The Empress handed the prepared document to the administrative officer in the White Palace office. The officer immediately opened his file and compared it with the list of recipients for the document.

The list was for sending appointment letters to administrative officers, officials, and clerks who would run the academy’s administration office.

“I will obtain His Majesty the Emperor’s approval today and send it to each family by messenger tomorrow.”

“Thank you for your hard work. And this is the important one.”

Proposal for recommending professors for the Liswan Women’s Specialized Academy.

The Emperor suggested putting Patricia’s name before the women’s specialized academy, but she insisted on keeping Liswan, the capital’s name.

The academy would initially operate with four departments – medical, swordsmanship, education, and literature and arts – and gradually increase the number of departments later.

The problem was the faculty, as Patricia had little information about recruiting talented professors.

While the red brick building of the Liswan Women’s Specialized Academy was steadily rising, she was worried about not being able to find professors.

Patricia planned to write and send professor recommendation proposals until she gave birth.

“It’s a proposal asking the Karsic Empire Academy official to recommend faculty. Send this together tomorrow.”

“Your Majesty, since it starts from next year’s fall semester anyway, there’s plenty of time. Once the administrative team is formed, then…”

“I don’t have time… Ah!”

“Y-Your Majesty! What’s wrong?”

The administrative officer rang the call bell in surprise. Anna immediately entered the office.

“Your Majesty, are you alright?”

Patricia’s face was damp with sweat and her complexion had turned pale. Anna examined the Empress’s condition and immediately sent a maid to the palace doctor.

“Administrative officer! What are you doing? If she’s sweating this much, she must have been in pain for a while now.”

The administrative officer’s face also turned pale in shock. Though he had been standing right next to her, the Empress had been writing documents so upright that he hadn’t noticed her pain.

“Ah, I, I didn’t know, Your Majesty wanted to process it urgently…”

“Enough, please inform His Majesty quickly.”

Patricia emphasized to the administrative officer who was about to turn away.

“Make sure to send the proposal to the Imperial Academy official.”

“Yes, yes, Your Majesty.”

The administrative officer gathered the documents the Empress wanted sent and left the office.

Patricia’s labor pains had started in the morning. However, having practiced childbirth many times with Harchen through books, she endured by measuring the intervals of pain through breathing.

The pain wasn’t continuous, and it subsided when she exhaled for a moment. As this continued, the intervals between pains gradually quickened.

“Haa, Anna. Prepare the carriage. Let’s go to Aster Palace.”

With Bern and Anna supporting her on both sides, she got into the carriage heading to Aster Palace. On the way, the Emperor’s horse followed closely beside the carriage.

Upon arriving at the palace, Harchen carried Patricia to the bedroom. Many people were waiting in the reception room and bedroom, including the palace doctor, midwife, Empress Dowager, and maids.

After laying Patricia on the bed, the Emperor ordered everyone in the bedroom to leave.

A wave of pain came. Harchen held her body and practiced breathing in and out together. Although the duration of pain lengthened, it finally subsided after enduring for a while.

Harchen carefully wiped her face, neck, and hands with a warm towel, then embraced her belly with both hands and spoke in a low voice.

“Aster, you must be scared and struggling too. Mom and Dad feel the same. Be brave and come out to the world vigorously. Mom and Dad will be waiting.”

Harchen kissed Patricia’s forehead, cheeks, and lips before going out to the reception room. The midwife, female doctor Helen, maids, and Annie entered the bedroom.

Harchen sat in the reception room with Calip, waiting anxiously with their ears turned towards the bedroom. For one hour, two hours, three hours, only the Empress’s intermittent groans could be heard from inside.

“Your Majesty, shall I light the lamps?”

Bern, who had entered at some point, lit the lamps on the walls and console in the reception room. Harchen suddenly realized that all the people who had filled the reception room were gone.

Surely Isabella, the Empress Dowager, and Carolina had been there too.

Harchen went to stand in the central living room outside the reception room. At the end of the dark hallway, he could hear murmuring voices.

It was from the direction of Aster’s room and the wet nurse’s room. He walked down the hallway and opened the reception room door where light was leaking through the crack.

“Haa, what is this?”

On the reception room sofa, seven women including the Empress Dowager, Isabella, and Carolina were sitting in a circle, chatting and laughing. Anna, two wet nurses, and a maid quickly stood up from their chairs and lowered their posture.

The round table was full of sandwiches, sausages, meatballs, fruits, and cheese.

“Your Majesty, you must be hungry? Here’s a sandwich- no, chamberlain, bring some light meal to His Majesty’s reception room…”

“Mother! How can you eat at a time like this?”

“Eh? Brother Harchen. It’ll still be a while before the baby comes out. Don’t waste your energy and wait comfortably.”

“Crow, you dare to chatter.”

Bang. Harchen slammed the door so hard it nearly fell off. He was angry and even felt betrayed.

The Emperor walked back to the reception room. Another five hours passed, and Patricia, after crying out in pain, fell into what seemed like a faint sleep and was quiet for a long time.

Anxious about the waiting time, Harchen knocked on the bedroom door, and Annie poked her head out to say the Empress had fallen asleep for a moment.

Harchen also collapsed onto the sofa and closed his eyes. Then, in his sleep, he was awakened by Patricia’s scream.

Blue dawn light was rising through the window.

The Empress’s groans and screams alternated at short intervals from the bedroom, and at some point, only screams could be heard continuously.

Unable to bear it any longer, Harchen entered the bedroom.

“Y-Your Majesty. Please wait outside.”

