‘It’s foolish to expect people to change unless something tremendous happens.’

Valentin scratched and scraped the corners of the Bible in his hand with his fingernails.  

He had reached a conclusion about Evener. Then he had to definitively turn his direction to create the remaining solutions.

‘Then what in the world is the way to perfectly refuse this marriage with the 3rd Prince that Empress Beatrice is pushing for?’

No matter how much he thought about it, he had no choice but to target this side.

Under the lace altar cloth woven with the finest silk handcrafts, his head was filled with messy yet important thoughts that would determine his life and death.

With his mind so complicated with these thoughts, the Viscountess sitting next to Valentin, whose knees were trembling impatiently, grabbed his knee with her hand and pressed it firmly, not letting it show.

“Valentin…”

It was a call meaning to please stay still and focus on the sermon quietly. 

Somehow, the Viscountess’s stern expression wearing an altar cloth seemed more transparent than his father’s and Dalton’s faces not wearing one…. Valentin tried hard to focus on the sermon, refraining from biting his nails.

“The Lord said to his disciples. ‘Therefore be as wise as serpents and as innocent as doves.'”

As soon as he focused, a single word he heard brought Valentin a fierce realization as if a light bulb turned on in his head and a bell rang.

‘Right…! That’s it. Innocence…! The keyword is ‘innocence’!’

As soon as he finished the Mass and returned home, Valentin hurriedly rushed into the study. The Viscount’s study wasn’t as huge as a library, but it still boasted a decent size as it was connected to the office of a family that ran a bigger business than other noble families.

And what Valentin was looking for was something that necessarily existed in the Wiche Viscount family’s study, which was essential for the books and documents needed for business.

The empire’s law book.

Article 276. Those who marry into the imperial family must be chaste. Those who have had sexual experience before marriage shall be deprived of the right to become the spouse of an imperial family member for the sin of not keeping a chaste body.

Although it was what he was looking for, a scoff naturally came out as soon as he read it with his eyes.

This clause that those who marry into the imperial family must be chaste was an obsolete clause.

‘How old-fashioned is this clause.’

It was an absurd clause, especially to Valentin who had memories of his previous life. Could people in the old days or now do genetic testing, was there any other magical way to know if the child was the offspring of the imperial family? He could understand a little the hearts of the people who were concerned that someone else’s child might mix into the imperial bloodline when enacting the old laws back then, along with religious reasons.

The initial law book passed down from the founding period had many parts that did not match the culture of the present hundreds of years later, so it was about to be revised recently due to the congress’s continuous petitions. Fortunately, the emperor was still indecisively dragging it out. Valentin carefully ran his hand over the law book, recalling that he had heard it was a clause that was thoroughly kept in the previous or great-previous generations, although no one kept it these days.

An anecdote that the great-previous crown princess had to shamefully get her chastity examined right before marriage was still being passed down through people’s mouths.

‘Hmph, what chastity.’

Valentin could bet all his hair that Evener had already shared his body with the 3rd Prince. To Valentin, that was quite a big and important part, similar to risking his life.

‘It must have been easy since they can’t live without each other like that.’

As the protagonists of the original novel to share a thousand-year love, how passionate and heated must their bodies have been? Valentin shuddered, recalling Evener’s handsomely well-defined face that threatened him a few days ago.

Anyway, just the fact that this clause was still alive opened up a way out for Valentin.

Valentin was convinced this was the only answer.

‘I am already unchaste, so I dare not marry into the imperial family.’

A body that will perish when he dies anyway. It had no meaning in the face of death.

If he made such a claim after throwing away his chastity and proved it appropriately, it was obvious this marriage would be overturned.

Then he just needed a chance to show it to the empress or the imperial family.

If only he could prove this to them with any excuse…!

At that moment when he was pondering so hard his little head might explode, the imperial event of a huge scale that Valentin heard at the dining table with his family just yesterday came to mind.

‘Ah! The founding anniversary ball!’

* * *

As the story that ‘that Valentin Wiche’, who had disappeared from Eldon at some point 5 years ago, had completely returned to the capital began to spread in social circles, invitations started pouring in one by one.

No matter how much of a little devil Valentin was in social circles in the past, he was the only dominant omega among the young people of his time in noble families above viscounts in the Heston Empire. And the people of the Wiche Viscount family were welcomed anywhere, so in a way, it was natural for invitations to pour in like a flood.

