Luciano surely had sent them a strange letter in secret. The story didn't make much sense, and especially the mention of a blue flower was confusing.

Blanche glanced at the picture at the bottom again. “It's a flower from Travuan though. Lord Vasquez was there during his vacation. But he probably didn't just want to share his traveling experiences. Is that flower...” She froze in place as she remembered something that reminded her of this. “The poison they used on me is blue. And it's made of extracts from flowers from Travuan. Did he mean that?” She looked up at her lover.

Theodore gritted his teeth. “I assume that he did. But he should know that showing me that he is aware of this poison may cause me to crush their household. His father's servant was the one bribing the perpetrator. That happened right after the Vasquez family was on vacation at the place that is the origin of this poison's ingredients. That only makes them the number one suspect aside from the dowager empress. Cedar had some of that poison too, but since they are working together, it wouldn't be surprising for both of them to share. But the whole story here is still unnecessary. He probably wanted to tell us something.”

Leonard looked up from his book and put it aside. “I would be a little more taken aback because your cousin sent you a story about someone's cousin taking over the family.”

The emperor sighed. “I know. But it doesn't make sense. Why would he threaten me first if he had such ridiculous ideas? Surely, only an insane person would wish to tell the emperor that they will take their place. But if my brother did it, I would understand why. He has the right to ascend to the throne if I'm gone. But Lord Vasquez would never become a royal heir. He isn't a member of the Estien family at all. He is related to the dowager empress, but there is no blood relation to any original member of royalty. So, he wouldn't fulfill the most important criteria. He isn't even the previous empress' son. That could make some people argue, but he isn't anywhere close to being an heir. And if he was, he certainly wouldn't be kind enough to warn me first. It would be better to strike without giving me a chance to realize that he is a threat.”

Blanche listened to that while reading through the story again. One thing was strange to her, now that she paid attention. “The ending is odd.” She waited for her lover to look at her and pointed at the line she was referring to. “It suddenly emphasizes the boy's father, who didn't do anything special before. But even before, this storytelling is strange. The boy who ends up as the heir never does anything himself. As if he isn't the main character. He just gets pushed forward by those around him. His ending doesn't even say whether he is happy. It says that his father is glad, but the rest isn't mentioned.”

“Now that you say it, this is strange.” Theodore put his hand to his chin as he read through the letter once more. “But I still don't understand how this would help him. Lord Vasquez wouldn't send this without a reason. If this note is supposed to make us believe something, that message would probably benefit his family in some way. That is why it might be better for us not to think about it much at all. I don't want them to lead us astray with their words.”

Leonard was in the middle of choosing another book from the shelf and turned around to add something. “Or he is using reversed psychology. They tell you something because they know that you won't believe them. He may also just have snapped and wished to send you a nice fairy tale. We have no way to know. In any case, we should keep an eye on him.”

Theodore rolled his eyes at the secretary. “I didn't think about that at all, you know. Of course, we will keep an eye on him and his whole family. Duke Vasquez should be getting uncomfortable by now. He will ask for an audience soon, and I will use that chance to humiliate him again. I want him to come to the edge of his breaking point. After all, I want him to admit what he knows, and him being enraged will certainly make it easier to do that.” He turned to his lover. “Would you mind coincidentally appearing while he is there? It would be easier if I had your help, but I understand if you don't want to see him.”

It was true that Blanche was more than reluctant to meet that arrogant duke. But as long as Theodore was right next to her, she didn't have to be scared anymore. “If I can help you in some way, I will gladly do it. I probably just have to say that I want him to apologize, right?”

Her lover smiled down at her and gently ran his fingers through her hair. “Exactly. He will come to an audience and see me sitting on the throne. And then you can come and sit down next to me. You can speak with him in a snarky tone, and that will make him blow up. Without a doubt, this would cause him to lose his mind, and he could perhaps accidentally tell us a few interesting things.”

Blanche could already imagine how any sane person would react to her sitting on the empress' throne after interrupting an audience. That had little to do with Claude's arrogance. She herself wasn't sure how she would react if any other woman did this in her stead. That was exactly why she was rather skeptical about that idea. “I don't know whether that is such a good plan. I can't just keep taking the empress' place. During the ball, you could justify it by saying that I was the host, but now we don't have an excuse.”

Theodore looked at her with a completely serious expression. “You don't need an excuse for taking what is yours. Every single person that complains, which only includes our enemies, will not be here for much longer. During the ball, you saw how everyone reacted. No one dared to say anything. Duke Duremont was only silent because of his daughter, but aside from him, there wasn't a single person that wished to cause problems on our side. So, you can relax. Everything will go smoothly. I will make sure of that.”