Helen and the midwife said in surprise.

“Ha-Harchen. Harchen!”

Patricia lifted her face, drenched in sweat, and called for Harchen. The Emperor, ignoring people’s attempts to stop him, went to Patricia’s bedside and sat on the bed.

“I won’t look that way, and I won’t leave even if you kick me out, so just pretend I’m not here.”

“Harchen, I. It’s too, agh.”

Harchen leaned over to brush away the hair sticking to Patricia’s forehead and cheeks, and wiped her face with a wet towel. He held her upper body, looking at her face and eyes.

“Your Majesty, just a little more strength…”

Patricia fixed her teary blue eyes on Harchen and pushed with all her might while crying.

“Yes, that’s right, you’re doing well. Just a little more, more. Hang in there, Patricia.”

After two hours of the imperial couple enduring the pain with their faces pressed together like that, summer morning sunlight poured through the glass ceiling. At the same time, a sharp baby’s cry was heard.

“Ah, it’s out, Patricia. You did well.”

“Harchen, you too.”

Harchen kept stroking her face and cheeks and kissing her lips.

“Oh my, what a beautiful princess she is.”

“Your Majesty, a small and beautiful princess has been born.”

Annie said to Patricia. Harchen had his face buried in Patricia’s neck. His hot, damp tears flowed onto Patricia’s neck.

“Harchen? They say it’s a baby girl. Look at the baby’s face.”

“No, I can’t look. I’m too upset.”

“Hehe, Harchen, it doesn’t hurt anymore. It feels like the pain just slipped out all at once.”

“Yes, you did well, Patricia. I love you.”

Harchen whispered in her ear.

“Your Majesty, we need to finish up now, so please leave quickly.”

The midwife and Helen said, almost chasing the Emperor out.

“Midwife, I’ll leave, but let me see my daughter’s face first.”

The midwife shook her head at the Emperor’s words.

“In my 30 years as a midwife, I’ve never seen a man like this.”

Harchen went out to the reception room with a shocked expression after seeing his daughter’s face. The reception room was already crowded with women, including the Empress Dowager, who had arrived at some point.

“Goodness, Harchen, were you in there?”

“Your Majesty, why were you there?”

“Wow, as expected, brother, you’re amazing. But why do you look like that?”

The Emperor nodded towards the outside to Bern. The quick-witted Bern followed with a cigar box. Calip also came out, sensing the situation.

“Your Majesty, congratulations on the birth of the princess.”

Receiving the lit cigar from Bern, he took a deep drag and exhaled the smoke with a sigh.

“Phew, but she doesn’t look like us. She’s a bit ugly, with wrinkles all over.”

Calip and Bern, also knowing nothing about babies, just listened to the Emperor’s words.

*

Harchen couldn’t close his mouth as he held his one-month-old daughter Evis in his arms.

“Patricia, look at Evis. Isn’t she so pretty? How did she only take after your pretty parts?”

“Hehe, Harchen. It’s time to go to the office.”

Their first daughter, Evis, grew more beautiful with each passing day. After a month, she had become an unparalleled beauty.

With blonde hair and blue eyes, she looked exactly like a miniature Patricia.

“She took after outsiders.”

Empress Dowager Diana had hoped for a crown prince to be born first, but she openly expressed her regret that a princess, and one who looked exactly like Patricia at that, was born first.

“There’s not a single part of her that looks like Harchen.”

In fact, Diana had tried to uncover Patricia’s infidelity based solely on Julia’s words, but she couldn’t create an affair that didn’t exist.

During the period when she had left the palace and gone missing, the knight named Eden, who could have been a potential partner, was preparing for rebellion with Patrick in Tane, and even the barbarian chief Bak turned out to be a half-brother.

Above all, she had to acknowledge the intense current flowing between Patricia and Harchen. There seemed to be no room even for sunlight to slip between the two.

To think that the man who stuck by his wife’s side as she overcame the crisis of childbirth and watched the delivery was the Emperor.

Diana was also displeased with the fact that her son had shared the pain of childbirth. She attributed the child’s exact resemblance to her mother to Patricia’s overly strong spirit.

Harchen carefully examined Evis’s face and body as she slept in his arms, then grabbed her ankle.

“Here, look at this.”

He showed his trouser leg to the Empress Dowager and Patricia.

“See this blue mole below the ankle bone? I have the same blue mole in the same place.”

“Oh my, how fascinating.”

Patricia crouched down and stroked Harchen’s ankle, causing him to blush.

Not knowing shame and acting so undignified, why is the Emperor behaving like this?

“Tsk.”

Diana twisted her lips as if finding it ridiculous as she looked down at her son’s ankle bone.

“But Mother, what brings you here so early in the morning?”

“Ahem, uh, I was wondering if Evis had been fussy all night. Give her here. I’ll take her to the wet nurse.”

Diana spread her arms towards Evis. Harchen reluctantly placed Evis in his mother’s arms at Patricia’s nod.

As the soft, warm flesh touched her arms, the corners of Diana’s lips turned up.

Diana stopped walking in the corridor when morning sunlight burst through the window.

“My goodness, when her hair gets tangled with the sunlight, I can’t tell them apart.”

While stopped, she held Evis in one arm and lifted the hem of her nightgown with the other hand. Seeing the large blue mole above the ankle bone, she grinned.

How can this little troublemaker make me so happy?

Diana had developed a habit of seeing Evis’s pink cheeks first thing in the morning before eating breakfast, as the image lingered in her mind when she opened her eyes.