Chapter 106

As the previous imperial family disappeared, the lives of the people of the Empire became smoother.

Naturally, Fernan’s status also increased.  The people of the Empire praised the new emperor and his loyal servant Fernan, and the number of nobles who wanted to have connections with him somehow grew day by day.

However, Fernan blocked himself from outside attention.  So he had only been in his estate for two months.

Even at the first founding festival after the change of the imperial family, he did not attend.

After sending his aide, Lloyd, his trusted right hand man, Fernan stayed only in his bedroom for a long time.

In the dark room where his breaths weren’t even heard, he lay on the bed and closed his eyes.  His dark eyelashes, which were set down, didn't move at all.  A strange silence continued.  For a while, Fernan had been buried in political affairs or battles.

Even in a small sweep that he did not need to go out on his own, he just ran out with his sword.

Only then could he survive the nightmares that crushed him.

His shirt was half ripped open, and new scars were engraved on his body, covering the original scars.

An injury that he would never have suffered. It was an injury that could only be explained that he purposely did not avoid the attack.

His knights said their master looked like someone who couldn’t die.

“Uh…I don’t know what’s wrong?  It's already been three days. I knocked on the door mornings and nights, but no answer came back…  ”

Outside the door, the voices of servants contemplating whether they should wake him up could be heard intermittently.

In the end, one of the servants mustered up the courage and knocked on the door again, but Fernan didn't open his eyes even after hearing the sound.

All colors disappeared from his sight, which was only in darkness.  There was no sense of vitality in his world, which was dyed only in black and white without a single light.

At first glance, he was so motionless that he looked like a dead person, but at some point he slowly opened his eyes.  The golden eyes exposed under the dark eyelids stared blankly at the ceiling.

As time passed, a woman's face suddenly began to appear in his empty head.

In a world where there was only darkness, Julia was the only one painted with color, and she was smiling like the sun.

The world around her slowly spread the light.

Even at the moment he seemed to have lost his emotions, his mind heated up when he thought of Julia like this.  Feeling the heat spreading through his head, Fernan slowly closed his eyes and opened them.

As the dead sensation came back to life, he felt a throbbing pain.

He got up slowly. Not long ago, the wound around his waist opened and the bandage began to turn red, but he didn't feel the need to stop the bleeding.

Leaning against the head of the bed, he ruffled his messy hair.

Julia's face was always drawn by itself, even if he didn't have to memorize it.

For him, Julia has always been an exceptional person.

In the fiercely lived past, in a time he was not shaken by anyone, Julia always easily drew out his emotions that he did not know existed.

Even when he harbored feelings of discomfort and contempt for her, whenever he looked at her, he always felt a burning sensation in his chest.

When that subtle heat that was unknown to him grew, he eventually reached her feelings of wanting to keep her by his side.

Only then did he know.  He realized that he wanted to hold the woman he had been so reluctant to know that he was being attracted to her.

After breaking her down with coercive acts and eventually letting her go with his own hands, he realized it again.

His feelings were not mere possessiveness.

Ironically, he was so engulfed in emotions that he considered it the least of his life.

Love.  He didn't want to own Julia, he wanted to love her.

No, he was already in love with her when he came to his senses.

Fernan let out a faint bitter smirk with his closed lips.

He once heard the song of a bard during a war.  It was a song about love.

The old song that praised the woman with beautiful and shiny words, resounded in his ears clearly at this moment.

Fernan closed his eyes again and listened to the intangible song.

At the same time, he thought it was fortunate that he didn’t tell Julia he loved her.

If she had heard it, she would have considered it abominable and disgusting.

But at least once, he wanted to tell her like that song of the minstrel.

How beautiful she was, and how far she captivated people with her sunny smile.

Maybe she didn’t know at all.

Fernan lifted his lips gently and placed his arm on my forehead.  Suddenly, a sleep that hadn't come in a while was pouring in.

He felt like he was slowly being encroached into a certain underground that had no end in sight.

