Eva felt dizzy as if cold water had been splashed on her face, but she didn’t show it. Patricia, who read Eva’s momentarily stiffened expression, asked Annie if she had given turkey to Brie.

Fortunately, the Emperor turned his gaze to Patricia and asked if the eagle that had been fiercely pecking at the glass ceiling since morning was male.

“Does Brie’s gender matter? I brought a letter from Patrick.”

“That guy, he’s male alright. But why do you look like that, is the content not good?”

“He was supposed to come to Nothos Palace, but he says he’ll go to Tane to finish work and then come.”

“I see.”

“There was also a letter to be delivered to Princess Carolina.”

“Ha, Patrick is being proactive. If it’s difficult to meet Carolina, I’ll deliver it.”

“It’s not like that. I want to meet the Princess. I’ll deliver it.”

Harchen thought that Patricia seemed to have become more proactive in meeting others than before.

Harchen had thought that Patricia was indifferent to various situations in the past.

According to reports, she had rejected audiences with noble ladies after about 3 times. It was reported that she had exchanged a few times with Isabella.

After finishing the meal, the Emperor was about to put a sugar cube in his teacup but stopped his hand. He tilted his head to look down at Patricia, smiled slightly, and put the sugar cube down on the saucer.

“You don’t put sugar in your tea, I see?”

He tilted his head to look down at Patricia, smiled slightly, and put his sugar cube down on the saucer.

Patricia lifted the teacup and smelled it. She didn’t know what her preference for drinking tea was. She thought her hand would move instinctively, just like when wielding a sword, but that wasn’t the case.

Patricia lifted her head blankly and met Anna’s gaze. The head maid might know.

“I guess so.”

Patricia was frustrated and troubled that she couldn’t remember how she responded to such trivial things as her preference for drinking tea, her way of interacting with people, and her attitude towards subordinates.

However, she decided to positively accept the occasional thoughts as an opportunity to observe herself again from a distance.

With a slightly different perspective, she felt reborn with time.

“Harchen, I’m going to White Palace today.”

“Why? I wanted to stay here for a few more days.”

“I want to go to my quarters and start grasping the Empress’s duties, even if just a little.”

“Good idea. Calip, Khan?”

“They’re on standby.”

“Let’s go.”

The Emperor took Patricia’s hand and went out to the front of Aster Palace. When Patricia pulled her hand away, he looked down at her and said,

“Come to the office for tea after walking in the garden.”

“Your Majesty, go ahead.”

“Alright. Don’t do anything you don’t feel like doing, rest well, and I’ll see you in the evening.”

As the Emperor mounted the warhorse Khan, Patricia turned around. As she entered Aster Palace, she ordered Eva and Anna to come to the reception room.

The Emperor rode a little, then looked back and laughed dejectedly. He hadn’t expected her to stand and watch until he disappeared, but.

To turn away that quickly. How cold.

*

Anna entered the reception room and stood with her hands clasped.

“Anna, we’re going to White Palace now. I want to start learning the Empress’s duties from today.”

Patricia said, looking at Anna. Anna made a puzzled expression and replied,

“Your Majesty the Empress, I apologize, but according to the records, Your Majesty delegated the internal affairs management of White Palace to the administrator in the national marriage agreement obligation and rights clause confirmation document.”

“I did?”

“Yes, so there are no duties to learn separately. Since you might have lost your memory, it would be good to review the document stating your rights and obligations again.”

Eva was startled by Anna’s answer and scrutinized her. Since it was recorded, she wouldn’t be lying.

But the way she reported was disrespectful. It should have been prioritized to have her look at the records at White Palace.

What made Eva uneasy was the attitude of the head maid Anna.

She clearly showed the utmost consideration and warmly assisted the Empress while preparing for the national marriage and handling the aftermath the day after the wedding night. But after returning from the honeymoon, she changed slightly, clearly.

It was problematic that she didn’t completely silence the maids, but she didn’t cover up the Empress’s appearance when she came out wearing only a blanket and had an observant attitude.

As if, she was trying to report to someone. For example, to… Her Majesty the Empress Dowager.

“Hmm, I see. Anna. Let’s talk again after going to White Palace and looking at the documents and records. Prepare, you may go.”

Eva was surprised that Patricia didn’t immediately agree with the head maid’s words and responded proactively.

Moreover, the attitude of dismissing Anna first, leaving Eva behind, was clearly drawing a line. If she was an experienced head maid, she would have understood the intention.

After the head maid left, Patricia turned to Eva.

“Eva, why were you so surprised about the necklace?”

Eva was surprised again. Had the Princess ever been so interested in worldly matters before?

“Your Majesty, the necklace is missing.”

“Tell me in detail what happened.”

The blue dawn light of Kaozan, the turquoise diamond necklace was a set with the wedding couple rings.

On the wedding day, she wore a flower crown until the marriage vows, and after the ceremony, the bride gave the flower crown to a sister or friend she wanted to give it to, and the Empress Dowager put on the tiara.

She wore the necklace that matched the White Flower Tiara passed down to the Empress of the Karsik Empire.

In reality, the blue dawn light diamond necklace didn’t match the pure white wedding dress and reception dress, so it was left in the Empress’s reception room at White Palace on the wedding day.

*

That day, Lena, frightened by Julia’s summons, devised a plan with her younger sister Mina and went to the maid quarters of White Palace.

At first, Lena packed her belongings.

