"How did Adelgius do it again?"
Kwon Minseong searched his memory and tapped the stairs with the tip of his shoe.
Nothing happened.
He clapped his hands the way he did when activating the mechanical arms.
Still nothing.
"Walk up."
The messenger spoke without taking his eyes off the front.
"The Emperor awaits above. Climb with reverence in your heart."
"Right... because walking up a few stairs magically creates reverence."
The brat was trying to establish authority from the entrance.
Ridiculous.
If he thought a few flights of stairs would intimidate him, he was mistaken.
Roughly three hundred...
Kwon Minseong quickly counted the steps with his eyes.
The marble staircase was about the height of a ten-story apartment building.
If he pretended the elevator was broken, it wasn't impossible.
And refusing to climb would only mean getting dragged into exactly the kind of power struggle the Emperor wanted.
So he started upward without complaint.
The Imperial messenger, who had been staring into space the entire time, stole a glance at him.
He seemed to be watching for some kind of reaction.
Many Elunem nobles had climbed these stairs drenched in humiliation.
Some had even burst into tears after realizing they were being forced to walk like commoners.
But Kwon Minseong marched upward energetically.
Keep the legs at ninety degrees.
Look straight ahead.
Long inhale.
Short exhale.
Stair climbing was excellent exercise.
It consumed one and a half times more energy than walking on level ground and burned more than twice as many calories.
No expensive equipment required.
All you needed was a staircase.
Simple.
Accessible.
Efficient.
Thanks to being physically fifteen years younger, Kwon Minseong climbed all three hundred steps with ease.
"Workout complete."
Reaching the top, he nodded to himself in satisfaction.
He even stretched properly, pulling each ankle inward for thirty seconds before looking around.
He had climbed the stairs exactly as instructed.
Yet neither Tillio nor the Imperial messenger was anywhere to be seen.
"Which way do I go?"
He turned toward a nearby Imperial Guard.
Naturally, the guard did not answer.
"Oh, come on. Seriously. They could've at least written directions in the letter."
This was probably another part of the power play.
That brat had learned all the wrong things.
Shaking his head, Kwon Minseong headed toward the palace entrance.
Passing through a colossal gate larger than Cologne Cathedral, he stepped inside.
Soft.
A blue carpet spread beneath his feet.
"Hmm."
Clap. Clap.
Planting his foot firmly on the carpet, he clapped his hands.
Nothing happened.
With no other choice, he began following the blue carpet.
If he kept walking, he would eventually run into someone.
A guard.
A servant.
Even a janitor.
Anyone.
Grind.
While he was admiring the portraits hanging on the walls, he suddenly heard machinery moving beneath his feet. Get faster updates on g.com.
"Huh?"
He nudged the carpet with the tip of his shoe.
"Was that you? Decided to give me a ride after all?"
He spoke to it as though it were an old friend.
The carpet immediately fell silent.
"What? Then where did that sound come fro—AAAHHHHH!"
Wheeeeeee!
The blue carpet shot forward.
Without exaggeration, it moved faster than the carriage that had brought him to the palace.
The speed was comparable to racing downhill on a bicycle with no brakes.
In short—
It was absurdly fast.
Unable to maintain his balance, Kwon Minseong collapsed onto all fours atop the moving carpet and screamed.
If there was anything that terrified thirty-five-year-old Kwon Minseong, whose soul had become thoroughly stained by the mortal world, it was three things.
One: bankruptcy.
Two: debt.
Three: amusement rides.
"AAAAAH! HELP ME!"
Every time the carpet veered left or right around a corner, Kwon Minseong shrieked.
He debated throwing himself off the carpet fourteen separate times.
Then the carpet suddenly accelerated toward a blue door.
If I hit that, I'm getting a concussion at minimum!
Instinctively, he covered his head.
"You here?"
There was no crash.
No impact.
Only a voice dripping with contempt landing atop his head.
Kwon Minseong cautiously opened one eye and looked up.
The Emperor of Elunem was sitting directly in front of him.
More accurately—
Kwon Minseong was sprawled flat at the Emperor's feet.
What happened?
He carefully surveyed the surroundings.
One moment he had been seconds away from smashing into a marble door.
The next he was bowing before a psychopath Emperor.
He had no idea how.
The room the moving carpet had delivered him to looked nothing like the rest of the palace.
