Late at night, a guest visited the room where its owner was sleeping deeply.
“He’s asleep…”
Only after opening the door did the words reach him. The guest paused for a beat, then waved the servant back and stepped quietly into the room.
No matter that this was his own palace—once he had given this room to a guest, he knew the owner of this room was not him, but the other man.
He’s so ignorant it’s almost pitiful now.
By what he had learned—learned in a way he could never forget—entering a room without the owner’s permission was a breach of etiquette.
And if that owner wasn’t even awake, but asleep, then it was even more so.
Because he hated not knowing. Hated being clumsy. Hated growing used to the look that said, I knew you’d be like this.
Even when his tone had been sharp, he had precisely pointed out the parts Edward confused, carefully and delicately, and Edward had tried not to forget those lessons.
Even after leaving the estate, he kept practicing—over and over—replaying everything about him in his head.
By chance, by design, by inevitability—every time they met, Edward carved him into his mind without missing even the tips of his fingers, the hem of his clothes, a single strand of hair.
And now. Unlike three years ago, he could confidently say he possessed proper etiquette.
And yet, he didn’t want to choose the option of doing it “properly”—setting an appointment for the next day and coming back again.
Even though he knew that if Sasha opened his eyes, he would carve Edward up again with that razor tongue.
“…Why did I call you here?”
A low, husky voice spread through the quiet room.
But the eyes that had always looked at him coldly were closed gently.
It felt unfamiliar—seeing him asleep without the slightest movement. Edward had carved every detail of this man into his brain, but this was the first time he’d seen this.
Of course it was. Sasha Ambrose would never sleep this comfortably in front of him.
Edward couldn’t bring himself to step closer. Standing by the door, staring at the sleeping Sasha, he felt strange.
Was it because the person who always raised sharp thorns the moment they were together was quiet now?
His deep, even breathing—soft, steady—was peacefully calm, like it was a lie.
Why did I really call you here?
He had never thought their meeting then would be the last.
You said you would become a great Emperor. Someday, he wanted to show you a version of himself that no one could deny—an Emperor in full.
But it wasn’t now.
The Empire—the capital—had only just barely regained stability.
And you, who always held standards so high and so unforgiving, wouldn’t acknowledge me for something as small as this.
I’ll look forward to it.
He had definitely said it.
Since that day, Edward had dreamed of the same scene so many times he couldn’t mistake it.
Rio had confirmed it again and again—Edward hadn’t been the only one to hear it.
A person who had never once expected anything from him had said that.
So he had to show you. He had to.
But it still wasn’t time.
And yet, out of nowhere, he thought he should summon you back.
Once the thought came, he couldn’t erase it.
I was the one who drove you out of the capital. I deliberately tried not to hear any news about you. I poured everything into stabilizing the country—into planting myself as Emperor.
But right now, he felt like he wouldn’t be able to endure it unless he brought Sasha before him.
He held it in for days.
And as he held it in again and again, a thought suddenly surfaced.
I’m the Emperor.
He was no longer an illegitimate son challenging for the throne. No longer a poor commoner. No longer some orphan bastard who didn’t even know who his mother or father were.
Now he could do anything he wanted.
Just like his father had.
He knew he shouldn’t do whatever he pleased just because he was Emperor. Especially not something like this—moving on pure impulse, with no reason at all.
But knowing that, he still sent people to the Ambrose territory without telling a single one of his close confidants.
It was an utterly selfish calculation: What can you do about it once I’ve already brought him here?
Was that why he felt guilty now? Did he regret summoning you, now that you were here? Or was he afraid to face you?
Even after hearing that Sasha was in the capital—inside the Imperial Palace—he only came to see him after finishing every last item of his day.
On the way here, he kept thinking about what he wanted.
Did he want to come to his senses again by hearing Sasha’s words that stabbed like daggers? Since everyone kept telling him he was doing well no matter what, did he start needing the one person who had always opposed him, criticized him—Sasha?
But now that he saw him, he understood.
That had only been a plausible rationalization—to justify summoning him.
Sasha wasn’t angry. He wasn’t cold. He wasn’t looking at him with indifferent eyes.
And that—Sasha like that—made Edward strangely… glad.
Yeah. He didn’t know why, but he must have missed him.
Why?
Why did I miss you?
You, who always knew everything—do you know why I’m like this?
“Sasha… Ambrose.”
Even as Emperor—knowing the other man was so deeply asleep he couldn’t hear him—Edward still couldn’t call his name easily.
