Chapter 39

The knight continued to explain in a mournful voice.

“Sir Yves Llewellyn…was attacked by assassins, and…..”

“…”

Theodore, who was momentarily stunned dropped what he was holding.

His face turned pale. He wanted to ask what the knight was talking about, but no voice came out.

“Miss Katarina was attacked, and Sir Yves tried to protect her…”

Theodore couldn’t believe the words that were being explained over and over again. He denied her death and asked.

“So Yves Llewellyn, where is he now?” (

[T/N: Theo used ‘he’ for Yves because other people didn’t know Yves was a woman]

After knowing where she was from the Knight, Theodore ran straight outside.

The area around the large golden carriage was in chaos due to the assassins’ attack.

“Theo…!”

Katarina, who found Theodore, ran to him and tried to hug him, but Theodore rushed past her.

“Ahh!”

Katarina, who suddenly rolled on the floor, let out a scream.

But Theodore was only interested in Yves Llewellyn.

Knights with mournful expressions surrounded the dead body.

Theodore hugged Yves’s body in a tight hug.

“Yves Llewellyn…?”

The cold body was cold.

She, who had been with him until just a day before, was now covered in a thick smell of blood.

It was so strong that he couldn’t smell anything.

“Are you really dead …?”

Since childhood he often saw dead bodies, and some of them were killed by his own hands.

It’s one of those things he had always seen, but he couldn’t figure out why he felt so strange now.

Theodore immediately noticed what this feeling that filled his heart resembled. Long ago, when he heard the news that Chernicia had been destroyed and Yvonne was dead.

Exactly like then, no, a feeling of despair even greater than then engulfed him.

***

The Emperor returned to the Imperial Palace with the corpse of Yves Llewellyn.

The blood dripping from the dead body made his whole body red.

“Your Majesty….!”

The servants looked at him with a surprised expression, but Theodore briefly ordered that no one could follow him, then went into the bedroom and locked the door.

“No way. You can’t be dead.”

Theodore, who placed her body neatly on his bed, muttered in a low voice, and reached out his hand.

A golden glow from his fingertips spread slowly toward her wound.

“Wait a minute, Yves Llewellyn. I will heal you soon……”

However, the deep wound was not healed no matter how much energy he poured out.

The blood stopped, but her flesh did not heal, leaving an open wound exposing her red flesh.

“What happened? Why, why……”

It was the power he had been training for a long time.

The power he had originally nurtured to heal Yvonne’s wounds, now it didn’t work on Yves at all.

As he tried to exert more force, Yves’s body began to rot from the wound.

“No, no, no….”

Surprised, Theodore quickly froze her body.

Her body froze cold.

“Why…….”

Yves didn’t open her eyes.

Theodore gently touched the fine silver eyelashes above her closed eyelids with his hand. She was cold and stiff.

“Yves… .”

Theodore pulled her cold body into his arms, and buried her head in his chest.

“Yves.… .”

Silent sobs floated in the air.

***

On the terrace in the warm morning sun, I was sitting opposite Benjamin and drinking tea.

‘It must be all over by now.’

Yves Llewellyn, who was among the knights escorting Katarina this morning, was a fake. It was a scarecrow made by Benjamin’s magic.

That day, when Benjamin came to the Imperial Palace with Katarina, I swapped with the scarecrow.

Yesterday, because I wanted to see Theodore for the last time, the scarecrow went to escort Katarina.

Taking advantage of the opportunity that came out of the palace, I went to the Imperial Palace.

Fortunately, no one noticed.

And it was there that I only found out that Theo was truly garbage that couldn’t be recycled.

‘He kissed a woman he doesn’t even care about the day before the engagement ceremony. Terrible.’

I thought it was fortunate that he lost his memory.

Otherwise, I might have made a bad choice because I was blinded by love without knowing his true form.

‘I liked him a lot…’

But I didn’t like my sparkling love for the past six months to fade. So I decided to separate the Theodore I loved and the Theodore who lost his memory.

Then, surprisingly, I felt relieved.

As I was touching my lips, where Theodore’s warm temperature had touched, suddenly Benjamin moved his head close to my face and sniffed.

“You smell like the Emperor.”

“Huh? Smell?”

“Yes, since last night… a very strong smell…”

I followed him, bowed my head and sniffed. But there was no smell.

