The Empress’s Beast Selection

Chapter 1 My Imprint Will Be On You

“You’ll be the one I imprint on, Sepia.”

The words were whispered by Demios, the little wolf.

Her Royal Highness, Sepia Arte.

Raised as a child by the Huron imperial family, the palace was a vast prison.

She was hated by the Empress and withered away day by day.

The only light in her life was Demios, the Crown Prince of the Beastman Empire.

The boy who came to study in the empire was said to have the blood of a beast.

At first, she was dumbfounded.

On the surface, he appeared to be a very handsome boy.

But Demios was a wolf at heart, and it was only when he revealed his true nature that he realized.

That the boy was not himself.

The grayish wolf licked the girl’s cheek.

Sepia’s eyes widened at the touch of his tongue, warm and soft and so unlike her own.

Then Demios, back in his boy form, asked.

“Were you scared?”

“… No.”

Sepia shook her head.

She was a little scared, but more than that, she was excited.

The young lovers were getting so close.

So the children met in secret, away from the Empress’s eyes.

One of their favorite pastimes was to talk about the differences between humans and beast people.

“The beast people have something called names.”

“Names?”

“Yes. It’s a rare occurrence among the beast. One day, suddenly, the name of the person you’re meant to be with is carved into your body.”

“Oh, you’re lying. Where is such a thing?”

She asked, but Demios’s expression was as serious as ever.

“For whatever reason, those who have their names imprinted on them seek out and love the one who bears that name, and when they meet, nothing can separate them.”

That’s why they’re meant to be together.

Sepia’s eyes sparkled at the emphasis.

It was a magical tale. Demios smiled at her interest.

“By the way, I feel like your name is going to appear on my body.”

“But… I’m human. Even if my imprint were to appear on you, it wouldn’t be me.”

She was disappointed that the story didn’t apply to humans.

But Demios was confident.

“Then it doesn’t matter, because my destiny is you.”

Where does he get such confidence?

Even as she thought that, her heart pounded in her chest.

Sepia laughed shyly, and Demios followed suit.

As she looked at the boy, she suddenly had a question.

“But what if it’s not both of them?”

What if only one of them has the other’s name, and the other doesn’t, or has a different name?

Would that be fate or misfortune?

Sepia’s heart sank downward with a thud, as if it were her own doing.

“That’s…”

The boy’s lips moved, but strangely, his voice was muffled.

Her vision grew dimmer. Soon it was pitch black.

“Empress, it’s time for you to wake up.”

Sepia’s eyes fluttered open at the birdlike voice.

‘Ah, a dream.’

For the first time in a long time, she felt like she was dreaming as a child.

How long had it been since she’d been Empress of the Beastman People, and yet she was dreaming about Demios’s study abroad.

As she laughed at the old memory, the maid who was drawing the curtains asked.

“Did you have a pleasant dream?”

“Well, it ended rather ambiguous.”

But it was a dream that didn’t need to end.

For a week after their dream conversation, Demios returned to his homeland.

‘Wait for me. I’ll come get you.’

True to his word, Demios never returned.

Not even after Sepia came of age, not even after news of his ascension to the throne.

“Gosh, I should have woken you up five minutes later, it’s not often you sleeps so soundly.”

The voice of the maidservant, a chirpy maidservant, woke him up.

“It’s okay, I’ll get ready.”

Today was the day she was supposed to have breakfast with Demios.

She wondered how he’d react if she told him he was in her dream.

Sepia smiled faintly and slid her feet out of bed.

The Empress woke up in earnest, and the maid who washed her face and combed her hair entered the room.

All of the ladies and young ladies in charge of the Empress’s personal care were bird servants.

They were human in appearance but animal in nature.

It had been more than five years since they had blended in.

“I’ll wear my hair long.”

“Just wear a bit of the decoration. Instead, I will use the sapphire pin that His Majesty gave you as a gift.”

The maids were the first people Sepia had brought into the Beastman Empire.

They had learnt her tastes long enough to make arrangements quickly.

As Sepia studied herself in the mirror, the young bulbul bird, finishing up her hair, chuckled.

“It’s been a while since Your Majesty had breakfast with His Majesty the Emperor, so let’s make it a little more alluring! Let’s make you so sexy that the Emperor will be completely captivated by you…”

“Betty!” 

“Humph. I’m sorry, Your Majesty.”

The youngest maid was silent at Madame nightingale bird attention.

The youngest maid was cheerful and bright, but sometimes she crossed the line like this.

But in truth, Sepia didn’t mind.

“It’s okay,” she said, “I’m sure it’s growing, but… names are still a rarity among the Beastman.”

It was just that they were Beastman, and she was human, and she felt a little distant.

In the spring of her twentieth year, Sepia was proposed to by Demios, who became Emperor.

