Breaking Off the Engagement with the Demon King - Chapter 6

“Shou… In your absence… I was lonely. I was scared. My heart was on the verge of breaking.”

Kiara once again delivered her lines in an overly theatrical tone.

At this point, no one reacted. Everyone, including Shou, had grown completely numb to her performances.

“But the one who saved my fragile heart… was Strey.”

“…Huh?”

The name “Strey” caused Shou’s brow to twitch.

“Did you just say… Strey?”

“Indeed. It was me.”

But the one who answered wasn’t Kiara—it was a man who stepped forward from behind her.

“…You.”

With long silver hair fluttering behind him, a face so delicate it could be mistaken for a woman’s, and a slender frame, the man was none other than Strey Bohring, heir to the Bohring ducal house.

In many ways, Strey was the complete opposite of Shou.
Though they were the same age and in the same class, the two had a long and bitter history—an unspoken rivalry that had flared up more than once.

Now, with a calm and practiced stride, Strey walked to Kiara’s side and gently slipped his arm around her waist.

Kiara rested her hand against his chest with a dreamy expression and, wearing a look of pure bliss, dropped a verbal bombshell.

“Allow me to introduce him, Shou. This is Lord Strey Bohring, heir to the Bohring Duchy. He filled the emptiness in my heart—and soon, we will be formally engaged.”

(What—!?!)

Though no one spoke it aloud, the entire audience was stunned to the point their eyes nearly popped out of their heads.

This was too fast.
Far too fast.
They’d skipped multiple steps of formal etiquette, and then some.

In fact… wasn’t Kiara the one guilty of betrayal here?

Everyone was thinking it.
But no one dared to say it—no one, that is, except one.

“What a roundabout way to do things…”

Scratching his head and speaking in a tone of bored exasperation, it was Shou who finally broke the silence.

“So this is what it’s all about, huh? You just wanted to break off our engagement so you could form a new one. All that noise, just to pin the blame on me… What a load of crap.”

His voice dripped not with anger, but pure disillusionment.

He’d already passed the point of being angry.
Now it was just too ridiculous to take seriously.

“How dare you call it nonsense! Hold your tongue! Kiara’s heart was wounded by your betrayal—Strey’s sincerity healed her! That love blossomed naturally between them!”

Lars shouted as if delivering a righteous verdict, but everyone present was thinking the same thing:

“No, this is clearly the princess’s own betrayal.”

Even if Shou had been unfaithful, Kiara committing the same sin negated her right to accuse him.
At that point, both parties were at fault.

If she wished to nurture love with another man, she should have first properly and formally annulled her engagement.
Only then would it have been acceptable.

But this outrageous, tactless, extreme engagement-breaking spectacle had everyone stunned into silence—not out of awe, but out of sheer disbelief.

And yet…

Lars, Kiara, and even Strey, misreading the silence, stood proudly with triumphant smiles, as if they had just won.