Chapter 28: The Consort (4)

Anok shook his heavy head left and right, feeling as though his mind had been reduced to a muddy mire. He gasped with short, fevered breaths, struggling desperately to support his own weight. To prevent any agonizing moans from escaping past his teeth, he bit down on his lower lip so severely that he was practically crushing the flesh.

“What do you think you are doing…… Anok.”

A thin trail of fresh blood finally began to seep from his delicate, vulnerable lip. Because his rationality had been nearly entirely swallowed by his dynamic instincts, Anok merely stared blankly at first when a foreign thumb wedged itself between his upper teeth and lower lip, before sharply shaking his head to wrench himself away.

“Stay still. You are already injured as it is.”

Though it had been nothing more than a fleeting touch, he could acutely feel his heightened senses aggressively latching onto the physical contact. Remaining like this any longer was catastrophic.

Anok shifted his kneeling frame backward, desperately widening the distance between himself and Yeo Jae-won.

“……Let me go.”

“What?”

“Please…… just let me go now.”

The words spilled from his lips while he was practically half-insane. He could vaguely perceive Yeo Jae-won pressing him with a question, but with his rationality eroded to near-nothingness, Anok merely muttered his singular plea over and over in a low, fragile whisper.

“Anok, look at me. What exactly do you mean by that right now?”

“…….”

“Let you go? What are you…….”

Ultimately, his lips could only partition the air into hollow shapes; no sound emerged from his throat. Twitching his parched, dry lips with his head cast downward, Anok’s physical frame finally succumbed to the overwhelming fever, collapsing entirely.

Just as it had occurred in the final, agonizing moments of his past life, he could vaguely perceive someone reaching out to catch his falling body, but Anok plunged into a deep unconsciousness before he could register anything that followed.

Anok had effectively disrupted the continuous, unvarying loop of Yeo Jae-won’s daily existence, which had previously offered nothing in the way of novelty. The prince had desperately wished to categorize him as merely an ordinary individual like any other, but reality refused to bend to his desires.

At some undefinable point, Yeo Jae-won was forced to concede that this person—who continually agitated his mind and manifested as a persistent, low-grade headache—could no longer be dismissed as an insignificant presence.

For the initial period following Anok’s arrival at the detached pavilion, Court Lady Lee and Attendant Seok had taken the initiative to relay daily reports. The updates were entirely routine, detailing how Anok was rehearsing for the impending wedding alongside Court Lady Jo and how his acquisition of imperial etiquette was progressing smoothly.

However, that arrangement proved short-lived. Observing their master’s consistently indifferent reactions, the two retainers eventually desisted from carrying news from the detached pavilion altogether, assuming he harbored no genuine interest in the matter.

“Has anything unusual occurred at the detached pavilion?”

Yeo Jae-won finally voiced the question several days after Court Lady Lee and Attendant Seok had ceased delivering their updates.

Even without Yeo Jae-won actively scrutinizing the detached pavilion himself, a torrential influx of information regularly flooded the ears of those two retainers, who governed every minor and major affair within the prince’s manor. Furthermore, given that this was the primary Consort their master was welcoming after a prolonged delay, it was entirely impossible for his closest confidants to treat the matter with negligence.

“……Consequently, she directly reprimanned Court Lady Jo early this morning regarding the issue with the personal servant.”

After listening to the exhaustive account of the morning’s occurrences delivered by Court Lady Lee as she assisted him with his garments, Yeo Jae-won lowered his head slightly—now relieved of the heavy official hat—and let loose a quiet, amused chuckle.

Prior to being reassigned to the Myeong Prince’s manor, Court Lady Jo had been a palace woman serving the Successor Empress within Gyoyeong Palace. In truth, the individual who had dispatched her to this estate was none other than the Successor Empress herself.

Because Yeo Jae-won occupied a position that barred him from interfering in the internal affairs of the Imperial Court, he lacked detailed knowledge of the inner palace mechanics. However, he was intimately aware that the master Court Lady Jo served on the surface was entirely distinct from the one she bowed to in secret.

