Silence flowed into the room, now heavily shrouded in darkness.

With my lips freed under the condition that I wouldn’t scream or call for help, I asked.

“So, what you’re saying is you want to sleep… in my bed?”

The prince, who had dragged a chair to the bedside, nodded his head.

“May I ask why?”

“That is…”

A frown creased the handsome Crown Prince’s eyebrows.

Reynard Valdik Rhenberg, the crown prince of the Rhenberg Empire. He was also one of the sub-male leads in the novel “Searching for a Husband”.

“Searching for a Husband” was a famously known work as a treasure trove of captivating sub-male leads. Despite a well-established main male lead, it had not one but three alluring secondary ones.

‘I remember the comments under each chapter, lamenting the waste of such characters. I must have contributed to those comments more than anyone else.’

The plot revolved around the heroine, Aila, who needed to find a husband in order to inherit the wealth left by her parents. The sub-male leads were the potential candidates she considered.

But the true male lead was always going to be Cedric, Aila’s childhood friend and the warm-hearted but stoic Archduke of the North with hair as dark as the night, engaged to her through a contract of convenience.

The charm of the novel was in the mutual misunderstanding between Aila, who saw Cedric only as a friend, and Cedric’s own ineptitude with expressing his feelings—how they both kept messing things up. And of course, Cedric’s adorable jealousy over the sub-male leads added a nice touch of popularity to the mix.

‘Not that I found it particularly moving.’

Speaking for myself, I had an unfortunate taste for the ones who tread a lonely path—those sub-male leads who, despite their best efforts, never got picked by the heroine.

It was almost natural then, that I was an avid reader of “Searching for a Husband”, enamored with its charming sub-male leads. My hobby was to pine for them in the comment sections under each chapter.

‘Author… I’ll buy a hundred copies if you make our beloved sub leads into Aila’s men… Let’s go for an all-together happy ending.’

‘The sub-male leads are just so pitiful… I wish just once they could be the lead… I’d have no other wish.’

‘Honestly, aren’t the sub-male leads more attractive than Cedric…? I can’t understand Aila’s taste. No offense to Cedric fans, but no attacking, please.’

‘I don’t care! Aila has Cedric, so I’m claiming all the cute sub-male leads for myself!’

…Looking back, I seem just like a troublesome reader, getting way too immersed in a novel.

But whatever my past obsessions were, the pressing reality now was the man in front of me, glaring at me with eyes sharp enough to slice through the veil of any pretense.

As much as I adored him as a sub-male lead, facing him in person was frightening—because he was none other than Reynard himself.

Reynard had a flaw that made him less than ideal as a main lead, aside from his narcissistic personality—it was his cruelty.

Though these days he was hiding his claws for the sake of image management, he was once infamous for his brutal slaughtering of his enemies.

As I was inwardly tensing up, Reynard finally broke the heavy silence.

“You asked why I wish to sleep in your bed.”

“Yes, yes, I did.”

“I suppose I ought to tell you… but you’ll think I’ve lost my mind.”

“Not at all! How dare I. Please, speak freely.”

The crown prince crossed his long legs, a gesture so mundane yet it carried an air of innate nobility and confidence, just like he was described in the novel.

“The truth is, I’ve been having trouble sleeping lately.”

Now that I looked closer, there did seem to be shadows under his eyes.

“Pushing my body to its limits, taking sleeping pills, nothing works. Exhausted as I am, sleep eludes me.”

His expression soured, and my heart, for no good reason, started to race.

“Because of this, my once flawless routine has crumbled. Look. Even my skin, once the envy of everyone, has suffered.”

…It wasn’t a lie, but hearing him say it was something else.

“And whenever I try to go to bed, I hear a voice.”

“A voice?”

“It must be a hallucination since only I can hear it. A chillingly vivid hallucination. It nags at my ear, repeating over and over. Damnable thing. I’ve heard it so often I could recite it without missing a beat.”

Swallowing nervously was a reflex. ‘Searching for a Husband’ was supposed to be a romantic comedy, so what was with this creepy turn of events?

Reynard’s voice was as solemn as could be when he reproduced the hallucinations.

“Author, since the male lead belongs to the female lead, I’ll take the sub-male lead. Reynard, come to my bed right now.”

“…huh?”

When the most unexpected words come from the most unexpected person at the most unexpected time, it can throw you for a loop. What on earth did he just say?

“I don’t understand it myself. What author? And what’s this about a sub-male lead?”

Given the foreignness of the words, I hadn’t misheard. I mulled over his words quietly.

