Seeing that Emmelyn managed to catch the box with her two hands, Mars could only curse his bad luck. He should have known that a girl who could fight and wield swords like Emmelyn must be trained enough to catch the box in that situation.

Uff … now he had to think of another way to prevent Emmelyn from giving the pie to his mother. What should he do?

What should he dooooo????

“Why are you just standing there?” asked Emmelyn, who stopped in her tracks and looked back. She only realized after ten steps that the prince was not following behind her.

Mars shook his head and pretended to admire the lion statue beside him. “Oh, sorry. I was distracted by this statue. I’ve never seen it before. The carving is very intricate.”

Emmelyn stood impatiently and waved her hand for Mars to follow her. 

“We will be late if you linger. Don’t you know it’s rude to be late?” She grumbled.

“I know,” Mars replied. He then walked over to Emmelyn, and after arriving beside the girl, he reached out his hand and grabbed her right hand. “Come.”

Emmelyn was stunned when the man grabbed her hand and pulled her into the palace. Suddenly, her chest was pounding.

Even though they already had sex regularly, the simple act of him holding her hand like this, on the way to see his mother, felt so… intimate.

Hey … why was her heart beating faster than usual? Emmelyn didn’t understand what was wrong with her today.

However, she didn’t have time to think about it for too long because two female servants in beautiful clothes had come to greet them from behind the door.

“Good after― Aaaahhhhh…!!!!” The two girls let out a muffled scream when they saw Prince Mars and hurriedly stepped back. They did not expect that the queen’s guest would arrive with the crown prince.

The palace maids had gotten used to it over the years to avoid being seen by the prince when he came to the palace. They didn’t want to be punished by the king or queen if they angered their only child.

No one wanted to die just for touching the prince, intentional or not. Hence, when they saw that the prince had suddenly appeared behind the door, the two women immediately bowed for mercy and disappeared inside.

Emmelyn just watched the incident with pity. She felt sorry for the terrified maids. At the same time, from the corner of her eyes, she saw the sad expression on Mars’s face.

The man could only stay still and didn’t say anything when people ran away from him when he arrived in a room.

Ahh .. if only they knew that the crown prince was not that evil to execute them if they touched him, maybe those maids would not have been so horrified upon seeing his presence.

Emmelyn turned to Mars and looked at his side profile. She could see a sad glint in those golden irises. Now, Emmelyn could understand how Mars must have felt.

The man was used to being treated like he was a cruel monster by many people since he was a child.

Those people didn’t know the truth …

Emmelyn took a deep breath and lowered her head. Subconsciously, her hand, which was in Mars’s grip, clasped the man’s hand and squeezed it gently.

Mars, who felt his hand being squeezed, spontaneously turned to the side to look at Emmelyn. Their two pairs of eyes met.

Mars smiled wryly.

“Now you can see for yourself, right?” he asked in a low voice. “They all think of me as a cruel and terrible monster who will kill them if they dare to come near.”

Emmelyn was speechless. She didn’t know how to comfort the handsome man beside her who had lived with a curse for nearly 27 years and couldn’t touch women at all… until Emmelyn came into his life.

She knew, no words of comfort could make things seem better.

Ahh .. now she could understand the suffering experienced by Prince Mars Strongmoor. Emmelyn remembered when Mars gave her the ‘silent treatment’ and let her be on her own for a day. 

That day, she felt very lonely and almost went crazy.

What if she had to experience a life like his, that she could not even have a close interaction with half the human species?

Mars’ life was limited to the men around him. The only woman who didn’t seem affected by his curse was his mother, and now Emmelyn.

His world must be very lonely, Emmelyn thought.

This thought suddenly triggered something in her mind.

Would the curse that befell Prince Mars Strongmoor be passed on to his children?

Emmelyn couldn’t imagine if the children she gave birth to later would experience a life like their father’s … It would be so heartbreaking!

She could see why Queen Elara was so excited when she saw Mars was sleeping with a woman this morning. She must be ecstatic and relieved that her son could finally live like a normal man.

Now, Emmelyn was suddenly worried about her own future children.

Even though she always insisted that she was only renting out her womb to Mars to produce his children, that did not mean she did not care about them at all. At least, Emmelyn hoped they would be well cared for and grow up happily into adulthood.

“Why the long face?” asked Mars when he saw Emmelyn’s expression now looking murky. The man smiled faintly and touched Emmelyn’s chin and lifted it slightly. “Are you feeling sorry for me?”

Emmelyn stared at those golden irises as their faces were so close to each other. She did recognize a glint of sorrow in Mars’s eyes.

Ah, but the man seemed to hide his feelings and acted like he was fine.

[Why do you have to pretend that you don’t care about how the people think of you as a monster? You idiot.]

[Wouldn’t it be better if they know the truth that you were cursed by an evil witch?]

[You are not a monster that they have to fear. You don’t kill people just because they touch you!]

Emmelyn couldn’t understand why the royal family would hide this fact from everyone and let the crown prince endure such a bad reputation.

Were they… still trying to cure the prince and didn’t want his reputation as a women-killer to be heard by the neighboring countries?

Hmm .. maybe they intended him to marry one of the princesses from the kingdoms around them, but they wanted to wait for the curse to be broken first.