The Grand Duchess Lost Her First Battle
The Grand Duchess lost her very first fight.
"Rebecca!"
The loud voice rang out the moment Rebecca finished muttering her insult about me being unpleasant. It was the Duchess of Valencia, the Grand Duchess's own mother.
"How many times have I told you to fix that manner of speaking!"
"...Yes, Mother."
Rebecca apparently had no confidence in talking back to her own mother, because she folded her position almost immediately.
...Something about that really rubs me the wrong way.
Watching her, though, only made my mood sour further. Here was someone perfectly capable of speaking with respect—so why had she flown into a hysterical tantrum the instant she laid eyes on me? Was I really that hideous? I couldn't honestly call myself handsome, not out loud, but surely I wasn't on the ugly end of the spectrum either.
A gloom settled over me without warning.
"Hurry and apologize to Prince Albert, dear."
Reading my sour expression, the Duchess must have taken me for wounded, because she pressed Rebecca to offer a proper apology.
It seemed the matter would be settled with the Grand Duchess's apology—until it wasn't.
"...No."
"Rebecca!"
The duchess's deranged daughter had just answered in a way that soared far past my expectations. Refusing to apologize in this situation? Good heavens—was this another side effect of her excessive competitive streak?
"This engagement wasn't something I wanted. Why should I have to apologize?"
Rebecca was using the excuse that the engagement hadn't been her own choice.
Frankly, I could understand her point to a degree. A noble daughter's engagement or marriage was almost never decided by her own will. In most cases it was an arranged match, settled by the family without the slightest regard for her own wishes.
Rebecca's engagement to me, too, had clearly been concluded entirely without her consent, so I could sympathize with her being upset about it.
But the reason I couldn't hold back my anger, even while understanding her position, was simple.
What did I ever do to deserve this?
So the engagement wasn't something she wanted—that gave her zero right to look me dead in the face and call me unpleasant.
Did I want to be engaged to Lady Rebecca? Well, yes, Rebecca Valencia was my favorite character in The Crown Prince Holds the Sword—but that hardly meant I wanted to be forcibly transmigrated and betrothed to her out of nowhere.
Not that I was opposed, exactly. She was far too beautiful for me to refuse. What kind of man turns down a gorgeous woman, after all?
Be that as it may: my opinion was that I had done nothing to deserve being cursed at the moment I arrived.
"Rebecca!"
The Duchess was about to shout down her daughter, who now refused even her mother's word, when—
"Your Grace, would you permit me a brief word alone with Lady Rebecca?"
I raised my hand and stopped the Duchess just before she could erupt.
"...Prince?"
"...?"
Naturally, the Duchess stared at me strangely, and even Lady Rebecca—who had been bracing herself with eyes squeezed shut for a scolding—turned to regard me with open bewilderment.
"Just trust me once, Your Grace."
My resolve did not waver.
"...If that is the Prince's wish, then so be it. I will step outside."
Perhaps the firm determination in my eyes reached her, because the Duchess granted my rather abrupt request.
"...Mother?"
With the situation suddenly veering off course, Rebecca grabbed at her mother's hem as the woman turned to leave—but what came back was the Duchess's icy retort.
"Rebecca, cause the Prince any more trouble, and you will be grounded."
"..."
For Lady Rebecca—a girl whose temperament left much to be desired but who adored being out and about—a ban on going outside was a punishment of tremendous severity.
I felt a small, quiet satisfaction.
"Then I leave our Rebecca in your hands, Prince."
"I won't take long."
With a nod at my dependable(?) answer, the Duchess left the parlor, and just like that, only two people remained in the room: me and Lady Rebecca.
The moment Rebecca confirmed her mother was gone, her true nature came flooding out.
"I don't know what scheme made you send my mother out of the room... but if you so much as try anything strange with me, I will cut that hand off on the spot."
A ruthlessly blunt tone with no regard whatsoever for etiquette or aristocratic grace.
I was dumbfounded. Was the Grand Duchess treating me as a common criminal right now?
I could have flown into a rage then and there at being branded a criminal. I could have demanded what on earth she took people for, whether she'd lost her mind entirely.
But I didn't.
...I'd rather like to keep my hands, thank you.
Lady Rebecca's threat to sever my hand had almost certainly not been a joke.