The concubine wasn't convinced. The fact that he kept hinting at her becoming the most important woman in this nation was more disturbing than anything else. That no one else would complain about this questionable decision was unlikely. In fact, Blanche was the first person here that would complain as soon as her lover brought it up. But Theodore sounded so convinced that she found it hard to refute him, and in the end, what would happen was already clear. So, she didn't voice her worries. She had more than enough time to do this later when the divorce was finalized and would be made official. She didn't look forward to that day at all. Aside from the fact that she would have to face this issue then, the Duremonts' response also wouldn't be kind.

Blanche didn't need much conviction to push those thoughts from her mind and quickly focused on the conversation again. “Let's see then. Tell me when Duke Vasquez shows up, and I will think about whether to do what you proposed. But I will come to annoy him no matter what. He deserves it for threatening us multiple times. I may be a little petty in that regard, but I don't care.”

Theodore gently patted her head. “That is good. I want you to feel free to get your revenge on anyone who wronged you. No matter who they are. If you say the word, they will get what they deserve.” As usual, he was a bit excessive in his promises. That his voice left no doubt that he was completely honest was probably the worst part about this.

Blanche held back a sigh and reached up to stroke over his hair in return. “I won't ruin our nation by blaming some powerful people for saying strange things. All in all, everyone was always polite. I don't want any issues for anyone, so that is all I will say about that. Getting revenge on your enemies is way more important.”

Her lover gave her a little smile before kissing her forehead. “You really are too kind.” He remained in that position for a moment before slowly pulling back. “Then I guess that we are done with work for today. Do you want to go back to our room? We have a lot of gifts to look at.”

The concubine remembered the mountain of items that were waiting for her and was both filled with anticipation and concern. “I feel like that will take at least a week. You really had to overdo it with your presents. And now you are neglecting your work because of that. You barely spent twenty minutes in your office today. How have you managed to do anything?”

Theodore reached forward and opened a drawer. He pulled out a folder with a couple of pages of documents. “I finished all of them already.” He gestured to the second half of the folder. Those weren't too many papers but still at least two dozen pages that were full of text on the front and the back.

Blanche lifted her gaze and looked at him with wide eyes. “Are you a mage? You couldn't have read all of those in twenty minutes.”

The emperor shrugged with a cheeky grin on his face. “What can I say? I'm efficient. If I want to go back to you, there is nothing stopping me.”

Leonard chimed in from the table again. “If you ask me, he is too efficient. I used to do at least half of the work, but now he is so fast that I can barely keep up. Along with our decreased workload thanks to your law, this causes us to be much quicker. But it's still weird. I feel like he sometimes knows what documents say before reading them.”

Theodore looked at him, still with a wide smile on his lips. “I just read faster than you do. Don't be jealous though. I'm just exceptional.” This earned him a snort from Leon. The emperor put on a pout at that.

Blanche took this as her cue to cup his face and give him a bright smile. “Don't feel bad. You're perfect.” She pressed a kiss onto his lips and let him take over for a moment.

When her lover pulled away, the look in his eyes seemed a bit sad. “Not at all. But I'm doing my best for you. And if that isn't enough, I will give even more.” He leaned in to kiss her again. Blanche enjoyed that fully and wrapped her arms around his neck. This proved to have been a good idea because Theodore just picked her up and rose from the chair. He carried her toward the door and gazed at Leon in the process. “We will leave then.”

The secretary grinned at that. “Good. Because I didn't need sugar poisoning today. Have a nice afternoon. But I still have to be strict one more time. Lady Blanche.” He turned to the concubine. “There is no time to be lazy. The empress will not be here much longer, which means that you will be the woman at Theodore's side. We need to prepare you. Starting from tomorrow, we will have lessons again. No more skipping.” They only had paused for two days, so the sudden seriousness in his voice was definitely exaggerated.

You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.

Blanche nodded anyway. “Of course. I will do my best to not disappoint the royal family.”

Theodore immediately chimed in at that. “You would never. You are the most amazing woman in this whole world. You care for other people, and you are interested in the nation and our citizens. That already makes you better than all the other empresses together.” He didn't even try to hide his goal anymore.

Leonard spoke up before Blanche could open her mouth to protest. “I wouldn't say things like that, simply because I never met any empresses except for the last two ones. But I can agree that you are better than both of them in the sense of being a sympathetic person. Your political knowledge is still a bit lacking, but we are working on that. But the fact that you are eager to learn and seem to absorb information like a sponge makes you very suitable to be the next...” He paused for a moment and scanned her expression. “A member of the royal family. It will be fine for you to become Theodore's wife if you continue to work hard. You are doing well, even better than I had expected.”

The emperor was silent for a few seconds before speaking up. “What are you currently discussing in your lessons?”

