This is giving "he's so mature for his age".
To be clear im not using his “mature” mentality as any means to erase his identity as a child. Because he understands the political weight he has being a prince with god’s blessing. Therefore he isn’t clueless of his situation.
A lot of these yaoi troupes always pour in trauma to an innocent clueless child that doesn’t understand why it has to happen and then the MC will act as a pure saviour for them and just be another parent to them. ML here understands his fate being a prince and the MC respects him as a prince. His care for him is brotherly not a that of a parental figure, ML isn’t desperately seeking protection to a parent and MC isn’t overly protective like it’s his child. At least that what I interpreted their relationship when reading this.
I hate this age gap troupe where the older one already knew the younger one when they’re still a child but this is one of the rare times I don’t feel weird reading.
For once this “it’s not weird because it’s historically accurate!!!” justification actually have substance… ML doesn’t act like clueless ignorant child. He had to quickly grow up mentally because of fighting for the throne problem and MC respected him not only as a guardian but also respected him who’s a prince that had to endure this hardships. And Im really happy grown up ML is a prince charming. One of the main things I hate about this troupe is they always make the ML a possessive psychopath.