Chapter 12: Chapter 12

Chapter 12

“It seems urgent, so I’ll let it slide this time.”

Isilis nodded her head at Faylos’ words.

“I’ll take a look, too.”

“You are really born for it.”

“I’ll take it as a compliment.”

She laughed when he said that she was born as an empress. Now, this meant that one thing was settled.

“The information will be three months later, around midnight. I will take it to the Imperial Palace myself.”

“I’ll wait.”

Faylos spoke, looking at Isilis, who stood up from her seat as soon as she had finished speaking, “Why don’t you have lunch?”

“I’m sorry, but I’m busy.”

“Oh, you’re meeting that guy?”

“You… you know that?”

“There was a surge of magic power, so there’s no way I wouldn’t know. It was more surprising that you came to see me than that. Do you know who that man is…”

“It’s enough.”

“Don’t tell me you really, a child…”

“Stop.”

At Isilis’ resolute answer, he laughed, amused.

“Ah, this… It was real. You really meant it.”

“I don’t need a husband. I just need a child.”

“If you knew who that man was, would you change your mind?”

“Nothing changes. I’ll leave here with the child.”

“As expected, you… That place suits you well. Isilis.”

“I’ll take it as a compliment.”

As soon as the words were finished, the space movement magic unfolded.

* * *

Berthas had a dream. Memories of when he was ten years old. He was shuddering with fear of his first murder when he sneaked out of the barracks and wept under a tree in the woods.

“Are you crying?”

“….”

There was a voice coming towards him, who was crying with his legs crossed and face covered.

“No.”

With his eyes wide open, he raised his head. A white-faced girl thrusted her head towards him. Berthas panicked at the approaching face and pulled back.

“Hmm… You look pretty good.”

“What?”

“Don’t cry. You look good, but if you cry, your face won’t look good anymore.”

“I didn’t cry!”

“You did cry.”

He turned his gaze to the girl who was slumped in the spot next to him. The little girl whispered softly as she sat next to him and pressed her chin to her knees.

“Even if something is sad, you shouldn’t cry. Then, you’ll look weak.”

When he heard it, it seemed to be true.

As he turned his head to look at the girl’s face, their faces were almost touching. He was talking to the child with her face turned right next to him.

“Because I don’t cry either. You shouldn’t cry either.”

“Have you ever been sad?”

“Of course. There were times like that too, though I didn’t cry.”

“That’s amazing.”

As Berthas spoke, biting his lip, he caught a glimpse of the girl’s smirk. She had blazing red hair and dark blue eyes.

Looking into her round eyes, he was genuinely admiring them.

“You’re beautiful.”

“You are handsome, too.”

Seeing the girl talking casually to him, Berthas looked back at her face. The forest at night was quiet, only the sound of the wind could be heard.

“Are you hurt?”

With blood gushed through his lightly clad clothes, the girl quietly took her hand and pressed it to Berthas’ wound.

“Heal.”

A small light shone, and his wounds disappeared as if washed away. When he looked at the girl with surprised eyes, the girl smiled brightly at him as well.

“You’re not hurt anymore, right?”

“Yes.”

A voice was heard, looking for someone from afar. Hearing that, the girl jumped up quickly.

“Oh! I’m going to go now!”

Taking the child’s hand who was about to go, Berthas opened his mouth.

“Can I see you…again?”

“I think it will be difficult. I have to go home now.”

“Then…”

It was at the moment when Berthas, who had been hesitant, was about to get his words out.

“There it is!”

People in black were running. It must have been the assassin sent by his uncle. Seeing the people approaching quickly, Berthas grabbed the child’s wrist and ran quickly.

“Hey! I…!”

“You must run!”

* * *

“No!”

Drenched in sweat, Berthas jumped to his feet. He clenched his fists so tightly that he could not open his hands for a while. As he glanced around, looking down at his cold sweaty hands.

She wasn’t there.

“Where did she go?”

He got out of bed, thinking she might have returned to her quarters as her quarters were next door. At the same time, his wet body felt unpleasant. It had been a long time since he dreamed of his old memories like this.

“It’s not even a battlefield… why…”

He thought it was because he had seen a similar face. The face of the little girl he met in the past was superimposed on the face of the woman he saw yesterday like an afterimage.

“…Look alike.”

She really looked like that child when she was young.

“Will she be alive…”

* * *

When she opened the door of the annex and entered, the man was already up.

‘How can you already…’

She thought he was still sleeping because of the magic, but he wasn’t.

‘Is it different because he was a Sword Master…?’

It seemed that the man woke up faster than expected. She restrained the man from getting up and put the bag down on her lap. When Isilis took off her hood, she met the man’s gaze looking up at her with puzzled eyes.

“Where have you been?”

“Buying some of these?”

Isilis said, taking a barley bread out of the bag and holding it. The barley bread was full of savory flavor.

“What is this…?”

“Bread?”

“I know that.”

“It’s barley bread. It only comes from this port.”

As it was a port city, it was a specialty of this area, where more barley than wheat was produced. When she was young, she always ate when she went out with her father.

“My father used to buy it for me.”

“Father?”

“Yes.”

The word popped out of nowhere.

‘Why am I saying this to that man…?’

Isilis couldn’t figure it out.

“It’s delicious.”

“I think so, too.”

She spoke as she sat down next to the man still on the bed.

“Did your father tell you to get married?”

“He is not here now.”

…If her father were still there, the ministers would not have been able to force her to marry. The Empress would still have firmly held her position, and she would have been just a princess himself.

“Then…”

“The vassals.”

At her brief reply, the man thought for a moment and then opened his mouth.

“I don’t have a father either.”

“Is that so?”

Isilis’s head turned to him. She licked her lips again as she met the man’s darkened eyes.

“It must have been difficult.”

The man’s age seemed to be similar to her or one or two years older than him, but at that age, he had achieved enough to become a sword master, so it seemed like she could see how twisted his life was. At first glance, the swordsmanship she saw at the bar was the swordsmanship used in battle.

‘It was murderous. He must have been on the battlefield at a young age.’

In an instant, she felt the man hugging her from behind. Her body was startled by the hand that wrapped around her waist, though the warm sensation made her body tired.

“I thought you were gone.”

“….”

Isilis made no reply to the man’s whisper as he hugged her and whispered.

The relationship would end in a month… The relationship would end when she had a child. She didn’t know what this man wanted from her, but he would probably never get it as long as she was the Empress.

Feeling the heat on her body, Isilis closed her eyes. One month was too short a time for her to know the man.

* * *

It had been a month since she had been with the man. Tomorrow, she had to return to the imperial capital, no matter what.

“Time flies.”

As she looked into the mirror, she was bewildered by her own eyes, which had turned ultramarine blue.

“It’s only natural that I take the reagent almost every week.”

The more you eat a magic reagent, the more resistance you develop. She took out the reagent from the space and swallowed it.

…One more day.

Even though Isilis did not know whether she had a child or not, whether there was or not, the time for her departure was steadily approaching.

She was confused. She abandoned her duties as Empress and met the man, and she gave him too much heart. She was a completely different person from who she was a month ago. She did nothing and got used to what the man gave, and she got used to the man’s protection of men.

Isilis trembled at her own cowardice whenever it occurred to her that it would be better to not return and that it would not be bad for her to live happily this way.

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