For a moment, no one in the council room dared to breathe.
The Hydra Knights. The men who had fought monsters, crossed battlefields, and faced death without blinking, stood frozen and rigid, their eyes darting between each other like witnesses to some divine phenomenon. Because the crown prince of Noctharis had just smiled.
Not the sharp, dangerous one that meant someone was about to die, but a real one. A soft and human smile that was warm enough to melt through the cold marble and steel that usually wrapped around him like some unbreakable barrier. Not to mention it had been so easy too.
The princess had only been in the room for less than a minute, and somehow the air no longer felt suffocating. Every bit of tension that had threatened to kill them five breaths ago had vanished. It made them wonder: Had the crown prince truly been softened by his wife… or was this the calm surrender of a man finally broken?
