CH 34

“What can I do for you?”

“Wash your hands first.”

Asha got onto the footrest with a familiar movement, washed her hands, and called Karnov with a gesture. By the time he washed and wiped his hands side by side, Pavel, who still did not understand the situation, appeared with the ingredients in the basket.

When the egg whites were needed, Asha measured out her sugar and prepared it separately while Pavel broke four of the eggs and separated the whites from the yolks.

“Now, I’ll ask you to.”

Asha smiled and put the whisk directly into Karnov’s hand. And Asha admired it a little.

‘It doesn’t suit him to the point of being phenomenal.’

She supposed she could believe him when he said he was born to not hold a whisk.

Tall, simple but tight-fitting suit, sculpted features, knife-like expressionless expression, and purple eyes that show no emotion beneath the black hair. And a whisk that looked like a bunch of twigs in his hand.

“…”

“…What should I do?”

“Hwihwi!*”

[*TN: A word describing the motion of wielding or stirring something wildly.]

“…?”

Asha deliberately sighed, took Karnov’s hand with the whisk, and stirred it in a bowl with egg whites. Karnov flinched but did not push her as he did on the night of the victory ball.

“Like this, swish the whites! Until it foams.”

“…White… You mean?”

“Yes. Until it’s as hard as cream, continue!”

At Asha’s words, Karnov couldn’t hide his eyes of disbelief—he couldn’t accept the fact that whites became as hard as cream—and began to whisk slowly.

It didn’t look like a whisker in the slightest, but it was also plausible to see him concentrating on the task he was told to do with his mouth tightly closed. Asha was taken aback by her own thoughts, and she pressed him to get rid of them.

“You have to do it quickly to make it foam. Otherwise It won’t happen until next year.”

“…”

“Yes, like that. A little faster. Go on. We’ll do it for about ten minutes at that rate.”

“…”

While Asha was smiling, Pavel, whose face turned blue, carefully led her to the corner, and lowered himself to the fullest extent and whispered.

“I, I can do the meringue, Your Highness! Please… please can I do it?”

“I don’t want to. Why would Pavel do it?”

“I’m the chef…”

“Karnov says he’ll do it. Why do you want to go through hardships that you shouldn’t have to go through?”

“Because this is harder!”

Pavel looked almost as if he wanted to scream. Asha frowned.

“Who is bothering who (Pavel)?”

“Huh, yes, yes?”

“Karnov said he would help me first. I didn’t drag him here, so you don’t have to worry.”

‘No, but even if I’m afraid of Karnov, shouldn’t I be more afraid?’

She was afraid of Karnov because she knew he would try to kill her future self, but she didn’t know why others were afraid of him.

Asha grumbled to herself and returned to the workstation, weighed almond powder and sugar, and opened her eyes wide. There was already quite a bit of white foam.

“Uh, uh. Already…”

“Is there a problem?”

“Oh, no. You can continue. Just add some sugar now…”

Asha added some of the sugar she had measured into Karnov’s bowl and she looked at his tired face alternately with the bowl.

‘He does it again and again when I tell him to do it…’

It didn’t even look very hard.

‘He’s a really boring person.’

Phoebe spoke to Asha while she was grumbling to herself.

<What did you expect from a human being who doesn’t care about carrying you on his back?>

‘But that person bothered me.’

<Bothered you? How?>

‘He pushed me. I fell down and my hand became like this. Phoebe doesn’t even know my heart.’

At Asha’s glance, Phoebe raised a firm voice.

<I could twist his wrist horizontally and make him feel the same way…>

‘You’re the most violent person in the room. You know that?’

<Even when I tell you how to do it, you just complain. What are you grumbling about? You’re just an immature human being.>

‘You’re supposed to show me the proper way!’

<It’s time to add sugar to that meringue.>

‘You didn’t even pretend to hear me. Okay, got it.’

Asha sighed deeply, and poured sugar into the bowl where Karnov was whisking.

“How long do I have to do this?”

“A little more.”

“…I hope it’s right to do because you have to do it.”

“Then do you think I deliberately asked for something I don’t need, just to make Karnov suffer? No way.”

Karnov’s purple eyes gazed coolly at her. Asha coughed and called Pavel to prepare a sanding sand for the cream.

Pavel approached and tried to ask again if he could make meringue, but Asha quickly closed his mouth. Asha decided not to do anything unnecessary against Karnov in the future.

“…”

“Is this enough?”

As Karnov lifted the whisk from his bowl, the white peaks stood firm and pointed. Karnov, who completed the meringue in only about 10 minutes, had no emotion on his face.

“That’s… that’s pretty good.”

“This meringue is very good, big.”

