Liard’s chest heaved in rapid, shallow breaths. He had spent his entire life taking suppressants — medication to dampen his desires and keep his heat in check.
Pleasure was something of no worth in Liard’s life. An unnecessary instinct that only ever got in the way of the greater good.
And yet in the prophecy, his future self was feeling so much that tears streamed down his face — legs locked tight around Erger’s waist, desperate to pull him closer. Eyes glazed over, mouth hanging open.
That is not me.
Liard refused it. It can’t be. There is no way that slovenly, out-of-his-mind creature is me…
The prophecy, mercilessly, continued to play on. He wanted it to stop, but it simply wouldn’t. Liard sat collapsed against the altar, trembling all over. There was no way to block what kept flooding into his mind.
Even pressing both palms flat against his ears did nothing — the voice of the man who dared to toy with the Emperor didn’t fade in the slightest; if anything, it rang out all the more intensely inside his head.
[How do you want it, hmm? Should I go slow? I ought to give our lovely Your Majesty exactly what he wants.]
The man grinned with a smug, lazy ease and rolled his hips in a slow, deliberate grind.
Lovely…? Liard’s jaw trembled. It was an expression he had never heard directed at himself in his life. What brazen soul would dare attach such a word to the Emperor?
Above all, Liard was handsome in a distinctly masculine way. He was a fine-featured man with a composed, temperate air — not someone the word pretty would ever naturally suit.
What in the world is any of this. And to think that the man spouting such insolent things was the fiancé he was about to meet.
Liard began to wonder if there wasn’t some kind of trap woven into this prophecy. How a prophecy was to be interpreted rested entirely with the Emperor who had received it. Something had to be wrong.
And is that man truly Erger? The boy he had seen ten years ago had been small and delicate. So much so that mistaking him for a girl wouldn’t have been strange at all…
The man whose back was all Liard could see was far, far larger than himself. And Liard was hardly small — he had spent his life with a sword in hand. What on earth had Erger been eating at the Mage Tower to have grown into someone like that?
[You don’t want slow? Wow, you’re clinging like mad.]
[Mm, yes. More…]
[As you command, Your Majesty.]
With those words, the agonizing prophecy finally came to an end.
“Ha— hah…”
Liard’s eyes flew open as he gasped for breath. His pale blue eyes shimmered with moisture. Mortification crashed over him and he didn’t know what to do with himself — he wanted nothing more than to crumple right where he sat.
Pressing one palm steadily against his heaving chest, he turned the prophecy the gods had just shown him over and over in his mind. Not a single part of it made sense.
It must have come down as a prophecy because it represents some seed of threat to the Empire’s wellbeing. But how is one supposed to interpret this?
Liard rubbed his face roughly with his hands as he struggled to recollect himself. Think through it calmly, one step at a time.
Prophecies only ever showed a fragment of the future — and they could change. Meaning this might be a warning.
Don’t lose yourself in acts of intercourse with Erger and neglect your duties. Certainly, his prophesied self had looked nothing short of unhinged. Letting out sounds of the most disgraceful sort every time Erger moved his hips…
“Ugh.”
The moment that wretched image surfaced in his mind again, Liard’s face burned scarlet all over again. He slumped against the altar and buried his face in both hands.
I must not become that. I cannot abandon my obligations in pursuit of the pleasure some young Alpha offers.
And furthermore — Erger was none other than the son of Duke Cezar Crowell. The Prime Minister of the Empire. Second in power only to the Emperor himself.
Or was he truly second? Of the six ministers who sat on the state council, five belonged to the Prime Minister.
Things had been even worse when Liard had first ascended the throne. Cezar had been in a position to effectively rule the Empire himself, using Liard as little more than his personal puppet.
Had it not been for the prophecies, Cezar would have simply had Liard disposed of and taken the imperial throne for himself. But the rifts — upon which the very survival of the Empire depended — made the Igvaltwyn bloodline a necessity he couldn’t do away with.
Cezar was a greedy man. Greedy enough to legitimize his own illegitimate ten-year-old son and maneuver him into place as the Emperor’s fiancé.
Up until his early twenties, Liard had kept his head down and done as Cezar said. Gradually, quietly, he had been building his strength from behind the scenes.
At present, Cezar was surely more discontented than ever. Over the past five years, Liard had blocked him at every turn.
Every prophecy that had come during these five rift-free years had carried word of Cezar’s schemes. It seemed the gods themselves believed that if the Prime Minister seized power, it would spell ruin for the Empire.
The fact that the Emperor received prophecies beyond those concerning rifts was a secret kept solely within the imperial family.
After announcing publicly that “there was no prophecy this time,” Liard would watch as the people rejoiced in the peace — and work quietly behind the scenes to hold Cezar back.
