itbomm

chapter 15: really, what does she know?

"Congrats, you became the Transmigrated Villainess Turned Saintess," Athanase dryly said before chewing on his cake. They were sitting in the parlour of the Amethyst Palace, with an assortment of sweets on the table before them.

They were finally left unsupervised — thank heavens for that. He wasn't prepared to choke on his cake again if Autumn ever dropped bombs of information, and he especially didn't want to play a game of mental tennis.

Switching between topics while simultaneously keeping track of it all just gave him headaches.

"It's a very strange situation," Autumn sighed. "I transmigrated as a Villainess, ended up reuniting with my best friend, and became a Saintess all in a week. Y'know, I was kind of hoping for a Melissa Podebrat situation — Beware of the Villainess and all, where I could do as I pleased and live a nice life, maybe get a pretty werewolf boyfriend with beautiful blue hair. Oh! Maybe I could've been Leilin in Today the Villainess Has Fun Again, being able to do as I please because I'd be a Candmione with all the wealth imaginable!"

"Oh yeah?" he raised a brow. "I think Fiona in I Became the Wife of the Male Lead is also a good option if we get to choose. She's got OP magic, she's attractive, and she could arguably be one of the best found family stories if she didn't have PTSD getting in the way of her accepting that."

"Hmm, hmm," Autumn hummed in agreement, closing her eyes as she thought it over. "But y'know, I think I'd like that manhwa more if they had more scenes from when they were kids — teens? There was a five-year time skip, wasn't there? Gosh, I really wanted to see more wholesome Found Family stuff, and maybe have the romance develop faster."

"What, like how soon Artezia's marriage with Cedric was in The Villainess Lives Twice?"

"Exactly," she nodded. "Speaking of which..." she trailed off, frowning.

He wrinkled his nose in distaste.

Marriage.

It wasn't a topic that they could avoid forever, especially after everything that's happened.

Since his sister collapsed and was on her deathbed for practically two months, it's safe to assume that people might still be under the impression that Athanase would rise up to become the crown prince, if the nobles decided to play up on the rumours of the Crown Princess being a sickly child and all that, and that she might relapse, he was undoubtedly going to end up gaining a faction of his own.

Assuming that the misogynists haven't gathered together already.

And then there was the fact of status coming into play. Unlike Lucas, Athanasia's playmate, Verena is the daughter of a Count, and would be considered to be one of his marriage candidates by that fact alone. However, if she was adopted by her aunt, Madame and Marchioness Pompidou, her status would be on a more even playing field among his other marriage candidates. Some of the Dukes did have daughters, but they were all either too old and already engaged by now or were married, so the next best thing would be the daughters of the Marquesses.

And she was now the Saintess — which would make Verena unrivalled as a candidate. She would have the support of the commoners and several noble families by that title alone. The Milfords and Nightingales would both support her already because she was accepted by Claude himself, and although they're not Dukes and Duchesses, they do have some semblance of political power.

The issue is that Athanase doesn't want the throne, but he also doesn't want to be engaged to a complete stranger, either. He wasn't physically old enough to be taken seriously by the nobles, especially for writing a statement in order to get rid of his claim to the throne — he tried, but everyone told him that he would have a chance in the future when his sister decides to pass on the crown, so he'd have to wait until he was thirteen to be taken seriously, maybe.