“Author… the sub-male lead… Reynard to bed…”

Wait, what? What’s this familiar style of nonsense?

My palms began to sweat as the crown prince continued.

“I don’t know what this auditory hallucination means, but your face keeps coming to mind. My instincts tell me. Go to you. Go to your bed.”

“Me, really?!”

“Yes. I feel like if I sleep in your bed, I could finally rest easy.”

The Crown Prince’s piercing gaze fell on me… no, more accurately, on the bed I was sitting on.

“So, will you let me sleep in your bed?”

It was a bolt from the blue. Words spun in my head: author, sub-male lead, bed, and me. I had to admit it.

‘That’s the comment I wrote…!’

“Author, since the main lead belongs to the female lead, I’ll take the sub-male lead… Reynard, come to my bed right now.”

I had sympathized with the fate of Reynard, a charming sub-male lead doomed not to be chosen by the heroine. If I could, I wanted to be his new love, maybe even share some cozy time in bed.

‘Could it be that my comment has led to this situation?!’

I thought I’d died in a car accident, only to fall into a novel’s world, and now the sub-male lead is asking to sleep in my bed. It seems as if the contents of my comment have come true…

‘No, no matter what, this can’t be right!’

I wanted to share a sweet love with Reynard, not be subjected to such a chilling gaze.

“Just to clarify, you haven’t cast some sort of insomnia curse on me, have you?”

“A curse?”

“It feels like someone has cursed me with sleeplessness. Most likely, the perpetrator is the owner of the voice in the hallucination. The voice tells me to come to its bed, but why do I keep seeing your face? Could it be…”

“No, absolutely not! I’ve never done such a thing!”

The moment he mentioned it, I could almost see him unsheathing the sword at his waist, so I hurriedly denied it with all my might.

“More than anything, I lack the power to do so. I can’t use magic at all, and having fallen out of favor with my father, I certainly don’t have the means to hire a sorcerer.”

My earnest persuasion seemed to soften the Crown prince’s gaze a bit.

“Besides, except for today, I’ve been grounded, so leaving the house was out of the question. If your symptoms started showing up recently, it can’t possibly be me.”

“It does seem unlikely that the lady known as Cedric Hyclide’s leech would cast a curse on me instead of on the Archduke.”

“That’s right. My affections have always been reserved solely for Archduke Hyclide. My feelings towards Your Highness are nothing but loyalty and respect.”

I was surprisingly grateful for the misunderstanding that I liked Cedric.

“Moreover, now that I hear you speak, the voice in the hallucinations is clearly different. While both are young women’s voices…”

“That’s a relief!”

Wait, isn’t that my real voice he’s talking about? Not Charlotte’s, but the voice of my true self. But there was no way to confirm it.

“Sigh, at this point, it’s not even certain if I can actually find sleep in your bed.”

Exhaustion was dripping from his sigh. The rumors that he had not been able to sleep these past few days seemed true.

“Regardless, I would like to borrow the bed to test it out.”

Is that all? Just lend the bed? I nodded vigorously.

“Yes, of course. I’ll have my bed delivered to the palace at the crack of dawn.”

“If I was willing to wait until then, I wouldn’t have bothered coming here tonight.”

“So, you mean to say…?”

“I’ll spend the night in this bed. By tomorrow, we’ll know whether your bed is the answer or not.”

“Uh, wouldn’t that be awkward? For a man and a woman to share a bed…”

Before I knew it, strange words escaped my lips. I had fantasized about such thrilling scenarios, but being suddenly confronted with the reality left me flustered.

Reynard looked utterly bewildered.

“Don’t tell me you’ve actually fallen for me? You should be sleeping elsewhere, obviously.”

“Where would that be?”

“That’s for you to figure out.”

Even though I hadn’t agreed to anything, the crown prince started to strip off his clothes right there and then, changing into another outfit he had brought with him. My cheeks flushed at the sudden glimpse of skin, and I had to hurriedly avert my eyes.

‘He even packed his pajamas. He really came prepared!’

The man, quickly dressed in his night attire, sprawled himself onto my bed without any hesitation.

“Sorry, but please try to understand. I’m so tired I could collapse; I’ve been holding it in for so long.”

Having been robbed of my bed, all I could do was stare blankly at the back of Reynard’s head.

To the unknown entity who dropped me into this world, who may or may not actually exist but made my whimsical comments a reality.

‘I didn’t wish to be kicked out of my own bed while the sub-male lead gets to sleep in it!’