CH 13

13. Twenty Four Hours (1)

‘I think I’m going to choke to death.’

These were the feelings Lasilia felt after spending half a day with the Emperor.

‘Why are you looking at me like that?’

She didn’t know that this meant that he would always be by her side. They ate together and drank tea together. She read, and she watched as the secretary put the imperial seal on a bunch of official documents. However, all the audiences were rejected. It was a trivial reason for not wanting to go to the throne room.

‘…No, it doesn’t seem insignificant for some reason.’

That tenacious gaze could never be said to be insignificant. When she thought he would be looking at her like that in the audience room, she felt chills for no reason.

‘He is an Emperor… Wouldn’t they think it was crazy or something similar?’

The blue moon seemed so terrible. Seeing that he was staring at the Empress, who he usually didn’t care about, as if every minute and every second was a waste.

‘That said, my memory won’t come back before Blue Moon.’

The Emperor put his seal on the last official document.

“It is over now.”

“I see.”

She was anxious inside.

‘It seemed like he was just pressing the seal without reading it.’

Well, it was someone else’s empire.

“I can do anything now. Is there anything you want to do?”

There’s no such thing, she just wanted him to stop staring at her.

“There is nothing.”

“Let’s go for a walk, then.”

The Emperor suggested taking a walk as if he had anticipated the refusal in advance.

“Walk…?”

“Would you like to go for a walk?”

“I don’t know… No, I don’t hate it.”

The Emperor might not know it, but the word “walking” sounded very fresh to Lasilia. The Prophet’s life was simple. Sleeping in the deepest part of the Great Hall, in a dark room without windows, was most of the day. As for Lasilia, the time when her prophetic powers manifested was early, and she lived a life without windows from a young age. She, of course, sometimes went out of the temple. She was to stand in front of people as a symbol of the former state instead of most of the royal events. But it was a very different thing from a walk.

Lasilia’s role as empress was due to her frequent dealings with her royal family as a prophetess. In order to interpret her dream, Lasilia knew a lot about the history and situation of the continent, but on the contrary, she didn’t know much about things that were not necessary for her role as a prophet. The outside appearance that could be seen when leaving the temple from time to time was a completely unknown territory to Lasilia.

Every room in the imperial palace had a large window. If the emperor hadn’t been staring at her like that all day, Lasilia would never have thought that she would be suffocated by being in her bedroom all her life.

“Is that okay?”

The Emperor stared blankly at her face.

“…I found one.”

“What do you mean?”

“A thing you like.”

“…?”

“Your expression has changed.”

While Lasilia was unknowingly touching her face, the Emperor got up from his temporary desk and approached her.

“Then shall we go?”

The Emperor respectfully held out his arm in front of Lasilia.

* * *

The walk was more free than she thought. The guards and attendants who had followed behind them silently disappeared at the entrance of the garden. The garden of the imperial palace was divided into four areas, and the place she was now in was called the Garden of Water.

The vast garden, which stretches along the deep and large canal that supplies water to the imperial palace, had deliberately cut down trees and planted low-key flowers to have an open view. The garden was very beautiful, with fountains and statues mixed with colorful flowers.

‘Ah…’

For a moment, she forgot the discomfort caused by the Emperor holding her arm tightly because she was distracted by the scene unfolding in front of her. He forgot to turn his head and stare at her face at the subject walking next to her.

“Is it good?” the emperor asked.

“Yes, Your Majesty.”

“Did you come for a walk with me?”

Lasilia quietly changed her words.

“Because the garden is beautiful… Except for one place.”

It was because she found a corner of the garden only belatedly. There was only one place in this perfect garden, where all the flowers had been cut off.

“What happened over there?”

Perhaps the problem was that the flowers were cut off, but gardeners there were diligently trimming the trees whose flowers had been cut off.

“This way.”

Lescal pointed the other way, subtly covering the place where gardenias had been in full bloom until yesterday.

“Yes, Your Majesty?”

“I thought it would be better to go this way. How about boating? Let the boat float if you want.”

She guessed it was award-winning. It looked like he was trying to hide something.

“The pear is good too. But I want to know what happened there.”

Lescal furrowed his eyebrows.

“Why should I know that?”

“Is there anything I shouldn’t have known about?”

“There is no such thing. I thought you might like boating.”

She had never been on a boat before. She wondered what it would feel like to float on the water.

“If it’s difficult to say, I’ll just move on.”

When the Emperor said he would hide it to the end, he intended to ask the birds. Unexpectedly, the Emperor muttered, averting his eyes with an awkward expression.

“No, I’m not trying to hide anything…”

Then Ryan intervened.

“Just say it, Your Majesty. It’s not even a secret. Wouldn’t it be more difficult if she just misunderstood it?”

Lasilia was startled when Ryan crawled out from under the flower tree. What was even more surprising was that as soon as she felt her presence, the Emperor stretched out his arms and wrapped them tightly around her body.

“…Why are you out there?”

“Sorry if I startled you, Your Majesty. Because of the damn crow.”

“Crow?”

“Yes. Something was stolen from me, but I was chasing after it, and I happened to…”

Ryan sighed in an inaudible swearing and brushed away the dust on her body.