This was precisely why he had dropped a subtle hint to Court Lady Lee and Attendant Seok early on to thoroughly investigate the training matron assigned to the detached pavilion.

On a formal level, if he were to expel a training matron dispatched by his imperial stepmother for his bride-to-be without a definitive, undeniable justification, it would inevitably provoke intense political backlash. Thus, despite viewing Court Lady Jo with profound displeasure, he was trapped in a position where he had no choice but to tolerate her presence at the detached pavilion.

According to the intelligence gathered by Court Lady Lee, the woman was described as profoundly calculating and exceptionally cunning. Yeo Jae-won had naturally assumed that the innocent, sheltered bride arriving from the distant Baekya estate would be effortlessly manipulated by her, yet it appeared the youth was not one to be meekly dragged around.

“So, he is quite different from what meets the eye,” Yeo Jae-won murmured with a faint smile coloring his features, prompting Court Lady Lee to offer one final piece of information.

“Ah, additionally, the court officials from the Bureau of Imperial Attire are scheduled to arrive today. They are stopping by to verify the fit of Anok-nim’s ceremonial robes one final time.”

At Court Lady Lee’s additional remark, Yeo Jae-won offered a slow nod, his countenance retaining its characteristic languor, before seating himself before his desk in far more relaxed, casual attire.

A few newly arrived official dispatches from Hamyang-ju caught his eye. However, his focus on state affairs proved exceptionally short-lived. Tapping his index finger rhythmically against the surface of the desk for a brief moment, Yeo Jae-won abruptly stood up.

“Shall I have the carriage prepared?”

“I am not venture out beyond the estate.”

“Then where are you heading, Your Highness?”

“The detached pavilion.”

The moment they stepped through the doors, Attendant Seok inquired about the carriage, fully under the assumption that his master intended to go out to catch a breath of fresh air. However, when Yeo Jae-won offered an entirely unanticipated destination, the attendant froze completely in astonishment.

It was a space the prince rarely frequented. Furthermore, since he had previously dismissed the detached pavilion as a place he would have no occasion to visit once it was renovated for Anok’s temporary stay before the wedding, it was entirely natural for his retainers to view his sudden interest as highly anomalous.

Even Yeo Jae-won could not properly articulate the complex, tangled nature of his current psychological state to Attendant Seok. He himself could not fathom why he was suddenly acting upon such an uncharacteristic impulse. Instead, maintaining a slow, unhurried pace, he moved down the path toward the detached pavilion.

Halting every servant who rushed forward to announce his arrival with a sharp, silencing gesture of his hand, Yeo Jae-won focused his attention entirely on the voices drifting through the closed doors.

“It appears you have shed even more weight in the interim. The breadth of the garment leaves far too much excess space.”

Hearing those unexpected words, the prince unconsciously knit his brows into a subtle, irritated scowl. If there was one thing he had given explicit orders regarding, it was to ensure that Anok’s meals and lodgings were meticulously managed so that he could put his mind at ease. He could not comprehend where the oversight had occurred.

Ultimately, Yeo Jae-won took the initiative to slide the door open and step inside. Because his movements were exceptionally quiet and those inside were entirely absorbed in the intricate process of fitting Anok’s ceremonial attire, no one registered his entrance, allowing the conversation to flow uninterrupted.

Surrounded by the female officials of the Bureau of Imperial Attire, Anok stood perfectly still, towering a full head taller than the women hovering around him. The deep, dark-blue ceremonial robe draped over his pale skin and long, slender neck seemed uniquely suited to highlight the pristine clarity of his fine features.

Staring at Anok’s back as the youth stood with his rear turned toward him, Yeo Jae-won felt a strikingly distinct sensation. Though composed of fluid, exceptionally delicate contours, the youth’s frame was fundamentally that of a man; framed by the female officials, the disparity in their physical statures was remarkably pronounced.

“We pay our respects to His Highness, the Prince of Myeong.”

Someone finally caught sight of him and let out a startled gasp, prompting the entire assembly of palace women from the Bureau of Imperial Attire to instantly prostrate themselves flat against the floor. Born as a legitimate imperial prince, Yeo Jae-won found absolutely nothing novel or surprising in such submission. His gaze remained anchored exclusively upon Anok.

