* * *
“Joel, are you here, by any chance?”
The person who burst into Benjamin’s tent, shouting that, was, unexpectedly, the Crown Prince.
“Yo-Your Highness…?”
For some reason, he looked completely distraught.
His perpetually well-groomed black hair was dishevelled, and his shirt and pants were heavily crumpled.
It was extremely rare for the Crown Prince to lose his composure, so Joel, wondering if something had happened, awkwardly rose to his feet.
The Crown Prince approached with hurried steps and embraced Joel tightly.
“Joel! You said you would be in the carriage, so why are you here? I’ve been looking for you for ages.”
A deep sense of relief was woven into his scolding voice.
Over the Crown Prince’s shoulder, the Commander of the Fourth Knight Order could be seen commanding someone, “We found Lord Joel. Tell the knights who went to search the forest to return.”
Clutched in the Crown Prince’s arms, Joel frowned in bewilderment.
‘Could it be… that the Crown Prince was so anxious because he was worried about me?’
But he couldn’t possibly believe it.
Because Joel thought he was not such an important or meaningful person to the Crown Prince.
Although he had received a proposal from him—the Crown Prince’s attitude had only softened slightly after the proposal, and he hadn’t shown any sign of being deeply infatuated with him.
So why was he acting like this all of a sudden?
The sight of the Crown Prince agitated because of him was unfamiliar.
It was hard to believe even while seeing it with his own eyes.
The Crown Prince put his arm around Joel’s shoulder and whispered, “Let’s go back now.”
Even then, the Crown Prince’s eyes were still trembling with anxiety, and the arm embracing Joel’s shoulder was gripping him with strong force.
Although he hadn’t found a suitable solution for Benjamin yet, Joel could only exchange a glance with Benjamin and be dragged away.
Even after getting Joel back, the Crown Prince couldn’t easily relax.
He was afraid that Joel might sneak out like a stray cat during the night, so he held Joel tightly while trying to fall asleep.
The feeling when he opened the carriage door and realized that Joel, who should have been inside, was missing.
Recalling the dizzying sensation of his heart plummeting, the Crown Prince tightened his arms around Joel even more. He knew himself that he was acting strangely, but…
Yet, he couldn’t suppress this anxious feeling.
The moment he realized Joel had disappeared, the Crown Prince felt an overwhelming sense of vertigo, as if the ground had fallen out from under his feet.
After that, he was completely out of his mind, thinking he might never get Joel back.
He frantically searched around the carriage, then woke up the sleeping knights and started a full-scale search of the forest.
If the sentry, who had briefly left to relieve himself, hadn’t returned and informed him that Joel had gone to Benjamin’s tent, he might have been combing the vast forest until dawn.
Why on earth had he done that?
No matter how much he thought about it, there was no reason for him to be so shocked by Joel’s disappearance.
The Crown Prince rubbed his nose against Joel’s shoulder and thought.
Hadn’t he coldly ignored Joel’s ceaseless courtship for three years?
After spending the night with Joel in the forest, he had proposed to him, half out of responsibility and half out of affection—but the originally insignificant feeling could not have suddenly become desperate just because of that one night.
Although this small body was lovely, Joel’s existence was not irreplaceable.
Moreover, to be frank, Joel’s appearance—the only feature he could boast of—was originally far from his ideal type.
‘Perhaps hitting my head on that stone Joel wielded was really what went wrong,’ the Crown Prince pondered the suspicion he had once entertained again.
“Your, Your Highness. That’s a bit too much…”
He was deep in thought when Joel, who had been quietly held in his arms, suddenly wriggled and protested.
Only then did the Crown Prince realize he had set his teeth against Joel’s neck.
As if he were trying to imprint him.
A proposal could be retracted, but imprinting was irreversible.
And yet, he was trying to imprint Joel.
It was something a sane person wouldn’t do.
Even as he thought that, the Crown Prince felt the option suddenly becoming incredibly appealing.
Should I just do it?
Should I embed my teeth into this deer-like, white, long neck and inject it full of my pheromones?
The imprinting mark would never disappear with time, so everyone would know whose Joel belonged to.
Joel, who kept spitefully rejecting his touch, would also no longer be able to push him away.