Though I've spent all this time cataloguing Rebecca's abominable personality, the truth is that she was a full-fledged munchkin character. Swordsmanship, magic—even archery and the spear. Rebecca could do it all.
I never understood why a novel's heroine needs to be a munchkin. But what can you do? The author wrote her that way.
At any rate, I had no intention whatsoever of losing a hand, so instead of getting angry, I addressed Rebecca in a perfectly amiable tone.
"Try anything? I haven't had the slightest thought of it, Lady Rebecca."
"..."
Her gaze said, Really? Because I don't believe you—and I had to swallow my irritation a second time. But my hands were precious to me, so I managed it.
Do you have any idea how many things become difficult without hands?
"Then let me make you a proposal, my lady."
"A proposal...?"
The Grand Duchess tilted her head as if to say, go on.
"If you challenge me to a wager and win, I will walk out of this room this instant and request that our engagement be annulled."
"...Ha. Why would I accept a proposal like that? If I simply ask my father, our engagement will be broken off anyway—it'll just take some time."
What should I call her—the Munchkin Young Lady, indeed.
Her situational awareness was remarkably sharp. She'd grasped instantly that she had no need to take my offer.
But I had one piece of bait that Rebecca couldn't resist.
"Does the Grand Duchess of Valencia, greatest of her generation, fear a mere Count's son? How disappointing."
Her competitive pride. This was the same Rebecca Valencia who had thrown herself into contest after contest against the original novel's protagonist—only to lose not just the heroine's spot but her place in the cast altogether.
There was no way she could stomach being belittled like that.
Just as I predicted, the Grand Duchess took the bait immediately.
"...Are you looking down on me right now? Fine. I'll hear out this wager of yours."
As the Grand Duchess bit down and walked into my trap, I nodded to myself and tossed out the next lure without delay.
"It's simple. If you beat me in a staring contest, I will concede my defeat cleanly and ask the Duke myself to end our engagement."
"...A staring contest?"
"Yes. A staring contest."
"You mean that game commoners play?"
The Grand Duchess asked me to repeat myself as if she'd misheard—but sadly, the game she was picturing was exactly the right answer. The one where you see who can keep their eyes open longest.
When I nodded to confirm it, she began regarding me with even greater contempt.
"The only wager you can come up with is a commoner's staring contest? Exactly how much abuse do you intend to invite upon yourself?"
"So. Will you do it or not?"
"No. I will."
Rebecca had truly made up her mind to the staring contest now.
"Whoever closes their eyes first loses. Correct?"
"Yes, that's right."
"And if I win, you'll tell my father immediately that you want the engagement dissolved."
"Of course. In return, if I win, you'll have to sincerely apologize for what you said to me earlier."
"...So that was your goal all along."
Rebecca seemed to have finally caught on to why I'd proposed this wager in the first place.
"Well, naturally. You'd never offer a bet that only benefits me."
"So—will you do it, or not?"
"Let's just get it over with."
The Grand Duchess radiated confidence, as though a future in which she lost simply did not exist.
But alas—what a shame. I had absolutely no intention of losing.
"Then I'll count us down."
"Hurry up. The sooner I'm rid of this engagement, the better."
"...Counting, then."
Three. Two. One.
The count ended, and Rebecca and I snapped our eyes wide open at the same time.
From a distance, the sight of two young people gazing serenely into each other's eyes might have looked terribly tender—
"Your eyes look like they're hurting."
"Says the man whose eyes have already turned bloodshot."
But up close, there was no battle on earth more serious than this one.
A staring contest wagered on an annulment and a heartfelt apology—no one but the participants could take it seriously.
My eyes were starting to ache.
"Eyes giving out already? I suppose it's only natural. Someone like you could never beat me."
Sensing that I was approaching my limit, Rebecca wasted no time in provoking me—but as I said before, I had absolutely no confidence in losing.
So instead of rising to her taunt, I went whoosh—and blew a puff of air from my mouth.
The small breeze I produced went straight for Lady Rebecca's eyes, right in front of me.
Blink—
Struck by the unexpected gust with her eyes wide open, Lady Rebecca's eyelids shut on the spot.
"...I believe I've won, my lady."
"Where is such a foul play allowed—"
The Grand Duchess glared at me, the very picture of grievance and injustice.
"Did I ever say that blowing air was against the rules?"
Sadly, my lady—life is combat, and there are no fouls on the battlefield.