two facts. That he had been found out for not proposing, and that Aillet was deeply upset, pierced his heart.
“Did Aillet… say that?”
“Yes.”
Of course, Ligares was someone who could lie without a change in his expression.
“So take this and propose, brother.”
Tesillid gazed at the brilliantly shining pink diamond for a long time.
Not only did it look far more precious than the ring Moriphis had presented to Aillet earlier, but the diamond’s color was so beautiful it naturally brought Aillet to mind.
Even to Tesillid, it felt as though there was no other engagement ring in the world quite like it. However…
“An engagement ring should have meaning if I prepare it myself……”
“Brother, you can’t buy a ring like this with a Holy Knight’s salary.”
“Even so, there’s no reason for me to receive a Winchester Kingdom royal heirloom……”
“There is! What’s strange about bestowing treasure upon a hero who saved the world?”
Ligares, cleverly, didn’t say anything like Tesillid deserved it because he was royalty, which wouldn’t have worked at all.
“Think of it as a hero’s pension.”
“Ah.”
Even Tesillid thought it was a valid point, as it was a persuasive reason.
In the past, when he regressed without answers, he was a devout and ascetic Holy Knight who shunned material desires as much as carnal ones, but the current him, having met Aillet, was different.
The peridot-colored eyes that momentarily couldn’t hide their sparkle when he said he would give her all his Holy Knight salary, and the torrent of praise she later showered him with for earning 2.67 million gold, had taught him a lesson.
‘The more I earn, the more Aillet will like it.’
And the more he looked at it, the more that pink royal heirloom seemed like a ring that existed solely for Aillet Rodelain. At this point, he felt a strong desire to place it on her finger.
“Please convey my gratitude to His Majesty.”
“Yep, got it!”
Tesillid didn’t know why Ligares, the messenger, was so happy, but he didn’t care much and put the ring box into his pocket.
“It seems our business is concluded. Then please, go ahead first, His Royal Highness the Former Prince.”
“No. I’ll go after I see you leave, brother.”
“You cannot. Please go first.”
“You first, brother……”
Tesillid sighed softly at the bickering situation.
“Ligares.”
“……!”
His bright blue eyes widened. As if it wasn’t a hallucination, Tesillid’s calm voice continued to echo through the air.
“I regret to say, but it will be difficult for me to become your brother. Even if I were to recover my childhood memories, it would be the same.”
“……”
“You may not understand, but the life I’ve lived makes it hard for me to accept you. So stop your futile efforts. You won’t be rewarded.”
“……Brother.”
A small call was all he could manage. Ligares remained rooted to the spot for a long time, unable to say anything more.
Tesillid bowed respectfully.
“I shall take my leave first, Your Highness.”
Tesillid deliberately turned away coldly and left the spot.
As Ligares faded into the distance behind him, the handsome man’s impassive expression crumbled slightly, as if mirroring his complex emotions.
In this timeline, Ligares’s wrongdoings against Tesillid were objectively small. However, to treat Ligares without excluding the memories accumulated from living through dozens of timelines, the things Tesillid had endured were simply too cruel.
The sight of a brother displaying affectionate expressions before him was simply overwhelmed by the memory of the arrogant prince who had once plunged a sword into his heart in the past. To a hollow extent, easily.
Tesillid had suffered so terribly that he could not forgive Ligares, and yet, on the other hand, he was so profoundly good that he didn’t want to harm Ligares even after experiencing such torment.
So he set a compromise. To live as complete strangers, unrelated, without intertwining.
He didn’t want to expend emotions. Even now, he felt rapidly fatigued from just a brief encounter.
‘I want to see Aillet.’
He felt he needed to see her face soon and recover. Fortunately, unlike his fingertips that had drawn lots, his walking steps seemed to be imbued with the power of love.
Soon, he was able to encounter her in a garden.
“Terri?”
“Aillet.”
“What brings you here alone?”
Aillet, too, was alone. Bianca, who had left the banquet hall with her, was not by her side. The fact that they could be alone together was exceedingly pleasing.
At any rate, Tesillid answered her question without hesitation.
He stepped closer to her, whispering.
“Because I missed you too much.”
He didn’t bother to mention the long-winded truth that he had followed her out from the banquet hall. That would seem too obsessive.
As expected, Aillet showed the reaction Tesillid wanted to see.
At his sudden, affectionate confession, her verdant eyes widened. The face gazing at him, forgetting even to blink, was so lovely.
While he suppressed the urge to kiss her eyes right then, she also came to her senses.
“Ah, it’s the same trick, but why do I fall for it every time?”
“Trick?”
“Isn’t it? It’s just an everyday phrase, but why do you make it so earnest that it makes my heart pound?”
“Because my feelings contained within those words are earnest?”
“……”
“Of course, it’s everyday. You are my life.”
“……What is this, a Rofan novel?”
He didn’t know what the words she was muttering dazedly meant, but seeing her reddened cheeks, it was clear they were good for him.
“By the way, Aillet, it seemed there was some commotion at your table.”
“Oh, that. It’s nothing much. Don’t worry about it.”
How could he not worry when his lover had just received a proposal from some madman?
As he felt a slight sense of unfairness, she tried to change the subject.
“And you, Terri, was there anything unusual at your table?”
“How could anything unusual happen at a family dinner?”
“My brother seemed to suddenly be acting very friendly towards you, didn’t he? How did you charm him… no, how did you win his favor?”
“Well……”
He had given Printz a little help to accurately recognize the situation, that he couldn’t be a candidate for Bianca’s husband given his position.
That would have been a sufficient summary, but Tesillid still hadn’t shaken off the feeling of unfairness from earlier. So, a small mischievous impulse arose.
Tesillid bent at the waist towards Aillet.
“Terri……?”
As his handsome face drew near, Aillet was slightly flustered. Just as the tension reached its peak, having approached to a kissable distance, Tesillid suddenly changed his demeanor plainly and gently bumped their foreheads together. Silver and pink hair intertwined as if belonging together.
“It seems your words came true. The whole world seems to love me.”
“……”
“Right? My world.”
“……Ah, seriously, again.”
At the charming laughter that rumbled in his throat, Aillet realized she had been teased.
Muttering softly, she soon reached a hand towards Tesillid’s forehead.
While tidying his slightly messy bangs, she seemed to feel an impulse and gently brushed them back.
When Tesillid gave her a puzzled look, she stated her impression.
“You look handsome even with your forehead revealed.”
“Do you like it?”
“Yes.”
“Then look at it a lot, and like it a lot.”
This time, laughter for both of them filled the air.
Just then.
<You two really have no sense of timing. If you lived together, you’d probably kiss with every breath.>
“……”
“……”
The two truly straightened their hair for each other, then stood properly.
“Let’s go back, Aillet.”
“Okay, Terri.”
The main characters cannot be absent from the banquet. The two walked together towards the banquet hall.