Chapter 68

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Chapter 68

“Your Majesty……!”

The knight standing behind the Emperor shouted, as if he didn’t want the Emperor to bow down to a child like me. But he didn’t seem to hate me.

(T/N: In case you didn’t know, an Emperor doesn’t bow or kneel to just anyone that’s why the knight shouted when the Emperor knelt in front of Shuelina. He must’ve known that Shuelina was the adopted daughter of the Grand Duke, thus his reaction. )

For some reason, he was looking at me with a welcoming expression. But it was definitely our first time seeing each other. I turned my head towards the Emperor, feeling a little complicated.

“Shh Evalt, quiet.”

The emperor frowned slightly and spoke to the knight, then focused on me again. He had a very tense face for some reason.

“Grand Chamberlain, bring it here.”

“Yes, Your Majesty.”

Upon receiving the emperor’s orders, the valet appeared with silent footsteps and held out something wrapped in colorful wrapping paper. The Emperor who received it carefully handed it to me.

“Will you accept this…?”

“What is this, Your Majesty?”

“That is… something you liked.”

Obviously, the face that I saw when ‘I’ entered the audience room of the Emperor looked as heartless as I imagined but now, the way he is treating me is a little cautious and clumsy, so I don’t feel scared. Lucas and the Emperor were somehow different from what I thought.

‘What is this?’

I couldn’t easily refuse what the Emperor gave me himself so I accepted what he gave me.

The round metal box was decorated with jewels and looked very splendid. The box shook briefly when the Emperor handed it to me, as if there was something rolling around inside.

“Can I open it?”

I turned to the person I could trust the most in this room, the Grand Duke, and asked. When I asked him with a puzzled face, he paused for a moment then nodded.

“Oh… candy?”

There was some colorful candy inside when I opened the box. Why candy? As I tilted my head to the Emperor, his red ears were visible.

“I thought you were holding that pouch as if the stuff in it was… precious.”

Ah, I think I know what the Emperor was talking about. That time I bumped into the Emperor… I had dropped a pack of candy that I was holding with a lot of care.

“It was a present for my father……”

I closed the box with an embarrassed expression and held it out to the emperor.

“Your Majesty, I guess… this isn’t something I can accept.”

The Emperor looked like something had broken when he heard my words. I don’t know what made him look so sad… but it was none of my business.

I put the box back in his hand and walked back to the Grand Duke politely. The Emperor was silent for a moment, then lowered his head and looked at me again. It was kinda sad, but the Grand Duke didn’t seem to care about it.

“Then, Your Majesty, I want to go home with my children. My daughter is weak.”

“Your body… is weak? Chief of staff, call the imperial physician right now!”

“It’s alright, Your Majesty. Even the Grand Duchy has competent physicians.”

The Emperor jumped up from his seat with a startled look on his face and shouted. It was so loud that I almost jumped in surprise. A piece of my heart felt strange seeing how he commanded with a desperate face with a genuine surprise.

‘Why are you pretending to care about me?’

Is it because, like Lucas, he’s convinced that I’m his own daughter? Neither situation was very enjoyable. Because I don’t want to become the object of someone’s attention and lose it anymore.

‘Once again……?’

『“This is my room……”

“This room is no longer yours. It is too good for a scammer to have.”

Lucas’ smooth lips, which were speaking such cold words, gleamed prettily.

“Father Emperor made that decision.”

I wanted to protest that it was impossible, but…』

“No!”

I almost remembered something but at that moment, the Emperor shouted in a loud voice, interrupting my thoughts.

“Grand Duke, I’ll give you the royal guesthouse today, so rest before you go.”

“Your Majesty, as you know, there is also a Grand Duke’s residence in the Imperial Capital.”

Between the emperor and the Grand Duke, I felt an electric current flowing through me. The Emperor seemed anxious to keep us in the palace.

Staring at the Grand Duke’s stern eyes, which seemed to say he won’t back down as soon as he said something about going to the Grand Duchy, an unknown smile flitted across the Emperor’s face.

“I apologize for interrupting your conversation, but I think I should let you know of a report I received just before you had an audience with them. May I speak with him for a moment?”

“You can.”

When the chieftain spoke in a respectful manner, the Emperor quickly responded. The chaplain turned towards the Grand Duke. As the Emperor’s vassal, why do you want to speak to the Grand Duke?

“Unfortunately… we have received information that there is a problem with the Grand Duke’s residence.”

“What? What’s the matter?”

The Grand Duke frowned and asked.

“It was said that there was a terrorist attack…. While there were no casualties, there was a slight problem with the mansion’s exterior.”

There’s a problem with the Grand Duke’s estate in the capital? Then how about Miya whom I sent first before going here? Is Kaiden alright?

My eyes opened widely as I looked at the Grand Chamberlain. It is a big problem if the terror attack has taken place in the Grand Duke’s estate, but the Grey-haired Grand Chamberlain showed no change in expression. He was just being cool as if he was telling the truth as it is.

“Something like that isn’t important. Then I will go back, Your Majesty.”

“Are you going to take a weak child back to the mansion where that accident happened? If that’s the case, you should leave the child behind in the palace.”

