Chapter 23

Chapter 23

Translator: wuttisyun

“I’ve already told Hannah in advance to not worry and just wait in the room.”

Lastly, my gaze fell on Anna, who nodded her head anxiously, before leaving the Palace.

There were only a few eyes watching me since there were already so little people in my Palace despite its size. If you knew the ropes well, it was very easy to escape.

“Thanks to that, it’s really easy to get to the Forbidden Forest.”

However, after a while, I was met with an obstacle when I arrived at the fence separating my Palace from the Forbidden Forest.

“Kung kung!”

“… A hound[1]?”

Just when I was trying to get past the fence, a hound appeared and began to sprint wildly towards me. It was at a considerable distance from me but it was travelling at an unbelievable speed!

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“Kung kung kung!”

“Oh my!”

Rendered confused, instead of crawling through the hole, I began to hurriedly climb up the fence. Fortunately, I was able to avoid its jaws by a hair’s breadth. Acting like a ladder, the fence had many depressions that made it easier for me to climb and I managed to reach the top quickly.

I was extremely flustered. I had not expected a situation like this to happen when I left. The hound continued to claw at the fence causing it to shake and forcing me to grab onto one of the pillars.

“… This is crazy.”

When did we have such a huge hound in our backyard?

“I mean, is that even a hound?”

Come to think of it, I think I have vaguely heard about the terrifying ‘guardian’ that protected the forest amidst the many rumors I heard about the Forbidden Forest. So, the forest was being protected by this beast which was as big as a bull.

No, but for it to actually exist?

The fierce black beast and its red eyes resembled that of men I saw on television who were under the influence of drugs. So to sum it up.

“This hound is crazy?”

Maybe I do have groups that wanted to assassinate me. Maybe their big plan was to make the only Imperial Princess suffer from rabies.

‘Who’s the one letting such a dangerous thing loose!’

I glanced at the other side of the fence.

‘This is too high.’

When I was younger, I had a very brave classmate jump from the 13th floor. Back then, my classmate’s right knee and left elbow were completely crushed.

If I jumped towards the forest from my position, my limbs would break.

I took a breath.

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“Why do I still have to struggle when I’m just trying to survive while crying bitterly…”

What do I do? What should I do? On one hand, I had a hound chasing me like crazy, setting me along the course to the road to death. On the other hand, if I jump off the other side, I will be saying goodbye to my knees forever.

“What are you doing there?”’

I frowned. I looked towards the direction of where I heard the loud voice come from.

“Sir Ray?”’

At the place I was staring at, the knight was sitting down since who knows when. He pointed his chin towards me relaxedly as if he did not notice the reality of my situation.

“S-since when were you here?”

“Since Your Highness was being chased by the hound.”

He confessed without hesitating as he slowly observed my dumb expression as if he thought this was funny. I glared back at him as if I was going to tear his face off[2].

That means he had been watching since the beginning!

“Is that the right time to be talking like that? Why are you teasing me!”

“I was following you ever since you left.”

I contorted my face to express how I thought this was ridiculous. The knight relaxed before gently gazing at my dangling legs. He shamelessly asked, “Is it hard to stay up there?”

‘Fuck. Does this not look hard!’

It was nice to have a helping hand reaching out towards me but the problem was that this hand belonged to someone devilish[3].

“Then why the hell are you here, Sir?”

“I already told you. I am going to follow His Highness back to his family home today but before that, I was going to look around.”

He gestured flamboyantly to his right.

“So that’s why I’m here.”

“… Ha.”

“I can tell you need help.”

This was the first time I ever wanted to punch him when he talked casually to me.

“How did you only realise that now? Amazing, I can only be in awe of how excellent you are in grasping the situation.”

The knight who was looking at me before giving a wry grin.

As he continued grinning, he jumped off the tree. The knight quickly fixed his posture as if he had been waiting. The hound ran towards the knight. He quickly reverted back from his relaxed stance.

“I’ll listen to the reason why you are here later.”

Kurung–

The hem of his loose sleeves shook vigorously. I was mesmerised by his smooth cat-like movements that I almost forgot about the situation I was in. Not long after he began to wield his sword, red liquid began to drip from its tip.

“Whimper!”

The sword that sliced the hound first was swung down once again. He moved very quickly but I could clearly see what was happening. After his last swing, the neck of the hound’s neck snapped and fell with a thud on the ground. He managed to achieve all this within 20 seconds.

“Your Highness.”

His relaxed voice managed to snap me out of my daze from watching such a surreal scene. He then stabbed his sword into the ground before stretching his hand towards me.

“You can jump.”

After hearing his words, I tilted my head before saying.”

“… Do you have to catch me? You can’t drop me, alright?”

He gave me an impression of a blunt and manly person. His expression bore the sincere and straightlaced image of the knights.

“Of course.”

But I knew that the knight was only making me trust that he would catch me before dropping me. I could even bet my entire fortune. It’s a shame but I did not have a choice at the moment.

“I will not play around with your safety.”

“… Alright.”

From such a tall height, I jumped. He caught me which sent trembles throughout my back to the point I was feeling numb. Soon, I felt something warm and firm. While still holding on to me, he started to walk lightly.

