Chapter 18

Lakshan briefly suspected she was awake.

In fact, this happened frequently while he was living as Lakshan with his face exposed.

There were people who approached fiercely enough to know that they were doing it on purpose, and fell into his arms pretending to have tripped.

It wasn’t just them.

It was all the women who he had never met before.

He was sure that if he got a room for himself, a stranger would lay naked in his bed and wave as if they were waiting for him to come.

As a result, Lakshan eventually had to wear a hood.

This was why it was different when he covered his face with a bandage.

Anyways, he was quite often attacked for that reason.

‘Maybe Elrose too?’

From the time they first met, Elrose also looked at his face.

Fortunately, she wasn’t trying to force herself into his arms or aim at his lips.

Instead, she glanced at his face and nodded her head as if she was trying to convince herself of something.

‘Don’t tell me Elrose is after me like the other women…’

But at that moment, a loud snoring sound was heard.

Lakshan glanced at Elrose again. She still had a look of tiredness on her face, and he realized that she was clutching his clothes with her hands.

“…”

He remembered her voice saying it was the first time for her to see the outside comfortably in a wagon.

This was probably the first break in a while for her.

“…”

Lakshan lowered the hand that was going to push Elrose away again and closed his eyes.

Her breathing that passed over his chest made his body twitch.

After she woke up, he was a little annoyed by her sleeping well, but he decided to let it slide today.

‘I’ll have to set up a separate room for tomorrow.’

Otherwise he wouldn’t be able to sleep.

While thinking of the option of sleeping on the floor until sunrise in the morning, Lakshan tossed and turned on the bed and stayed up all night.

~*~

As Lakshan wiped his face with his hand while recalling what happened last night, the bathroom door opened and Elrose came out.

Her long blonde hair was wet and darker than usual.

“Oh, you’re back. Where have you been?”

When Elrose saw Lakshan, she approached him with a happy look on her face.

When she approached, the scent of soap filled the air.

Lakshan’s face felt hot without realizing it.

“Lakshan?”

Lakshan came to his senses when he heard a voice calling him.

“…I just brought breakfast here. I thought you’d sleep a little longer.”

He went to get it in advance because the restaurant would be closed by the time Elrose woke up.

“Sorry for oversleeping.”

“No, you’ve been in the wagon for a long time, so you can’t help it. Besides, it also must have been an aftereffect of the antidote. Let’s eat first.”

Elrose quickly sat in front of the table because she was hungry.

Looking at warm bread, fresh milk, and a tray full of well-crafted fruits and vegetables, she had a happy look on her face.

After splitting the bread and spreading a lot of butter on it, she took a big bite.

It was delicious.

When she lived in the cabin, she had to hide in the monastery’s kitchen to eat bread.

Elrose tried to make it in the cabin a few times, but it was hard to get an oven and bake without being caught.

The butter-filled bread eaten by monks was delicious, but it was always baked for a long time.

‘Now that we’re going to Lakshan’s hometown, I can probably bake bread every day.’

Thinking of all the bread recipes she had seen in the book, Elrose’s smile was full of happiness.

“What’s making you so happy?”

“Oh, it’s nothing. What’s the plan to leave today?”

When Elrose asked, Lakshan opened a map he had bought at the inn counter on the table.

“This is the town we’re in, and my hometown is around here… It’s too small to be marked on the map. Anyways, we’re going to leave here today and ride a horse for another day. Let’s buy more things from there.”

“What do we need?”

“…You might need clothes first.”

Elrose’s face turned red with embarrassment at the words.

Well, she didn’t even have any clothes to change into, so she just fell asleep.

Elrose then took the paper that was next to the table and began to write down what she needed.

Bags, clothes, shoes…

Her hand stopped as she was writing and then spoke in a serious tone.

“Lakshan.”

“Yes?”

“I’m wondering, where can I stay when I go to your hometown?”

At Elrose’s question, he went silent for a moment.