The emperor looked at me with a sad expression on his face.

Leave me alone, just by myself? I became anxious and grabbed the hem of the Grand Duke’s robe with one hand, and then he glanced down at me.

“Take Shushu with you Dad. You can’t just leave her alone. Or I will stay with her.”

Wyndert grabbed my other hand and said in a firm voice. The Imperial Palace is like a den of enemies to me. It would only be for one night but it is a place where I will never know what is going to happen.

As Wyndert spoke with a desperate expression as if protecting me, the Grand Duke remained silent then shook his head afterwards.

“I cannot leave you two alone so I will send a knight to the mansion to check what’s going on. In that case, Your Majesty, we will stay for only one day.”

“That’s great. Mayor, give them the guesthouse. I have something to ask the Crown Prince so let him remain here.”

“Yes, Your Majesty.”

The Grand Duke hugged me again. Wrapping my hands to his wide neck as usual, the Emperor muttered with a slightly sad expression.

“Would you like to meet again?”

I did not respond to that, pretending not to hear him, and buried my head in the Grand Duke’s neck.

His gaze was filled with nostalgia and felt sad, but….

‘Was there a word like ‘again’ in the relationship between you and Shuelina? It seemed really incompatible.’

His tender gaze left me with only bitter sorrow.

All the way out, the Emperor’s gaze was fixed on me as if it was going to pierce me, and it was a little scary for some reason.

“Wow… it’s really big.”

The guesthouse we stayed in was very big.

I took Wyndert’s hand as my mouth gaped open in surprise. The Imperial Palace felt strangely familiar, but it was different here.

‘I don’t know if my paranoia is what I’m experiencing because of this body.’

When I think back on the sense of dizziness I felt sometimes, it was clear that it had something to do with the original content. Obviously, Shuelina had never been to the Imperial Palace at this point, so she couldn’t understand how it felt.

“It’s quite large, as each of the imperial palaces is designed like a separate little mansion.”

The maid who guided us smiled softly. She also informed us that the Diamond Room we were assigned to was the largest among the VIP rooms in the guesthouse.

‘It’s really luxurious.’

It reminded me of a nice apartment with a few connected rooms rather than a simple guest room for someone to stay in for a night.

So he could also give us such a luxurious and comfortable room.

I looked around the living room and felt a bit bitter. I’m being treated like this because I came with the Grand Duke… but it’s completely different from the original novel.

“Princess?”

“Huh?”

“This is the princess’s room.”

As I recalled the original novel while keeping silent for a moment, the maid called me, perhaps seeing my silence. I followed her to a room with a pink diamond studded floor.

The room was really special. Obviously, the living room was also very luxuriously arranged to welcome a VIP, but the bedroom was completely different.

A very well decorated room in yellow color was really lovely like a child’s room.

To say that it was prepared in a short period of time is hard to believe, the furniture and atmosphere were different. It was a room where you could feel a lot of sincerity in every detail that came into contact with your eyes.

“The room… is nice.”

I sat on the bright yellow bed and whispered to the maid, then the maid smiled kindly to me.

“There are snacks prepared to welcome the arrival of the princess. You can eat it while you wait for the maid to arrive who will attend to you.”

I guess this maid won’t be the one attending to me. I nodded and walked over the table and picked up a cookie. As I nibbled on the chocolate cookies while waiting for the maid, the maid didn’t come back.

‘What’s going on?’

Only experienced handmaids will be sent if it was a maid from the Imperial Palace. They couldn’t have left a VIP alone like this unintentionally right? Did the Emperor decide to neglect me? I don’t know but there’s nothing I can do right now, so I decided to look around the room first.

‘What is all this!’

I looked around, and there was a side door studded with beautiful diamonds on one side, so I swung the door open. It contained all kinds of clothes and beautiful jewels. There were unnecessary things in the dressing room where I would stay overnight.

As anyone can see, they are new, and all my belongings were sent to the Grand Duchy’s residence as soon as I entered the Imperial Capital, so there was no way it was ever mine.

[Shuelina Stella de Abunicia, the star I’ve always been waiting for.]

On the table in the dressing room was a card written in beautiful handwriting.

It was my name with the Imperial Family’s surname with the middle name Stella, though I don’t know what it means… but intuitively, I know the card was written by the Emperor.

‘Are you recognizing me so easily?’

Then, why the hell did he do that to Shuelina in the original?

A corner of my heart was aching. I crumpled the card up and hid it instinctively in my arms. Then, I didn’t want to be caught looking in the dressing room, so I ran back to the bedroom.

Haa, haa, I calmed down my breathing while resting in the bed, and that’s when I heard a knock on the door. It seemed that the maid had finally arrived.

“Excuse me, Princess.”

“Come in.”

“Princess, I am Thalia and I am here to attend to you.”

As soon as my gentle voice told her to come in, the maid with a slightly fierce look came into the room. She bowed her head very politely in front of me and looked at me shyly.

“I never knew there was such a beautiful person in the Grand Duke’s family.”

Thalia whispered as she stared at me with her enchanted eyes, as if she was in a dream. I nodded my head with an expressionless face at her words.

‘You said the same thing back then.’

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