The Stand-In Empress’S Wedding Night [EN]: Chapter 39

39. My Face is My Weapon

It was a moment of drifting between consciousness and unconsciousness. I groggily opened my heavy eyelids and asked,

“You cried?”

“…How did the conversation develop that way?”

“Why? Why did you cry?”

“I don’t think I said I cried.”

Linelle chuckled, touching his eyes with his fingers.

“Ah, did you say you wanted to cry?”

“…I probably said I felt like crying, maybe?”

“I’m sorry, I only caught it in my sleep…”

“I’m more sorry. How dare an emperor disturb the empress’s sleep.”

“Hehehe.”

Even as sleep poured over me again, a laugh escaped at his joke.

“But you woke me up too.”

“Hmm? Did I perhaps say something in my sleep?”

“No, I mean you awakened all my senses. It was only the second time I’ve felt that in my life.”

Linelle spoke solemnly, as if he had received a divine revelation.

“When was the first time?”

I forced my eyelids, which had already lost their function, to open and close, asking him. I asked the question, but I felt like I would fall asleep like this without hearing his answer. All my energy had been drained from my body by whatever he had done to me.

“The first time I felt all my senses awaken was while practicing swordsmanship.”

“Ah, swordsmanship…”

Even in my sleep, I tried my best to respond to his words.

“There was a moment when I felt like I was climbing one step at a time, and then suddenly leaping over many steps at once.”

“Yes, stairs… You have to be careful.”

Hearing his words, the scene of Melanie falling down the stairs flashed through my mind. Linelle’s laughter sounded distant. His laughter reached my face with a cool breath.

“You’ve awakened everything in me, and now you’re falling asleep?”

“Yeees…”

“Heh, anyway, you wouldn’t know that feeling, would you? A woman who doesn’t even have the strength to pick up a sword wouldn’t know.”

A sword…! I heard my favorite word from my favorite voice. Even as I was falling asleep, my mind briefly returned when the word ‘sword’ came up.

“So, you’ll have to take responsibility for me for the rest of your life. The sword that awakened my senses is always attached to my hip, so you have to do the same.”

I felt Linelle’s hand stroking my hair. I wanted to stroke it too. The sword…

“Say you will for the rest of your life. I’ll be generous since you’re half asleep anyway.”

“Yes, for life… stroke…”

“I don’t think you know what you’re saying right now? Well, it’s okay. I’ll just fit it together and understand it.”

Kiss-.

“I’ll cherish and use you well for the rest of my life.”

I felt his lips touch and leave my forehead. I forced my half-closed eyes open at the sensation and moved my lips to match his conversation even a little.

“The sword?”

“You. Even more precious in bed.”

“The sword…?”

“The sword can be used roughly in the training ground. Heh, you probably don’t even know what you’re asking about right now, do you?”

“Where… where is the training ground here?”

“What? Why are you suddenly looking for the training ground?”

“When my body… gets hot and I can’t stand it… I’m going to go…”

That’s how it was when I lived in the Shattonil royal family. When the heat wouldn’t cool down even with cold water. When I couldn’t control that terrible feeling of standing alone in the flames. At times like that, I would run to the empty training ground in the middle of the night. I swung my sword for hours until the morning sun rose in the training ground. After entrusting my fiery body to the sword for a long time, the heat that had been burning all over my body would disappear. But why did I just bring up the word ‘training ground’? Ah, Linelle must have brought it up first, right? Yes, that must have been it. So I must have answered and then asked.

“If you get a fever and get excited, go to the training ground…”

I feel like I’m babbling something again? As soon as I spit the words out, they disappear from my memory.

“Zelda, you should come to me at times like that, why go to the training ground?”

“Because it’s worth looking for…”

“Perhaps, do you mean you want to try kissing in the training ground or something?”

“…”

“Empress’s subconscious, answer me. Quickly.”

My mind went dark for a moment and then turned on, so I didn’t hear his words properly. Oh well, I don’t know. When you don’t know, a positive answer is always the right answer.

“Yes? Yeees… That’s right.”

“!”

I politely answered him until the last moment. I was proud of myself, and then all my senses fell back into a faint as if fainting.

***

Linelle spent time continuing to look at Zelda’s sleeping face. Before he knew it, dawn was breaking. He felt like a new emotion was sprouting for her every time he blinked. He was liking her more and more. The more he touched her, the more he trembled. The more he looked at her, the more lovely she was. Whether it was with a calm and composed gaze, or with her eyes and mouth closed like this, or when she opened her eyes wide and talked back to him, the emperor, or when her pink eyes moved here and there in embarrassment, or when she didn’t know what she was saying because she was drunk on sleep like before, everything about Zelda was always new and fresh. In fact, he hadn’t felt any initial attraction to her. It was just before the wedding night that he felt a little sorry for the woman who was marrying an emperor she had never seen before in a strange country. On the first night, she acted like someone who had never heard of the Lapion imperial family. At first, he suspected that she was lying or pretending. But her clear eyes seemed to really not know anything. An empress who married without knowing anything about the Lapion imperial family’s traditional wedding night rituals. Linelle was just as embarrassed.

“What would have happened if the tradition of the priests watching the wedding night hadn’t changed? Huh?”

