Celebrity Lady - Chapter 11

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Celebrity Lady
Chapter 11
Lark accepted the water bottle from one of the knights and tilted his head back to drink, sweeping his sweat-dampened hair away from his forehead.
As sunlight poured down like a spotlight, it shattered across his fine silver hair, scattering brilliance in every direction.
“Ahh…….”
“What, what is it? It’s so bright. Why is the weather like this today?”
The knights who had been standing transfixed, staring at Lark, all shielded their eyes at once, their expressions twisting in discomfort. Though the sun was indeed relentless, that alone did not account for their reaction.
There in the middle of the Training Ground, this man stood as if posing for a photoshoot, drawing every eye—even those of hardened soldiers—toward him. Lark van Rashmah Deccard.
To the men of the Deccard Empire, he was “the man they wished to become”; to the women, “the man they wished to possess.” He was the empire’s highest celebrity.
“Rest a while, Victor.”
“Yes, of course.”
Victor, who had been regarding his dumbstruck fellow knights with contempt, nodded perfunctorily and followed.
“I won that one, didn’t I?”
Lark collapsed into a patch of shade and smiled wryly as he spoke.
“Yes, well.”
The Imperial Knights—an elite gathering where only the most skilled could join, an honor to the Deccard Empire.
Among them, Vice-Captain Victor Diolus, renowned for his extraordinary prowess, had only one true rival: Crown Prince Lark.
“I trust you haven’t forgotten our wager.”
“No.”
Victor nodded at Lark’s words.
Today’s match had carried a bet—the loser would grant the winner one favor.
“But Your Highness, what could you possibly ask of me?”
“Well, lately I’ve been somewhat troubled at the nobility councils. Every time they see me, they press the matter of when I’ll marry.”
“Ah, yes. You are rather overdue, I suppose.”
Crown Prince Lark remained unmarried, and the position of Crown Princess sat empty.
Looking at the precedent set by past imperial heirs—where the custom was to marry in childhood, even before a sword could be worn at one’s waist…….
‘Come to think of it, why have I been putting this off?’
That Lark, now nineteen years old, had yet to take a Crown Princess was indeed peculiar.
Victor tilted his head and asked.
“……Why not simply marry? Your Highness, if you lined up all the noble ladies eager to entangle themselves with you, the queue would wrap around the square ten times over.”
“I cannot take just anyone as my consort.”
Startled by this unexpected response, Victor drew his head back like a turtle retreating into its shell.
“What, what do you mean? That she wouldn’t be a good fit? Or—do you perhaps wish to commit your life to some lady you love with passionate fervor?”
“Me?”
At Victor’s blundering, Lark let out a laugh of disbelief.
“My fingers curl up just thinking about it. Spare me such childish talk of love and romance.”
That figured. Victor released a deflated sigh.
Crown Prince Lark van Rashmah Deccard—he was regarded as the most perfect successor the imperial house had ever produced.
He had mastered the sciences of rulership by age ten, distinguished himself in politics and economics, and excelled at diplomacy. When he negotiated friendly relations with the Roben Kingdom, the center of maritime trade, Lark was but thirteen.
And that was not all.
What do the people of a great nation desire most from their leader?
Without question—defense: the preparedness to guard against foreign invasion and protect the realm.
Lark was also a soldier without peer.
‘As long as His Highness draws breath, any war will end in total victory…….’
The spirit Lark commanded ranked among the highest order—the Earth Spirit. Thus any battlefield where he took the field became terrain inherently favorable to the imperial forces.
Treacherous mountain passes flattened into open plains where enemies could not ambush; when besieged, a rise of sand soldiers turned the tide. It was, quite simply, boundless military might.
That everyone revered Lark, so flawless in every regard, was only natural. All looked forward with unified hope to his reign and the prosperity it would bring the empire.
And Lark himself…….
‘I shall live my entire life for the empire alone.’
He was a man haunted by the compulsion to remain perfect, to live up to such expectations.
‘A tedious man.’
Victor shook his head slowly in thought.
A diehard who never blinked at a murderous schedule—four hours of sleep daily, drowning in state affairs and training.
A man bereft of joy, viewing even this punishing existence as his duty born of being an heir—yes, thoroughly tedious!
“Ah!”
Suddenly Victor uttered an exclamation.
He had dimly grasped what this particular Lark meant to ask of him, now that a wager hung on it.
‘The fact that he brought up marriage so abruptly…….’
Childish romance was, by Lark’s standards, entirely unnecessary and futile.