Where will she stay?

He had been thinking about it ever since he told her if he would go back to his hometown.

Lakshan began to think. He hadn’t been able to go back since the war broke out five years ago.

The letters from his colleagues who went back first stated that there were many people who had not yet returned to the village.

The villagers had either gone somewhere else… or lost their life during the war.

“There will be some empty houses. If there is a house you want, I can repair it for you.”

At those words, Elrose felt a little sad.

‘I was expecting that a little bit.’

In fact, she thought she might be living in Lakshan’s home. So she was thinking about how much rent she would have to pay him.

‘Well, after all, Lakshan said that he only needed paperwork, so we won’t have to pretend to be married even in the village.’

When they arrive at the village, he would say that Elrose was the daughter of his benefactor and that she came with him because she had nowhere to go after her parents died.

It was a story without any room for doubts.

There were so many people who died during the war that this happened often.

‘Can’t we still live together…’

Elrose poked an innocent apple with a fork.

She lived alone for a long time. Maybe that’s why when she shared a room with Lakshan yesterday, it felt more enjoyable.

It had been so long since she spent time talking to someone in the same room.

‘But we can go out more often.’

‘I’ll try to find my own house near Lakshan’s.’

Thinking that, Elrose finished eating breakfast.

~*~

After leaving the inn, the two moved busily.

The first place Elrose went to was a different currency exchange shop from yesterday’s place.

After converting half of the gold coins into northern currencies, including the gold coins returned by the owner of the currency exchange last time, Elrose began shopping like a storm.

After a while, Lakshan took her luggage.

“I’ll hold it.”

Although it was quite heavy, he lifted it lightly with one hand and carried it on his shoulder.

She thought he was a mercenary who was not very talented when she saw him begging the guards at the gambling house, but he seemed to have a lot of strength instead.

‘Well, otherwise, it would be a waste.’

The two of them again wandered around the market and bought more things they needed.

Then, Elrose’s steps stopped in one place.

“Wow…”

An exclamation came out of her mouth spontaneously.

The place Elrose saw was a vendor’s stall selling seeds.

“I’ve never seen so many…”

Elrose approached the stall as if possessed and frantically looked at the things lying there.

Eggplant, pumpkin, cucumber, tomato, potato…

Seeing the name of the seeds written on it, Elrose gulped.

She remembered the garden she had cultivated in the forest of the monastery. Vegetables grown lusciously without missing anything thanks to her taking care of it with all her soul.

While working hard on them, Elrose always felt sorry for herself.

‘I want to grow more diverse things.’

However, there were only very few seeds in the market of the village below the monastery.

‘That’s why it bothered me when I read the cookbook.’

Among the books thrown away by Elrose was a cookbook filled with all sorts of recipes.

She always gulped while looking at the appetizing pictures under the moonlight.

But, she couldn’t make them.

The crops in the garden were limited and she couldn’t use pots or an oven in the cabin.

It was impossible to use the monastery kitchen because she had to sneak in around at night.

Elrose looked around again at the seeds the merchant sold.

It was full of herbs as well as fruit crops.

While looking at it for a long time, Elrose suddenly seemed to have a clearer mind.

It was good to escape the capital, go to Lakshan’s hometown, and hide for a year.

But there was no clear decision on what she would do for the year.

If she found all the emergency money left by her mother, she would have no problem living on it for the rest of her life.

But, it was boring to stay still.

Elrose wanted to work, although others might think it was strange.

‘Is it because I have my mother’s blood?’

If she were like her father, she would have already spent a lot of that money playing around.

But, Elrose had fun growing, making and bargaining.

‘Then…’

It would be nice to practice this and that while preparing for the future in the village for a year.

‘I’ll go to the village and buy a lot of them.’

Elrose remembered the name of the seeds in her head and imagined her garden in Lakshan’s village.

He said it was a rich land.

She was sure she would be able to cheerfully grow a pleasant garden.