Transmigrated Into The Body Of The Cursed Prince Wife
Chapter 172: The play at the market

Chapter 172: The play at the market

Zane would have sworn this man wasn’t the second prince he knew; had it not been for his glares and his aura, he was certain the Lucian he knew would never be petty enough to go to this extent just because he had been jealous yesterday when Ave held his hand. Zane stood where he was, too stunned to move until Lucian turned around and called out,

"Come with us and let Evan guard the horses."

Zane let out a heavy sigh, hoping the prince wouldn’t do anything to torture him more because of his petty jealousy. He then followed behind the couple with his hands behind his back as he walked. His poor heart wouldn’t be able to take Lucian’s petty betrayal again if he were to make him the bad guy in front of the lady. It would be in his best interest to follow them at a distance to keep an eye on anything suspicious and threatening, as the prince had ordered.

He watched the two walk away hand in hand, with Ave pointing at random things she found fascinating along the road, and Zane couldn’t believe his eyes when the prince asked if she liked it and wanted him to purchase it for her. What even surprised Zane was him asking if she liked a weird-looking hut on the side of the market road, a hut that probably belonged to a poor merchant to store his goods, yet the second prince was asking if the woman wanted it, and he’d purchase it and ask his men to remove it from the town and take it to his palace for her.

Zane’s jaw fell slack as he heard those words. How on earth could one remove a hut and move it elsewhere? he wondered, silently praying the lady wouldn’t say yes, as Zane knew he might be the one ordered to do the impossible of moving a built-up hut. Whatever it was, it seemed the prince was possessed by some insane evil spirit today, and Zane wouldn’t want to be at the mercy of that spirit.

Zane didn’t realize he was holding his breath until Ave, who had been surprised by Lucian’s remark to move the hut to his palace for her, replied, "Moving it would ruin it. I just admire the weird way it’s built and how cute it is, but I have nothing to do with it. Don’t mind it." She waved her hands dismissively, smiling as if not believing he would suggest moving the hut because she liked it.

Noticing how he seemed ready to buy anything she pointed at, Ave began to point less at any random stuff and instead pulled him along to the market square, where merchants and sellers were calling out to their customers. The market seemed even more colorful and lively today than when they’d come the last time. It seemed there was a show or something going on at a set platform on the side of the market, some commoners stood around watching something, and Ave pulled Lucian there with her out of curiosity before they’d start buying anything she needed. What was the point of coming out if one wouldn’t explore everything?

Thankfully, they were in disguise and dressed like the commoners, so they wouldn’t draw any attention to themselves. However, their unblemished skin and aura made them stand out from most people in the commoners’ market, and a few turned to look at them as Ave pushed her way to the front of the crowd while holding tightly to the reluctant Lucian’s hand.

Lucian wasn’t a fan of crowded places and didn’t like anything that would cause attention to be drawn to him, but because he’d promised not to stop Ave from doing whatever she wanted, he allowed her to pull him into the crowd. However, his stone-cold face and detached eyes made anyone who looked at him once hurriedly look away.

Ave stopped short in her tracks when she noticed what the crowd had gathered around for. Right in the middle, where a platform was set, men in costumes could be seen preparing to start a drama play for the onlookers at the market sides. A frown settled on Ave’s face. They held fake swords and armor, but that wasn’t what made her frown; it was the fact that a man was tied up and pushed to the ground on the platform. The man wore a wig made of hay painted in black that stopped at his shoulder as his hair, and a parchment paper with amber eyes drawn on it was tied around his eyes to make him look like the cheap and stupid version of the cursed prince.

The man trembled falsely as he looked around at the men dressed in armor as the play began. "Please, kind soldiers, do not kill me, for I shall kill myself for the bad luck I have brought upon my lands. I am the son of the devil, and the day my witch of a mother birthed me, the lands were flooded with water and many of our people died. I deserve no mercy from you kind soldiers, but I will rid the world of evil by killing myself!"

"Shut up, you son of the devil! You evil soul, we shall kill you ourselves for the pain you bring upon us! You tremble like a pig on the slaughter stage, but that won’t bring us to pity you, you demon! Now bow to us before we slaughter you!" The man playing the soldier shouted as he pulled out his fake wooden sword, and many of the onlookers laughed out loud as they enjoyed the misery of the man playing the second prince.

"Spare my life, milord!" the man cried out loudly in a dramatic way that made Ave cringe internally, annoyed that they were making a fool of Lucian to entertain the market people. She wasn’t the kind to take things like this seriously, but this didn’t sit well with her. How dare they make fun of him like that?

She felt Lucian’s fingers tighten around hers where they held hands, and when she turned to him, she was startled by the look she saw in his eyes. He was staring murderously at the stage, like he would lose his disguise and deal with them for the way they were mocking his image. His eyes were so dark Ave knew if he were to deal with these commoners, only their dead corpses would be taken away from here.

Though they had managed to get Hugo’s village folks to like Lucian, as well as those in the neighboring village, not all the people of the lands had. Many still despised him, and after hearing about the news of him getting back on the lines of succession, they were enraged by it.

When the onlookers laughed out loud again, Ave turned back to the stage to see the actors spitting on the person playing Lucian while ridiculously dancing around him like lunatics. She couldn’t believe how anyone could watch this; the actors weren’t only terrible at acting but were disgustingly cheap for spitting around like that. She felt Lucian curse under his breath as he pulled his hand away from hers and was about to walk up to the stage, but she quickly pulled back his hand to stop him.