If he just bit this neck, he could become perfectly one with Joel.
“If you keep doing this, I’m going to go sleep in Ben’s tent.”
As the Crown Prince kept setting his teeth on his neck, the anxious Joel slapped his hand over his neck and complained testily.
Afraid of losing the lovely warmth in his arms, the Crown Prince quickly apologized, “I understand. I’m sorry,” and retreated.
Instead, this time he started showing interest elsewhere.
Joel felt embarrassed by the heavy, meaty club starting to prod at his inner thigh.
He was already uncomfortable enough with the Crown Prince clinging to him like a leech from behind.
He had stayed quietly in his arms because the Prince was overly anxious, but if he kept doing this, he would have no choice but to reconsider sleeping together.
“Stop it. This is really, really my last warning…”
But despite the warning, the Crown Prince’s hand slyly crept under his clothes.
“Hah, Joel…”
“Yo-Your Highness. Hnnh, I told you to really stop. Ung, ooht, you promised not to do things like this…!”
Joel forcibly suppressed his moan and argued in a low voice.
It was a situation where noise might easily be heard outside.
The highly aroused Crown Prince, at least conscious that they shouldn’t be caught, pressed his lips close to Joel’s ear and whispered.
“I did. But it’s only right that a person who makes a mistake is given a chance to make amends.”
“What chance, ooht…!”
“If you give me just one more chance, hah. I will never disappoint you again.”
His hot breath tickled Joel’s ear.
At the same time, his chest was being inappropriately massaged.
He tried to gasp and grab the Crown Prince’s hand away, but the Crown Prince’s rude fingers clung to his nipple and wouldn’t let go.
“I, I said no. Don’t touch… Ah. Ah-ah. If you touch me like that…!”
A shiver of pleasure arose.
Joel, who had been arguing in a low voice, covered his mouth to suppress a moan.
Meanwhile, as a suggestive moan escaped Joel’s lips, the hand fondling his chest became even bolder.
The Crown Prince painfully pinched and kneaded Joel’s nipple, while the other hand wrapped around his waist, obscenely stroked his side.
It was a sensual and dirty caress.
Joel felt his body becoming breathtakingly hot.
He tried to summon all his strength to escape the Crown Prince’s arms, but instead, he was pinned down beneath the Crown Prince like a dog copulating.
In an unguarded moment, his pants were swiftly pulled down, and just as his buttock was grabbed, it was forcefully spread open.
The Crown Prince began explicitly fondling Joel’s anus. Joel tightly clutched the blanket and tried to restrain the Crown Prince, suppressing his intensely aroused sexual sensitivity.
But even when he tried to stop him, saying, “Wai, wait, stop for a second! Your Highness, Your Highness!” the Crown Prince was adamant.
Fondling Joel’s anus, the Crown Prince countered with a shameless tone, “Honestly, you don’t seem to hate it that much either.”
In fact, Joel’s backside was already moist and twitching in response to the pheromones of the dominant Alpha and the persistent fondling.
When a finger finally squeezed past the clench of his sphincter and forced its way in, Joel groaned, “Hah-ooht!” and twisted his hips.
Moaning, Joel was startled by himself and quickly looked around.
The sound was too loud.
‘Did people outside hear it?’
There was a sentry standing guard outside, and two other tents where people were sleeping.
Joel let go of the blanket he had been clutching and covered his mouth again.
‘Anyway, this really can’t happen,’ Joel thought foolishly with his heated mind.
He couldn’t sleep with the Crown Prince, who didn’t know about his pregnancy, when he was only in the early stages.
‘If the Crown Prince’s thing were small, maybe…’
He hadn’t properly seen the Crown Prince’s ‘thing’, but since that impressive ‘thing’ was energetically prodding his inner thigh right now, guessing its size was not difficult at all.
Thinking about it, there seemed to be no advantage for him if the Crown Prince’s that was large.
It would only be painful and difficult every time they had relations.
Joel, who unintentionally grumbled to himself with such thoughts, suddenly snapped back to attention.
This was no time to be indulging in such idle fantasies.
The Crown Prince was already trying to push in his second finger.
* * *
WOAH.