It was salvation.

She hadn’t expected her letter, her last hope, to reach him.

The more Sepia grew up, the more the Empress hated her.

After Demios’s departure, Sepia’s childhood was a torment, and the Empress finally declared that she would be sent away as the 18th wife of a distant desert Emperor.

It was bad enough that she was exiled over a thousand miles away, but now she would have to take as her husband a man who had murdered his own wife.

She had to live.

She must flee, anywhere.

That’s when she remembered Demios.

‘Wait for me to contact you first.’

That was his promise to her.

But the wait was too long, and Sepia was already at her limit.

She wrote to Demios for the first time.

Shortly thereafter, a proposal of marriage arrived in the Empire.

In the spring of her twenty-first year.

When they met again, he was a man taller than Sepia’s head.

‘Just like the others.’

Demios was a blunt, cold man.

He was different from the man she had known as a child, but there was no doubt in her mind that he was her savior.

The wedding was a quick affair.

The world was told that Demios had studied abroad and that they were a special couple.

But their relationship was not as affectionate as it was made out to be.

He had become a seldom-smiling man, and Sepia was unable to overcome the distance.

‘It’s okay, though.’

Demios treated her like an Empress, and always kept to the bare minimum.

That was enough, so.

‘Who cares about the imprint?’

It was only when you were a girl that you could have romantic dreams.

It was time to get ready.

“His Majesty has told me to tell you that breakfast will be canceled today.”

It was the Emperor’s servant.

The maids blinked in surprise at what was happening.

“My goodness, His Majesty never misses a meal.”

“Is there something wrong with His Majesty?”

The handmaidens chartered. Sepia tried to calm them down.

“It’s all right, I’m sure he has a reason, just tell him I understand.”

“I will pass the word.”

The servant withdrew carefully.

Without the Emperor’s breakfast, the morning was suddenly leisurely.

“I suppose I’ll have to dine at the Empress’s palace today.”

“I’ll be ready at once.”

The young maid hurried out of the bedroom.

Sepia drank the tea that Lady Oriole had served her, lost in thought.

‘What’s going on?’

She pretended to be unconcerned, but she was bothered.

Meals together were one of the few times they could be alone as a couple.

He knew it, and she just assumed he’d been respecting it all this time.

‘No news, I wonder if something is wrong.’

If it was a matter of state, news would have reached her, the Empress.

The servant hadn’t said what was going on either, so it was only right to wait.

Sepia finished breakfast with her maids.

Afterwards, she prepared for the party later in the week.

It was to be a victory feast for the duke, who had just vanquished the barbarians, a long-standing problem for the empire.

‘I had never met the Duke before.’

He had been at war since before Sepia became Empress.

The morning’s events were quickly forgotten as she prepared to greet the Duke.

It was afternoon.

As Sepia rested, her maid spoke up.

“You have tea with the chinchilla ladies in an hour.”

There are even finer categorisations: predator or herbivore, or mammal or bird.

The Beastman were divided into factions of beast species, and Sepia, as Empress, held regular meetings with them.

‘I wonder if this is what makes them different from humans.’

Human aristocrats may have been drawn together by their own ideas and interests, but the beast was different.

Beyond power, the beast was obsessed with primal blood and species distinctions.

They had distinct personalities and traits based on their species, and sometimes, in the heat of the moment, they would become anthropomorphised.

They were all human in appearance, but animal in nature.

It was therefore particularly unusual for a human, Sepia, to become the Empress of the Beastman.

“Let’s go attend.”

“Yes. I’ll take you.”

The tea party was held in the outer palace near the central garden of the imperial palace.

It was usually rented by the capital’s noblewomen to hold parties and gatherings within the imperial palace.

There was a rustling at the door. The chatter was cut short when the door opened.

Inside the room, all the ladies were already gathered.

“Meet the Empress.”

The rodent ladies, including chinchillas, hamsters, and groundhogs, stood up and bowed.

They all stood out for their small size and rounded physical features.

They sat down as Sepia took her seat at the head table.

‘This is a strange atmosphere.’

The chattering group had fallen silent, glancing at each other.

Rodents were usually quick on their feet, quicker than most to pick up on rumors.

She wondered if there was a rumor spreading that she didn’t know about.

Sepia lifted her glass and asked.

“I heard you two chatting. What were you talking about?”

“That is…”

Countess Chinchilla hesitated to answer.

She was by nature a talkative person, but she was also timid and wary of dangerous rumors.

Hesitating under Sepia’s gaze, Countess Chinchilla finally spoke cautiously.

“Actually, I heard it from my cousin, who said that a woman with the Emperor’s name has appeared, and that the Emperor has now gone to see her…”

A name.

Sepia’s heart dropped to the floor with a thud at the word she had treated as nothing.