“Excuse my rudeness for a moment.”

Sir Ray asked me for my patience for some reason and covered my eyes before taking me further away from where we were.

“Now then, Your Highness.”

My eyes were blinded by the sudden flash of light.

“I’m not particularly curious but I’m still going to ask.”

He gently released the tension and spoke slowly without hesitation.

“For what reason were you hanging around the wilderness so close to the Forbidden Forest? Is this a new game you came up with?”

“Are you going to play?”

“I knew it.”

He then began lecturing me on how dangerous this place was and how I should not be alone here. He said all this without any change in his expression but I could hear the sincerity in his voice.

“… You know, Sir. Can you not ask about anything?”

“It’s not like I was asking because I was curious either. But please remember who I am.”

As I kept my silence, he gave a slight jerk.

“Since my role is my role, I’ll be in a bit of a difficult situation if Your Highness were to get hurt or die. Also, he’ll be sad.”

He tilted his head before looking at me.

He continued speaking slightly softer now while I fiddled half heartedly with his cape.

“… I’m sorry Sir, but you don’t look like you’d be troubled at all. Of course, I’m not disappointed about that.”

“Can’t you tell how serious I’m being?”

With that face?

How could I sense his sincerity? Sir Ray spoke completely in monotone. Even while speaking to me, his deep blue eyes were constantly looking away from me. In the end, he cleanly admitted that it would not be good to continue with such a silent confrontation so he brought up a completely different topic.

“Your Highness, do you remember what happened in Prince Dane’s garden 3 years ago?”

The moment I met his eyes, it felt like I was going back in time, back to the day it happened. Back to a few years ago, during the dawn of the morning stars[4].

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“… I do.”

A long time ago, Dane was trying to grow a rare plant that came from a distant desert country in the west. He had warned me to never touch it with my hands as it was very dangerous. Then, when Dane looked away for a moment, a cat began to walk towards the plant. I tried to stop the cat from nearing the plant which pricked my finger and caused me to bleed.

“Your Highness continued to insist that you were not hurt even while you were bleeding.”

It turned out that the plant was carnivorous and used a very strong poison to kill its prey.

When I wanted to do something, I was the type of person to work to see it come true no matter what. This bulldozer-like personality was a result of my stubborn character from my previous life.

‘Dane had loved that pretty cat so I wanted to stop it from getting too close to the extremely dangerous plant.’

Even if I could choose carefully, I would still value my judgement above the advice of those around me

Dane’s fury was as intense as fire as I almost lost my pinky forever.

“The day Prince Dane got angry, Your Highness promised not to do anything dangerous ever again. But the next day, you stood in front of Fleon to stop him while he was still swinging his sword.”

“I stopped him because he was trying to kill one of my maids.”

All I did was try to stop a child from finding faults with nothing and committing such violent crimes with his own hands.

“Yes. You won’t stand for what you think is not right.”

The knight said it with such grandiose. As if I had stepped up because only I could. I was about to protest before he brought up today’s incident where I bravely stood in front of a hound that could easily eat people. The knight laughed.

“You had always been the one in control since you were young.”

Sir Ray whispered gently and softly.

His dark blue eyes that were as dark as the night turned back to the sky as if he was reminiscing.

“While I have given up.”

He then sighed, no longer looking my way.

“… It’s no longer worth nagging you anymore. My mouth hurts.”

For some reason, he looked like a small sulking child.

His hair that seemed to be a mix of blue and purple ruffled. The knight frowned at the darkening sky and the wind before sighing again. When his gaze lowered from the sky, he shot a mischievous smile.

“No matter what I say from now on, you’re not even going to listen, are you?”

He turned his head, revealing his exposed side profile.

“I never listen to anything you say anyways.”

He replied with a sigh as if thinking back on the regrets he held during the 6 years we knew each other.

Before I noticed, this blunt, rude and sarcastic knight had been looking back at me.

“… Let me down.”

Instead of listening to me, he continued to stare at me curiously. He ignored what I said and spoke.

“Are you really scared of telling me?”

“Yeah. It’s a really important issue. You can’t ask anything about it.”

I gave a firm resolution that he could not possibly go against.

“I see.”

I had a serious look in my face and my gaze was almost intense enough to pierce through him.

“… Is it related to how you changed clothes with that child from the kitchen a few days ago?”

I froze. I was so shocked my pupils were shaking but I remained silent till the end.

‘How did he know?’

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T/N:

[1]: I used ‘dog’ in C1 but after thinking about it, considering its size and more animalistic nature, I decided to change it to ‘hound’.

[2]: Direct tl is ‘chew him out/up’ but the former already had another meaning in english and the latter didn’t really make that much sense so I used an equivalent.

[3]: Again, not a direct tl because instead of using a helping hand, the author used ‘ray of light’ and if I had used the metaphor directly, it could be easily misinterpreted so I just changed it to this.

[4]: I think she meant it literally like it happened during the early morning and stuff. I was searching stuff up and wondering if there was any special meaning behind it but I couldn’t find any so this is what I’m assuming LOL