Chapter 150: Chapter-150

“I’ll survive,” Heena said, trying to smile even though she felt like crying from sheer frustration and exhaustion. “Three days. We can survive three days.”

“Three days,” Larus repeated, like he was trying to convince himself.

The Duchess was already pulling him down the corridor. “Come along, Your Highness. Don’t make this harder than it needs to be.”

“Goodnight, Your Majesty,” Larus called back, and the longing in his voice was almost painful.

“Goodnight,” Heena managed, her hand raised in a small wave.

She watched him disappear around the corner, escorted by her aunt and several attendants.

And then she was alone.

In the corridor.

On her wedding night.

Heena stood there for a long moment, processing what had just happened.

Then she screamed—a short, sharp sound of pure frustration that echoed through the empty hallway.

A servant poked her head around the corner nervously. “Your Majesty? Is everything—”

“FINE,” Heena said, her voice slightly unhinged. “Everything is FINE. I’m just going to my EMPTY QUARTERS to sleep ALONE on my WEDDING NIGHT because apparently ANCIENT DEAD PEOPLE have more control over my life than I DO.”

The servant wisely retreated.

Heena stomped toward her chambers, her exhaustion momentarily overcome by sheer indignant rage.

System 427 materialized beside her, looking sympathetic. “Host… that was rough.”

“Not now, System,” Heena warned.

“But Host, maybe the Duchess has a point about—”

“System,” Heena interrupted, her voice dangerous, “I have had the longest day of my life. I am tired, frustrated, and my feet feel like they’re going to fall off. If you say one more word defending those stupid traditions, I will delete you and throw your core crystal into the ocean.”

The System wisely went silent.

Heena reached her chambers, dismissed all the attendants with a sharp gesture, and slammed the door.

She stood in the middle of her enormous, luxurious, ’empty’ bedroom and wanted to break something.

Instead, she very carefully removed her jewelry, placed it on the dressing table, and changed into sleeping robes.

Then she climbed into her massive, comfortable, ’lonely’ bed and stared at the ceiling.

This was supposed to be her wedding night.

She should be with Larus right now. Talking, laughing, maybe falling asleep together after the exhausting day they’d survived.

Instead, she was alone.

Because of ’traditions’.

“I hate this world,” she muttered into the darkness.

From somewhere in the room, the System’s small voice said, “Host… would it help if I told you that Larus is probably just as miserable right now?”

“Not really,” Heena admitted. “But thanks for trying.”

She closed her eyes and tried to sleep.

It took hours.

—

## Meanwhile, in the Emperor Consort’s Chambers

Larus was having a similar experience.

The Duchess had escorted him to a beautiful suite of rooms—sitting room, bedroom, private bath, everything luxuriously appointed.

“Rest well, Your Highness,” she’d said with that serene smile. “Tomorrow’s purification ceremonies begin at dawn.”

“More ceremonies,” Larus said numbly.

“Only six or seven,” the Duchess assured him. “Nothing too strenuous. Ritual bathing, prayer circles, blessing meditations, the usual.”

“The usual,” Larus repeated weakly.

The Duchess patted his shoulder almost maternally. “You’ll survive. And in three days, you’ll be free to spend as much time with Heena as you wish.”

She left, and Larus was alone.

He looked around the beautiful, empty suite and felt a wave of loneliness so intense it was almost physical.

This was his wedding night.

He should be with Heena.

Instead, he was standing in a strange room, wearing formal robes he didn’t know how to remove properly, more exhausted than he’d ever been in his life.

He managed to get out of the ceremonial clothing through sheer determination, took a quick bath, and collapsed into bed.

The bed was enormous and comfortable.

And completely empty.

Larus stared at the canopy above him and thought about Heena—probably in her own chambers, equally frustrated, equally alone.

“Three days,” he whispered to himself.

It felt like an eternity.

# The Kitchen Ritual

—

The next morning, Heena stood in the palace kitchen—the actual, literal imperial kitchen where hundreds of servants normally worked to feed the entire palace staff.

Larus was standing in front of a cooking station, looking simultaneously confused and resigned, while the Duchess stood beside him with her arms crossed, looking far too pleased with herself.

“Your Highness,” the Duchess was saying cheerfully, “you’ll need to prepare something sweet for Her Majesty. The ritual requires—”

“AUNT.”

Heena’s voice cut through the kitchen like a knife, making several nearby servants jump.

The Duchess turned with an expression of complete innocence. “Yes, Your Majesty?”

Heena looked at her aunt with an expression of pure disbelief and said in the flattest tone possible: “Aunt. You run an empire. Not even an empire—you help ’me’ run an empire. We have servants. Literally hundreds of servants. We have an entire department of kitchen staff whose ’only job’ is to cook.”

She gestured wildly at the kitchen around them, where at least twenty cooks were pretending very hard not to listen.

“And even if one day I go completely bankrupt—even if this empire gets sold at auction to the highest bidder and we lose everything—we would ’still’ have enough money for servants who can cook. And even if we somehow lost ALL the money and couldn’t afford servants, before that day even came, we would probably die of old age first!”

She pointed at Larus, who was standing there looking like he wanted to sink through the floor.

“So I cannot—I ’cannot’—understand why you are making an ’Emperor Consort’, a man who is supposed to sit in council meetings and review documents and help govern an empire, stand in a kitchen and cook like some kind of—of—”

“Chef?” the Duchess supplied helpfully.

“—KITCHEN STAFF!” Heena finished, ignoring her. “Can someone please explain to me ’who the hell’ made this idiotic ritual?! Why does a man whose job is literally to sit on a throne and make important decisions need to know how to cook?! What special magical dinosaur is going to emerge from whatever food he makes?! Is the kheer going to grant us immortality?! Will the dessert solve all our political problems?!”

The Duchess waited patiently for Heena to finish her rant, then said with perfect calm: “Your Majesty, I have not asked you to cook. Secondly, this ritual was established by your own family—specifically, your great-great-grandmother, who was quite insistent about it. And if you don’t want His Highness to follow it, that’s perfectly fine. Don’t let him participate.”

She paused, letting that sink in.

“But then don’t come crying to me later if something goes wrong.”

Heena stared at her. “What could ’possibly’ go wrong?! The worst that could happen is he sets the kitchen on fire and we have to rebuild it! That’s it! That’s the big catastrophe!”

“Is it?” the Duchess asked mildly.

“YES!” Heena exploded. “What else could happen?! Will the gods smite us?! Will the empire collapse?! Will—”

“Your Majesty,” the Duchess interrupted, her voice taking on that particular patient tone that made Heena want to scream, “you’re being deliberately obtuse. You know very well that traditional rituals serve purposes beyond their surface appearance.”

’This fool…who made her empror’.

Source: Webnovel.com, updated by NovelKeep