Chapter 535: Chapter-535
Heena immediately lowered her head, perfectly executing the posture of a modest, humble noblewoman.
"I thank His Majesty for the high praise," Heena replied, her voice soft and deferential. "It is truly nothing, Your Majesty. My grandmother simply insisted on teaching me poetry, literature, and the classics to ensure I would not fall behind the other noble ladies of the capital. I do not know much, but I know a little."
Across the hall, several civil nobles were internally grinding their teeth. ’Can you not just shut your mouth?!’ they grumbled in their minds. ’Just act like a brute who doesn’t know anything! Stop outsmarting us!’
Heena caught their furious expressions out of the corner of her eye and mentally scoffed. ’Why should I? Stay mad, ink-drinkers.’
As she stood there, looking at the furious nobles and the smiling Emperor, Heena felt absolutely zero fear.
In ancient palace dramas, the ultimate threat held over a defiant noble was the "execution of nine generations"—wiping out an entire family tree for treason. It was the Emperor’s greatest leash. But as Heena analyzed the Marcuset family tree, she realized just how incredibly bulletproof they actually were.
The Vanguard had no extended family to leverage.
Grandmother Marcuset’s original maiden family? They were completely untouchable. When Grandma had married the "brutish" Grandpa Marcuset decades ago, she had demanded an official, documented separation from her aristocratic family. They had technically kicked her out on paper. So, even if the Vanguard committed high treason, Grandma’s blood relatives could not be legally dragged to the execution block.
And Grandpa Marcuset? He was a self-made warlord who had risen from nothing. He had no siblings, no cousins, and no ancestral clan.
The "nine generations" of the Marcuset family currently consisted of exactly three people: Grandpa, Grandma, and Heena. (Samuel didn’t count yet, as they weren’t officially married).
’So,’ Heena thought, a dark, cynical amusement bubbling in her chest. ’If the Emperor actually tries to execute us, there is no massive family clan for him to threaten. And if he corners the three of us... we will just physically assassinate him on our way down to the underworld. We will drag him to hell with us.’
Because she knew the Emperor essentially held no real leverage over their lives, she felt absolutely no threat standing in front of him.
The Emperor laughed again, seemingly delighted by her modest answer.
"It is so very interesting," the Emperor sighed, shaking his head. "If I had known you possessed such hidden depths, Lady Seera, I would have taken you as my own daughter in law long ago."
He paused, the benevolent smile dropping into a look of calculating intent.
"How about it, child?" the Emperor offered, his voice echoing across the silent hall. "You are of age, and a woman of your unique talents should not be hidden away in a military estate. Should I introduce you to someone? Perhaps a fine, imperial-blooded youth from the inner palace to be your husband?"
Heena clenched her fist tightly inside her leather sleeve.
’I knew it,’ Heena cursed internally. ’This disgusting pest. This absolute leech is trying to suck the Vanguard’s blood by forcing a royal marriage onto me!’
The entire courtroom fell into a stunned, suffocating silence.
Beside her, Grandpa Marcuset’s massive fists clenched with an audible creak of leather and bone. But to his absolute credit, the old warlord snapped his mouth shut and didn’t utter a single word. He looked at Heena, his eyes fierce but trusting. There were some decisions in life—and some traps—that a Vanguard heir had to navigate entirely on her own.
Heena stepped forward and offered a deep, sweeping bow.
"I thank His Majesty for his gracious, overwhelming favor," Heena said, keeping her voice perfectly steady.
The Emperor smiled, anticipating her submission.
"But," Heena continued, straightening her back and looking directly at the Emperor, "this subject has already promised her heart to someone else."
A collective, silent gasp rippled through the ranks of the civil scholars. ’Are you completely crazy?!’ their wide, terrified eyes screamed at her. ’Who outright rejects a direct marital favor from the Emperor?!’
Heena just glanced at them, a microscopic smirk touching the corner of her mouth. ’I do.’
She turned her attention back to the golden throne.
"Your Majesty, there is already someone waiting for me back at my home," Heena explained, her tone dripping with the exact, fabricated romantic desperation she had been accused of in the morning papers. "If I were to dare marry someone else, or even look at another man... I fear the person waiting for me is so incredibly jealous, he would burn my entire courtyard to the ground out of sheer spite."
She bowed her head one final time, her voice ringing with finality.
"So, while I am deeply, truly humbled by the high praise His Majesty thinks of me... I unfortunately must reject it. This subject begs Your Imperial Majesty for forgiveness."
For a terrifying, drawn-out moment, the only sound in the grand Imperial Courtroom was the faint, rhythmic rustle of the Emperor’s silk sleeves.
Rejecting a direct imperial decree—especially a decree of marriage from a ruler who was currently in the absolute prime of his reign—was not just a faux pas. To the civil scholars kneeling on the jade floor, it was tantamount to placing your own neck directly on the executioner’s block. The air grew so thick and suffocating that several of the older ministers genuinely looked as if they might faint from the secondhand stress.
Grandpa Marcuset remained perfectly still, though the veins in his thick neck were bulging.
The Emperor stared down at Heena from the golden throne. His face was entirely unreadable. The commanding, vital energy radiating from his posture was a sharp reminder that this was not some frail, elderly king nearing the end of his days. This was a sharp, dangerous ruler who held the entire empire in an iron grip.
His dark eyes bore into her, dissecting her excuse.
And then, the Emperor smiled.
It was not a warm smile. It was the terrifying, brilliant smile of a master chess player who had just watched his opponent willingly walk into a trap.
"Burn your courtyard down?" the Emperor repeated, his voice laced with profound, theatrical disbelief.
Suddenly, he threw his head back and let out a booming, echoing laugh that sent a flock of terrified pigeons scattering from the courtroom rafters.
"My, my! General Marcuset!" the Emperor called out, wiping an imaginary tear of mirth from his eye. "It seems the fierce Vanguard bloodline has finally been conquered by the soft blade of love! A jealous scholar waiting at home? How wonderfully tragic!"
The civil scholars, realizing they were not about to be executed in a crossfire, tentatively joined in with nervous, sycophantic chuckles.
Heena remained kneeling, her head bowed, but internally, she was gritting her teeth so hard her jaw ached.
’Laugh it up, you royal parasite,’ Heena thought coldly.
She knew exactly what the Emperor was doing. By openly playing into her excuse, he was completely validating the humiliating rumors printed in the Capital Daily Observer. He was officially stamping the imperial seal of approval onto the narrative that the Vanguard Madam was nothing more than a love-crazed, desperate woman entirely ruled by her emotions.
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