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‘Whoaaaaa!’
Surprised by the sight of the emperor suddenly appearing in the middle of the room with a radiance, Pollan rushed.
“Your Majesty! Where did you go…”
“Call the palace! Hurry up!”
Pollan recognized the person he held in his arms. The princess who had disappeared a few days ago was limp. The Count, who quickly understood the situation, called someone to the palace.
Eustis, who put Philomel on the bed, couldn’t stand the moment when the courtier arrived, and anxiously moved around, impatiently.
“For God’s sake, the kid looks like is going to die, so why aren’t they coming sooner!”
The Countess secretly checked the princess’s condition. Her complexion was not good, but her breathing was steady and her pulse was even. She thought it was an exaggeration that she looked dead, but she kept her mouth shut, afraid of the Emperor’s spirit.
He arrived in a matter of minutes, but the court physician, who had been unfairly criticized for being slow, examined her princess.
“She just passed out from accumulated fatigue and lack of sleep. She must have been overly stressed in that state…. If she takes a break and replenishes her nutrition, she will soon regain her energy. I’m afraid.”
“She looks like this because of stress?”
“That’s right. Did she hear some shocking news or saw a stressful scene before passing out…?”
Considering the time lag between the disappearance and reappearance of the emperor after hearing the report from the Duke of Avrydon, the cause of stress was due to high anger. The Emperor’s words, actions, or existence itself.
He left, saying he would prepare medicine for when the princes woke up. One might be curious about the princess, who has been rumored lately, but the courtier showed no signs of being different. That was the way to survive for a long time in the silent battlefield, the imperial palace.
“I’ll prepare a bed in another room. Your Majesty will rest there too.”
Pollan lowered his voice, trying not to wake the sleeping princess.
“It’s okay. I’ll stay here.”
“It was only yesterday that you collapsed, and didn’t you use movement magic twice? If you collapse again after that…”
“Even so it’s okay.”
As the Emperor waved his hand in irritation, Pollan had no choice but to back down. He was about to leave the room, but when he turned around, he saw Eustis pulling a chair and putting it beside the bed.
Princess Philomel has returned. So the emperor and the imperial palace would return to their original form. Pollan happily walked down the aisle.
* * *
Loving the soft, smooth feel of the fabric, Philomel was buried under the blanket.
‘What time is it? I have to get up, get dressed, and get ready for class.’
Really tired. She wanted to stay like that for a little while longer. But it didn’t work. She had a routine that she had to perform every day. Besides, the economics’ teacher she was having was pretty strict. If she was late for class, she’d be dissatisfied with the year instructions.
Her eyelids were unusually heavy, so she struggled to open her eyes.
A familiar yet unfamiliar ceiling. She blinked her eyes a couple of times before realizing she wasn’t in her room. Her bedding smelled of cool, heavy wood.
‘This is the incense that comes from the body of the emperor.’ Her head was all jumbled up, so she couldn’t remember why she was there.
She slightly turned her head, and what came into her field of vision was Eustis’ face with his eyes closed.
‘Wait, Eustis…?’
Philomel bounced up and looked around at her false-father. That was the bedchamber of the emperor, and Philomel was lying on his bed.
It all came to Philomel’s mind. She ran away, met her biological father, was put in jail, and went to live with Nassar. She unexpectedly encountered Eustis, who came looking for her and after that her memory was blank.
She was so shocked that she seemed to have lost her mind, but she couldn’t imagine the intermediate process leading up to the current situation. They must have moved to the imperial palace with the power of Eustis. But why was Philomel lying on the emperor’s bed, while the owner of the bed was dozing in a chair? And that too, with the tip of her own filthy skirt clenched in her hand.
In an instant, her pulse went blank.
‘As long as I’m captured, it doesn’t matter where I am.’
Through the wide window, the image of the imperial palace where she was born and raised was reflected.
Philomel’s beautiful prison.
