Adele slowly looked around the empress’s chambers, as if checking one last time to see whether she had left behind even the smallest lingering attachment.
But no matter how many times she looked, there was nothing.
‘Ah… it really is nothing.’
The moment she thought that, her heart felt astonishingly light.
Just then, she heard hurried footsteps—and with a bang, the door burst open. There was only one person who could open her door like that.
The man who appeared made her momentarily lose her breath—he was breathtakingly beautiful. His shimmering blond hair was tousled as if he had run here. With sharp, decadent-looking violet eyes, he glared at Adele.
He was Karl Ulrich of Ehmont, Emperor of the Ehmont Empire and Adele’s ex-husband.
Karl looked almost deathly pale. His eyes raked over Adele’s attire from head to toe, and he clenched his jaw tightly.
“Where do you think you’re going?”
His blazing gaze looked ready to devour her.
Adele turned away from him and strode forward. The Emperor stepped in front of her, blocking her path, then approached her closely with a low growl.
“I asked you a question. Where are you going?”
Adele’s golden eyes shot back at him defiantly—eyes he could never grasp no matter how hard he tried.
The Emperor wanted to lock her away like this. Even if he had to confine and restrain her—if that was what it took to keep her—he wanted to do it right now.
“……”
She stepped back as if unwilling to answer him, then moved toward the door again.
Seeing this, the Emperor grabbed her shoulder hard and spun her around. He knew how much she hated that, but he couldn’t think of any other way.
Adele harshly slapped his hand away. The two glared at each other, tension stretched taut between them.
A step—then another—they pulled further apart. Emperor Karl trembled as a chilling sensation swept over him, and finally blurted out the question that had been eating at him.
“You’re going to him, aren’t you?”
“……”
“You’re really going to Lionel Baldur, aren’t you?!!!”
The Emperor’s voice was one of despair, but Adele’s expression turned colder than ever the moment she heard the name.
He still didn’t understand what mattered most. Or perhaps… they simply valued different things.
“Why does it matter where I’m going?”
“……”
“No. That’s not important. What matters is that I can’t stand being near you anymore.”
“If my empress won’t stay by my side, then where will she go?!”
His growling question made Adele burst into incredulous laughter.
“Your empress? After you deposed me?”
Karl was struck speechless by her accusation. Adele wiped the laughter from her face and looked at him with a detached gaze, speaking in a whisper.
“This is better.”
She looked as if she had stripped away all burdens—and Karl’s whole body began to shake.
Stop. Don’t say more. Karl wanted to kneel before her and beg her to stop. But Adele didn’t give him the chance.
“Even if you hadn’t deposed me, I would have said this eventually.”
“……Stop.”
Only now did she show him the crescent-moon smile he had longed for.
“I’m throwing away the seat next to you.”
The Emperor stared at her with a face collapsing in agony. But Adele felt not even a shred of pity. Because even with that face, he could not let go of his own way. And indeed, with bloodshot eyes, he screamed:
“No!! You can’t do that. The only place you belong is beside me. No matter what it takes, I’ll seat you there again. You are my empress!!!”
To the man who dared call her “empress,” Adele delivered the final blow in a firm voice.
“I renounce the title of empress.”
A group of people crossed the vast wilderness. A long line of massive wagons loaded with rare goods followed one after another, and the soldiers escorting them numbered easily in the hundreds.
What stood out most in the procession was a large, lavishly decorated carriage—and the two flags hanging side by side from it. On either side of the carriage fluttered the banners of two great empires, positioned across the sea from each other.
Inside the ornate carriage, a woman gazed out the window with a bored expression.
Her glossy black hair fluttered in the wind, obscuring her view, so she lifted a hand to brush it aside. Revealed beneath it were eyes like rare golden jewels, shining as if they held sunlight within them.
Her name was Adelaide Gottrop—one of the highest-ranking Strikers capable of destroying the Tower’s core alone, and former princess—no, crown princess—of the Gottrop Empire.
The soldiers escorting the carriage kept stealing glances at the foreign princess through the open window. She possessed the kind of beauty that drew eyes without effort.
“Adelaide Gottrop.”
Adele repeated her own name with a cynical tone and let out a faint laugh.
‘It’s a marriage proposal from the Emperor of Ehmont. Go and become the Empress of Ehmont.’
‘…You must have been too anxious to keep me here any longer, Mother?’
‘I thought you’d accept gladly—was I wrong?’
At the Empress Dowager’s probing question, Adele was momentarily speechless. The Dowager leaned toward her silent daughter and whispered:
‘In every difficult moment… Don’t you regret that day? If only you’d let Lucio die that day… you would have become the Emperor of Gottrop.’
“Stop.”
Adele pushed her mother away with bloodshot eyes, but the Dowager did not back down easily. She looked at Adele with sorrowful eyes.
‘Adele. You owe your brother, don’t you? You may be loyal to Lucio, but what about your future children? Your retainers? Will they all think as you do? Even your heart wavered, didn’t it?’
“……”
‘Your existence is like a blade under the empire’s chin. For the empire’s sake—for your brother’s sake—leave.’
Adele shook her head, rejecting her mother’s words, and pulled out a small box tucked in a corner of the carriage. Inside the box, in a red envelope, were a portrait and a document.
With an indifferent hand, Adele lifted the portrait. It depicted a man dressed in Ehmont’s imperial attire. He was astonishingly beautiful. His neat blond hair and mysterious violet eyes belonged to Karl Ulrich Ehmont, the current Emperor of Ehmont—and the man she was to marry.
She had been driven out in such haste that she was only now seeing her future husband’s face and information for the first time. Adele set the portrait aside and pulled out the document.
As she skimmed through the brief, sparse information about Ehmont with a weary sigh, a small slip of paper fell onto her knee. Adele frowned and unfolded it.
[The Emperor Karl Ulrich’s mistress.
Name: Dian Poitiers
Age: 29]
It was likely a torn-out page from an informant’s notebook—something they hadn’t planned to include but slipped in at the last minute, just in case. She felt nothing in particular upon reading it.
A breeze blew in through the open window. Adele returned the papers and portrait to the box and closed the lid.
Would this road truly be smooth?
She had left behind everyone she could trust. She had severed her ties coldly, ruthlessly. When she turned her head now, no one who had always been there remained—it left her strangely empty.
She had left her homeland, crossed the deep and turbulent sea, and arrived on a new continent. Feeling the wind sweep across her body, Adele closed her eyes lazily.
“…Ah, damn it. This place is really far.”
Meanwhile, at that very moment in the Ehmont Empire, Emperor Karl was in his office receiving reports regarding his future empress. News had arrived via signal fire that the Gottrop princess had safely crossed the sea and reached the harbor. After presenting the list of dowry items from Gottrop, the attendant placed one final sealed document before the Emperor and stepped back.
“These are the documents regarding the dowry.”
The attendant glanced at the Emperor’s face and swallowed nervously. The beautiful, almost unreal Emperor showed no trace of emotion. That was what made it chilling.
Emperor Karl casually broke the seal and pulled out the document. As he did, something fell onto the desk with a soft thud.
“……”
It was the portrait of his future empress.
