By Zephyria 
Looking at the back of his round head, I was overcome by a strange feeling. I thought he would resist at least a little, but I didn’t expect him to be so dejected. I hesitated, pursed my lips, swallowed, and said.
“The people here are all quick-witted and kind, so they won’t treat you badly. I’ll tell them in advance, so don’t worry too much about that.”
“……”
“And, well, I’m a Prince, and you’re married to me, so you’re my consort. So, no one except the Emperor and my brother will treat you badly, right? But my brother isn’t the type to treat you badly, so if you’re careful of only the Emperor, there’s not much danger for you.”
“……”
I spoke as carefully as possible, but Aegis didn’t lift his head. Was he crying? Recalling his violent appearance from earlier, it seemed unlikely, but there was still a chance.
I panicked, unsure of what to do, and then lowered my head slightly and called out to him.
“Aegis.”
“……”
“Are you perhaps cry……”
I almost bit my tongue before I could finish speaking. Aegis, who had been looking down, raised his gaze to look at me. The distance was so close that I was startled, but what surprised me even more was the excessively intense look in his eyes.
Like the Eye beam of the mad bull who had punched me earlier…
“Why… Why! What!”
I was startled and jumped up, taking a couple of steps back. Aegis, who had been glaring at me with a fierce and venomous look, belatedly opened his mouth.
“There’s some truth in what you say.”
“Oh, okay. Thank you…”
But why that expression? I stammered, looking flustered, and Aegis added.
“But I don’t want to listen to you.”
“What?”
“I just don’t want to do what you tell me to do.”
“……”
What kind of ridiculous tantrum was this? He was just saying he didn’t want to without any logic, so I didn’t know what to say.
I just stared blankly at the proud fool and asked, genuinely curious.
“Then are you just going to die?”
“I don’t want to die either.”
“Then what are you going to do?”
“I’m going to study. But keep this in mind.”
Didn’t he say he wouldn’t do it earlier? Still, I was relieved that he was going to do it again, but I still felt uneasy. I nodded with a dazed expression.
“I’ll keep it in mind, so tell me. What do I need to know?”
“Just because I’m listening to you doesn’t mean I’m submitting to you.”
“…I never thought that in the first place?”
What was he even talking about? I was flustered by the sudden turn of logic, and Aegis, who had stood up from his seat, dusted off the dirt on his skirt and said.
“I’m just learning because I think it will be useful to me, not because you told me to.”
“Good thinking.”
“And in the future, even if I get angry, I’ll hide where no one is and smash things.”
Wasn’t there an option not to smash things in the first place? I wanted to ask, but I just nodded, afraid of provoking him again.
“Okay, good job.”
Aegis glared at me again at my words, but the venom had disappeared from his eyes. I wanted to end it on a good note like this, but since it had come to this, I decided to see it through to the end today.
“I forgot to mention it earlier, but from now on, we have to sleep together in the same room.”
“I’m warning you in advance.”
“Wait a minute!”
At this point, I knew what was going to come out of his mouth without even hearing it. I opened my mouth before Aegis could utter any profanities.
“I’m saying this for your sake, so listen for now. You’re not an ordinary person, and you’re a Princess who came as a hostage, so if rumors spread that you’re sleeping alone from the first day of your marriage to me, how will people see you? So, to prevent gossip, let’s just sleep together for a week.”
“……”
“I usually go to the Harem often, so if we just stay together for a week, no one will say anything even if we don’t sleep together after that.”
A week was a bit too short, but considering Aegis’s personality, a week seemed to be the limit.
“Messy bastard.”
Then Aegis started cursing again. It was so sad that I didn’t even hear those things as curses anymore. In just one day, I had heard all sorts of vulgar curses, so there was no impact at all.
“The royals of this country all have one or two Harems.”
“Is that something to be proud of?”
“It’s not a flaw, is it? Don’t you have things like that in your country?”
“No! Where would we put something like that!”
Why was he so angry? I sighed deeply, and I saw Aegis taking a deep breath as if he was about to say something again.
“And try to fix your way of speaking. I told you, you can’t do that?”
I spoke before another curse could come out of his mouth, and Aegis tilted his head to the side and said.
“There’s no one here anyway.”
“Why is there no one? I’m here.”
“Shut up.”
I saw Aegis gripping the back of the chair next to him tightly. Seeing that, I was dumbfounded and closed my mouth for the time being.