Blanche took a short moment to remember. “The luxury tax and the trading routes within Artias. How that law looks like and how you implemented it despite the ministers' split opinions. And we talked about how those routes are being protected and used. Things like that.”

Theodore stood still for a bit before turning around and walking toward his desk. “Maybe practicing is better than doing it in theory only. I happen to have documents regarding those two topics here. Some are recent too. We could take a look at them together.”

The concubine blinked in surprise. “Really?” It would certainly be interesting to see how all of this actually looked in reality.

But Leonard wasn't happy about that. He let out a loud sigh. “She will sit on your lap the whole time while you do that, won't she? Great. Now my day will be full of seeing you cuddle.”

Theodore took his time sitting down and carefully helping his lover shuffle around so that she could sit comfortably. He opened another drawer and pulled out a stack of folders, which he placed on the desk. Only then, he replied. “If that burdens you that much, I am granting you permission to leave.”

Leon shook his head. He closed his book and stood up to bring it back to the shelf. “I'm her tutor, aren't I? I have to overlook this lesson too. Even if it will bring me so much pain that I might collapse soon.” He pressed a hand to his forehead and put on an exaggerated grimace.

Blanche almost chuckled at that, but she kept quiet and focused on the documents her lover was showing her. At first, it took a bit until she got used to the way that some things were phrased or how confusing the layout of the older pages sometimes was. But after a while, she didn't have any problems seeing the similarities between the things she had learned from her teacher and the documents she was reading right now. If she had a question, both Theodore and Leonard were ready to answer it, so there weren't any issues.

They examined some papers for about two hours before her lover decided that it was time for a break. He insisted that she deserved cake as a reward, and they ate some of the leftovers from yesterday. It was as delicious as the day before, which only served to lighten Blanche's spirits. She hadn't done anything exhausting today and could spend every minute with her pampering lover, which would give her a chance to recover from the events during her birthday.

At least she had thought that before they returned to their room and began taking a look at her gifts. Seemingly, it would be a little more exhausting than she had believed previously, but at the same time, she had to admit that she was happy about every small item she received. Her lover truly knew her best.

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The next few days passed, and it was a strange contrast. On the one hand, nothing much seemed to change. But in reality, everything was rather different now.

Angelica and Darlene had become the concubine's personal attendants just three days after they had agreed. Being accompanied by two more people felt strange at first, but it quickly became normal since Blanche was used to those two. The most tiring thing about their presence was just them joking about not having anything to do since Theodore was always around. But it was easy to quieten them down by giving them a chance to be alone for a moment, which would cause the maids to start cuddling immediately. Blanche and Stella always found that rather entertaining, even if it occasionally defeated the original purpose of the two other servants spending time with Stella.

At the same time, the concubine's lessons continued. Like normally, she often went through many topics with Leon, but she also looked at some contemporary documents whenever Theodore offered them to her. She still refused to sign contracts for him when he joked about it, but she had begun to read through many alongside him. It wasn't much different now. But every time she went through some documents and understood what they were about without help, she felt more like she might not be as clueless as before anymore.

The tailor came once more too. This time, Blanche didn't even have a chance to discuss before her lover bought all the dresses and gifted them to her despite her not even having worn the ones from her birthday. That wasn't new. The only thing that was different now was that Theodore was rather open about the empress not receiving a single piece of clothing. The inquiries of Madame Charture were defeated as Theodore argued that Blanche was the one he loved and the only one fit to be by his side. Somehow, that made enough sense for the overly romantic tailor, so she didn't ask again.

Like this, things were quite different from before.

However, these changes meant nothing in comparison to what the progress of time itself meant. The original day of the villainess' death wasn't far away.

There were only days left, but Blanche hadn't lost Theodore's love nor committed any crimes. She hadn't been put on trial nor had she been thrown into a cell. Because this world wasn't the novel's one. That realization allowed her to be strangely calm. She had lost track of the exact date of her original counterpart's execution, but she didn't even fear that. She knew that something like this wouldn't happen again. For her, the book had almost lost its entire meaning. She would only use the additional knowledge from “To Be Empress” if she needed it, but she wouldn't believe in the novel's storyline for one second.

It was laughable if one compared her first reaction upon gaining the book's memories and her current mindset. But the things around her had changed, which was why all of this only made sense.

Blanche was happy with her situation. She had time to do what she wanted while her lover worked, had some lessons and then spent the rest of the day with Theodore. It was perfect.

----------------------------------------

Today was a similarly relaxed day. Blanche had baked a chocolate cake for once and was bringing it to the emperor's office to surprise him. She felt a bit strange moving through the hallways with four people trailing behind her, but she was slowly getting used to it. That didn't mean that she liked it though.