“Anyway, you’d better just say it, Your Majesty. Could it be that Her Majesty the Empress did not know what had happened to Gardenia Garden? It’s the place she liked the most in the imperial palace.”

“…?”

Lasilia struggled to turn her head to look at the Emperor. As he wrapped his arms around herself completely, he was in a pose looking up from under his chin.

“…I didn’t ruin it on purpose.”

His stiff jawline caught her eye first. The Emperor was still unable to meet her eyes.

“Just… It’s your favorite, so I just said to bring as many as they could.”

“…ah.”

For the first time, Lasilia was able to connect the garden, which had been cut out of flowers, with the Emperor’s secret. The flowers the Emperor had sent in abundance yesterday seemed to be called gardenias.

“You didn’t ruin it.”

“…I didn’t expect it to be like that.”

“Then the rose garden would have a similar shape.”

“It’s fine there. I told them to make just one bouquet.”

Wouldn’t it be too conscienceless to call the size of a bouquet of flowers?

“Okay, let go.”

“…”

The Emperor subtly softened the lines of his lips. It was an expression Lasilia was already used to.

‘If I tell him to let go, he always makes that kind of expression.’

It was also a familiar thing to reluctantly withdraw his hand. And she seemed to be getting used to it little by little. For example, when she didn’t know that the noise was Ryan, the Emperor hugged her tightly.

‘It’s a bit similar to saying that he would eat an unknown fruit first.’

It felt like it was something to cover her first from a threat, which he didn’t know what it was.

‘Even if the empress doesn’t have feelings, does he have some kind of instinct as a companion? …Well, that’s why they’re called partners of fate.’

It was unfortunate. That the mark of the Empress was disappearing.

‘That might be proof that he has another partner. It might have appeared to another companion after the mark of the Empress was erased.’

They said that she must be born as his pair, so if the empress wasn’t real, he must have a real partner somewhere.

‘It would be nice if that person showed up first.’

Either the real one appeared on its own, or the Empress disappeared and the Emperor set out to find the real one himself.

‘I wish I could have a dream. Something about a true lover.’

That was when she thought about it. Ryan asked, who had been watching Lescal’s reaction carefully before shaking off the dust from her.

“By the way, you two, are you going to board the boat now?”

The Emperor finally met her gaze.

“What do you think?”

“I am good.”

He didn’t know it, but Lasilia was a little excited. She liked walking slowly from the Empress’ palace to the water garden, and she also liked feeling the fresh sunlight and air directly on her skin. Riding a boat would be even newer for her.

“Aha, you like riding a boat. Then, the two of you, please come down slowly to the dock. I will go ahead and tell them to prepare the boat.”

Ryan, who finished her words, hurriedly ran toward the canal.

* * *

“Um… Do you really like boating?”

It must have been about ten minutes since they boarded the boat. Ryan inevitably insisted on rowing herself and accompanied them on the boat ride. As the sword master-class knight made up her mind and rowed, the small boat floating on the waterway rushed into the middle of the water like a battleship.

Lasilia, new to boating, didn’t know what was wrong. She just thought that boating was much more exciting than riding her horse.

“I think so. It’s fun because it’s fast.”

“Yes? Is it fast or fun?”

“However.”

“…”

Ryan looked at her face and narrowed her eyes. Lescal guessed something was wrong with that expression.

“Isn’t the sun too hot?”

It was the moment when Lescal spoke to Lasilia to divert attention and to use her as an excuse to stick around a little longer.

“Evil! That bastard bird!”

Aww!

Ryan jumped up from inside the boat, handing her paddle to Lescal.

“Your majesty! I’m presumptuous, but please stir. Hey you damn bird! Give me back my things!”

Ryan drew her sword and swung it through the air at her, making her growl.

“Oh, that bird…”

Apparently, one of the birds that spoke to her was the black one.

“Caw!”

– Later, later. The moon rises, the moon rises

A black bird called from afar. It seemed that he had come to tell her this.

“That is…”

Lasilia covered her mouth with her hand. If it was the moon, it seemed to mean a blue moon.

Ryan threw her temper.

“Take a look, Your Majesty! That bird, isn’t it extremely suspicious? Strangely, when it sees me, it tries to bully me.”

Pretending not to know, Lasilia defended the bird.

“Isn’t that just a passing road? There would be no reason for birds to bother humans.”

Ryan gnashed her teeth.

“This is what Her Majesty said because she did not know. What did that vicious bird do to me just now… Ah, an opportunity!”

It was still a long way from Lasilia’s point of view, but it didn’t seem like it to Ryan. She had previously dismissed it as a bird, but now she was sincere. Ryan, who lowered herself with a sword in her right hand, tried to leap into the air.

“Kyung! Stop!”

Lasilia tried to grab Ryan.

“It’s dangerous! don’t get up.”

Lescal caught Lasilia first and stopped her.

‘It’s no good!’

Lasilia struggled and cried out in her heart. Meanwhile, Ryan, who had measured her distance with her sharp eyes, jumped up holding her sword. Birds were in the sky, and humans couldn’t fly, but Ryan seemed to be able to catch the black bird somehow.

“No!”

The moment Lasilia cried out earnestly, something happened.

—————————————————————