4.

After that day, the two didn’t exchange a single word throughout their long journey. Nian stared straight ahead with an expressionless face that revealed nothing of her thoughts, while Dade occasionally glanced at her but never initiated conversation.

In this tense atmosphere that felt like walking on thin ice, Dade continued to pretend indifference, only looking forward. He deliberately rode slightly ahead of Nian, maintaining a faster pace.

In truth, he somewhat regretted this. Not looking at someone didn’t mean they truly became invisible.

Though the taciturn empress rarely spoke first, she readily answered when nearby knights inquired about her wellbeing. When they stopped to rest, she would thank the knights who helped her dismount.

And each time Nian made her presence known, Dade felt as if he had eyes on the back of his head, seeing her clearly.

As always, she would hide her true feelings behind a faint smile. She would have retied her loosened black hair after dismounting, and without any fuss, simply sat on a nearby rock to rest her tired body.

‘Damn it.’

Though he could picture her clearly, Dade bit his lip hard to suppress the urge to turn around and look at her directly.

‘What exactly is this feeling?’

He asked the long-standing question again.

‘It’s possessiveness.’

He ended up laughing in disbelief.

Ah, yes. He admitted it. He intensely desired that stoic woman. She was someone he wanted to possess, to touch, to hold in his arms.

Whenever he approached her with excitement, she invariably pushed him away, yet made it impossible for him to let go. Possessiveness seemed like a plausible answer, but once again, it was incorrect.

She was the Empress. From beginning to end, entirely his. His woman.

She had acknowledged this as well.

If it were merely possessiveness, he wouldn’t be so distracted and agitated over something he already possessed.

‘Damn it.’

Frustrated by another wrong answer, Dade irritably yanked the horse’s reins.

The horse picked up speed, putting more distance between him and Nian.

* * *

“We’ll stay here tonight.”

At Dade’s words, the entire party halted. They had pushed too hard trying to reach Rund, and now the night had grown too deep. Continuing further would be unreasonable, so Dade finally decided to make camp.

As the guards and attendants began setting up tents, Dade pretended to oversee them while stealing glances at Nian behind him.

Nian appeared quite exhausted.

She dismounted and, as expected, retied her disheveled hair before looking around briefly and sitting down against a large tree.

You truly are someone I can see even without looking.

Dade smiled wryly.

Nian felt fatigue throughout her body. The ground where she sat was damp with dew, making her skirt cling uncomfortably, but she didn’t mind.

The hard tree she leaned against was quite bumpy due to knots, but she was grateful just to have something to lean on.

No, perhaps it was her heart that was more tired than her body.

Dade.

Since that day, she couldn’t have any conversation with him. He seemed angry.

Why was he angry? If only he would explain what she had done wrong……

It was always like this. His anger came so suddenly that it caught her off guard, and he never explained the reason, leaving her unable to even defend herself. He would simply become angry and distant, and she couldn’t hold him back.

She thought about the incident at the lake, but no matter how much she considered it, she couldn’t understand why he was angry. Even if it had been a misunderstanding, even if she had actually been bathing and someone else had seen her, that would have been humiliating for her, not something for him to be angry about.

Finally, Nian stood up. She planned to take a walk until the tents were fully set up. Sitting here meant she would keep stealing glances at Dade while pretending to look elsewhere, and that was too painful for her.

Dade was anxiously scanning the surroundings. It happened in just a moment. After occasionally glancing at her, he had a brief conversation with the knight commander.

And then she had vanished without a trace. At first, he thought he had simply lost sight of her among the crowd. He looked around, but she was nowhere to be found.

He couldn’t possibly have missed her. There was no way he wouldn’t immediately recognize the woman whose mere sight made his heart flutter.

Finally, Dade bit his lip tightly and spoke with an anxious voice.

“Where has the Empress…… gone?”

Nian was walking hurriedly with anxious eyes. Though it was night, the moon was bright, and the dense trees reflecting the moonlight were so beautiful that she had walked quite far.

The forest’s beauty was its consistency—it looked the same everywhere. Cities were laid out in an orderly fashion with distinct buildings and different roads in each direction, but the quiet forest had the same trees and soil wherever one looked.

Eventually, she had gotten lost.

Having quietly slipped away during the busy camp preparations, she was now alone without any attendants. She thought she was retracing her steps, but even after walking twice the time it took to get there, the campsite was nowhere in sight.

Anxiety made her heart tremble.

‘I shouldn’t have done this. Even if seeing you is troublesome and painful, I should have stayed put as always. I’m being punished for my foolishness.’

Once again, she faced a fork in the path. Which way should she go?

For Nian, “choice” was something quite unfamiliar and extremely difficult. After hesitating for a long time, she finally chose the right path and began walking. She couldn’t just stop because it was difficult.

“Your Majesty! Empress!”

The usually quiet forest was quite noisy. Upon discovering the Empress had disappeared, the Emperor raged furiously and angrily berated the knights and guards who hadn’t even noticed her absence.

Fearing severe punishment if they didn’t find her immediately, they forgot their daytime fatigue and hurriedly began searching for the Empress.

Dade also went out to search for her. He couldn’t possibly sit still. The knight commander tried to dissuade him, saying it was dangerous, but when Dade glared at him with a look that showed he had lost all reason, the commander fell silent.

He walked urgently through the dense forest. Though it seemed impossible, he worried that she might have run away due to his recent coldness. He was frantic.

The sticky forest air made it feel suffocating. The howling of wild animals in the deepening night sent chills down his spine, increasing his anxiety.

How had he been searching for her?

Desperately? No, more like a madman.

Unlike the surrounding soldiers who loudly called out for the Empress, he walked quietly with tightly bitten lips, but inside he was burning with worry. If someone had seen him, they might have described his eyes as bloodshot.

He constantly looked around, scanning even the ground for any items she might have dropped, hastening his steps. He had long forgotten the fatigue from the day’s journey.

And yet, the woman he had been so desperately searching for was sitting on a cliff edge far from the campsite, and unlike him, she was peacefully asleep.

She was truly obtuse in many ways. How could she fall asleep in such a situation?

The moment he saw her sleeping soundly, surprisingly, what he felt wasn’t anger or resentment but profound relief.

Finally, he had found her.

And there’s not a scratch on her.

His emotions welled up, making his tone sharp. When he sternly rebuked her, she became dejected, stammering excuses. His heart was still racing with emotion, but he intended to stop there. The burning tension had dissipated all at once, replaced by fatigue, and he desperately wanted to return to camp and rest.

He would scold her after dawn when his heart had calmed down. If he did it now…… he might make her cry unnecessarily.

That’s what he had intended. If only Nian hadn’t fallen off the cliff while getting up, and if only he hadn’t instinctively rushed to embrace her as she fell.

It happened so suddenly that he had no time to think. He held her curled-up body in his arms as they fell.

Ah, I must have finally gone mad.

In that moment of falling, he thought this and fervently prayed that the lake below would be deep.

If it was shallow, they would surely die.

‘What exactly is this feeling?’

Questioning the identity of this inexplicable emotion, he closed his eyes.

Nian opened her eyes.

Seeing the tent ceiling through blurry vision, she frowned. As her eyes focused and her vision cleared, she slowly sat up.

“Ugh!”

A groan escaped her lips. Moving her body caused pain throughout, as if she had been beaten with a blunt object.

What…… happened?

‘Heavens! His Majesty!’