Staring intently at Anok—who kept his eyes cast downward beneath the weight of the ceremonial crown adorned with clear, pale-blue jade beads that matched his attire perfectly—Yeo Jae-won slowly closed the distance between them.

It was a profoundly bizarre phenomenon. Whenever he brought Anok within his immediate field of vision, a strange, tightly coiled knot deep within his chest began to violently writhe. It moved as if desperately clamoring for his conscious recognition, yet whenever Yeo Jae-won attempted to calmly peer into it, it would abruptly flee into the shadows, as if whispering that the time was not yet ripe.

He harbored a phantom sensation that he had looked upon Anok arrayed in this exact attire somewhere in the past, yet simultaneously, the image felt completely unprecedented and intensely foreign.

As Yeo Jae-won slowly swept his eyes over Anok’s form, the youth’s body suddenly faltered, teetering into a dangerous stumble. Acting entirely on instinct, the prince reached out and caught him before he could fall.

“……!”

“…….”

Though he maintained a completely unfazed, nonchalant facade across the instantly vanished distance between them, his internal pulse was thumping in a chaotic, unruly rhythm. In that exact instant, a remarkably pure, crisp fragrance brushed against the tip of his nose.

It was a clean, refreshing scent that lacked any trace of suffocating heaviness, naturally awakening his dormant senses, while his arms held fast to the slender frame pinned against him.

He sensed that if he remained frozen like this, he would helplessly lose himself in the desire to continuously indulge in that fragrance. To make matters more complicated, Yeo Jae-won was actively securing Anok’s arms and waist within his twin grasp. Through the multiple layers of heavy fabric, the fragile, stark contours of the thin body were vividly perceptible. He needed to shatter this heavy, stagnating silence by any means necessary.

In that fleeting moment, the faint, nearly vanished trace of the wound on Anok’s pristine face caught his eye.

“It appears you have applied the medicinal salve diligently.”

In truth, the remark served as nothing more than a convenient excuse to break the tension, yet Anok refused to treat even a single word with flippant disregard. Offering a brief acknowledgment with a flicker of his eyes, Anok pulled himself upright, promptly turning away to remove the suffocating weight of the ceremonial crown.

When framed by the female officials, the youth had appeared much like any ordinary boy of his age, but holding him close within his arms once more, Yeo Jae-won could register nothing but the sheer thinness of his frame.

Halting midway through an impulse to demand why he had shed so much weight despite not being starved, the prince had thrown out a mischievous, teasing jest instead, provoking a remarkably sharp, glaring gaze from the youth. Watching that fierce reaction, Yeo Jae-won had unconsciously let a soft smile slip. Yet, the memory of Anok’s highly ambiguous, evasive counter-question when asked about a abandoned lover suddenly drifted back into his thoughts.

That was the sole reason he had chosen to articulate such a highly cautionary warning, and why he had driven the nail home by commanding him to wait for their wedding day. He had been driven by a sudden, subterranean fear that Anok—who had demanded a dissolution of their engagement from their absolute first encounter—was still harboring a singular desire to flee from his side.

……But why should I care if he departs?

Naturally, the moment his marriage alliance with Anok—more accurately, his political betrothal to the Baekya Clan—shattered into ruins, it would profoundly incur his Imperial Father’s wrath. Such a development would severely derail his trajectory toward the Eastern Palace, potentially yielding a golden opportunity to Prince Hye.

Yet, he knew with absolute certainty that his anxiety was not confined merely to political calculations. Stepping outside into the courtyard of the detached pavilion, Yeo Jae-won continued to minutely retrace the lingering sensation of Anok’s frame within his hands and the crisp, clean fragrance that had brushed his senses, his handsome features clouding into a silent, deeply troubled frown.

📚 Also on NHV Novels

Empress’s Pampering, I Secretly Hoarded Divine Weapons and Became Invincible

ComedyFantasyRomance

Read Now →
Not interested