Chapter 112: Chapter-112

Heena looked at him with a smile. “Oh? In that case, should your father have also elevated your aunt—or I mean, your ’stepmother’—as the main consort, sweetie?”

He looked at her, thrown off. “Your Majesty, this is not the point of my father’s life—”

“Why not?” Heena shot back. “You just questioned me, so I am questioning you back. If I am not wrong, your stepmother was the ’first’ one who came into your father’s life. The first one he married. So in that sense, why was ’your mother’ the main wife?”

She looked at him pointedly. “If you cannot answer that, then just shut up.”

With that, she stood up, dusting off her hands, and said in a serious tone: “Prince Larus is going to be the main consort. Main wife. Main power. If any of you have a problem—” her voice turned cold, “—just take the divorce papers and get lost.”

This time, there was a firm, undeniable tone in Heena’s words, clearly showing she was not joking.

They looked at her, then exchanged glances. “Your Majesty… do you really want to anger all five of us? You know the power behind us.”

Heena laughed out loud. “Oh, you’re ’blackmailing’ me, huh?”

They looked at her carefully. “We are not blackmailing you, Your Majesty. We are just stating the facts.”

Heena looked at them, then said coldly, “Okay. Then just ’do it’. You want to cause problems? Go on.” She stomped her foot on the ground. “I am still ’here’. Sitting in this palace. If you have the guts, then do it.”

With that, all of them turned around and slowly left.

Raphael paused, looking back at her with something unreadable in his expression, before turning around and leaving as well.

As the door closed, Heena sighed and slipped back onto the sofa.

The system, who had been watching silently, spoke up with hesitation. There was a worried expression on his small face. “Host… is it really good to go against the male leads like this?”

Heena just sighed. “So what should I do? Massage their feet and put them on my head?”

The system shook his head quickly. “I don’t mean that! I’m just asking—we’re going against the male leads like this. What if it causes problems? Five of them—if they work together, it’s quite strong.”

Heena laughed out loud. “Better yet—strong? Well, they ’were’ strong before I came to this world. Not now.”

The system looked slightly confused.

Heena leaned back. “Do you really think they came here because they have some so-called love or anything like that?”

The system shook his head. Even if he was young, he knew that much. These male leads did not love his host.

“So,” Heena continued, “do you think they respect me or anything like that?”

The system shook his head again. No, that was definitely not the case.

Heena smiled. “That’s the point. So do you know ’why’ they came here?”

The system paused, thinking. “Because… they are scared?”

Heena nodded. “Exactly. They are scared because literally, in these three years of marriage, the Empress—’me’—has not conceived even one time. Do you know what that means?”

The system blinked.

“If I was only with ’them’ and still not conceived, then that might be my problem, right? Like, five men couldn’t all have the same problem. But—” she leaned forward, “—what do you think would happen if, after marrying Prince Larus, I suddenly conceived?”

The system’s expression brightened. “Then it means ’they’ have the problem!”

“Exactly,” Heena said. “But I couldn’t just publish in the newspaper that my five husbands haven’t touched me for three whole years of our marriage. Do you know how vulgar and insulting that would be for ’me’?”

The system nodded vigorously. “Yes! Because people would say there might be something wrong with ’you’—that’s why all five of them didn’t spend nights with you for three whole years. And it’s all five of them, not just one.”

Heena nodded. “Yes. They would blame ’me’. But if suddenly I have a child—” she smiled coldly, “—do you know what people would say?”

The system’s eyes went wide. “They would say… that the ’consorts’ have the problem!”

“Exactly,” Heena said, satisfaction in her voice. “The narrative changes completely. And that’s why they’re ’terrified’.”

So after dealing with her five dramatic, traumatized, newly terrified husbands—

Heena got exactly five minutes of peace.

’Five.’

She had barely resettled onto her sofa, was maybe thirty seconds into staring at the ceiling and thinking about absolutely nothing, when her secretary appeared at the door to remind her about the noble council meeting.

Right.

The in-laws.

Not the actual parents of her five husbands. Those people couldn’t lay a finger on her. She was the Empress. They could marinate in their feelings from a respectful distance.

No, the ’real’ in-laws were far worse.

The noble council. The high lords. The ancient family representatives who had held their positions for generations and had collectively decided, somewhere along the way, that being powerful enough to influence the empire meant they were also entitled to an opinion on every single thing the Empress did, said, wore, ate, and apparently now—who she planned to marry next.

In that very broad, very irritating sense, Heena had approximately a hundred in-laws. Possibly more. She had genuinely stopped counting because counting them made her want to commit crimes.

She was the female Emperor.

’Emperor’. That was the word. Not Empress-who-needs-guidance. Not Empress-who-should-consult-us-first. ’Emperor’. The one in charge. The one making decisions. The one who should, theoretically, not have to justify herself to a room full of old men in expensive robes.

Theoretically.

She changed her clothes herself, because she always changed her clothes herself.

Some context: tradition dictated that people of her rank were dressed by attendants. Maids laid out the clothes, fastened buttons, arranged hair, the whole elaborate ritual. Many people found it luxurious. Comforting, even.

Heena found it deeply, viscerally wrong. Unknown hands near her face, touching her collar, adjusting things on her body without asking—she had shut that down on day three of being Empress with a look so sharp that the head maid had needed a moment to recover.

So she dressed herself.

It took slightly longer. The back buttons required creative problem-solving. But it was infinitely better than the alternative, and she arrived at the council chamber doors twenty minutes later looking perfectly composed and feeling approximately like she was about to walk into a den of well-dressed wolves.

She stopped in front of the doors.

The two guards flanking the entrance had their hands on the handles. Standard procedure. They were waiting for her nod.

Heena stood there.

With her hand over her eyes.

The guards held perfectly still, demonstrating the extraordinary discipline of people paid to pretend they weren’t witnessing anything unusual.

Here is the thing about the noble council that made them genuinely, specifically exhausting in a way that her five husbands—for all their drama—simply were not:

They didn’t shout. They didn’t threaten openly. They didn’t kick doors in or make dramatic late-night corridor ambushes.

They ’questioned’.

Endlessly. In that specific refined way where every single question was actually a statement, and every statement was actually a demand, and every demand was wrapped in four layers of courtesy so thick you couldn’t call it rude even though it absolutely was. They smiled while doing it. They phrased things as concerns. They used words like ’perhaps’ and ’one might wonder’ and ’it has come to our attention’ in tones that meant ’you will explain yourself right now.’

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