BSPC 06

Chapter 6

Tamia and Leon’s eyes met in midair.

[That handsome husband of yours has been wearing a black hood this whole time. Why don’t you take it off first!]

“Take it off! Take it off!”

The louder the crowd cheered, the stiffer Leon’s expression became.

If word got out that the Second Prince of the Empire had entered into a fake marriage just to win the prize money, next month’s front-page headline in Babble-Babble would be his.

“Imperial Finances in Jeopardy? Second Prince Leon Enters Fake Marriage to Win Prize Money!”

……Just thinking about it was horrifying.

Tamia was equally tormented.

Nooo! We have to pretend to be married for an entire year?! Then obviously Father will find out and scold me to death for getting married without his permission!

But the prize money was far too large for her to simply give up first place.

As Tamia’s pupils darted frantically back and forth between money and freedom, it happened.

“Kyaaaaaa!”

A kangaroo-shaped monster that had been secretly hiding behind the podium flew toward Leon’s back like a cannonball.

Before Leon could dodge, the monster’s forepaw hooked his hood with the precision of a fisherman landing a catch.

Whoosh!

The hood was ripped off before he could do a thing, revealing a head of brilliant golden hair.

“……!”

“W-what the—?! Where were you hiding?”

Startled, Tamia rushed over and slammed the monster into the ground.

The monster didn’t even have time to scream before it turned into smoke and disappeared.

—Bang!

“Whew, everyone! You were surprised, weren’t you? Sorry about that. I thought I’d already taken care of all of them.”

Tamia dusted off her clothes and gestured apologetically toward the audience.

But something about the audience’s reaction was strange.

“……”

“……”

“What’s with everyone? Why aren’t you saying anything?”

Even the announcer stood there frozen, mouth hanging open.

“Hey, you guys? Did everyone get hit with some kind of paralysis spell at the same time? What’s going on?”

Tamia walked over to the announcer and lightly slapped his face.

Smack, smack.

Only then did the announcer finally snap back to reality and stammer.

[Th-the Second Prince?! Y-your Highness, wh-what are you doing here, Your Highness?!]

“Huh? Your Highness?”

Tamia, the only person who hadn’t figured out what was happening, looked back and forth between Leon and the announcer in confusion.

“Where is there a ‘Your Highness’ here?”

[Wh-what do you mean?! He’s standing right there! Your husband!!]

“That striking golden hair, those vivid red eyes, that incredible swordsmanship……”

“There’s no doubt about it! It’s His Highness Prince Leon, the Second Prince!”

The audience finally began to murmur among themselves.

“W-what, what, what did you say?”

Only then did Tamia realize what was happening.

Come to think of it, she vaguely remembered her mother once telling her that golden hair and red eyes were symbols of the Imperial Family.

She also suddenly remembered her father telling her that the commander of the Griffin Order was the Second Prince of the Empire.

She had thought it was information she had no practical use for, so she’d promptly deleted it from her brain……

“You lied to me! You never said you were a prince!!”

Tamia’s eyes widened as she charged straight at Leon and began pounding her fists against his chest.

“Urgh—wait! I didn’t deliberately try to deceive you……”

Leon hurriedly tried to grab her arms, but there was no way he could overcome Tamia’s monstrous strength.

“How could you trick me into marrying you? Huh?! You should’ve told me you were a prince from the beginning! Huh?!”

Every time she struck him, the impact was enough to make Leon feel as though his ribs were about to crack.

He hurriedly backed away, desperately trying to defend himself.

“No, it’s not like I deliberately hid it……”

Honestly, he felt wronged.

He had never hidden his golden hair, the symbol of the Imperial Family, from Tamia. Nor had he deliberately concealed the name written on their marriage certificate.

He had dozens of Griffin Order knights shouting “Your Highness!” at the top of their lungs, and Tamia had simply filtered all of that out on her own.

And now somehow this was his fault?

“Aaaah! What am I going to do?! I was an innocent girl, and you tricked me into becoming a princess! I’m going to be the Crown Princess—well, the Prince’s Consort! I absolutely hate this!”

Tamia stopped punching Leon and began pulling at her own hair instead.

As Leon watched her vehemently reject the position, he began to feel rather strange.

“……Do you really hate it that much?”

“Of course I do! Huh?! If I become the prince’s consort, I’ll have to live in the Imperial Palace! That place where you have to wear those ridiculous, dragging dresses every day and attend boring parties all the time? It’s basically a prison!”

