Forced Happiness

Asseylum was happy. Well, as happy as a woman being forced into marriage could be. Klancain wasn't mean to her. If anything, he was actually quite considerate of her. She'd been taught and conditioned that a princess had a job: support and cater to the man who'll be the next emperor. The only reason why she could dream of being empress was because her grandfather didn't trust Klancain with the permission to properly use aldnoah as his –or her –knight. Klancain's purpose was to secure the royal line; her job was to preserve it.

But all the same, she was better off than most of her people. They were confused, angry, hurt, and thoroughly frustrated. These people's faith in royalty had been shaken off its pedestal. These past two years had been hectic. They all believed that she'd been murdered, that she was completely fine but still wanted to massacre a planet that did nothing wrong, and that now she was awake from a coma, she wanted peace. Nobody knew whom to trust for protection. They didn't even know who to properly blame for the disruption of their, Terra and Mar's, co-existence.

Despite the obvious confusion and gratefulness towards a Terran called Kaizuka Inaho, her people didn't trust anyone. They only knew that a Terran was more trustworthy that their government.

Asseylum wanted so badly to placate her people, but because of her previous naiveté and Lemrina's manipulation, she was a part of the problem. No one wanted a little girl with no power, who didn't even have the power to choose her own marriage partner. It wasn't like her foolish belief for peace helped her position. Even the United Forces of Earth wanted nothing to do with her except for obtaining aldnoah. She honestly expected them to hassle Inaho to get Asseylum to over reach her fragile, puppet position for them. Either they were more patient than she was led to believe, or they were hassling Inaho, but Inaho wouldn't do it.

Asseylum continuously gained respect for her best friend. Inaho was magnificent, the type of woman Asseylum wanted so badly to be. Inaho hadn't even been a soldier two years ago, but now she was in the UFE. People respected her as a peace advocate and as a war hero. She was amazing and beautiful. Asseylum envied Inaho's intelligence and leadership qualities.

While Inaho ended a war, Asseylum couldn't do anything. So she smiled like she was told until one day she could seize the moment and do something.