Not a Honeymoon Suite, but an Interview Room

#2. Not a Honeymoon Suite, but an Interview Room

"I-It's cold…."

Inside the carriage bound for the Winterwald Grand Duchy, at the northernmost edge of the Empire.

Fourth Imperial Princess Eleanor von Valdemar huddled up, trembling, and pulled her thick coat tighter.

But the icy wind forcing its way through the gaps in the carriage easily pierced even the finest wolf pelt.

"Sob, sob, Your Highness…. What are we to do? How could His Majesty send Her Highness into such a terrible place?"

Her personal maid, Marie, sitting across from her, sniffled as she repeatedly wiped away her tears. Eleanor forced a faint smile and patted Marie's hand.

"Don't cry, Marie. This is a duty I must bear as a princess."

Though she said that, Eleanor was burning with anguish inside.

Illegitimate child. Lowborn. A disgrace to the imperial family. These were the labels that had followed her like tags all her life.

To escape the contempt of high society in the imperial court and the bullying of her half-siblings, she had fled to the library of the Imperial Academy.

A library was a quiet place—and a place where one had to be quiet.

For someone treated like an invisible person everywhere else, the library, where everyone was equally silent, had been her only refuge.

After studying like mad throughout her school years, she had even graduated at the top of her class.

What came back to her was not her family's recognition, but a political marriage to the monster Grand Duke of the North.

The North wanted abundant material support, but the emperor had tried to settle the matter with a single bastard who was a princess in name only.

Given the circumstances, there was no way she could expect to be treated well after going there, either.

'Kylan Winterwald.'

Eleanor repeated her prospective husband's name in her mind.

A heartless butcher. A barbarian from the North who tore human flesh with his teeth and drank wine from goblets made of his enemies' skulls. A Sword Master whom even the emperor feared to provoke carelessly.

At least, that was the kind of man Kylan was according to the rumors.

'What if he takes out his anger at the imperial family on me? I might be locked away in a tower where not a ray of light shines and flogged every day for the rest of my life.'

Just as her imagination began to run wild with fear, the carriage came to a stop with a heavy rumble.

Creak!

"It seems we've arrived! Your Highness!"

Marie shouted, her face turning pale.

The carriage door opened.

In the fierce blizzard, knights clad in black plate armor stood in formation.

'It's spring, so how can the weather be like this…'

The oppressive sight took her breath away.

They were different from the gentle knights of the imperial capital down to their eyes. They even gave off the smell of blood, as if they had just finished hacking apart monsters.

In the center of the knights stood a massive man with a black wolf pelt draped over his shoulders.

'Black hair and tall… So that's the man who will become my husband….'

Eleanor, stepping down from the carriage, stared blankly at Kylan for a moment.

She had definitely imagined he would be a barbarian covered in scars, with shaggy hair.

But Kylan was a handsome man more dashing than any young nobleman Eleanor had ever seen.

Jet-black hair like the North's night sky, features carved with the care of a sculptor, and blue eyes so vivid they could freeze one's heart.

He was simply scowling fiercely.

In reality, he merely had the exhausted face of an office worker who had spent all night wrestling with deficit ledgers, but Eleanor had no way of knowing that.

'He really is angry at me! He's angry that some lowborn princess sent from the imperial family dared to keep the Grand Duke of the North waiting…!'

It was just as Eleanor trembled like an aspen, clutching her skirt and about to bow in greeting.

Clomp, clomp.

Kylan strode toward the carriage on his long legs. Eleanor reflexively squeezed her eyes shut. She thought he might slap her.

"Are you Her Highness Princess Eleanor von Valdemar?"

"Y-Yes! Y-yes, I am. It's a pleasure to meet Your Grace…."

"Did you bring your valedictorian diploma?"

This was even more unexpected than being slapped.

"……What?"

Eleanor made a foolish sound to express her confusion.

Not the marriage vows bearing the imperial crest, nor His Majesty's personal letter—he was asking for her academy diploma?

At her blank reaction, the furrow between Kylan's brows deepened.

"Come with me. We have no time."

Kylan abruptly snatched Eleanor's slender wrist and started striding into the castle.

"Eek!"

A short scream escaped Eleanor's lips.

The knights and servants lined up nearby gaped.

Their normally brusque lord, who was as indifferent to women as stone, had seized the wrist of a princess he had just met and was dragging her away roughly!