Like that, he felt like he never wanted to wake up again.

****

“His Highness seems to be trying to die.”

“He’s hurting his body on purpose.  That's an act no less than self-harm… “

“I know it’s selfish of me to ask, but can Grand Duchess go see him just once?  You’re the only one who can stop him….”

Julia recalled the words she heard from Lloyd.

As soon as she heard his words, Julia hurriedly left the capital as if possessed by something.  The place she headed straight to was the Castle of Grand Duchy.

The castle has not changed from her memories.  After briefly examining the exterior of the castle, Julia entered without hesitation.

It took her over half a day to get here.

Her body was eroded by fatigue after a long journey, but strangely, her body was light as if she had awakened.

“Oh, Grand Duchess?"

Upon entering the lobby, a servant who recognized her dropped the vase in surprise.

However, the sharp sounds or their gazes did not enter Julia's nerves.

Hurried to Fernan's bedroom, that was all she remembered.

Passing through the long hallway, she stopped only when she reached the door.

Then, suddenly, her mind came back.

‘Can I go in? Is it true that Fernan in there?’ 

With that thought, as she pondered and pondered, her hand was raised by itself.

When she grabbed the doorknob and turned it, the door opened easily.

Julia walked into the bedroom with tension and at the same time saw a man lying neatly on the bed.

A trembling breath came out from her tension, and Julia walked closer to him.

“…Your Highness."

As she called him with a clear voice, she sat down next to him.  She filled his face in her eyes.

Even in half a year, he remained unchanged.  His large body covered with muscles was still daunting.

But his countenance was pale as if he was about to die, and his firm body was more damaged than she remembered.

Fernan was broken.  It was as Lloyd said.

When she realized that fact with her own eyes, Julia felt a distant feeling.  She slowly reached out and took his hand, but she didn't feel the warmth he had before.

“… why."

Julia held up his hand and buried it on her cheek.  She rubbed it on her cheek, hoping the warmth would reach him.

Even so, his fully closed eyelids were firm as if they would never open again.

Julia kept calling him, feeling like she wanted to cry.

"Your Highness, wake up.”

"You said you'd come to see me again. But you didn't come, so I came.”

Julia, who kept talking to the man who did not open his eyes, eventually pulled out the feelings she buried deep in her heart.

“I missed you so much….”

It was only after she let out her emotions through her lips, that Julia could fully realize how much she missed him.

She wanted his big hand to caress her, and the warm gaze he only showed her to touch her whole body.

She wanted to sleep with him like that one night, when she had a happy dream in his arms.

They had to cross this complicated road to untangle the twisted knot.

But the rough road had already been polished and smoothed by this man, and she only had to take one step.

All the roads he made for her.  The door that was always opened so that she could come back whenever she wanted.

Crossing that road and opening the door, she hesitated a lot.

It took a lot of courage and conviction to fully realize his sincerity and her own heart.

“… I am here now."

“… ”

“Here, I will be by your side.”

Julia whispered in a weeping voice, but did not shed a single tear.

Instead, she reached out and touched Fernan's eyelids.

When she cried, as this man always did, he touched her eyes with a loving touch, wiping away her tears.

After a while the hand that had been wandering around his eyes stopped.  Fernan's hand, which moved before the tightly closed eyelids, suddenly grabbed Julia's wrist.

He slowly opened his eyes.

With his unfocused gaze, Fernan stared at her still.

“… Julia.”

And in his wet, hazy voice, he called out her name.

While lowering his eyelids half-way again as if he had not fully awakened, he clearly captured Julia in his eyes.

The voice that came out was hoarse.

“…Am I dreaming?”

Julia looked at him, who was murmuring, and raised her lips as if she was falling apart.

"It's not a dream."

Julia held up his hand that was holding her wrist.

"Look. I'm in your hand like this."

As she squeezed his clasped hand, Fernan’s fingers flinched.

At the same time, his eyes that looked at Julia began to gradually return to focus.