“Actually, I’m only telling Aris this, but His Majesty said he would give me the position of Head Chamberlain if I finish this matter well.”
A smile naturally came out at his proud-looking face. It was obvious he was moved by his own ability to rise to the position of Head Chamberlain, the Emperor’s recognition, and the future of rising to the highest position where he could assist the great Emperor.
Aris raised the corners of his mouth looking at that naive yet greedy face.
‘There’s no need to worry.’
At least Puti would definitely never die even if he entered the dragon’s mouth.
‘Because Seoho-nim cherishes Puti a lot.’
As long as Seoho was with him, Puti would rise to the highest position he wanted, and he too would feel pleasure and interest rather than fear while watching them.
Aris erased the deeply lingering afterimage of the Emperor’s blue eyes. And he focused on Puti’s question.
“So, in order to do this job well, I need to know the Prince well. What’s the Prince like that Aris directly saw?”
It was a slightly strange question. He was always submitting reports related to the Prince, and Puti was in a position where he could read those reports.
Aris asked.
“Are you asking for my personal opinion?”
“Yes, you always only write objective information in the reports.”
Aris searched his memory for a moment. When with Seoho, the Prince mostly had a smiling face, but there were times when he occasionally looked at Seoho with strange eyes.
“Mm, well, it’s certain that he has favorable feelings toward Seoho-nim and is trying to get close. And… sometimes it seems like he looks at Seoho-nim with eyes mixed with pity.”
“Pity?”
“Yeah.”
As Aris calmly affirmed, Puti’s eyes became sharp again.
“About what part?”
“I don’t really know either.”
Actually, he wasn’t that unsure. He too felt the same way—that Seoho, who would be together with the Emperor without knowing anything, was a bit pitiful.
But Puti’s thoughts seemed to be different.
“No, our Majesty is a bit strange, but still, he treats Seoho-nim well. So why would he feel pity? What’s wrong with our Majesty?”
At Puti who seemed excited, Aris was a bit flustered.
“I mean, he just looks that way. I don’t know how it actually is.”
But Puti didn’t seem to hear Aris’s words.
“Look at this laughter. How happy is Seoho-nim?”
As he grabbed Puti’s shoulder as if to stop him from stomping his feet as if wronged, he instead grabbed Aris’s wrist and asked.
“Does Aris think Seoho-nim is pitiful too?”
Looking at the captured wrist and the red face that seemed about to burst with injustice, Aris decided to just give the answer Puti wanted.
“Of course not.”
“Right?”
“How happy does he look. Look even now. He’s having so much fun like this.”
“Right!”
Puti, greatly satisfied, handed Aris refreshments once more. The refreshment he absent-mindedly put in his mouth tasted even better than before.
‘Even though it’s a bit noisy. I still don’t dislike it.’
Like that, Aris chewed on the refreshments and let Puti’s words listing the reasons why Seoho was happy flow past him.
***
He had certainly thought that. That even though this place was a bit noisy right now, he didn’t dislike it.
‘But it’s still bothersome after all.’
Actually, nothing particularly great happened at the meeting with the Prince.
After informing the Prince again of the conditions the Emperor had set forth, they just walked around the designated area with the thing called a camera and took pictures together.
And after the designated hour passed, the Prince handed over the photographs to Seoho, even delivered Concubine Grace’s letter, and they parted ways cleanly.
That should have been the end of today’s work when they returned to the room, but they ended up facing an unexpected person like this.
When Saintess Angel discovered Seoho and greeted him with noticeably pleased feelings, Seoho bowed his head and accepted the greeting.
“What a coincidence. Seoho-nim.”
Aris swallowed his sneer.
‘It must be a planned meeting.’
Since he had become the Emperor’s person and heard all about what had happened, he also knew all the anecdotes about Angel toward Rosetta.
Now Aris knew how much Angel disliked while simultaneously envying the Emperor.
Actually, since Aris too had felt disgust toward the Emperor after not being treated as human, he didn’t fail to understand why Angel disliked the Emperor.
‘However, looking at her attitude toward Seoho-nim, it’s ambiguous.’
Unlike when dealing with Rosetta, Angel’s appearance when dealing with Seoho was a bit ambiguous.
“I heard you’ve been spending time with Sol recently.”
“Well, we do have things in common.”