The social circles were always full of people who wanted to somehow connect a business line with the Wiche Viscount family.  

From those who wanted to collaborate on a large scale to those who simply hoped for them to invest their huge funds in them, those who wanted to get advice on business, mines, or railways, to the absurd ones who wanted to privately lay railways in their territory for whatever reason. No matter the reason, as long as that enormous money was involved, it was overflowing with people who had similar thoughts everywhere.

It was the same for the Viscountess or the Viscount’s heir, who were not greatly involved in business, because even if they were not the parties involved, there were people everywhere who thought it was important to somehow connect a line of ties with them as long as they were family.

Things like, ‘Viscountess Wiche, I heard you like the precious wine from the Kent mountains! Will you give me a chance to treat you to it at the next banquet? Please come with your husband,’ or ‘Viscount Valentin, can’t you arrange a meeting with your father or uncle sometime? I have a very good business idea.’ These were words Valentin always thought were so common to hear from people in social circles that if those words had any form, they would have been worn out without shape from being used too much by everyone.

Anyhow, when everyone wanted Valentin’s steps for such reasons, he rejected all invitations at once and went into seclusion on the excuse of a ‘serious illness due to an unspeakable reason’.

It made it seem as if he had completely disappeared, as if visiting the gallery the day after returning home was the first and last social activity the adult Valentin did in Eldon.

Valentin had a firm belief that Empress Beatrice made him have no choice but to make such a choice, and completely locked the door.

That door was so sturdy that among the servants, no one could come and go except Valentin’s personal butler, Dawson.

Because Valentin firmly believed that if he showed even a slightly healthy appearance, and if that was conveyed to the empress through someone’s mouth, he would immediately have to go on an unofficial outing with the 3rd Prince.

‘I can’t show even a bit of a gap.’

So this was an inevitable choice for survival.

*

“No matter what, you should at least come out of bed, my son.”

“Mom…”

The bosom of the Viscountess who personally came to the bedroom of her grown-up son who had started seclusion on his own instantly made Valentin a baby.

Valentin whined, rubbing his face on the Viscountess’s hand that was softly stroking his face placed on her knee.

“I’ve sufficiently told the servants that you’re sick, so you don’t have to worry. Surely the imperial family won’t monitor the inside of our house, right?”

It was a vivid gaze that if such a thing happened, she would never stay still. Valentin flinched, seeing the rare expression of a beast protecting its young on the face of his always gentle mother.

She seemed to know well what Valentin was worrying about to act like this.

“Didn’t you say you’ll attend the founding anniversary ball?”

“That’s right.”

That day was the day of the decisive battle.

He had firmly made up his mind to carry out what he had planned last time at the founding anniversary ball no matter what, and was meticulously devising a strategy on his own.

“If that intention is definite, hurry and tidy up your face and come out. I called for Madame Delacroix. You can’t wear clothes made by someone unknown in Sorencia to the imperial ball.”

The Viscountess preferred designers from Blanches like Madame Delacroix.

Mom… How stylish of a city is Sorencia…. Valentin wanted to persuade his mother, but he didn’t have the energy to persuade his mother’s prejudice, which had already passed middle age by far, so he just swallowed what he wanted to say.

Moreover, it was true that he needed to have new clothes made, as she said. Among the members of great noble families, there were people who fussed around saying that the mere thought of wearing the same outfit worn last time to the imperial ball instead of a newly tailored evening gown was equivalent to the shame of walking around the square naked.

Furthermore, since he had been living in Sorencia hiding his status and had not attended any noble family’s social activities at all, he had no proper evening gown to wear to the imperial ball. Valentin nodded, recalling the state of his dressing room filled with only everyday clothes.

It was time to get up to meet Madame Delacroix.

Because in order to succeed in the grand plan he had schemed for several days with his little head, it was also important to look attractive himself.

Of course, Valentin, who had strangely equipped humility through years of effort to avoid the ruinous ending, had no idea that with that beauty and pheromones, he could captivate any alpha even if he wore rags that rolled in the stables.

*

In fact, I want to say that our poor protagonist Valentin did his best in his own way.

Let’s retrace together the traces of struggle that Valentin acted upon after realizing the memories of his previous life at the age of 15.

First, a polite rejection of the engagement through his parents.

Of course, unfortunately, it didn’t work at all.

Second, escape.

He cried and cried, completely running away, but this also didn’t work at all.