“Just one week.”
I nodded at Aegis’s grinding words. I was starting to feel disillusioned, wondering if I had to go this far while being treated like this, even though it wasn’t for my own good.
Still, now that I had made up my mind, I decided to just do this much and then stop caring. I sighed and added, just in case Aegis was worried.
“I swear that I won’t do anything you hate or any unfair acts while we’re together.”
I saw Aegis’s shoulders twitch at my words. Seeing that, I opened my mouth as carefully as possible.
“As I said, I only like men anyway, so to you…”
“Shut your mouth, you pervert.”
Carefully my ass, I couldn’t hold back in the end and clenched my fist and screamed.
“You personality-wreck!”
“Shut up! Shut up!”
“Look at that, that bad temper! Hey! Hey! Aren’t you going to put that down? Hey!”
In the end, even the last remaining chair met its end, and just before it escalated into a physical fight like before, we barely regained our sanity and found common ground.
“I don’t care about your preferences, so don’t ever say that kind of thing in front of me again. I’m not curious and I don’t want to know!”
“No, I’m just…”
“If I say it once, understand. Don’t make me repeat myself.”
“…Okay.”
What did I do so wrong? I pouted my lips and frowned as hard as I could and said.
“Don’t use violence. I told you, it’s absolutely not allowed.”
“I didn’t hit you, I just…”
“I told you to understand if I say it once, right? Don’t make excuses.”
I saw his expression distort at my words. Aegis, who had taken a breath as if to say something, slowly exhaled and gritted his teeth and said.
“Okay.”
“……”
“……”
After saying those words, we glared at each other for a long time, and then we turned our heads away without either of us being the first to do so.
And we left the perfectly good bed and took our places at opposite ends of the room. Aegis spent the night at the far east end of the room, and I spent the night at the far west end, with our backs turned to each other.
¸.•¨•¸.•¨•¸.•¨•¸
After spending our first night together, we were supposed to have breakfast together, but we had barely slept a wink on the hard floor, so we had no appetite.
We didn’t say anything to each other, but we conveyed our intention to skip breakfast and go back to our rooms to sleep with our eyes, and then we returned to our respective rooms. As soon as I flopped down on the bed in my room, I finally felt a little better.
Perhaps because the tension had been released, I suddenly started to feel sleepy. I called a maid and told her about Aegis’s etiquette education and not to argue with his words, and then I fell asleep as if I had fainted.
And I woke up late in the afternoon.
I still didn’t have an appetite, so after eating a few pieces of fruit, I tried to go to Aegis, but it wasn’t easy to take a step. When we were together, our emotions were so intense that I didn’t really know, but when I thought about it calmly, I couldn’t understand why I had to be treated like this.
Or do everyone go through these difficulties when they get married? As someone who was ignorant about relationships, there were so many things I didn’t understand.
I didn’t think I would get an answer by worrying alone, so I went to Mahir in one go. It was time for Mahir to be working hard, so I went to his office and shouted, barging in without knocking.
“Brother!”
Mahir, who was talking with a few officials, perhaps having a meeting, sighed and looked at me.
“Kyle, you have to knock.”
“Sorry. But are you happy, brother?”
“What?”
“Do you like living?”
Looking at Mahir’s face, the sorrow of being treated coldly by Aegis began to well up. I approached Mahir and grabbed his collar, and a crying sound came out on its own.
“Brother, I have something to say…”
It wasn’t Mahir who answered my words, but one of the officials.
“We’ll be leaving now.”
Mahir frowned and tried to say something, but he looked at my face, which I had squeezed to look pitiful, and then sighed and shook his head. And after conveying a few instructions to the officials, he sent them all out.
As soon as we were alone in the office, I flopped down on the sofa and asked.
“Are you happy living, brother?”
“Why are you suddenly saying that? Did the wedding go well? I was thinking of going to Talim yesterday, but I didn’t go on purpose because I thought I might be in the way.”
Mahir said, pouring tea into a teacup and handing it to me. I stared at the steaming red tea and said weakly, receiving the teacup.
“It went well. It went well…”
“But why do you look like that? Did something happen?”
“No… Just… Just…”
“……?”
Mahir tilted his head as I kept trailing off.
“Just… I suddenly thought of the saying that marriage is the tomb of life…”
“……”
“Are you happy, brother?”
“……”
Mahir’s expression began to turn serious as I asked with a gloomy expression.