“I see. I heard His Majesty was with you recently too…”
“That’s right. Rosetta said he wanted to join.”
Angel’s attitude was similar to the Prince’s yet also slightly different at the same time.
“You’re going through a lot in various ways.”
“Pardon?”
Seoho seemed not to have properly noticed, but what had briefly appeared on Angel’s face just before was guilt.
As Aris narrowed his eyes and looked at Angel, Angel, who had already put on a smooth expression again, changed the topic.
“No. It’s a bit late, but I was grateful for the letter you sent last time.”
“Ah.”
So she was talking about that letter Seoho had written together with Aris. Angel smiled brightly and continued.
“I couldn’t write a separate reply, but I’m keeping it well.”
The tips of Seoho’s ears turned red.
“…It’s a bit embarrassing.”
“I’m thinking how fortunate it is that His Majesty has someone like Seoho-nim.”
It was quite a meaningful statement. Words that seemed to insult Rosetta while simultaneously praising Seoho.
Then Seoho, who had been blinking and looking at Angel, smiled gently and answered.
“I’m also relieved that there’s someone like Angel-nim who helps Rosetta.”
Aris turned to look at Seoho as if in admiration. Like the previous letter and the matter with the Prince, Seoho was not someone easy to deal with.
“I see. …I’ve kept Seoho-nim too long.”
Aris subtly turned his head to look at Angel, but her smile remained. Angel concluded the conversation with a flawless face.
“I’ll formally request another meeting next time.”
“Yes. I’ll be waiting.”
“Then.”
Angel left first, and when there was sufficient distance from her, Aris called Seoho.
“Seoho-nim.”
“Yes?”
A face smiling kindly with an elegant expression. He didn’t seem like someone who had just skillfully deflected Angel’s words.
But rather than pointing that out, Aris pointed to the object held in Seoho’s hand.
“I’ll carry that for you.”
“I can carry this much myself. You worked hard today.”
Following two people around for an hour was boring but not difficult work. Aris answered only half honestly.
“His Majesty controlled things in advance, so it wasn’t that difficult.”
Then Seoho corrected his words as if he had been waiting.
“Then I’ll say thank you. Thank you for helping today.”
It was a simple greeting. He seemed to understand why Angel and the Prince showed favorable feelings toward him.
“I’ll gratefully accept such thanks.”
When he readily accepted the thanks, Seoho laughed out loud as if finding it amusing. At the same time as he laughed, the conviction arose that as long as there was only Seoho, the Emperor and his current daily life wouldn’t change much.
At the same time, the pity toward Seoho also subsided.
Seoho was not a naive child who knew nothing. And if one was only by Seoho’s side, the Emperor was not a monster or something strange, but a person.
‘It’s ridiculous to sympathize.’
Along with that, the heavy burden remaining in a corner of Aris’s heart disappeared cleanly.
***
After reading Grace’s letter together, Rosetta was examining the photographs handed over with interested eyes.
To be precise, he was very interested in photographs containing Seoho’s appearance. Even though they were only Seoho’s fingers or hem of clothes that accidentally appeared or came out wrong at the beginning.
“Did you take this?”
Rosetta pointed to something white that suddenly protruded from one corner of the photograph.
Seoho gave an awkward smile. Actually, Seoho tended to mainly use the camera on his phone rather than using a separate camera.
In other words, he didn’t really know how to use an instant camera.
“My finger touched the lens.”
Since they developed immediately, he couldn’t even erase wrongly taken photographs.
Since they had decided to bring all the photographs to Rosetta, at Aris’s words that he shouldn’t process them on his end first, he had no choice but to bring all the wrongly taken photographs as well.
After examining the photographs for a while again, Rosetta showed another photograph and asked.
“This one?”
It was a photograph where his toes appeared even though he had deliberately stepped back so as not to appear in the picture because Yun was photographing the garden scenery.
“That was my mistake. I didn’t know how far back to step.”
Fortunately, there were no other photographs showing Seoho’s body besides those. But Rosetta seemed dissatisfied with that.
“Your face didn’t come out like last time.”
At that face where his disappointment was clearly visible, Seoho let out a small laugh.
“Well, I didn’t photograph faces, you know?”
What Yun had wanted to photograph were the palace’s appearance, decorations, and paintings, weren’t they? There was no way Seoho would appear in those photographs.