The usual cobalt blue and gold extravagance was nowhere to be seen.
The walls were rough and unfinished, covered only in plaster.
The room looked more like a construction site.
Is exposed concrete fashionable here too?
Boom.
While he was distracted by the thought, the marble doors closed firmly behind him.
His wandering black eyes found the Emperor again.
To look at Tillio's face, Kwon Minseong had to crane his neck for quite a while.
If inheriting Eickhalden blood wasn't the only qualification for becoming Emperor in Elunem, then there were clearly two additional requirements.
Either be rude.
Or be tall.
The giant standing before him wore a formal uniform woven from blue silk representing the Imperial Family.
Brilliant gold embroidery, as bright as the Emperor's own hair, decorated the sleeves and collar.
A thick braided gold cord draped from his shoulder to a jeweled brooch on his chest.
Without the black cloak that usually concealed him from head to toe, the sheer presence and beauty of the Emperor struck Kwon Minseong like a physical force.
His breath caught automatically.
There was no way this beautiful man could be the psychotic thug Kwon Minseong knew.
He must have a hidden twin brother.
There was no other explanation.
Then Tillio shifted his weight onto one leg and tilted his head at an angle like a delinquent.
The illusion vanished instantly.
Nope. Definitely the thug Emperor.
"Hey. Quack."
The title Emperor was wasted on him.
He looked more like a debt collector.
"Get home safely this morning?"
Even that sounded like something a gangster would say.
Kwon Minseong shuddered and squeezed his eyes shut.
Even Adelgius's arrogant way of speaking was ten thousand times better.
"I obviously got home safely. Otherwise I wouldn't be here."
"Yeah. Looks that way."
Tillio smirked.
"Heat Cycle over?"
"If it wasn't, I wouldn't be here."
The Emperor raised a finger and lifted Kwon Minseong's chin.
"Didn't realize Heat Cycles ended that quickly."
"Maybe some people spend a day in heat. Maybe some spend a year. Why do you care?"
"An Omega's heat."
You don't have to lean in that close.
Everyone already knows you're handsome.
Kwon Minseong looked away indifferently.
Tillio immediately tightened his grip and forced his face back toward him.
"An Omega's heat lasts a minimum of three days and as long as five. Yours ended in less than twelve hours."
Kwon Minseong secretly bit his lower lip.
He had been so desperate to hide Aswin that he'd neglected the details of his lie.
So this was why he'd been summoned.
The man was annoyingly persistent.
"What about your Rut Cycle?"
Tillio's eyebrow twitched.
"What did you just say?"
"When was your last Rut Cycle? How long did it last? Did you resolve it by sleeping with an Omega, or with medication? How often do you take the medication?"
The questions fired out in rapid succession.
Tillio stared at the constantly moving lips before slowly tightening his grip.
Kwon Minseong's cheek compressed.
His lips popped outward like a goldfish.
"Uneducated quack. How dare you pry into the Emperor's Rut Cycle?"
"You started prying into my private life first."
"Are you comparing yourself to me?"
"Of course not. We look different. We come from different backgrounds. We have different body types, different eye colors, different jobs. Do you think that's all that differs between people? Put a hundred people in a room and you'll find a hundred different constitutions. How can you confidently claim every Omega's Heat Cycle lasts three to five days? Human bodies aren't machines. Some Omegas stay in heat for more than a week."
He paused.
"And some are like me."
Not that I'm actually an Omega.
He silently added the last part to himself.
Tillio stared down at the insolent quack lying at his feet.
The man was disrespectful.
Shameless.
But he was right.
A hundred people meant a hundred different constitutions.
Tillio himself was proof of that.
Because he was the only Alpha in existence without a Rut Cycle.
There had once been a time when he'd hoped he might secretly be a Beta instead.
Unfortunately, reality had proven otherwise.
The reactions of his body to Omega scent.
The blood tests Reiner had personally conducted more than ten times.
Neither left room for false hope.
"Quack."
"Not answering, are you?"
"I'm not a quack. That's why I can't answer."
Uneducated.
Infuriating.
Yet there was nothing else quite like him.
Tilting his head, Tillio pressed their foreheads together.
A nose bridge taller than the clock tower in Elun Square settled firmly against Kwon Minseong's.
The distance between them vanished.