Fostering the Male Lead

Rosetta might not have liked it, but I liked the Duchy quite a lot. I liked the secluded and quiet place rather than the capital where all sorts of incidents and accidents happen. But maybe my thoughts didn’t reach her, the Duchess kept trying to appease me as if she were making excuses.

“That day, you kept screaming that we were abandoning you, but in fact it was all to protect you.”

“…Protect me?”

From what? Rosetta had a proud personality and a body as strong as steel.

She was more suited to protecting someone rather than being protected. Rosetta was the type of person who would survive even if she was thrown into the mountains. But what protection is she talking about? I blinked my eyes in wonder.

The duchess, who was sitting on her knees in front of me, wrapped her arms around my wrist. Her hand felt impatient yet desperate.

“That was the only way to keep you away from the eyes of the empress.”

“…Huh?”

The Empress again? I forced myself to suppress a sneer that was about to burst out. I was so dumbfounded that I couldn’t even say a word.

The duchess’ slender hands, which seemed unable to even break a branch, suddenly clenched around my wrist.

It was an unexpected force.

“Looking at the marriage talks going on between the 2nd prince and the young lady of the Ludrick family, it seems like she has given up on you.”

Her face, which had always been kind and gentle, hardened.

No way! It can’t be. My back shivered at her words. I shook my head slowly, not wanting to hear anything that would come out of her mouth.

“The empress really liked you, Rosetta.”

My head felt dizzy as if I had been hit in the back of the head.

*  *  *

Could it be because the boundaries of the duchy, which I believed would be safe, had been breached, and I had been repeatedly threatened by the empress?

The Duchess pulled my hand saying she would rather keep me by her side, so she told me to stay here. I couldn’t give a definite answer to her desperate hold.

My head was blank as if I had been hit in the back of the head.

“Milady?”

“Get out. I want to be alone.”

Interrupted by the maids who were hesitantly looking at me, I stared blankly into space.

‘Did she really say that the Empress picked me to be the second prince’s bride?’

I thought I would have lived a normal life if it wasn’t for Sihael, but now that I see it, even if it wasn’t for him, I was destined to be unlucky. My forehead throbbed at the secret past that kept popping up.

“Did she think of using me to make the Katzel family to come to her side?”

Since we were the most powerful family in the empire, the Empress must have wanted us to be on her side. But by then, the Katzels had already extended their hand towards Sihael…

‘She probably wanted to use me to disperse the power going to Sihael.’

I knew that she was greedy, but I never dreamed that she would even covet Rosetta.

‘Is that why she glared at me?’

She looked at me disapprovingly, so of course I thought it was because of Sihael. But now it seemed that she was also retaliating for rejecting her son.

By the way, my parents must have been quite helpless for them to send Rosetta to the duchy, but did she really give up?

It had already been 6 years, and there were rumors that she was initiating marriage talks with a girl from another family, so it seems like she eventually gave up, but I couldn’t believe it.

Because the Empress I knew was someone who would do anything to get what she wanted.

‘The reason why she abandoned Rosetta in the original work was probably because it was more profitable that way.’

Because it would be more advantageous for the empress to use her to depose Sihael as crown prince rather than have Rosetta as the prince’s consort.

‘However, it was all in vain.’

Regardless of how much the empress plotted and schemed, the second prince had no desire to be Crown Prince.

The empress had high expectations for her second son, but he was only a debauchee enjoying women, alcohol, and nightlife.

Second Prince of the Empire, Eutis von Idris.

When I first saw him at a banquet not too long ago, he resembled Sihael, but he had a different face. If Sihael had brilliant silver hair, he had blonde hair and golden eyes that looked like melted gold.

He was different from Sihael in many ways.

Unlike Sihael, who was tall and firm, he was weak and dainty as if he had never held a sword. But he was quite handsome since he was the son of the emperor and the empress.

‘Well, Sihael is more handsome.’

After unconsciously comparing Sihael with Eutis, I rubbed the back of my neck in embarrassment.

“My Lady, Sir Leonard has arrived.”

I cleared my cluttered thoughts and got up. As I followed Marina down the hallway, I saw Leonard, who had come to escort me today. When I put my hand around his outstretched arm, Leonard asked me as if he had been waiting.

“Are you nervous?”

“No.”

“Your expression is strange.”

I put a lot of effort into managing my facial expressions, but I didn’t know he would find out right away. I raised my hand and groped my cheek. I waited for a moment before asking Leonard, who was walking in step with me.

“Brother, is it true that the Empress considered me for the position of prince consort?”

“Where did you hear that?”

“From our mother.”

As expected, Leonard knew. If so, Lanoa would also know. Everyone in the family knew, but I was the only one who didn’t know.

“So was that why you took me to the Duchy? To hide from the Empress?”

“Yeah. You even destroyed all the furniture in the room saying you wouldn’t go even if you died.”