Naturally, the position of Crown Princess would be to him merely a means to achieving perfect leadership.
What were the most ideal conditions Lark sought in a Crown Princess?
‘Certainly a woman whose position would benefit his power.’
A woman from the Diolus Family—second only to the imperial house—would be precisely the sort to appeal to Lark’s interests as a Crown Princess.
“You wish me to introduce my sister, Your Highness?”
“Ah, as expected—your insight is refreshingly sharp.”
Lark smiled broadly.
“I cannot keep the Crown Princess position vacant much longer. And lately, the movements of Nathan have been… concerning.”
“Nathan? You mean His Highness the Second Prince? Why? Moreover, do you truly need to ask this of me? Lillia would be easy enough to meet—she spends her days flitting from one nobleman’s tea party to the next…….”
Lillia was, strictly speaking, Victor’s great-aunt, though she was three years his junior and so was conventionally treated as his sister.
The youngest of the Diolus Family—known as the “Swan” of the house—Lillia.
Despite her youth, she had already become the talk of high society.
She bore a striking resemblance to her mother, Molga, who had seized a duchess’s seat through beauty alone, and was herself breathtakingly beautiful.
‘Lillia would certainly be a Crown Princess candidate worthy of catching this man’s eye.’
Yet Lark, contrary to Victor’s expectation, frowned and shook his head.
“No. Not her.”
“……I beg your pardon?”
“Lady Lillia is your great-aunt, is she not? I was referring to your blood sister.”
Victor caught his breath sharply.
“Sister,” when mentioned so casually, in fact…….
There was another. That is to say.
“……You cannot mean… Rubetreia?”
At Victor’s astonished question, Lark nodded at once and countered.
“Why? Is there a problem?”
* * *
“Why, is there a problem?”
Casting the empire’s highest celebrity—the Crown Prince himself—as a model.
Having received Wishet’s rather sensible advice to use Victor, the Crown Prince’s close second-oldest brother, as a stepping stone toward this great undertaking, I had hastily formulated a plan…….
“Is there a problem, you ask?”
For some reason, the very person who had offered the opinion, Wishet, now wore a skeptical expression.
“There is a problem. Think back to when you were Juliet Kareñina. If some upstart shopkeeper came to you asking you to model for their newly opened boutique, would you agree?”
“If the terms were right? I was always quite agreeable to endorsements.”
I formed my thumb and forefinger into a circle, sketching the shape of money as I continued.
“Money is money.”
“Right, so an endorsement means paying money to have the model wear clothes and promote them, yes?”
“Exactly.”
“Which is why there’s a flaw in that plan.”
“What flaw?”
“The Crown Prince has no need for money.”
“Ah!”
So that was the concern?
Wishet clicked his tongue and regarded me as though I were a fool.
“You carry Rubetreia’s memories—surely you know something of the Crown Prince. He’s practically…….”
Wishet gestured to his own face, narrowing his eyes slightly.
“A manufactured level of leader, one might say? He cares for nothing but the empire’s prosperity—an utterly joyless sort. Since his image is the imperial image itself, he scrutinizes his every action with obsessive rigor. I’ve felt it acutely the few times I’ve seen him—he’s the suffocating type, a personality that makes you hold your breath—”
“—which means if I ask him to be a model, he’ll naturally refuse?”
Cutting short his elaboration, I posed the question, and Wishet regarded me as if I were stating the obvious.
“But I’m not going to offer him money for an endorsement.”
“What?”
“Money obviously won’t move the Crown Prince. Did you think I hadn’t considered that much?”
“Then what—do you have some other leverage? Something capable of moving the Crown Prince?”
Wishet asked with no real expectation in his eyes.
Status, wealth, connections……. The Crown Prince already possessed everything. I cannot sway him with money, nor move him with power.
But.
“If I save his life, wouldn’t modeling be the least he could do?”
“…….”
Wishet fell silent, then his eyes sharpened as he asked.
“……You mean to save him? The Crown Prince?”
“Not a bad outcome, is it? Save the Crown Prince, secure a model. That’s killing two birds with one stone.”
I regarded Wishet, wearing the Crown Prince’s face, with a moment of pity.
“Honestly, it would be a national loss if such a face were to die in mere years.”
That was the truth. Crown Prince Lark van Rashmah Deccard would, regrettably, soon be dead.
At the heart of the Deccard Empire’s imperial house—where blood-soaked power struggles raged.
The Second Prince, Nathan van Rashmah Deccard, who had long coveted the heir’s throne, would succeed in assassinating the Crown Prince.

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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