Beast Gacha System: All Mine

"Actually... I also have problems."

When she said that, Damon immediately assumed Bessa’s problem was that the dream was too big for her, an alchemist who had only ever wished to live out her days as a humble farmer, suddenly asked to shoulder the weight of an empire’s propaganda machine.

The intelligence Ivy had provided on her said exactly that. She was truly a quiet and practical woman with modest ambitions. A woman who would find the scale of this plan overwhelming.

He wasn’t wrong. But he also wasn’t entirely right.

"I... happen to be in love with someone recently," Bessa said.

Damon’s eyes widened.

...Love?

Of all things, love again?

Something in his heart stirred.

He didn’t expect this at all. Was she saying she could give up the life she had built, but not the man who held her heart?

"I just had a serious crush on him not long ago. He doesn’t know, of course. And I’ll never dream of actually marrying him," Bessa said, waving her hand dismissively as if she could brush away the confession with the motion. "But... well, I’m saying... Your Majesty... I’m in love with someone else."

Damon studied her face. There was no guile in it, just raw and awkward honesty.

"Why are you telling me this?" he asked. Was she about to refuse the plan after all?

"I mean, for a contract marriage like this, isn’t it great if we know these things in advance? I... I will do as the Princess says. I will fulfill my role. Just that, even if we marry... I won’t be able to fall in love with you easily," Bessa said.

Damon smiled, and Bessa flinched. But the smile was... strange. A-amused?

Little by little, Bessa felt an absurd blush creep up her neck. The Emperor seemed to be teasing her about something, though she couldn’t imagine what yet—

"So... are you planning on falling in love with me eventually, too?" he suddenly asked.

Bessa’s breath hitched. "T-that’s—! No! I-I mean, if you..."

Damon’s gaze softened. His violet eyes, usually so cold, warmed just slightly, and for a moment he looked younger. More like a man his actual age and less like a myth.

"If you never fall in love with me, it’s actually even better," he said gently. "You know who I am. And soon, who we are. People like us are in no position to hold passion or fire that would cloud our judgment."

This...

Bessa stared at him, wide-eyed. "So... you don’t want to fall in love at all?"

Damon nodded. "That’s the kind of relationship I think is ideal between Emperor and Empress. If you have doubts, should I explain why?"

Bessa blinked, startled by his gentleness. This was only their first real conversation, and yet he was being so... thorough. So patient.

"I’d like to know..."

"Alright." Damon smiled again, but this time there was a bitter edge to it. "You... know how my mother passed away, right?"

Bessa flinched.

The late Empress. It had been a famous tragedy. The Empress had been traveling from her father’s region when she, exhausted, fell from her horse and struck her head. It was too sudden. Too cruel. The entire empire had mourned.

"The former Saintess, Cecilia Araceli, revealed privately to us that she didn’t die from such an accident. She was poisoned. That was why she fell from her horse," Damon said.

Bessa gasped, her hand flying to her mouth. "Is that—"

"Yes. That’s the truth."

But why was he telling her this? What did his mother’s murder have to do with a loveless marriage?

"The Empress... our mother... she loved our father very much," Damon said quietly. "She never said it. And I don’t know whether Father knew, or only pretended not to know."

His smile turned sneering. "But the reason she rushed back home that day was because of that love. She heard that the Emperor had suddenly brought another woman into the palace."

Bessa’s blood ran cold.

The Empress had been so overcome by jealousy, so desperate to confront her husband, that she had ridden recklessly through the night.

More than that recklessness, someone had used that love against her. They poisoned her beforehand, knowing the fall would be blamed on exhaustion.

Damon and Angela had been very young when it happened. Only years later, after Cecilia became Saintess, did they learn the truth.

By then, their stepmother, Lady Vera, had almost become the next Empress. But with Cecilia’s revelation, they were able to cut off her support and prevent her ascension.

Lady Vera might not have been the mastermind. But her rise to power had been tied to their mother’s death, and that was enough to earn the siblings’ enmity.

Damon had been ruthless when the truth came out. He cut down everyone involved in his mother’s murder, one by one. It was that campaign of quiet vengeance that had earned him his notorious reputation.

"Between me and my Empress, I don’t want that kind of tragedy," Damon said. "At the same time, I know if I love someone, I’ll lose most of my reason and abandon my responsibilities."

Bessa’s eyes were still wide.

This was not something she had ever imagined. Not even her dreams could conjure such a story.

The Emperor, the cold, cruel, monstrous Emperor of rumor, was this kind of man?

He was... someone who had witnessed love destroy his family and decided he would rather live without it than risk the same fate?

"Miss Bessa, as the rumors say, I truly am a cruel, violent, and insane man," Damon said, his voice dropping. "If I love you and fall into that passion, I might behead a man for looking at you too long. I don’t want to be that kind of person."

He said it so simply. So matter-of-factly, like a man describing the symptoms of a terminal disease he had already accepted.

This... It felt like an exaggeration. It had to be. But Bessa didn’t know him well enough to tell.

And yet, the only thing that was clear to her at that moment was this. Damon Iondora was afraid of his own feelings.

Not in the way a shy boy fears rejection, but in the way a general fears an enemy that lives inside his own walls.

He was afraid that his feelings would cost lives. He was afraid that his whims would reshape the fates of many.

He was that kind of emperor.

At that very moment, Bessa decided. She would marry him.

Because he was such a good emperor.

"I will never fall in love with you, Your Majesty," Bessa said, smiling as she nodded. "I mean, the man I have a crush on... he’s far more handsome than you."

Damon’s eyes widened. And then he burst into laughter—"AHAHAHAHAHA—"

When was the last time he had been slapped with a joke like this?

Bessa found her respect for him in that laughter. And at the same time, she felt safe.

This dream, no matter how impossible, ambitious, or world-changing, might actually succeed. If it was this man and his sister behind it, if they truly believed in it, then maybe, just maybe, she could believe in it too.

She would give up her quiet, simple life. She would trade her garden and her chickens and her sea lavender for a throne and a cause. And she would do it willingly, because the dream was worth it. Because the children... and this man, were worth it.

"Now that you’ve told me your ’problem,’ I’ll also tell you mine," Damon said, and Bessa straightened, ready.

She braced herself. What could possibly be worse than a loveless marriage to a self-aware madman?

"I... have a weakness," Damon explained. "And that weakness’s name is... Princess Ivy Cassia."

Bessa tilted her head, confused. The name... meant nothing to her.

Damon leaned forward, his expression turning serious, and he spoke earnestly.

"If one day she ever tells you that we spent a night together, right before I met you... and if she tells you it was more than just a night of uncontrollable passion..." His eyes grew complicated. "...please know that it’s true. But it’s something that will never happen again."

Bessa looked into his eyes and felt, suddenly, as though she were staring into a mirror. She knew that look. She had worn it herself.

The look of someone who had loved, and lost.

"Miss Bessa, I... it’s good that I have you now," Damon smiled. "Because I’ve fallen in love with Princess Ivy Cassia."

Bessa stared at him, an ache blooming in her chest. "What... do you mean?"

Damon answered simply. "I’m telling you that only you can slap me awake from that dream, so we can live ours."

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