Behind Her Highness's Smile

Description

When the king offers Aerik Cladinae his own sister's hand in marriage for his meritorious deeds in battle, he didn't expect to get saddled with a limping, drooling woman like Miesa Esquillre. Driven insane by her brother's physical and psychological torture, Miesa rolls around on the ground, spills food all over herself, and screams unintelligebly as a way of communicating. But sometimes, Aerik catches a flash of shrewd understanding behind those vacant eyes. Is Miesa truly as mad as everyone thinks... or is she hiding something?

Original Novel:
R15: Naver Series, KakaoPage
R19: Naver - Main Story, Naver - Side Stories, Ridibooks

Original Webtoon:
Naver Webtoon, Naver Series

Official Translations:
English, Thai, Indonesian, S.Chinese, T.Chinese, French, Japanese

Type

Manhwa

Related Series

N/A

Associated Names

Behind the Laughter of the Surviving Princess

Beneath the Surviving Princess Joyful Facade

Beneath the Surviving Princess Joyful Façade

Ce qui se cache derrière son sourire

เบื้องหลังรอยยิ้มของเจ้าหญิง

倖存王女的微笑之謎

幸存王女的微笑背后

活下来的王女的笑容背后

生き残った王女の笑顔の裏には

살아남은 왕녀의 웃음 뒤에는

Groups Scanlating

LINE Webtoon

MagusManga

Speedcat

Latest Release(s)

c.52 by LINE Webtoon 3 days ago

c.51 by LINE Webtoon 1 week ago

c.50 by LINE Webtoon 2 weeks ago

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Status in Country of Origin

59 Chapters (Ongoing)

S1: 44 Chapters (1-44)
S2: 15 Chapters (Ongoing) 45~

Completely Scanlated?

Anime Start/End Chapter

N/A

User Reviews

N/A

Forum

0 topics, 0 posts

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User Rating

Average: 8.1 / 10.0 (53 votes)

Bayesian Average: 7.44 / 10.0

23%

21%

17%

13%

Last Updated

July 6th, 2025 8:20pm PDT - 3 weeks ago

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Genre

Drama Fantasy Josei Psychological Romance
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Categories

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Category Recommendations

Ookami Shougun no Ikenie no Hanayome

Just Kill Me Now

Lost Phoenix: Spoil the Repudiated Empress

Dearest Fiancé, I Know You Despise Me

My Unexpected Marriage

Recommendations

N/A

Author(s)

Artist(s)

Year

Original Publisher

AB Entertainment

Naver

Serialized In (magazine)

Naver Webtoon (Naver)

Naver Series (Naver)

Licensed (in English)

Yes

English Publisher

LINE Webtoon

Activity Stats (vs. other series)

Weekly Pos #280

(-91)

Monthly Pos #440

(+9)

3 Month Pos #449

(+136)

6 Month Pos #333

(+147)

Year Pos #280

(+246)

List Stats

On 399 reading lists

On 202 wish lists

On 4 completed lists

On 14 unfinished lists

On 153 custom lists

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Forum Posts Click to view the forum

User Comments [ Order by usefulness ]

Psychological Suspense?? In my romance novel???

by TenseTactics
4 days ago

Rating: 9.0 / 10.0

Spoilers ahead in the TW, because I can’t figure out how to heckin hide them. And just a heads up, Trigger warnings in this series for:

Mental Illness / Disability
Physical abuse
Psychological torment
Abuse of the disabled
Violence (just in general dawg there’s like a lot shit happening)
Blood
Infantilization
Panic Attacks
Infidelity
Attempted Rape (they don’t even like, get as far as physically suppressing the woman, but they did plan to)
sexual abuse accusations

I love the caution that this series has for the topics discussed in it. The characters feel 3-Dimensional and like they aren’t just doing things for the drama of it or like wow we need some plot in here, they’re doing things to survive, to live, because of their own desires. Honestly props the ML, because he handles the initial situation as best he could, and treats the FL like a human being before the plot starts to reveal anything.

Real spoilers ahead

The male lead treats the FL like a god damn human being despite not knowing if she was in control of her mental faculties, and actively seeks out ways to address her needs on her terms. He treats her with dignity. I don’t know if I’d call her actually mentally disabled. On one hand she does have difficulty communicating and due to her basically dissociating from herself to survive she has doesn’t have a great grasp on social dynamics beyond that of the age when she began to act crazy (like 8 I believe). Like the insanity is definitely a mask, but the person underneath “has a profound darkness” aka is extremely traumatized.

Either way the story is about them keeping the mask up, and her trying to survive. She’s at an extreme disadvantage but not to the extent that other people believe her to be. I think that’s how the ML sees her. Anyway make your own judgement, just know it takes like 20 chapters for it to really get interesting rather than just a little bit… leery so to say.

... Last updated 4 days ago

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