"Oh my goodness!"

"His Lordship has finally awakened to his instincts as a man!"

"He's dragging her along in such a hurry—could he be taking her straight to the honeymoon suite in broad daylight?!"

The servants' excited whispers reached Eleanor's ears loud and clear. Her pale cheeks instantly flushed red.

'In broad daylight? Is he taking me straight to the bedroom without a word of conversation on our first meeting? Maybe the rumors that he's a beast were true!'

Eleanor's eyes brimmed with tears, but cowed by Kylan's strength and charisma, she was dragged along without managing even a single protest.

Once inside the castle, Kylan went straight past the reception room and dining hall to a massive oak door at the very back.

Bang—!

Kylan flung the door open and entered with Eleanor. Then he firmly locked it so no one could come in.

"……!!"

Eleanor looked in despair at the closed door behind her. It was a sealed room. No one outside would come to rescue her.

"Y-Your Grace. We haven't even held the wedding ceremony yet, and you're talking about consummating the marriage… The imperial court's customs… Eek!"

Eleanor squeezed her eyes shut, clasped both hands to her chest, and took a defensive stance.

But what came toward her face was not a man's lips, but a massive bundle of parchment.

Thud.

"……?"

Eleanor, who had caught something, cautiously opened one eye.

The place she had been dragged to was not a honeymoon suite, but an office filled with the smell of ink and dust.

Two desks faced each other in the center of the room, and as soon as she entered, Kylan dropped into the chair at the desk opposite hers and folded his arms.

It was the scene of an ordinary office, utterly devoid of romance.

"The imperial court's customs mean nothing here in the North."

Kylan said coldly.

"W-why did you summon me here…."

"Your Highness the Princess. I was curious about your abilities. I wanted to know whether the title of valedictorian of the Imperial Academy was merely decorative."

Eleanor was confused by the sudden turn of events.

She had expected him to tell her to take off her clothes, and now he was suddenly demanding that she prove her abilities?

Was he planning to send her back to the imperial family under one pretext or another?

"Open the ledger."

At Kylan's command, Eleanor checked the ledger she had been handed.

[Third-Quarter Settlement Report on Supplies and Maintenance for the Territorial Defense Forces]

The title stirred Eleanor's scholarly passion—the one that had driven her to live for numbers.

"Page 74. Look at the settlement details at the bottom."

Eleanor turned the ledger pages with trembling hands.

"Find what's wrong with that item and explain it. You have five minutes."

***

Kylan watched her sharply with his chin propped on one hand.

In fact, the ledger was one of the duplicate sets of books Kylan had personally dug into to find out how the territory's military supply officers had been embezzling the budget.

'I wonder whether knowledge learned from books will hold up even in this rotten real-world mess.'

Her initial fluster lasted only a moment before Eleanor began focusing on the ledger.

"……Time's up. Did you find anything strange?"

At Kylan's question, Eleanor snapped the ledger shut and looked up.

The girl who had been trembling moments ago was nowhere to be seen.

"Your Grace, this ledger is… trash."

"Oh?"

The corners of Kylan's mouth lifted slightly.

Trash. An exact description.

Eleanor continued in a clear voice.

"The unit purchase price of magic stones is set 30% higher than the market price in the capital. Even accounting for the North's transportation costs, it's an abnormal figure. The bigger problem is the weapon repair item below it.”

She pointed out every error in the ledger, one by one.

Comparing the knights' deployment logs by date, she pointed out that although there had been only one large-scale extermination campaign in the third quarter, the repair charges had hit the monthly limit every month.

She hardened her expression, kept silent for a moment, then carefully opened her mouth.

“It may be presumptuous of me to say this….”

That's not presumptuous! Say it!

"I suspect the military supply officer colluded with an outside merchant guild, inflated the price of the magic stones, and siphoned off funds by fabricating repair records.… No, this is unequivocally embezzlement.”

‘Got it!'

Eleanor's words did not end there.

“Under Chapter 4, Article 12 of the Imperial Tax Code, this is a grave felony requiring the immediate seizure of the parties' assets and their interrogation. They've siphoned off 1,000 gold a month for three years, so including interest, it must amount to more than 40,000 gold."

“…….”

Kylan stared blankly at Eleanor.

His heart pounded.

As if he had met his first love again.

'There was a law like that!? Forty thousand gold would cover an entire month's deficit and still leave some over….'

