“Wooow! Mister Machina, your muscles are amazing!”

A beautiful woman dressed like a dancer raised her high-pitched voice while touching Machina’s arm, who was sitting on my right side.

A dimly lit room. Mosaic lanterns placed around the room dimly illuminated the area. The low, comfortable sofa looks more like a large cushion with a peculiar weave than a sofa, and it’s also like a round sleeping pad. Several smaller cushions lay on top of it.

The smoke from a hookah was wafting in the air, giving off a sexy aroma.

The graceful-looking beauty sitting next to me whispered in my ear.

“Are you enjoying yourself, Your Highness?”

“Yes… Excuse me for not being used to this.”

“My, my. Your Highness has such a beautiful face, yet you don’t play with women?”

When asked that question, I felt troubled.

Certainly, in my position, there is no lack of such education. But as a third prince, I thought that I would not be expected to do so much, and I came of age without being accustomed to such things.

Of course, my older brothers are probably well-educated about it and know how to treat women.

I feel embarrassed, as if it has been pointed out that I’m somehow inadequate at something.

Machina said, “Since we’re all here, let’s invite some girls and have a banquet,” so after returning to Parthenios, we ended up having a banquet at Lambert’s mansion.

I was going to refuse, but then he told me, “There’s no harm in getting used to girls,” and the momentum of his words pushed me into it.

I wondered what Mika would say, but he stared at Machina’s face and said to him with a look of disgust, “Well… I guess you should know about it too,” and said something that I didn’t understand. Machina didn’t seem to understand what he meant either, and like me, he seemed to have a lot of question marks around his head.

After supper, Machina showed me to a room where six or seven beautiful women were waiting for us. Each two of them sat between Mika, Machina, and me, while drinking. A woman with a cheerful demeanor, sitting next to the beautiful woman who had just spoken to me, said.

“But, we have no position with a prince with such a beautiful face!”

“Right. I never knew that the prince of our country was so beautiful.”

“That’s not true. I think you two are also… very beautiful.”

Embarrassed, I tell them so in clumsy words, while feeling my cheeks redden.

People keep telling me I’m beautiful, but I’m sure it’s not the same as that of a woman. I don’t have soft skin, fruity red lips, or flowing glossy hair.

As I looked them firmly in the eye and said those words, hoping they would get the message, the two women beside me let out a gasp of delight while holding their cheeks.

“S-so cute! Your Highness, you’re so cute!”

“No! It’s rude to call him cute. He’s so beautiful… I didn’t know such a gentleman existed…”

“No, you two are exaggerating…”

For some reason, I ended up glancing at Mika, who was sitting on the left side of the room, while the two women next to me were getting excited.

My heart ached as I saw a beautiful white hand resting on top of Mika’s large spread legs. The beautiful woman sitting on the other side of the room had her head completely nestled into Mika’s shoulder.

But when I saw Mika leaning against a large cushion, looking unconcerned, and drinking alcohol, I felt that I was confronted with the reality that he was different from me.

Mika sipped his glass of alcohol, looking bored and unperturbed by the fact that a beautiful woman was sticking close to him and talking to him about something.

(E-even if someone is leaning on him seductively… h-he still can leisurely drink alcohol…?!)

Annoyed, I reached for my own glass, and the woman brought it to my mouth from the side.

I drink it just like that, and she smiles gently at me. The slightly droopy eyes of the woman felt erotic, and I felt a thrill of excitement. It was the first time in my life that I had been entertained by someone who even held my glass of wine, and to be honest, I didn’t know what to do.

My heart beats faster at the sight of the soft lines of a woman’s body right next to me. A hand reaches out from the other side, and I’m surprised when the cheerful woman takes my cheek between her hands.

“Your Highness, your skin is so smooth.”

I’m not sure what kind of entertainment is this, but perhaps it is meant to be rude. I’ve almost never been touched on the cheek, except by an impolite childhood friend, and I shivered at the closeness of it. But as I was staring into those big eyes in front of me, I felt like I was going to feel weird, so I gently laid my hands on the woman’s hands on my cheeks.

“I feel embarrassed… um, when someone as beautiful as yourself stares at me.”

“!”

“Please keep these beautiful hands to touch those you love.”

“……No-no good~! This prince is too adorable!!”

For some reason, the beautiful women next to Mika and the beautiful women next to Machina found themselves all around me. Even though I had just told them not to touch me, they were all over me, touching me, making me eat and drink various things, and I don’t really understand why, but they were all over me until the banquet was over.

There was no way I could have realized what Mika and Machina were talking about as they looked at me.

“Mika…… Is Your Highness Nagi….”

“Yeah, he’s a natural prince. He’s a little bit gloomy on the inside, but he’s always been like that.”

“…So this is what you mean, what I should know about His Highness. …It must be hard for you.”

“That’s right.”

And then, the night in the desert passed—.