She gazed over her shoulder to glance at her maids and began explaining for the hundredth time. “You are my personal attendants. That means that you always have to be there if I have an order for you that can't be carried out by other servants. That doesn't mean that you have to follow me at all times though. It's fine if one of you is with me, and even that won't be necessary. I can ask someone else if something suddenly bothers me. You really don't need to waste your time by standing behind me like this while I pick up Theodore.”

Darlene shrugged. “Maybe we will become a bit more lenient with time. But we haven't even had this position for a week. I would feel bad if we got money for not doing anything. You've been with His Majesty and Lord Astame the entire day, so we had no tasks. Now Stella didn't even allow us to carry the cake. We will manage to follow you for a while. As soon as you are back in your lover's arms, we can retire for the night anyway. And then we can go back into our fluffy bed.” A dreamy look came onto her face.

Blanche glanced to the front to ensure that she wasn't bumping into anything before turning her head back again. “Right. I didn't ask about your room yet. You seemed to be very fond of it the first time you saw it. Now that you've spent a few nights there, what are your thoughts?”

Darlene replied with a bright grin. “It's heavenly. Thanks to you, we are allowed to share a room without needing to secretly slip into each other's chamber every night. It's perfect.”

Angelica smiled at her lover before turning to her mistress and responding as well. “Of course, the room isn't nearly as luxurious as yours. But in comparison to our old quarters, it is rather grand. We were a bit overwhelmed with that, but, as Darlene said, it's wonderful. I never slept in such a comfortable bed.”

Stella, who was currently holding the cake and the cover under which it was hidden increased her pace to walk next to the other maids. “I had to admit that old habits die hard. I am used to waking up early and getting breakfast for My Lady before waking you up. Back then, that was needed too, but His Majesty has others bring your food anyway. Now I wake up too early without having anything to do. Surely, I can go eat with the others, but then we sit around for another hour until you and His Majesty finish. If we are lucky, you come out then. If not, we have to wait until lunch and he goes to work until we can catch a glimpse of your face.”

Blanche turned around with her whole body this time. “I told you that you don't have to wait for me. You could use that time for yourselves as well. I will call for you as soon as I leave my room. I don't know how the empress deals with her attendants, but she sometimes sends them away too. So, there is no need to wait for me like some lost-”

“Lady Blanche!” Owen interrupted her by jumping forward and pulling her toward him.

The concubine almost had a heart attack upon suddenly being moved against her will. She barely noticed what was going on when the knight had already set her down a few steps away from her original position again. For a moment, she could only stare at him in disbelief. He had seriously just picked her up like she weighed nothing and didn't seem to have used any strength. She took a few seconds before turning her attention to the more important thing.

Noah was standing right by the corner where she had been before. While she had been turned around, she could have sworn that he had almost made contact with her. She didn't need long to realize that she had been walking backward and that he had probably rounded the corner at the exact same second.

Owen had just saved her from a rather embarrassing incident.

Blanche became even more relieved when she saw how Seraphina and her two maids were coming out of the hallway behind Noah. She quickly whispered to her knight. “Thank you.” Then she turned to the group in front of them and made a curtsy.

The empress immediately greeted her. “Good day, Lady Blanche. Did you get injured? That was rather close.” So, she had seen that.

The concubine inwardly cursed and let out a nervous laugh. “Good day, Your Majesty. Nothing happened. Thank you for worrying though. I have to apologize for my carelessness.” She made eye contact with Noah. “I apologize for that...” She paused for a moment and thought about whether she should address him by his first name as he had offered it to her or use his last name since they weren't alone. In the end, she just chose to refrain from saying his name completely. “Due to my negligence, there almost was an accident. I am sorry.”

Noah gave her his typical gentle smile that immediately made her feel better. “I wish you a wonderful day, Lady Blanche. There is no need to apologize. As you said, nothing happened. I should have been more careful as well. We have to thank Sir Maillont for his quick reflexes though.”

Blanche mentally noted to never walk backward again since a collision would obviously have been her fault, but she didn't point that out. Instead, she just nodded with a smile. “Thank you for your consideration. I already thanked him, and I will do it once again.” She turned to Owen, but he replied before she could address him.

“It is my duty to protect you, so I do not require thanks for such a small action. It is only natural for me to act like this.” As always, he was stone-faced, with not a single trace of any emotions being visible.

Even Seraphina looked overly expressive in comparison. Her expression wasn't as cold as it was in public. Instead, she rather seemed relaxed. The empress was silent for a moment and looked at the concubine before speaking up. “It seems that you have capable attendants, which is quite an important part of your role. I see some changes though. Are those two the new attendants that were assigned to you this week?” Of course, she would notice.

The reply was quite obvious too. And at this point, telling anything but the truth wasn't necessary either.