Chapter 23: CH 22

Somehow, Yul succeeded in putting the shirt on. When he glanced down at his stomach, it was as if the buttons would burst at any moment.

Yul released his breath little by little and tried to avoid the shame of the buttons flying off.

To him, it was the most important moment of his life. Meanwhile, a small wind blew over his round head. When he glanced up at the tickling of his head, Mikael was laughing. Seeing that, Yul’s eyes became sharp at once.

“Don’t laugh, it’s not really my stomach!”

“Who said anything?”

“That’s not it, but…”

In response to the cold reply, Yul responded with a mumble. Mikael burst out laughing once more at his sullen face.

Yul protested one more time, saying, ‘’I told you not to laugh!’, but to no avail.

Mikael, who had struggled to put on the shirt on him, finally put a red bow tie around Yul’s neck.

A red bow tie seemed to go well with Yul’s appearance. From the moment Mikael first saw the white clothes, he thought he definitely needed that bow tie.

Not surprisingly, the red bow tie went well with Yul. Yul fiddled with the bow tie, but he did not untie it.

Mikael put Yul in front of the mirror.

“Ooh, clothes make the man!”

Yul looked at himself and smiled happily. He had never worn clothes like this before in his life, but since he looked like a doll, he looked good in clothes like this. Yul turned his head back and forth in front of the mirror and looked at himself from various angles.

He smiled contentedly, and Levi held out something to Mikael, who was looking at him.

Mikael was staring at Yul, so he didn’t even look at what Levi had given him, and put it on the side table.

“This is an invitation to a banquet from the Duke of Esirene.”

“From who?”

“The Duke of Esirene.”

However, at Levi’s words, Mikael quickly hardened his expression. He asked where the invitation came from, not because he hadn’t heard Levi but to confirm whether it was really sent by the Duke of Esirene.

“How interesting.”

It was a cold voice. Yul, who was busy admiring himself in the mirror, looked up at Mikael’s cold voice for the first time in surprise. His red eyes shone very sharply. Like drops of blood on the tip of a sharpened blade.

Yul was troubled as to why he was suddenly like this.

Clearly, his mood changed in an instant after Levi said that it was the Duke of Esirene. In that case, it seemed like he had unfavorable opinions of the Duke of Esirene, but he couldn’t immediately recall why.

The Duke of Esirene, the Duke of Esirene…

Yul looked back at the contents of the novel “The Red Prison” and thought about whether there was anything related to the Duke of Esirene. The story of the Duke of Esirene came to mind only after he recalled a dozen times of all the ways of Mikael’s mistreatment of Levi.

‘Gaps, is it that Esirene? That bastard who’s as crazy as Mikael in The Red Prison?’

In the original, the Duke of Esirene was ambitious. He was not satisfied with his status as a duke. He wanted something greater.

He did not simply aim for the position of Archduke. He was jealous and envious of the very authority of Archduke Orlov, who even the imperial family could not treat him rudely.

In the original work, it is said that this attitude of the Duke of Esirene has been going on for quite some time. And it was Constantine Esirene who took it to the climax.

To put it simply, he was just as insane as Mikael.

In the original story, he even went overboard to kidnap Levi to threaten Mikael.

It wouldn’t have been so bad if he had only been kidnapped, but he even tortured Levi to discover Mikael’s weakness. Beating was par for the course, he was water tortured and even his nails pulled out.

The scene in which his toenails were pulled out was so vividly described that it even made Yul rush to check the safety of his intact nails, while reading the book.

Even before that happened, he was portrayed as a man who bare his claws to Mikael in everything. So, even at this point, before the novel’s contents were actually developed it was natural for Mikael to be so angry at the name of Esirene.

“Are you going to go?”

“Since he invited me, I should go. He must have prepared something interesting since he even sent the invitation by hand.”

“Yes, I understand. Then I will reply that you will be attending.”

There was a lot of tension in the conversation between the two.