"Don’t," she said quietly as she hugged his arm to her chest and pull him back. "They are just a bunch of losers; you shouldn’t..." Ave was saying, but the loud voice of the actors on stage interrupted her words. It wasn’t only their voices but what they were saying that made her angrily turn back to the stage again.

"Your witch of a mother must be wailing loudly in hell as she watches us righteous beings punish the son she birthed for the devil and claimed it to be our Emperor’s seed. The devil had crawled its way to her bed, and the whore opened her legs for him, but today not even the devil can stop us from killing you, and...!" The man didn’t get to finish his words, because in a flash—even before Lucian could stop her—Ave had jumped onto the stage with an unladylike grace that left everyone speechless. They hadn’t expected anyone to leap in from the audience.

Ave was trembling with rage at what the man had said, and without a care in the world for who was watching or what might happen, she decided to teach the disrespectful actors a lesson they’d never forget, one that would make them think twice before insulting someone’s deceased mother. She glared at the round-bellied man playing the soldier, her jaw twitching.

"What in the holy name do you think you’re doing up here, lass?" the man demanded as he eyed her up and down, but Ave didn’t give him a chance to register what she was doing.

"How dare you speak ill of the second prince of Pendragon in my presence! How dare you speak so poorly of his late mother without a shred of shame or human decency?" she chided angrily, using the kind of voice people used in plays, making it seem to the onlookers as though she were one of the actors. She grabbed his fake sword and placed it dramatically against his fat neck.

"For the ill words you speak, I shall kill you for it!" She said as she raised the fake wooden sword as if she would behead him, but instead she used the sword to strike his lousy mouth that had been spouting nonsense about Lucian and his late mother. His co-actors were too shocked to interfere, unsure if their master, the man Ave was dealing with, had arranged for this plot twist without informing them beforehand, as something like this had happened many times so they could play naturally for their audience.

Lucian didn’t move from where he stood to stop Ave. Instead, he watched in awe as she defended him in front of everyone. He felt a warm surge of admiration as he realized just how fiercely different she was to any woman he’d known in the entire land of Pendragon, not that he knew many apart from his mother and Selene, but Ave would never cease to amaze him with her boldness.

Part of him had known she was remarkable, but seeing her fierce protection of him before everyone made him realize just now much he wanted this woman to be his, just how much he was ready to bring the world down to her feet just to make her return his feelings and forget about going back to her time.

He watched her continue hitting the man, who was shouting for his men to help him—but they seemed to believe it was part of the play and didn’t interfere. The audience laughed out loud at the way Ave was hitting him, while she dramatically chided, "Nobody insults the second prince in my presence and lives on unharmed!"

A smile broke across Lucian’s lips.

However, when the man suddenly yelled to his men to restrain her, claiming she wasn’t part of his play, Lucian’s legs moved toward the stage as the crowd began to realize she was an intruder. But before he could step in, Ave raised her wooden sword toward them.

"Who said I wasn’t part of the play? This is part of the play, and I was hired by piggy here to play this part!" She then turned to the audience, who seemed to be enjoying whatever was going on more than they had enjoyed the disgusting display of the actors spitting on a man earlier.

"I was hired to play this part," she announced, swirling the wooden sword in her hands like a skilled fighter, further entertaining the onlookers. She had learned to swirl a sword when she played the tyrant princess in the modern world, and she showed off her skills before pointing the sword at the fat man, who flinched in fear at her display.

Though it was rare for a woman to be this skilled with a sword, it wasn’t completely impossible in their time, only that the women who could do that were mostly those who had given away their womanhood to be soldiers and were seen as a disgrace to their families. Women like that were said to be ruthless once they returned from battle, and judging that the Pendragon soldiers would be going to war tomorrow, the man believed Ave must be one of those rare female soldiers.

"Apologize to the second prince, or I shall teach you a far greater lesson you will regret all your life!" she warned, a wicked smirk on her face as she stared the man down with the same cold look she used when playing the tyrant princess.

"Wh-who are you to dare make me apologize to a devil’s son?" he questioned shakily, casting a pleading look toward the audience. But none of them thought his desperation was real; they believed it was all part of the play. They were so captivated by the scene that even more people gathered, watching attentively to see what would happen next.

Lucian folded his arms against his chest as he watched his girlfriend proudly, waiting to hear her answer to the man’s question. Zane came to stand beside Lucian and leaned down to whisper worriedly, "Don’t you think we should stop her now before she announces to all that she knows you personally? The people think she is acting, but if she gives herself away by saying she knows you personally, they wouldn’t let her off easily."

Zane couldn’t believe Lucian had even allowed her to step up there in the first place instead of ordering him to arrest all of the actors and take them back to the phony cell to receive punishment for their disrespectful behavior of insulting a royal.

"Nobody would dare lay a hand on her while I’m here. Just let her play; she seems to enjoy beating up the idiot," Lucian remarked in amusement. However, he hoped she wouldn’t announce to the people that she knew him personally, or the news of her interference would reach the Empress and might earn her a punishment. But then, if she were even to announce that, all he would have to do was kill every single person present here to stop the words from spreading or reaching the palace. As simple as that!