Chapter 10

“Hmm… So, Terry. Everything’s fine, but why are you helping Sir Bruf with his romantic endeavors?”

Ah. Come to think of it, she had forgotten.

“No matter how I think about it, you and Sir Bruf are in a situation where things can’t improve between you two.”

Orgon, like Eched, was a sharp individual.

The golden eyes that matched her gaze felt burdensome, so she subtly averted her own.

“I’m just supporting someone’s one-sided love for the sake of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs… for the Empire…”

“Ah-ha. That matchmaking. So, you and Sir Bruf planned this together?”

Planned it together? Though it was true, his tone was unnecessarily cheap!

“Ahem. Are you going to tell?”

“Well, considering how His Majesty is saddened by the thought that your personality hasn’t changed, I feel like I should.”

Orgon chuckled slyly, saying, 

“This is quite the dilemma.” 

She glared at him.

“So, you’re saying you’ve got something on me?”

“If you think it’s a weakness, then it is. If you don’t, then it isn’t.”

“Fine, go ahead and tell! Do it!”

“Really?”

Orgon stared at her intently. The playful glint in his eyes was infuriating, but at this moment, she was the one at a disadvantage.

She hesitated, then shook her head reluctantly.

She could already imagine how much nagging the Emperor would unleash once he learned the truth of the matter.

‘That would be the end of me.’

Orgon smirked and looked away.

“His Majesty is so persistent. Instead of this troublesome ordeal, he should just have you marry the Knight Commander.”

“It’s my marriage. Why are you making decisions for me? And I’m not marrying Eched or anyone else.”

“But the Knight Commander is perfect for you.”

“I’ve been curious for a while. Why are you so intent on pairing me with Eched?”

“Why indeed.”

Orgon murmured the question to himself, looking down at her with an inscrutable expression.

Why was he looking at me like that?

She tilted her head in confusion.

“Huh?”

“Really, why…”

He kept asking the question as if searching for an answer. But to her, it seemed like Orgon already knew the answer.

At that moment, a gentle breeze swept through.

She blinked, and when she opened her eyes again, Orgon was smiling faintly. It was a subtle yet protagonist-like smile.

“Shaterian, I’ll be going.”

It seemed Orgon had no intention of giving her an answer.

After lightly patting her head, Orgon walked away toward the Crown Prince’s palace.

She absentmindedly touched her head where he had patted her, watching his retreating figure.

For a moment, that peculiar aura she occasionally sensed from him felt unusually strong.

***

“Don’t you think the Knight Commander’s acting strange?”

“Yeah. It’s like his sword feels heavier than usual.”

The 1st Knight Order’s training grounds.

Once a week, the Knight Commander personally oversaw the knights’ training.

It was during a session where the knights took turns sparring directly with the Knight Commander after completing most of their daily tasks.

Eched had been swinging his sword with a contemplative look on his face all day.

The knights waiting for their turn—or those who had already been reduced to exhaustion—whispered as they watched Eched’s sword.

Though he wasn’t a talkative person by nature, today he hadn’t even given simple responses, leading to complaints.

At first, they had hoped today’s training might be easier.

But that hope was soon shattered.

Normally, Eched would notice when the knights were getting tired and adjust accordingly, but today he didn’t time anything.

As a result, the only ones suffering were the knights.

“Maybe he’s busy preparing for a campaign?”

“I think it’s because of those rumors.”

“He must be upset. After all, the subject of the scandal is none other than the Chief of the Counseling Office.”

“That’s not it. At first, the Commander didn’t care about the rumors. He only started changing after hearing that the Chief was going on matchmaking meetings.”

“…”

A moment of silence fell. An ominous thought crossed their minds.

Though unspoken, their exchanged glances revealed they were thinking the same thing.

‘Could it be that the Commander… likes the Chief?’

“B-but! Isn’t it true that the whole thing was a scheme by the Chief to seduce the Commander?”

“Do you really believe that? Do you think our Commander wouldn’t see through such an obvious ploy? If that were the case, he’d already be married.”

“That’s true. Things like that happened all the time, didn’t they?”

“And not once did he fall for it.”

Eched’s nickname as the ‘Monk of the Kentri Empire’ wasn’t for nothing.

The knights, each lost in thought, were startled when one of them clapped their hands together.

As everyone’s attention turned to him, he slowly began to speak.

“Alright, let’s summarize.”

1. All the incidents that occurred that day are true.
2. After the incident, the Chief started attending matchmaking meetings.
3. Since then, the Commander has been in a terrible mood.

“If we piece these events together, the conclusion is: the Commander likes the Chief. But he was rejected. Yet, he still harbors lingering feelings, which is why he’s jealous.”

“Whoa!”

The knights who had been listening intently whistled and clapped.

“You’re pretty smart.”

“Well, of course.”

The praised knight rubbed his nose and puffed out his chest.

It was then.

Clang!

A sword flew and embedded itself into the ground.

The knights, dumbfounded, turned to see Eched holding another sword.

“Eek!”

Startled, the knights jumped to their feet.

Though it shouldn’t have been audible, it seemed he had heard everything. His face was dark and ominous.

“Take a break.”

“Yes, Sir!”

The knights fled in haste.

Eched watched their retreating backs before sheathing his sword.

“You must be bored lately, which is why you’re tolerating this.” 

Lutz remarked.

Even without Lutz’s comment, Eched had no intention of acting on anything.

‘Who likes whom, exactly?’

What annoyed him was seeing them believe a conclusion based on a faulty premise as if it were the truth.

“Did something happen yesterday?”

“Something…? No, nothing.”

Nothing particularly unusual had occurred.

