"Really? I'm impressed you used it right after Irene gave it to you, Jeno."

"That's right; I'm so proud of you "

Irene smiled as she patted Jeno's cheek, smiling at him as Jeno looked at them.

"But why did you give it to me? Not Jaemin or Renjun. Or even Haechan!"

"Jaemin and Renjun, both are quite tricky. Haechan is too impulsive to understand his feeling despite being an affectionate person."

"But you, Jeno, are the perfect one."

Irene pulled out an album photo, placing it in the table and opened it. Lots of pictures of ladies, which made Jeno confused.

Until he noticed a distinctive feature that could only posses by the lady of House of Weissmann.

"These all were Lord Weissmann's daughters from all generations. Beautiful, aren't they?"

"They are."

I replied as Suho turned to another page. In there, I witnessed great, horrifying pictures.

"They all were ... burnt."

Jeno said as he looked at them, whispering murmurs.

"Burnt? Why?"

"They didn't possess what Y/N has to be the sacrificial bride."

"The most important thing of being the sacrificial bride of the Demons is-"

"Having the red eyes."

I replied and noticed none of them inherited the red eyes. Only golden or sometimes violet eyes.

But red? Obviously, no. Until one of his sons married and his wife conceived to a beautiful, red-eyed daughter.

"With that, you must protect her."

She said as I understood why she did all of these now. She did it to protect both Lux and I.

"Now, you do understand how important is this for our faction, right?"

It wasn't a secret anymore that there were two factions in here, Young Blood and Old Aristocrat.

The faction of OA was created by our great-great-grandfather when led this empire. Thus, making it compelling because it was by the emperor himself.

The YB faction was when my father's rebellion against my grandfather started. He against most of the tradition in here, such as bachelor to be in the queen's party and increasing tax with no reason.

As some of my brothers were in the OA, I, myself, was in YB. WinWin, Renjun and Chenle were also in YB like me as they weren't so interested being a follower. They wanted to make our empire better than now.

Because of the emperor himself lived in another place, we didn't know what to do after our coronations. Heck, we even didn't know how to differentiate which one was for work and which one was an invitation letter.

"I hope you can learn more about us. Suho, please take care of Jeno."

"Let's go, Jeno."

He said as I followed his and slipped in a photo inside my pocket. Making sure I could learn more about Y/N's lineage.

∆∆∆

I was in the library, waiting for Jeno to come back from his visit.

The smell of old books and new books were filling my nostrils. The old book smelled like vanilla and dead grass, while the new book smelled more like ice and a bit of alcohol.

Seeing a hand was placing down the book to my lap, it was under my chin. Raising my head a bit to see his eyes directly while the other hand was holding both of my hands to be secured and immovable.

"It's great to see you fine, dear."

Jaemin was sitting beside me as he gave me a sweet kiss on the lips. Closing my eyes, I could feel his long eyelashes were trickling my cheek as his lips were resting on mine for a while.

Lingering for a moment, he finally pulled away, and I opened my eyes. Looking at his burning gaze, which was covered by calamity as I touched his lips.

"It's bleeding, Jaemin."

I said as I cupped his cheek and tracing his lips with my finger. I am making sure if the cut was still fresh or dried up.

"It's alright."

He said, pulling away from my hands from his face as he smiled gently at me.

"Your kiss made it better, Y/N."

He said as he placed his hands above mine. He was caressing it softly before finally had them showered them with his love and kisses.

Flustering, I almost jolted when he leaned forward to rub his forehead against mine. Feeling my body warmth that he rarely felt in here.

He held my hips to be secured on the place before put me on his lap, hugging me close as he laid down his head against my chest.

"Is Jeno that special for you that you rarely come to us again, Y/N?"

He whispered as I looked at him in silent.

"Do you know how dangerous Jeno is?"

"What do you mean by dangerous?"

"Y/N, he's a threat to this monarch. That's why, because he know he can't be the first line to the throne."

Jaemin whispered.

"But, because he's a dear brother of mine. I can't just confront him and hurt him like that, Y/N. That's why I need you to always be by my side. Both to protect us and the others from Jeno and his faction's plan."

I couldn't believe what Jaemin said about Jeno. But, I wasn't sure if he was wrong. So far, Jeno was the one who mostly not fitted the custom in here and did everything by his own way.

"Especially because he's against my faction, our own grandfather's faction, who led this empire to its glory and defeated the Heaven and took what supposed to be ours from their hands. Instead, he's with our father, who never even showed up in this castle."

Hearing his complaints and rants about that, I became to trusting Jaemin more than Jeno as I nodded at him.

"I'll be with you, Jaemin. I trust you."

I said as Jaemin touched my cheek before caressed it lovingly. Pulling my face to get closer with his before placed a gentle kiss over my lips.

"Thank you, Y/N. You know I'm the only one you can trust in this place."