Princess, Please Fall in Love with Me

Chapter 6 : Rose, I Only Wish to Offer My Loyalty

“Ever since earlier, I noticed you’ve been following me. Who are you?”

Looking at the girl before me with a cold, stern expression, so different from the timid, fearful demeanor I had seen in my previous life, I, Loka, understood she had always been pretending.

In my previous life, I had wandered here, lost, after enduring the nobles mocking jeers.

Two outcasts had met by chance.

Back then, seeing this girl clutching her sword, looking at me with fear, I had thought she was just another lost girl.

Now, thinking back, perhaps I wasn’t the only one who had seen her as a harmless child.

The girl before me had long noticed my gaze and had lured me here according to her plan.

Like the lofty Emperor of Austin, Miles, she had golden hair that shimmered with iridescent hues.

Her amethyst-like eyes, inherited from her mother, held a mysterious, melancholic depth, and her cold gaze was clearly not that of an eleven- or twelve-year-old girl.

Looking at the girl pointing her sword at me, as cold and merciless as she had been in my previous life when she drove her silver blade into my chest, I didn’t retreat.

Instead, I smiled and caught her blade.

“Loka Alva, at your service, Sixth Princess Yiwen.”

As blood flowed from my palm, Yiwen lowered her sword slowly, her expression one of disbelief.

She scrutinized me with suspicious eyes, looking at the smiling girl before her.

My actions were hardly those of a ten-year-old.

“How do you know my name, bastard daughter of the Alva Family?”

Hearing this, I grew increasingly certain of my conclusion—we were the same, both having already seen through each other completely!

Indeed, the only one who could kill me in my previous life was a “monster” like me!

“I came here for you, Your Highness. We are the same.”

My grip on the blade tightened, as if the flowing blood was merely a trivial matter.

I looked sincerely at Yiwen’s face, even if that sincerity carried calculation.

“I swear to you, I will help you seize that supreme position, for your revenge, for myself, and for our ambitions.”

In the empty garden, only the faint rustle of the breeze over the grass could be heard.

The people gathered in the banquet hall wouldn’t notice this place, nor would anyone care about two girls of low status.

Yiwen slowly reached out to retrieve her silver sword, but in the next moment, she placed it at my throat, as if ready to pierce my tender neck.

“Do you think, if the Sixth Princess accidentally killed a bastard girl plotting against the royal family in the garden, your duke's father would bother to collect your body?”

Yiwen wasn’t swayed by my so-called sincerity, her suspicious gaze fixed on me.

Precisely because she knew we were the same—monsters who could only lick each other’s wounds—she trusted me even less.

But when my blade rested at her throat, her eyes gleamed with an even more excited expression.

Was I mistaken? Or was this girl, at her core, a masochist?

“Naturally, compared to your noble status, I may be insignificant, but my promise remains unchanging. I will lead you to the position that belongs to you, nothing more.”

In the not-so-long standoff, we felt as if days had passed.

Until a butterfly carelessly brushed the water’s surface, sending ripples spreading outward.

Yiwen lowered her silver sword and extended her right hand.

“If that’s the case, then take a look at this.”

At this time, Yiwen was only eleven or twelve, but her hand was covered in scars, like those of a tortured prisoner, as if she wore gloves sewn with thorns every day.

Revealing her darkest scars to an outsider was the decision Yiwen made.

As for the barely concealed scars on my neck, she chose to ignore them.

She had her own hidden ambitions, and naturally, she could see the vast, greedy ambition in my eyes.

But who would devour whom?

She felt a thrill of excitement at the prospect.

I froze for a moment, perhaps surprised that even her status as a princess couldn’t shield her from others’ cruelty, or perhaps the scars on my back resonated with hers.

I gently took her less-than-smooth hand, as if caressing the smoothest jade, and knelt on one knee, softly leaving my mark on that beautiful hand.

This was a knight’s pledge of life and loyalty to their sovereign.

“I offer my loyalty, my life, until the end of my soul’s death. All that I am belongs to you, my Princess.”

Yiwen seemed momentarily stunned by such earnest words.

She lightly brushed my forehead with her left hand.

This was the Austin Empire’s royal gesture, symbolizing a sovereign’s trust and value in their subordinate.

“Until you take my life, your life is mine to command.”

“As you command, my Highness.”

We would survive until the end, and only we could stand at the end—behind or before each other.

At that moment, in the banquet hall, nobles currying favor with the duke’s household raised their glasses to congratulate him.

The Duke smiled calmly, accepting their praise.

Someone suddenly recalled the other child who had vanished.

The Duke merely waved his hand, dismissing it quietly.

“Just an ordinary girl. Why bother about her?”

In the garden, Yiwen withdrew her outstretched hand, returning to her usual cold demeanor.

I stood quietly by her side, smiling at her.

“As my person, you should show some proof of your loyalty, shouldn’t you?”

“Naturally.”

I gazed at the lake’s reflection and whispered a secret.

Perhaps out of mischief, I also nibbled on Yiwen’s ear.

“Loka, where did you go just now?”

In the carriage, the Duke grew impatient with my late arrival.

After all, Balesha had become the First Prince’s companion, naturally making him more worthy of the Duke’s favor.

I, his daughter, seemed insignificant again.

Nobles were like merchants—wherever there was profit, their attention turned.

“I just wandered around. There was no one nearby, Father.”

“Good. Remember, you represent the face of the Duke’s household.”

Back at the Duke’s residence, Lina combed my hair while curiously asking about the banquet.

I shared some interesting tidbits, and she listened with rapt attention.

“Miss, your hand! Oh! How did you get such a big scar?”

Seeing Lina hurriedly apply ointment to the scabbing wound, I smiled and gently touched the treated scar.

“Miss, the ointment is still on! You can’t touch it!”

“It’s fine. I’m just feeling it.”

Recalling how Yiwen’s face softened from coldness to warmth, how she blushed faintly—befitting her age—when I kissed her hand, had I not seen that face drive a blade through me in my past life, perhaps the naive boy I was would have fallen for her.

Thinking of our garden conversation, of the ever-widening ripples on the lake, my mood couldn’t help but lift.

The show was about to begin.