Road to the Crown

As soon as I woke up, I realised that something was wrong. Outside of the obvious effects of sleeping in a damned carriage instead of a proper bed like back pain and sore muscles, the fact that I could feel a soft warmth on my chest was definitely extraordinary, not to speak about soft breath that continuously moved the hair of my beard!

Reluctantly opening my eyes, I saw the sight I was worried I could see.

Under the influence of the drinks from the yesterday and her request, we actually ended up sleeping together!

Not in a way your dirty mind would explain those words!

With her small face cuddled into my shoulder, Elia was still soundly sleeping, unaware of how bothersome her presence in my arms would be. Looking at her calm expression as if she managed to relax for the first time in ages made me unable to break this eerie moment of hers.

With the coat still keeping the both of us as warm as two cuddled people could be under a thick bear fur, I could only let the reins of my imagination go free, with her soft body pressing against mine through a thin layer of our inner clothes. While I hated to admit it, it was the first time when any girl would cuddle like that with me, so I just decided to enjoy the moment while waiting for the storm to ensue.

"Wha… what the hell?!"

About ten to fifteen minutes after I regained my consciousness, Elia started moving around as if looking for a better position to continue her sleep, before finally opening her eyes. At first confused, she quickly turned wrathful as if the notion of spending the night in my arms was so repulsive that her body couldn't handle it!

Let's just take it for a natural reaction of a woman who was constantly on edge since a long time ago, instead of me being ugly. Twenty-five years of solitude in the modern world were enough to make me sort of a loner, I didn't know if I could take a hit of a young girl being dejected by me!

"Calm down, it's not like anything serious happened."

Like, seriously… It was my ego that just received a fatal hit! I can understand your reaction, but tone it down a bit, would ya?

"Wha?! Nothing happened?! Do you want to say that sleeping with me counts as nothing?!"

Oh gosh… Maybe that's a reason I was alone both in my modern life and so far in my current transmigrated one. How the heck did she came to such conclusion? I just wanted to calm her down and now I'm guilty of not acknowledging her charms?

"I'm not gonna lie. I really have no idea what to say if you put this matter in this perspective. Should I take it as you blaming me for not making a move on you and urging me to fix this mistake?"

Being a noble and something of a seasoned warrior according to my statistics, I internally knew about the most important rule that was behind most of the decisions that future generations of historians with the knowledge of their effects considered to be apocalyptic. It's better to make any decision instead of not taking any at all because it means giving up the initiative to the enemy! And just like that, I decided that only with an all-out attack I could prevail!

"N-no, it's not like that…"

Most likely imagining the scenario I forced on her, Elia's face covered in blush, as she pushed her body as far against the opposite wall of the carriage as she could. It seemed that I won this attack, but at what cost?

"Come on now, let's drop this. We were both drunk and we should be happy neither of us actually went too far. But thinking about this, I promised to tell you what sort of plan I have for solving your problem. While I can tell you it now, I hope you won't mind the poor timing of it."

With the coat thrown to the side by Elia's previous movements, nothing was blocking me so I used the chance to jump off the carriage and start stretching my limbs. No matter how nice it felt to have a young girl sleep snuggled on top of one's chest, my old, already twenty-five years body had its own needs. Unless I was willing to suffer through the rebound of this night later in the day, I had to stretch!

"Just hit me with it. I promise I won't hold it against you."

Surprisingly, those words actually managed to reassure me. While this late medieval times had many faults, there was one thing that later generations would miss about this period.

People used to keep their word.

Like always, this rule didn't apply to everyone and every situation, but with how serious the people were about their honour and loyalty and with little to none form of guaranteeing one's status, unless someone was willing to be ostracised by literally everyone around him, giving someone your word, meant wonders.

"Since the main trouble lies with you lacking any backer and the governor most likely going to force you into a marriage in order to stabilise the situation, why don't we claim that we are engaged, so that we could take care of your family and deprive them of means of hurting your business, before declaring our premature divorce?"

While this solution has its own flaws, starting from the potential scar on my reputation when it would come for later marital affairs, and at the scorn of the governor who could feel cheated ending. Thinking about it, we could even keep the ruse for a while to ensure both ends of the deal, before either officially breaking up or actually falling for each other.

Maybe because I was alone in my entire life, the perspective of getting engaged, even if only for the sake of appearances and politic gains, made me quite excited. While my position was higher than hers, the city of her father was actually more wealthy and developed than mine, even if the history would put it way higher on the pedestal due to certain events that Pilzno disregarded and Tarnow banked upon to rise into prominence.

"If we were to put it like that…"

At first, her face clouded in thoughts, only for her complexion to suddenly improve after just a few moments. With a quick jump, she descended from the carriage without even bothering to grab the expensive coat that we were sleeping under, before latching onto my arm with a smug smile.

"... then shouldn't we start setting the stage right away?"