Her brief escape ended in vain. Even if she used her spirit and ran away, she was in the palm of the emperor’s hand. The villainess couldn’t change the given fate. Thinking about it made her feel better. It didn’t change no matter what she tried, but the person who tried was stupid. She fooled around every day for seven years.
“Philomel.”
Philomel had no motivation whatsoever, she was dazed and she wais sitting on the bed when her name was called.
“Your Majesty.”
Dark blue eyes stared at Philomel.
“You’re up. How are you feeling?”
Seeing him rubbing his brows as if he was tired, it seemed that Eustis should lie down rather than herself.
“It’s okay. I’ll get out of the way, so your Majesty can sleep here.”
“Not. You lie down some more.”
Philomel complied. She had no particular reason. She didn’t want to roll her head as she struggled to live any longer. Everything about her became a nuisance.
Compared to Philomel, who emptied her head, Eustis had a distraught face.
“Why… did you leave?”
After a while, he asked something obvious so Philomel answered without hesitation.
“Because I am not your real daughter.”
She, he, and everybody must already know, but for some reason he put on a shocked expression. As if interrogated, several questions followed. The answers spilled out of Philomel’s lips. Surprisingly, since she had let go of everything, Eustis wasn’t as scary as before.
“Did you write that letter?”
“Yes.”
“Where have you been?”
“Here and there around the neighborhood where I was born.”
About her going to Angelium, she didn’t want to tell him much. It was almost certain that it would be found out anyway if Nassar officially reported it, but that was just how Philomel felt.
“Why did you go there?”
“I just wanted to go there one more time. When I visited with the Duke of Avrydon before, I thought the city was very pretty.”
She was red, and she wasn’t even lying.
“Has there been any change in the meantime?”
“If it’s a change…”
“Meeting a monster, or being seriously ill.”
“No big deal.”
Although confronted with the secret of her birth and slapped for the first time in her life… Ah, being imprisoned was a different experience for her.
“Then why does His Highness’ face look so bad? He’s very skinny.”
“The bed and food must have been bad.”
‘Even if I had a hard time going out, why did he lose weight?’
She was just a little curious, very little Eustis, who had washed his face dry, looked serious.
“Philomel. Just because you’re not my daughter doesn’t mean you have to leave. Even if we’re not blood related, you’re my daughter.”
It was an incomprehensible story. How could she be a daughter when she wasn’t blood related? There were people who were family even without blood ties, such as adoptive families, but Eustis and Philomel did not have that. Philomel was nothing more than a cuckoo’s egg, which Catherine pushed into that stranger’s nest. The original egg was pushed out of her nest and she pretends to be the offspring of her parent bird. Technically, she wasn’t pushed out by Philomel, but as a result, Ellencia grew up separated from her parents.
She was no different.
As she looked at him with eyes seeking an explanation, Eustis solemnly declared.
“I will register you.”
Registration.
Philomel quietly chewed that word. He meant to adopt her as his adopted daughter. Why was he so inconclusive? Didn’t his soul come out?
“…why?”
“Because you are my daughter.”
She heard the answer, but her doubts only grew. Her head hurt again. After giving up on everything at best, she was willing to accept any ending, even if it was death. However, something completely unexpected came out.
Philomel first asked the most urgent question.
“Um. So… you have no intention of killing me?”
“… Why would I kill you?”
Eustis asked in dismay. As if Philomel’s question was nonsense.
“Then why did you try to find me like that?”
“Because you suddenly disappeared.”
“You didn’t want to find out and punish me, did you?”
“If you didn’t commit a crime, why would I punish you? The person who switched you and Ellencia was your mother, not you.”
It was a fact, so there was nothing to accept. It was insanely awkward to hear the right words come out of Eustis’ mouth.
“If you’re not trying to punish me, why are you looking for me so much?”
“Because my daughter was gone.”
She wondered if she had heard it wrong, so she asked one more time and got an even more shocking answer.
‘Daughter? Did he just call me his daughter?’