Yul averted his eyes and looked around. He didn’t know what Constantine was thinking, but he invited Mikael, and Mikael also accepted the invitation, so it seemed like a big match between the lunatics would be going down.

Unless Mikael was really crazy, there would be no way he would bring a cotton doll to a banquet held by a political rival. There was nothing in the world that’s as fun as watching a fight between madmen, and Yul was bitterly regretful about not being able to see it.

———

“Kimchi! It’s kimchi!”

Yul jumped with joy at the bright red food that was casually placed on the table. It was a familiar food that you could see everywhere in Korea, but it was the first time he’s seen it since he came to this world.

Of course, compared to what he saw in Korea, there were definitely some disappointments in terms of visuals, but for now it had the shape of kimchi. In addition, it was accompanied by steaming white rice.

“Oh, thank you! I will enjoy this food!”

After holding the dessert fork preciously and saying thank you, Yul rushed towards the kimchi.

He took a small piece with a fork and put it in his mouth, and a familiar taste spread across his mouth. Maybe it was because of the limitations of the ingredients, it tasted a bit empty but kimchi was kimchi.

“Ah, yes. This is it! Keuu, I need two bottles of soju with this.”

Yul enjoyed the taste of his hometown, forgot the state he was in and started fantasizing about pouring soju. Then he ate the kimchi with a fork in succession.

“I should eat rice. Huh, rice is like this. It’s okay, it’s rice.”

It wasn’t the sticky rice he used to eat in Korea, but it was still rice. When he ate kimchi on top of the rice, it felt like every corner of his heart that had been feeling empty was filled.

“It’s been a long time since I ate it, so it’s really delicious. Ahh, it’s good. I like it.”

Yul burst into exclamations of satisfaction as he hurriedly put kimchi and rice in his mouth. Even so, he was so small that others wouldn’t even be able to tell the food was eaten.

“Argh, I’m craving soju, soju. Mikael, you don’t have soju right? Okay, I get it. So what drinks are there?”

“… You can drink too?”

“Ha! Even though I look like this, I can drink like a fish. I can drink up to four bottles of soju, and I can’t drink much beer once I’m full, but I can still drink quite a bit?”

Yul proudly replied to Mikael’s words.

He didn’t drink often, but every time he did, he drank tremendously. And so that was how he ended up in this situation.

“Mikael, I want to drink. Is this wine?”

Well, after drinking and waking up, he possessed a doll’s body, but how could things get any worse than it was now? Perhaps it will be possible to return to the human body again. He had seen it in movies before, you lose your memory after hitting your head, and then regain your memory by being struck by the head again.

So he might become a human again if he drank alcohol, Yul thought about the pretty flowery future.

But what if he didn’t become a human again even after the effect of alcohol? Anyway, it was already the worst situation for him, so nothing could get worse. Drinking alcohol instead would make him feel better at the very least.

Thinking like this, Yul decided to drink out a bottle for the first time in a long time.

Before Mikael’s reply came, Yul approached the wine that was always ready by his side at every meal.

He whined to drink wine from the wine glass with a slim neck, but of course there was no way he could do that with his small body.

Mikael, who was looking at him quietly, emptied the water in the glass that was originally intended to contain sauce or sugar but now used as Yul’s cup and filled his cup with wine. Then, after waiting eagerly, Yul rushed in and drank the wine.

“Wahh, it tastes good. Wow, this is real wine. It’s really classy.”

He had tried a variety of alcoholic beverages, but only cheap wine, priced at seven to eight thousand won at the mart.

Yul applauded its clean and rich flavor that could not be compared with any wine he had ever tasted. Instead of a cheerful clap clap, there was only a light tapping sound of cotton.

“One more drink!”

Yul eagerly requested a refill. Although Mikael looked a bit awkward, he once again filled Yul’s cup.

Just like that, drink, fill, drink and fill again. After repeating the same thing a few more times, and in the end…