Kylan had only been in this world for a few months, so he had no way of knowing about such a law.

Kylan sprang to his feet. Then he strode toward Eleanor.

***

Eleanor watched Kylan approach and suddenly grew terrified that her impertinent attitude had offended him.

'Aah, what was I thinking! I acted like a know-it-all in front of the monster Grand Duke! Is he going to have my head cut off right now!'

Just as she squeezed her eyes shut and flinched, Kylan grabbed her by the shoulders.

"Eleanor."

It was the first time Kylan had called her by name.

"Y-Yes…."

Kylan stared intently into her eyes and whispered in a lowered voice.

"Stay by my side."

"……What?!"

"Your brilliance. I think I've fallen for that beautiful intelligence of yours. Unfortunately, my loyal retainers only know how to fight; they don't know how to read numbers. And the ones who can read them have been too busy committing corruption… Winterwald desperately needs a lady of the house like you."

Eleanor's mind went blank at the sudden confession!

'Beautiful? Fallen for me? He wants me to stay by his side…?!'

It was a direct confession unlike anything she had ever heard in her life.

And it came from the ruler of the North, who was said to have neither blood nor tears.

It had come from a man whose attractive physique was utterly irresistible to any woman.

Eleanor's heart began pounding as if it would burst.

Kylan took a ring from inside his coat.

Taking advantage of the princess being too dazed to recover, he took her hand and slipped the ring onto her ring finger.

"This is my sincerity toward you."

Eleanor looked down at the ring on her hand with trembling eyes.

It was a diamond ring.

Diamonds meant eternal love and devotion.

"From now on, you are the wife of the Grand Duke of the North. This ring is the token, and I swear on the name of the Grand Duke of the North that I will not spare anything that threatens your safety. Will you accept it?"

'Ah…!'

Eleanor inhaled sharply.

He was vowing to throw his whole body into protecting the bastard no one had wanted.

She carefully nodded and shyly lowered her gaze.

Tears of emotion were about to well up in her eyes… when it happened.

"Now, then, let's end the vows of love here. Since Her Highness the Princess is now my treasurer, I have a first task to assign you."

"……What? Wh-what task…."

Kylan theatrically wrapped his arms around his shoulders and shivered as if cold.

"Isn't the room cold? The price of fire magic stones has shot through the roof lately, so the territory doesn't have enough heating money. Whatever shall we do?"

Kylan looked at Eleanor with a shameless expression.

"Ah, I hear you possess sun magic. Since the room is cold, would you mind using your magic to cast a heating spell?"

"……!!"

Eleanor's shoulders stiffened for a moment in surprise.

She had once burned down her own room with her sun magic.

It had been when she suffered a stress-induced mana rampage after being unable to endure the harsh persecution.

After that, the imperial family began mocking it as proof of a cursed bloodline.

From then on, Eleanor had spent her entire life suppressing her magic.

But wasn't Kylan treating the very power she had been most ashamed and afraid of as if it were nothing at all?

Simply, with an ordinary attitude, as though it were no big deal.

"Y-Your Grace…. Everyone shuns this cursed magic, calling it ominous because it is difficult to control. I could injure you if something goes wrong…."

"Cursed?"

Kylan snorted.

"How is warming a fire for us a curse? In the North, heat is life and a blessing. Don't worry about what others think and use your power to your heart's content."

In truth, it was merely the miserly remark of a poor lord on the verge of bankruptcy, but it sounded completely different to Eleanor!

Because she had never met anyone who acknowledged her worth as it was and actually needed her!

'His Grace intends to cover even my cursed magic with love. He sees me for who I am…!'

Eleanor let the tears she had been holding back stream down her cheeks.

Then, as if she had made up her mind, she straightened her shoulders and flung open the mana circuits sealed inside her body.

Whoosh!

The air in the ice-cold room warmed in an instant.

Judging by the servants' excited voices outside, it seemed the entire castle had probably grown warm.

"Excellent. I like it very much. At this rate, we should save several gold coins on the castle's heating costs. Hahaha."

"Th-thank you, Your Grace…."

Kylan pointed to the mountain of documents piled high as he faced Eleanor, who was wiping away her tears and smiling shyly.

"Now, the room is warm, so let's get down to business."

"Yes! Leave it to me!"

However, the princess's eyes, which had sparkled brightly until late-night snack time, were already dead by the time she started working overtime.