He had gone to the Grievance Counseling Office to retrieve performance statistics for selecting knights for deployment and had listened to Bruf’s concerns there. 

After that, he had simply walked to the training ground with Shaterian, who happened to be heading in the same direction.

‘I need to grow, too. I can’t spend my whole life helping the Knight Order. I need to become independent.’

The word “independence” from that conversation had been somewhat unsettling, but that was all.

What bothered him more was…

‘Commander, it seems you’ve been out of the dating game for so long that you don’t even recognize it anymore.’

Her tone had been one of certainty, as if she were sure she had experienced romance herself.

‘Dating…’

Whether or not what he had experienced could be called romance was beside the point.

The first thought that came to mind was, “How?”

Then, “Does she really know?”

And if she did, “Who told her?”

“It’s bothersome…”

Yes, it was bothersome.

Shaterian Melis was an oddly bothersome woman.

“With all these rumors tying you two together lately, it’s understandable.”

Lutz suggested, seemingly understanding the situation perfectly. However, Eched shook his head, indicating that wasn’t it.

“It’s been bothersome since before that. The night of the party? No, even before that…”

A vague feeling he couldn’t quite pin down had been gnawing at him for some time.

“Are you… jealous?”

Lutz hesitated as he asked, even surprising himself.

It was a word that seemed so ill-suited for someone as detached as Eched that he doubted the man even knew its meaning.

But he had to ask.

“Could it be that you like her?”

As expected, Eched’s gaze was filled with confusion.

“Jealousy… liking…”

He muttered the words, as though trying to gauge the meaning of those emotions.

“It’s not that kind of feeling. It’s just… bothersome.”

It was genuinely just bothersome.

It was Shaterian who dragged out emotions he couldn’t even name.

In any case.

He didn’t like the knights’ baseless speculations.

Nor did he like Lutz’s question about whether he liked Shaterian.

The only way to quell these rumors was to find Shaterian a match.

‘Should I help her?’

Eched entertained a thought that would have made Shaterian gasp in outrage if she had heard it.

And the problem was that he didn’t just leave it as a thought—he turned it into action.

***

The idea was amusing, but reality was not so kind.

“What’s the point of a romance narrative if there’s no one to use it on?”

Shaterian realized this after just two days.

She slammed her desk in frustration.

It was exhausting enough trying to find someone to use it on, but amidst all this, she was constantly being pressured to attend matchmaking meetings.

Fortunately, most of the matches fell through before they even began, as the other parties rejected her, steadily reducing the list of candidates.

Her current matchmaking partner was the second son of the LePell Earldom.

The Emperor had excluded the eldest son, claiming he was too busy to live leisurely. It was his way of being considerate.

Tap, tap.

Shaterian tapped her pen against the desk as she reviewed the documents in front of her.

They were investigative documents on the LePell Earldom. And they had been prepared by none other than Eched.

The documents detailed everything from the family’s history to its prominent figures, hereditary diseases, and more.

On paper, there seemed to be no problems. The second son of the LePell family appeared to be a very upright young man.

The issue lay in what Eched had said when handing over the documents.

‘This man is said to have a history with women.’

It was baffling enough that he had investigated her matchmaking partner, but he had even added a warning.

Why was he investigating my matches in the first place?

Shaterian tapped her pen against the desk again.

“Chief, please. You know we don’t have any budget left.”

While consumables like ink were provided by the Imperial Household, items like quills or fountain pens had to be purchased using the department’s allocated budget.

Since Shaterian often damaged pen tips, she had to buy replacements frequently.

“Let’s just steal some from the aides’ office.”

“If we get caught, you’ll take the blame, right?”

“It was a joke. I don’t want to go to prison.”

She didn’t want to go to prison.

Even if she were to die someday, it wouldn’t be in prison.

Amid such frivolous jokes, a nagging thought lingered.

‘Isn’t he acting a bit differently than usual?’

No matter how she thought about it, Eched was acting strange. Normally, he wouldn’t even care who she was meeting for matchmaking, let alone investigate them.

But she couldn’t pinpoint exactly what was different, which frustrated her.

“Come to think of it, the Foundation Festival is coming up soon.”

The Foundation Festival…

“How old will Orgon be this year?”

“Since he was born on the day of the Foundation Festival, he’ll turn 26 that day.”

She had forgotten.

The year Orgon turned 26, during the Foundation Festival.

That day was also the night of a once-in-a-decade full moon.

And it was the starting point of the original novel.

The story began with Orgon confessing to the novice priestess, Anella.

Anella, who also had feelings for Orgon, was forced to reject him due to various circumstances.

Feeling dejected, Orgon wandered into the garden, where he encountered Eched, who suddenly collapsed.

Eched, who had been holding on for so long, was on the brink of death as his human body could no longer contain his raging soul due to a lack of divine power.

Anella saved Eched by using her divine power, marking the beginning of a love triangle.

But, absurdly, Eched did nothing.

Despite waiting for ‘her’ reincarnation and knowing that Anella was her reincarnation, he simply watched as she married Orgon.

Eched always observed ‘her’ new life.

And yet, he steadfastly waited for her reincarnation.

Perhaps because he was like a dog.

He was incredibly patient when it came to waiting.

While Shaterian had thought the author favored Eched, she now wondered if that wasn’t the case.

Eched was the character who suffered the most in the story.

In the end, the author didn’t pair Eched with Anella.

“Still, I hope he succeeds this time…”

If she intervened, it would solve the problem easily.

Even someone as dense as Eched would change if he were certain about his feelings for Anella.

“But if I do that, Orgon might cry.”

Not that it was her concern.

Tap, tap.

Shaterian habitually tapped her pen again, earning a scolding from Pell.