Then she remembered the contraceptive pills that Lady Julia had instructed to be fed to the Empress.

She boldly tried to enter the Empress’s bedroom to find and dispose of the contraceptive pills, but she glimpsed the jewelry box spread out on the table in the reception room.

“Why is the necklace laid out here?”

It was an incredible necklace at a glance. In her haste, Lena didn’t think to close the lid of the jewelry box and entered the Empress’s bedroom.

The contraceptive pills mixed with tonic pills were nowhere to be seen on the table or desk.

Suddenly, she recalled the morning when she gave the tonic pills to the Empress.

That maid who came together from Tane, Eva.

She said her waist and knee joints hurt on rainy days when the air was humid, and a young maid clung to her and massaged her. The Empress, who seemed so caring, must have given the tonic pills to that maid.

Lena stopped as she was passing through the reception room on her way out of the bedroom.

She needed to move her mother’s quarters away from Julia’s pursuit. Above all, she needed a lot of money.

With the feeling that she had already stepped into a black river she shouldn’t have crossed, she touched the necklace.

Lena confirmed that the contraceptive pills were in Eva and Annie’s quarters. Since it didn’t matter if maids took contraceptive pills anyway, she was about to turn away when she discovered the jewels wrapped in cloth and took those as well.

Lena’s face flushed and her legs wobbled with fear and guilt. She ran through the crowd gathered around Helios Hall and down the metasequoia-lined street.

It wasn’t until she collapsed into the gazebo in the Water Garden at the entrance of the palace, where she was supposed to meet Mina, that she wiped her face, wet with tears.

The Viscount Vizer family was neither a great noble family nor economically wealthy from merchant guild operations or gold mining ventures.

However, the Vizer sisters also grew up righteous and modest under their upright and virtuous mother’s home education.

In winter, when the bitter cold of the fierce wind scratching the Kaozan ice wall approached, they gathered in the reception room.

Their mother made clothes for the people of the viscount’s family together with the maid. Lena, the bookworm, stayed up all night transcribing books borrowed from the royal library in Nothos Palace.

Mina, who was skilled with her hands, sat nearby and bloomed flowers with colorful threads on muslin and linen.

Although the reception room was crowded with people seeking shelter from the cold, it was quiet as everyone focused on their work. They quietly, quietly spent their time in the same space.

Until Viscount Vizer’s affair happened.

Viscount Vizer was a man like a reed swaying by the water’s edge. He was kind and gentle, but not firm-minded and was swayed by others.

Someone said they saw Viscountess Vizer walking down Ephi Street with a knight from her maiden family when she was unmarried and entered Arteum.

He developed jealousy from a small word uttered without malice, intent, or purpose at a drinking party.

She bought herbs in Oro Alley with a knight from her maiden family who came up from the countryside estate.

There was no suitable place to park a carriage in the steep and narrow Oro Alley, so they parked the carriage by the lakeside next to Ephi Street and walked.

Despite the viscountess’s calm explanation, he couldn’t distinguish right from wrong and only put his petty emotions first and raged. He wielded his sword at his wife and the male guard who was her companion.

Unable to control his anger, the viscount also stabbed his own lungs with the blood-stained sword. The viscount and the guard died instantly at the scene.

The viscountess, who survived by avoiding vital points, couldn’t receive proper treatment.

Her mother, who had maintained her composure and modesty for many years, screamed in pain. Lena endured the years in a hallucinatory state with cheap drugs she obtained by doing odd jobs.

Lena stood up as she spotted Mina walking quickly down the metasequoia-lined street.

Lena knew that Julia was vicious and persistent.

They had to hurry before Julia woke up. If they were caught by the nape following their mother, what awaited them was not disgrace but death.

There was no choice.

Lena intended to sell the jewels and ornaments to move to another kingdom.

However, the black market merchant said it was impossible to trade because the necklace was named. They had no choice but to sell it at a ridiculously low price, even after begging and pleading.

Lena and Mina met the small owner Bark through Old Man Chen’s introduction. Bark, the leader of the Heun tribe hunters and ruler of Oro Alley, listened silently as Lena calmly explained their situation and wrote a letter of recommendation without a word.

That’s how the Vizer sisters and the viscountess went to the Kaozan gold mining area. Due to the shortage of restaurant staff, they were hired immediately with Bark’s recommendation letter and a simple interview.

Fortunately, they were assigned a 2-person room with a kitchen at the very end. They completely erased their identity as daughters of a viscount family in case of emergency and secretly brought their mother.

They moved the bed under the window with good lighting and laid their mother down. Their mother, intoxicated with expensive drugs that had a strong hallucinatory effect, didn’t complain of pain while moving.

Their bodies were tired from doing assistant work at the restaurant from dawn to night, but their minds were at ease.

They didn’t mingle with colleagues, and when work was over, they quickly returned to their lodgings, carefully drew the curtains, and locked the door.

They quietly prepared meals for their mother and gently washed her.

Sitting at the kitchen table, Lena opened the books she had transcribed so far, and Mina connected broken threads and spread muslin cloth, but they nodded off after less than half an hour.

Lena and Mina lay tightly together like chopsticks on the single bed.

Lena’s heart ached for making Mina’s white hands, which should have been blooming flowers with fine silk thread, wet with hard work and tears.

“Mina, I’m sorry.”

“Sister, I sleep well because you’re by my side, because I’m at ease.”