Chapter 63: Chapter-63

Heena stopped in front of him, eyes half‑lidded with exhaustion and murder. “Robinson.”

Estov winced in sympathy. “Ah. The one with the permanently sweaty forehead.”

“He woke me up,” Heena said, “to tell me that the Northern Empire is sending an embassy in seven days.”

Estov stared. Then slowly covered his mouth, shoulders shaking.

“Don’t,” Heena warned.

A muffled snort escaped anyway. “Sorry, sorry. I just—seven days, ’middle of the night’… he really signed his own death contract, huh?”

Heena rubbed the corner of her eye with one knuckle, smearing a bit of kohl. “If I kill him now, the paperwork will take longer than the satisfaction.”

System 427 bobbed beside them, tail stiff. “Host, jokes aside, seven days isn’t much. We still don’t know if that marriage talk from the border kingdom is tied to this delegation or if it’s a separate move. And if X‑system is behind their timing—”

“I know.” Heena’s voice dropped, the edge of her anger condensing into something colder, sharper. “Northern empire, sudden peace, marriage offer, now an embassy rushing in seven days. That’s not diplomacy. That’s ’plot acceleration’.”

Estov’s playful look faded. His fox‑eyes narrowed. “You think the runaway system is pushing it?”

“I think,” Heena said, “someone’s trying to cram three arcs into one month before I can stabilize anything.”

She started walking again, and Estov fell into step beside her without needing to be asked.

“So,” he said, back to his casual tone but eyes serious, “what’s the plan, my dear overworked empress? Smile, host the embassy, pretend to be impressed by their prince’s portrait, and meanwhile silently strangle Seraphina’s favorability vein behind the scenes?”

Heena gave him a sideways look. “More or less. Except I’ll also be testing every envoy for system residue. If X‑system thinks it can sneak another pawn into my palace, I want to see its face when I flip the board.”

System 427’s ears twitched. “That means no more three‑hour naps, host. You’ll need to—”

She stopped outside her chamber doors and put a hand on the lion’s head, pressing him down mid‑lecture.

“I am going to lie down,” she said slowly, “for at least ’two’ more hours. If anyone tries to wake me, I don’t care if it’s a god, a system, or the endof the world. I will kill them.”

Estov raised a hand. “What if it’s me?”

“Then I’ll kill you first.”

He smiled faintly. “Noted.”

The guards opened the doors. Heena stepped inside, then paused and glanced back over her shoulder.

“Estov,” she said, voice low, “while I’m unconscious, make yourself useful. I want every rumor, every whisper about that northern embassy by the time I wake up. And I want to know if any of Seraphina’s new idiot admirers have ties to their court.”

Estov’s grin sharpened. “So the green tea gets to steep properly at last. Consider it done.”

He bowed with exaggerated elegance. “Sleep, Your Majesty. I’ll bring you a nice pot of chaos when you wake up.”

Heena didn’t answer.

She just shut the door in his face.

Inside, she tore off the new set of jewelry the servants had forced onto her half an hour ago, let it clatter wherever it fell, and face‑planted onto the bed again.

Three hours wasn’t enough.

But with an embassy, a white lotus, a runaway system, and five dangerous husbands all circling her like wolves, she would take every stolen minute she could get.

It would have been fine if they had just let her reach the bed.

Henna really, ’really’ just wanted to rest. Her head was throbbing in that deep, ugly way that meant her bloodline condition was starting to act up again. She was halfway down the corridor to her chambers, already mentally throwing herself face‑first into the mattress—

When a servant skidded to a stop in front of her, nearly falling to his knees.

“Y‑Your Majesty,” he panted, “L‑Lady Seraphina has come to ask for an audience—”

Something in Henna’s vision snapped.

System 427, hovering at the edge of her mind, went rigid and immediately hid behind a mental filing cabinet. He could ’feel’ it—the last shred of her patience tearing like cheap paper.

Henna smiled.

Brightly.

“Oh?” she said sweetly. “Lady SerapHina has come? At this hour?” Her gaze slid over the trembling servant. “What happened? Did the sun fall out of the sky? Did her mother die? Is the empire on fire?”

The servant’s legs shook harder. “Y‑Your Majesty, I…”

Henna’s smile vanished. Her face went blank, voice turning flat. “Did I, or did I not, say that SerapHenna is ’forbidden’ to enter the royal palace?”

Her words fell like stones.

“Do my orders go in one ear and out the other?” she continued. “Who the hell let her in?”

“T‑The guest wing, Your Majesty,” the servant whispered. “She is in a guest room…”

Henna stared at him for a long, cold second.

“And is the guest wing,” she asked softly, “’not’ part of the royal palace?”

The servant’s expression collapsed completely. He dropped to his knees, forehead hitting the floor. Everyone nearby felt their blood run cold. She wasn’t shouting. That was the problem.

Henna turned away from him.

She walked to the side, to the stone railing that overlooked the vast inner courtyard two floors below. The night was heavy and silent, most lights dimmed.

She drew in a breath.

“KNIGHTS,” she roared, voice powered by pure fury and imperial authority, “ASSEMBLE!”

The shout ripped through the night like thunder.

Chaos erupted.

Soldiers scrambled out of barracks, half-dressed, weapons grabbed in panic. Servants poured into hallways. Nobles in nightclothes stumbled to windows. Everyone who heard the Empress’s voice—and those who didn’t but heard the stampede—’ran’.

Within five minutes, the entire courtyard was packed.

Knights in formation. Servants pressed against walls. Guards at attention. Even a few of the

Nobels appeared in distant doorways, watching with wary eyes.

Heena descended the stairs slowly, deliberately, each step making the crowd go quieter.

She walked straight to the Knight Commander—a grizzled veteran who’d served the empire for twenty years. He stood at attention, sword at his side, confusion and dread warring on his face.

Heenastopped in front of him.

“Who do you follow?” she asked, voice calm.

He saluted immediately. “Your Majesty, of course.”

“Whose rules do you follow?”

“Your Majesty’s.”

“Whose orders do you obey?”

“Your Majesty’s!”

’CRACK.’

Heena’s hand struck his face so hard the sound echoed across the courtyard like a whip.

The entire assembly gasped.

The Knight Commander staggered, hand flying to his cheek, eyes wide with shock. In twenty years of service, the Empress had never—’never’—

“Then how,” Heenasaid, voice still deadly calm, “did Lady SerapHeenaenter ’my’ palace without ’my’ permission?”

Silence.

The commander opened his mouth. “Your Majesty, she—she requested an audience, and protocol states that nobles of sufficient rank may—”

’CRACK.’

She slapped him again, harder this time, the other cheek.

“So you thought,” Heena said softly, “that just because she ’asked’, you could forget your Empress’s direct order and let her waltz in?”

Before he could answer, she turned to a nearby knight and pulled his sword from its sheath in one smooth motion. The blade sang as it cleared the scabbard.

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