How bitterly Cezar must have been grinding his teeth all this while. Now that he was sending his son into the imperial palace, there was no doubt he would find some way to make his move.
So I must keep my head absolutely clear. Erger was nothing more than the son of a political enemy.
Intercourse, and only intercourse, for the sake of producing an heir. Do that, and send Erger straight back. There was nothing to be gained by keeping the Prime Minister’s man close. Emotional entanglement of any kind was absolutely, under no circumstances, to be allowed.
Liard clenched his jaw and rose to his feet. Erger’s voice from the prophecy was still lodged stubbornly in his mind and refused to leave, but he forced himself to ignore it.
Calling me lovely, of all things — me, twelve years his senior. Utter nonsense. Speaking to me as if I were a lover he’s trying to charm.
He had clearly been sent by Cezar with orders to bewitch him. The prophecy had only shown a view from behind, but Erger had been quite the beautiful boy back then — he had probably grown into a handsome man.
Is the Prime Minister planning to use his own son as a honey trap?
Erger’s life was a pitiable one, too, when he thought about it. Somehow ending up taken in by the Prime Minister, and now having to seduce an old man like himself… He was handsome and wellborn, so he probably had no shortage of people who followed him.
According to the informant Liard had planted within the Mage Tower, Erger had apparently lived quite a dissolute life during his time there. And now that very person had to court the favor of a man so much older than himself.
Everyone had their first child by their mid-twenties at the latest. At thirty-two, Liard was extremely late. On top of that, in the Empire, a man in his mid-thirties was plainly considered middle-aged. Liard would be there soon enough.
“Huu.”
Liard walked on with a worn expression. His head throbbed dully from the aftermath of the prophecy, but there was no room to indulge it. There was still much to be done.
When the Emperor rests, the people suffer for it. So no matter how hard it gets, all I can do is keep running. Endlessly. Until the moment my last breath leaves me.
He was just making to leave the temple when it happened.
“Cough — kh!”
Liard clapped a hand urgently over his mouth. Dark blood welled up and spilled out.
“…Good grief.”
Liard quickly wiped the blood away with his handkerchief. Even so, several more blood-laced coughs followed in succession. It seemed he would have to wait here until they passed entirely.
It would be a problem if anyone saw the Emperor coughing up blood. The imperial throne was no different from a bed of thorns. Those eager to tear a piece of flesh from the Emperor at the first opportunity swarmed all around him.
Liard caught his breath and let his eyes fall shut. He was tired. Exhaustion wasn’t something he usually let himself feel — but today, even he was worn through.
The irregularity in his body had begun around the start of this year. He had not yet told anyone.
He had his suspicions as to the cause. But he hadn’t been able to bring himself to say it aloud — not even to his younger sister, his only remaining blood relation.
Liard had simply resolved to push himself harder. He needed to stabilize the imperial seat by any means necessary, and he needed to produce an heir.
He had a plan. A plan that, for whatever time remained to him, made provision for nothing but the best outcomes for the Empire.
He would not allow anything — or anyone — to interfere with that plan. Not even the young Alpha being brought to the imperial palace like someone sold into it.
* * *
“You lunatic! Are you going to lie there all day?!”
Drmersh, an elder of the Mage Tower, twisted his face in fury and swung his staff. He beat his one and only disciple — sprawled out, stark naked, dead asleep — without a shred of mercy.
“Ugh…”
The massive bare figure gave a start.
“How many people did you have in your bed last night?! I told you you’d need to be up early and ready today. You’ll be the death of me, I swear. You hear me?!”
At the loud bellowing, the other figures scattered around the room began waking one by one. All of them were undressed. It appeared that his insufferable disciple — the one who’d make your eyes ache just to look at him — had dragged in a whole crowd again for a night of debauchery.
“Ah, Elder—”
“We’ll just be going, then…”
They were all trainees and mages from the Mage Tower. Every last one of them gathered up their clothes and shuffled out of the room.
The last to rise was the room’s owner — Erger Crowell. The man had the constitution of an ox; ordinary beatings barely registered. Erger scratched at his disheveled platinum hair and pushed himself up, bare-chested.
“You’ll wear it down to a nub, you fool.”
Erger let out a wide yawn and mumbled.
“Couldn’t be helped. Last night my magical energy again—”
“Stop using your magical energy as an excuse! That doesn’t mean you have to do it with multiple people every single time!”
Drmersh smacked the top of Erger’s head with his staff. Erger cradled his skull and grinned — the smile his mentor always called needlessly wicked.
“So what am I supposed to do? They’re all falling over each other asking me to sleep with them.”
With an irate Drmersh right in front of him, Erger let his eyes curve into a lazy, unhurried expression.
“Sleep with me and you feel good and you walk away with some magical energy. On top of that, I’m young and handsome. Honestly? I’d say I’m sacrificing myself for the good of the Mage Tower.”