Why was he so careful, and yet unable to tear his eyes away from the sleeping face?
And now—
“You.”
Edward made a choice that none of his people, Sasha, or even Edward himself could truly understand.
“I need you…”
The words came out.
“By my side.”
It had been impulsive—but the moment he said it, he knew.
This was what Edward had wanted since that day, half a year ago.
*****
Early in the morning, nobles who had gathered at the Imperial Palace at the Emperor’s summons looked around and whispered.
“Did you hear?”
“…You mean Marquess Ambrose?”
“Viscount.”
No one in the capital or the Imperial Palace didn’t know Sasha Ambrose had been demoted to Viscount. And yet, the name “Marquess Ambrose” still clung to people’s minds with a fierce intensity.
Sasha Theodore Ambrose.
Born a ruler. A man who had never once bowed his head to anyone—nobility itself made flesh.
Even among nobles who had grown sick of beauty over a lifetime, he possessed a face that refused to become familiar. That alone made him exceptional, but Sasha Ambrose had something else besides looks that captured people.
An overwhelming presence that couldn’t be put into words.
The way people assigned meaning to his smallest movement. The way they became restless at a single look, a single glance.
An absolute authority no one could easily challenge.
That was what everyone felt the moment they saw Sasha Ambrose.
That was why, when Sasha raised a banner against the imperial family, nobles only thought, So it’s finally come. And when they saw the nobles who followed him, they set right and wrong aside and thought, I can see how that could happen.
But that Sasha Ambrose had been defeated by Edward Lacarte.
The downfall of a man who didn’t match the word defeat in any way brought confusion to the nobility.
It was so abrupt that even the Emperor’s own people were thrown off—because the damage had been smaller than expected.
Like the heavens were helping them: if they lifted their heads, if they stumbled, assistance fell by coincidence at exactly the right moment.
Hadn’t someone said it, watching that chain of events unfold a few months ago?
An Emperor really has to be born with heaven-sent fortune.
They had been chewed out for it the moment they spoke—how dare you insult His Majesty—but plenty of the people who heard it must have agreed.
That was how immense the weight of Sasha Ambrose’s name was.
But Sasha Ambrose had lost, and he had been expelled from the capital.
And the nobles of the capital gradually forgot him. The capital was changing rapidly, and they were too busy surviving to spend time thinking about someone already gone.
When people heard that the Grand Duke, the deposed former Emperor, and Sasha had not been executed, at first they judged the new Emperor as too soft.
But that opinion died quickly.
Their new Emperor, Edward, was upright and merciful—yet at the same time, coldly rational and decisive.
Nobles who had looked down on him, thinking he might be weak and easy to handle, paid a proper price. Those who didn’t know their place and tried to raise their heads again—whether from the Grand Duke’s faction or the Emperor’s—had their necks cut without exception this time.
It kept happening: nobles who had attended meetings together died overnight, and then the noble next door died.
The nobility learned—down to the bone—that “merciful” did not mean “easy.”
And then, just as they were finally finishing their read on the new Emperor, that name surfaced out of nowhere.
Sasha Ambrose.
Unlike other forces that had twitched and stirred from time to time, this faction had shown no sign at all—which only made it more suspicious.
Its head had returned to the capital.
Not by choice, but by the Emperor’s command.
“What in the world is going on?”
“Did he do something again without us knowing?”
“…Then he’d be in the underground prison.”
The Emperor was not someone who would ever overlook a criminal who committed crimes again.
And yet they said Sasha Ambrose—returned to the capital—was staying in the Imperial Palace as a guest.
The nobles exchanged looks, realized none of them knew anything, and could only smack their lips in frustration.
“Well. We’ll find out today.”
“I suppose we will. Ah—by the way, people who actually saw the viscount in person were making a fuss.”
A noble shook his head as he recalled the man whose chilling smile—surely full of schemes—was beautiful beyond reason.
“I heard. They said he got even more beautiful.”
“They said they thought they’d built up immunity, but after seeing him again, it was all gone.”
“So what? It’s not like we’re going to rip his face off and live on it.”
“Well, with a face like that…”
Once one person started, it spread like contagion—talk about his looks flowed through the meeting hall.
Even if he was terrifying, it was hard not to envy the beauty he possessed.
“His Majesty enters!”
And when their master—the Emperor, Edward—stepped into the meeting hall, the commotion that had briefly settled immediately swelled again, exploding at the decision he delivered.