Pavel, who had forgotten his feelings for Karnov for a moment, was struck in the back by Asha and hurriedly closed his mouth with a painful expression.

Asha brought the bowl containing meringue, poured out the powder, and mixed the powder diligently by rotating the bowl. After putting the dough in a piping bag, squeezing it into a pan, and putting it in the oven, Karnov, who stood next to him, suddenly said with his arms crossed.

“You knead the dough really well.”

“You said you liked to cook.”

As Asha raised her chin, Karnov opened his eyes in a blur.

“I remember you asked me to do it because your wrist hurts.”

“Oh, that’s right.”

“…”

Karnov’s gaze grew stern.

Asha, avoiding his gaze, had Pavel whip and make a cream of butter, condensed milk, cream, lemon juice, and orange marmalade. It was also mixed by Karnov in place of Asha, who had a sore wrist.

“Since you helped me so much, I’ll share the baked goods with you.”

“It’s tough.”

“It’s a real habit, a habit. Right?”

“Isn’t it a low-level ability to draw only negative answers from you no matter what I do?”

“That’s all right. I don’t enjoy sweets.”

“I didn’t put any poison in it. We made it together, so you know.”

“That’s not what I meant…”

“Ouch! My wrist hurts!”

“…”

“My ankle hurts too… It’s seriously hurting…”

“…If you’re giving it to me, thank you… I’ll eat it.”

Asha smiled. At last, the sand in the hourglass told her that the time was up.

Pavel begged her to let him squeeze the cream into the dacquoise, so she asked him to without hesitation. It was completed by squeezing butter cream along the edge of the bottom of the dacquoise, putting orange marmalade in the middle, and covering it with the dacquoise again.

“It’s done!”

Asha looked at the finished dacquoise with a proud expression and put it one by one in front of Pavel and Karnov. Then she took a bite of dacquoise.

“Ha-am!”

She didn’t even add butter, but it seemed to have a savory butter flavor, perhaps because it was made with almond powder. After the crispy outside, the inside was softly chewy, and the sweetness of the snack and the sour taste of the cream gently harmonized.

‘What?’

Why was it so good? Was it because she hadn’t had sweets for ten years?

<It is also the strength of this body!>

Asha looked down at the buttons on her coat. This was also engraved with a bird shape. Asha asked, thinking that she should prepare a cage before the buttons on all her clothes turn into artisan-like bird-shaped decorative buttons.

‘What makes the sweets so delicious?’

<Because those sweets are born with the most perfect senses at your fingertips.>

So, even when mixing meringue and powder, her hands moved enough to make the most delicious stuff after baking. To achieve the most exquisite balance of sugar, meringue, and powder particles.

<Your hands are still like bunches of grapes, so you haven’t been able to use the full strength of your body.>

‘A bunch of soft grapes. It’s still small, but it’ll grow quickly soon.’

Asha extended her hand and looked down at the back of her hand.

After coming to the Imperial Palace, it was a small hand that became soft with a little weight, away from being skinny. Although it seemed like it went back to its original state due to the pain of lying down for the past three days.

‘Then I can bake the cookies more and more perfectly, and in other words, their minds…’

As it did with Alexei, she would be able to convey her true feelings to others without misunderstanding. Asha, who enjoyed the dacquoise to the fullest, looked up to see their appreciation and blinked her eyes with a curious look.

Pavel’s hand was shaking slightly, and Karnov, who had confessed to having no taste for sweets, still had his arms crossed.

“Pavel? Why aren’t you eating? This is delicious.”

“Ah, e… Eat…”

“…Ha, let me have it.”

Then Karnov suddenly snatched the snack placed in front of Pavel before Pavel did.

“Why did you leave your own and take Pavel’s share?”

But Karnov did not reply to Asha’s words, but glanced at Pavel.

“If you have anything to drink, I’ll ask you to get them. With something cold.”

Pavel, who paused for a moment, went out with a determined look on his face, and in the meantime Karnov took a short sigh and looked back at Asha.

“Don’t be harsh to him.”

“What do you mean harsh? This is delicious… It’s delicious.”

She took another dacquoise and took a bite, just in case, but the snack still tasted better than she thought.

“That’s not what I’m talking about.”

Karnov seemed to hesitate for a moment. Looking at the snack in hand.

“I’ll tell you now because I don’t think Your Highness knows what kind of spirit my spirit is. I…”

“Huh? No, I know. Isn’t it the spirit of death?”

“…Did you know?”

Karnov opened his eyes wide.

At that moment, Asha caught a glimpse of the air of emotion that stood out from Karnov for the first time. In an instant, a refreshing wave that rose high swept past her like a wave.