‘Theodore, too, why does everyone keep talking about my smell?’

As I mumbled inside, Benjamin paused abruptly and put down the teacup he was holding in his hand.

“What’s the matter?”

“That crazy Emperor……”

Benjamin muttered as if it was ridiculous.

“….?”

Looking at Benjamin, who couldn’t speak, I tilted my head, he frowned and started explaining.

“He took your dead body to the Imperial Palace.”

“What?”

I opened my mouth wide.

“He took my body? Why?”

Suddenly, an old rumor came to my mind.

A corpse is found every night in the Imperial Palace. It is said that Prince Theodore is an ancient incarnation of darkness who plays with corpses.

‘Is the rumor true?’

Goosebumps welled up all over my body, and I rubbed my forearms as I trembled.

“It’s a big deal.”

“Why, why?”

“If the scarecrow’s duration runs out, the emperor might notice. Before that, we’ll have to bury it in the ground soon……”

God, it was a really big deal.

“How long will it last?”

“3 years.”

But I was relieved by Benjamin’s reply.

No matter how strange Theodore was, how could he hold the dead body for three years?

Moreover, although today’s engagement ceremony was ruined, Katarina was by his side.

And a year later, Katarina’s baby will be born.

He wouldn’t be holding my body for three years, nor would it ever prove that my death was a lie.

‘By the way, did he find the letter by now?’

I quietly sip my tea, reminiscing about the goodbye later that was riddled with profanity.

***

At the same time.

Theodore moved everything from Yves’ quarters to his bedroom. And among the items, he found a letter from Yves to him.

Goodbye, Your Majesty.

The XX b*stard who only disturb Your Majesty’s heart will disappear.

Think of it as an engagement gift.

We were like X when we met, let’s not see each other again.

May you live a long life.

P.s. But do you know that?

Your face was the most X-like, XX XX.

In particular, seeing that there was strength in the part that said ‘It was like X when we met’, Yves must have written it down with strong emotion.

Theodore imagined the image of Yves, who would have frowned at that time and kept her lips closed……

“So cute and lovely.”

He looked back at Yves, who was lying on the hard bed, and smiled.

“Is that right, Yves?”

But Yves did not respond. She just closed her eyes with a cold face.

“Why do you look like that?”

Then Theodore asked Yves.

“Are you still mad at me?”

Of course, there was no reply from the dead woman.

Theodore clenched his fists tightly.

“No. Don’t make that face.”

He bit his lip nervously.

Then suddenly he got up and opened the drawer and took out the hairpin which he had taken from her.

“Release your anger, Yves. I’ll give this back to you.”

He twisted his lips and walked towards the bed.

“I think I know why I gave this to you.”

He knelt on one knee by the bed and stroked Yves’s hair gently.

“Before I lost my memory, I liked you, right?”

There was clear conviction in his voice as he whispered.

“I saw you and must have fallen in love. So I brought you from Ferdinand…… But why didn’t you tell me? That I liked you…… .”

Then he looked at her with his eyes fluttering at the sudden thought.

“Is it because of Benjamin Ferdinand?”

The moment Theodore thought of that man, intense anger swelled in his chest.

He remembered her having a secret meeting with that man without his knowledge, and how she came back full of the man’s smell.

“Because of that dough-looking guy?”

But he calmed down immediately.

“No, no. You like me. I like you too.”

As he thought about that, he gradually found peace of mind.

“Yes, we like each other. Even Benjamin Ferdinand would not dare to intervene. But, why are you……ah…..”

Suddenly Theodore realized that he had not given Yves a chance to speak.

“You were always trying to say something to me.”

He remembered her letter which he tore and threw away without a single thought. He eventually burned it down to ashes, so the letter he sought to find again could not be found.

“Why did I…… What you were trying to convey…… I should have read it…I should have listened to what you had to say…”

Theodore muttered sadly and ruffled her hair, but the shortened hair didn’t come together. It was this hand that brutally cut off the long, shiny hair.

Theodore’s face, looking down at his hand, contorted in pain.

But he did not give up and moved his hand again. However, after a few tries, he eventually lost the hairpin he was holding.

Clank!

When he saw the hairpin falling to the floor and rolling, he felt like his heart was plummeting into the abyss.

Yves still didn’t look at him or smile.

Theodore buried his head in the bed sheet.