Linelle whispered softly, touching her cute nose with his hand. When Linelle learned that Zelda had no information about the wedding night, he felt like he was a shameless person doing something bad. It was unfair to call him shameless because it was his first experience too. As an emperor who had to show dignity and skill in every way, he tried to act calm in front of her. Fortunately, she was so nervous that she probably didn’t notice his clumsy kiss. It wasn’t that he wouldn’t sleep with the empress for the rest of his life. But he had no intention of spending the wedding night in front of the priests who only looked for God’s will in everything. So he changed the tradition of the Lapion Empire during his reign… But, he ended up causing an accident, led by a strange force. It’s strange to call it an accident, but Linelle thought it was a mistake because it wasn’t planned. Besides, he had promised the empress not to worry and to pretend to be acting! After the priests left, Linelle and she awkwardly looked up at the ceiling for a while. At the point when the sounds of each other’s rough breathing were almost simultaneously stabilizing… He thought it was from then on. That’s when she became special. That specialness became more and more intense as they talked to each other. He had always lived alone, enduring cold and gloomy nights since he received the hypothermia curse. But he laughed a lot on the night of the wedding night. Just looking at each other was laughter. Even the air was laughter. Every moment was warm that night. Linelle felt that feeling was happiness. After the first night, he felt like he had to see the empress every day for some reason. Otherwise, he felt like the day was too empty. Maybe he was just deciding on that feeling and insisting on it. But unlike his feelings that were getting closer and closer to the empress, she often showed an uncomfortable look when she faced him. He knew she was trying to hide something. He didn’t know what she was trying to hide, but somehow her pink eyes seemed to contain an apology. Why? Why was she looking at him with those eyes? Every time Linelle made eye contact with Zelda and talked to her, that question came up in his mind. She firmly countered his words, but sometimes she swallowed her words. Also, she raised her hand and came close to touching him, but stopped several times. It must be because he is the emperor and she finds his existence difficult.

‘Our empress is very shy.’

Linelle thought so. But that thought was completely shattered tonight. It turned out that she wasn’t just a shy wife. She stole his lips first, and today she boldly laid him down on the bed. Zelda immediately made a regretful expression, but… well… the attempt was good. Her sudden actions made him very happy and hot. Recalling that moment that had happened just a few hours ago, Linelle wanted to crumple up the rising sun somewhere and put it back in.

“Should I wake her up?”

He murmured, feeling Zelda’s rich and soft hair with the back of his hand.

“My wife’s body is so weak, I shouldn’t push her with my stamina, right?”

Ah, it’s painful. Linelle closed his eyes and deeply inhaled her fragrant hair.

“Zelda…”

Eventually, Linelle called her name. Still, he had a conscience, so he suppressed his voice as much as possible.

“…”

She was sleeping soundly without moving. As expected, her frail body seemed to fall asleep easily.

“Zelda?”

This time, he abandoned his conscience and raised his voice slightly.

“Empress?”

“Ugh…”

Zelda’s eyes fluttered and showed a slight reaction. Linelle straightened up from his side as if he had found a glimmer of hope in despair.

“Can you hear me? Are you awake?”

Linelle carefully raised his hand, but he couldn’t bring himself to shake her shoulder.

“Zelda? You have to answer when the emperor calls you.”

He desperately whispered her name and waved his lost hand over her closed eyes. After a while, her lips parted slightly. Her mumbling lips suddenly spat out words.

“Listen…”

“Huh? What?”

Linelle looked down at her face and asked back. She’s speaking with her eyes closed, so it’s definitely like sleep talking, but why is our wife’s voice so solemn?

“Do you have something to say to me? What should I listen to?”

Linelle chuckled and asked her sleep-talking command, ‘Listen.’

“Weapon… to.”

Zelda raised both hands and made a pose as if she was holding a sword.

“What do you mean suddenly telling me to take up a weapon?”

“Never mind. Listen, weapon…”

Our empress is strange.

“…She doesn’t have a fever?”

She’s talking nonsense. Linelle put his hand on her forehead and tilted his head.

“Charge!”

She seemed to be fighting someone in her dream. Is it because the last conversation they had before going to sleep was about swords and the training ground?

“She’s dreaming of fighting, which is really out of character.”

Linelle put his fist to his mouth and laughed. Her serious sleep-talking, worthy of a sword master, continued.

“Weapon in your body…”

“Huh? A weapon in my body?”

He continued to try to talk to Zelda in her dream.

“I know everything you’ve hidden…”

“How did you know? That I have many things in my body that could be weapons? You’re sharp.”

Linelle sat with his arms crossed and looked down at her sleep-talking as if watching a show.

“So, take up a weapon…”

“Zelda, I always carry my weapon anyway. My face is my weapon.”

Linelle said in a serious tone.

“And I do have other weapons, but I can’t just take them out.”

“You talk too much. Hurry up and take it out…”

“I said I can’t, didn’t I?”

He flopped back down on the bed and replied.

“Hurry up and charge…!”

Zelda swung her clasped hands left and right in the air.

“She’s so cute, I’m going crazy.”

He grabbed Zelda’s hands, which were wandering in the air, and pulled them down. And he pulled her into his arms.

“Haa, just kill me, kill me!”

At that moment, when Linelle gathered all his patience and exerted his self-control and shouted,

“Ugh!”

Zelda’s weak fist struck below Linelle’s abdomen.