After shouting that at the top of her lungs, Tamia suddenly froze.

“……Give me some.”

“What?”

“Give me some salt.”

[Salt?]

“That thing is definitely a monster disguised as a prince. We have to drive it out by sprinkling salt all over it! There’s no way my husband could be a prince. Get out of my husband’s body right now!!”

Conveniently, neatly packaged bags of pink salt—the participation prizes to be given to everyone—had been placed on the podium.

Tamia swiftly snatched up a bag, grabbed a generous handful of salt, and threw it straight at Leon.

“Begone! Prince, begone!”

[P-please, calm down!]

The horrified announcer rushed over and restrained Tamia.

Sure, he was her husband, but still—how could she possibly behave like that toward His Highness the Second Prince?!

Tamia promptly tossed the bag aside and began sniffling.

“Sniff…… I have to train with a sword regularly, ride horses across wide-open plains, and sometimes go monster hunting so I can swing my sword to my heart’s content…… But if I become the prince’s consort, I won’t be able to do any of that, will I? Huh? Sniff.”

Seeing Tamia’s intense reaction, murmurs began spreading through the audience.

“Oh dear…… It seems His Highness had been hiding his identity from her all this time.”

“Well, if I found out my husband was a prince, I might faint on the spot too.”

As sympathy for Tamia began to spread throughout the crowd—

Leon’s mood had already soured completely.

Tamia was the first person in his life to so openly and vehemently reject the position of the Second Prince’s Consort.

“No, you can train with me. I’ll make time for you from time to time. Riding horses and hunting monsters, too—you can do all of that with me.”

“Hic! I should be able to do those things whenever I want! What kind of freedom is it if I have to spend forever waiting for the busy Second Prince to find time to play with me?!”

Tamia’s defiance finally snapped the last thread of Leon’s patience.

“Hah! Tamia! You clearly have absolutely no idea what you’re talking about. Do you know how much freedom the prince’s consorts throughout history have enjoyed?!”

“……Huh?”

“Her Majesty Empress Camilla, before she became empress, was famous for sneaking out every night while she was a prince’s consort and emptying entire crates of beer at taverns! All under the pretext of personally inspecting the Empire’s public safety!”

At his outburst, Tamia stopped sniffling and listened, utterly captivated.

“And that’s not all! Every morning, Her Majesty Empress Isabella would choose whatever jewelry she wanted from the Imperial treasury and wear it. Once she had worn a piece of jewelry, she would never look at it again! And Her Majesty Empress Emily? At every tea party, she would forcibly drag her husband over and make him serve as a cake stand. For a full three hours, even though the prince was busy with state affairs!”

“Is that really true……?”

[Y-your Highness! Is it really all right to just say things like that? There are so many people here!]

“If you become the prince’s consort, you can use me that way too. And that’s not even all. There are 28,375 other benefits prepared that you don’t even know about. And yet you still refuse the position of prince’s consort? Why?”

“B-but I only wanted to win the prize money. How did things get this far……?”

Tamia’s voice trembled.

She felt as though her soul were about to be blown away by the force of Leon’s storm-like intensity.

That was when—

[P-please, both of you, calm down…… Huh? Wait a moment! The prize money? Did you just say you only wanted the prize money?]

The announcer, who had been anxiously wedged between the two of them, suddenly raised his voice, his tone sharp with suspicion.

[Don’t tell me…… You two got married for the prize money?!]

“Well, if they were really married, there’s no way she wouldn’t know her husband’s identity.”

“Then are you saying the two of them deliberately committed fraud?”

As whispers spread through the audience, Leon’s mind snapped fully awake.

If things went wrong, he was about to face a scandal accusing the Second Prince of the Empire of staging a fake-marriage scam.

“N-no, that’s a misunderstanding!”

Leon glanced at Tamia, who had abruptly stopped crying in surprise.

Fortunately, Tamia had clamped her mouth shut.

Apparently, she still hadn’t decided whether to give up the prize money or become the prince’s consort.

[Then what did you mean when you mentioned the prize money?!]

The announcer was relentless.

For now, I need to convince them that this marriage isn’t a scam.

It was a perfectly reasonable and logical conclusion.

But there was one thing Leon had overlooked.

If Tamia hadn’t been someone he actually liked in the first place, Leon would have ignored the criticism of the Empire’s people a hundred times over.