“Lady Rosabella, I was really happy that day.”
“Huh? What?”
“When I was young, Prince was mischievous and very ambitious. Just like an ordinary child. But after Her Highness passed away and since then, he changed as if he were a person who had no particular regrets in life…”
As Melissa’s face blurred at the end of her words, a sad expression appeared. Approaching slowly in front of me, she tightly held both of my hands and spoke again.
“After hearing what Prince told you that day, I was a bit surprised, wondering if it was not Prince but someone wearing Prince’s disguise… But hearing those words and seeing that Prince not only has someone precious but also someone he wants to protect made me happy.”
I also want to protect that person.
Although she didn’t explicitly mention those words, Melissa seemed to understand my feelings. She lightly patted the back of my hand as if to comfort me and smiled. When she blinked her eyes quickly, the tears that had gathered in the corners of her eyes quickly disappeared.
“We don’t have time for this; shall we go up now?”
Melissa gestured with her eyes towards the second floor. Following her upstairs, there was a spacious dressing room.
“This is…”
“It’s Her Highness’s dressing room. After Her Highness passed away, I moved her belongings from the palace here.”
So, this room is filled to the brim with those items.
As I looked around silently, my eyes were drawn to the boxes on the table.
“What’s this?”
“Open it and see.”
“Can I open it?”
“Of course. It’s something Prince prepared for Lady Rosabella.”
Approaching hesitantly to the table, I opened the large box first. Inside, there was a white dress that shone like fresh snow.
Countless jewels sparkled as if someone had scattered stardust on the silver embroidery.
“It looks like a dress made by melting crystals.”
Melissa, who looked down at the dress, murmured in fascination. As Melissa said, there was not a single spot that didn’t glitter.
In the small box next to it, there were various accessories, from necklaces to earrings and bracelets. The last box I opened contained a somewhat familiar brooch.
This is the brooch I picked out for Ian back then…
“Oh my, it’s a brooch that looks just like someone.”
“Indeed. It’s still beautiful upon closer inspection.”
As I caressed the blue-shining brooch, Melissa suddenly spoke.
“Prince said to show this brooch to Lady Rosabella, no matter what.”
Understanding Ian’s intentions, I alternately looked at the dress and the brooch inside the large box. The combination of the white dress and the blue brooch seemed to fit very well.
“I don’t need other accessories; just attach this brooch.”
Entering the banquet hall of the palace, Olivia looked around anxiously. The hall, where the Imperial Prince’s Book-Binding Ceremony and the celebration banquet were held, was crowded with people without any space to spare.
Even if all the nobles within the empire gathered, it would not be an exaggeration to say that this place, where the Imperial Prince was to be bound, was packed.
‘What happened? Empress said she would use poison on the Crown Prince, so why is the Book-Binding Ceremony proceeding as planned?’
It was a moment when an uneasy premonition was slowly emerging.
“Mother, are you looking for Lady?”
At Kaden’s sudden question, Olivia pretended to smile casually.
“Yes, I thought she might have come separately, so I assumed she would already be here.”
“Olivia, haven’t you seen Rosabella?”
“I’ve been looking around as soon as I came here, but I haven’t seen Rose yet.”
“I hope nothing happened on her way here.”
Olivia suspected both of her ears. Rosebelia hadn’t blatantly flirted with Herman. She didn’t become like this just because he responded softly with a few gentle words.
“It can’t be. Perhaps Rose said she would come separately because she didn’t want to attend the Book-Binding Ceremony?”
“If that were the case, Lady would have honestly told Father or Mother from the beginning. Since Lady said she would come, undoubtedly… Look over there.”
Caden, who suddenly stopped talking, pointed somewhere with his fingertips.
“Why are you saying that?”
“Over there… Isn’t that Lady?”
Olivia slowly turned her gaze to where Caden’s fingertip was pointing. At the same time, as the noise in the hall, which had been bustling, quieted down, her head tilted halfway in an apparent expression of curiosity.
The stares of people who had tightly closed their mouths were all directed toward the direction Caden indicated. There, just as Caden said, Rosebelia was present.
Wearing a white dress that revealed her smooth shoulders, Rosebelia shone even without a single common necklace.
With only a silver hair ornament elegantly twisted up, it seemed like all the light was focused on Rosebelia alone.
Every time Rosebelia took a slightly slow step, it felt like a sigh of admiration burst out from somewhere.
“Rose?”
Whether she heard Olivia’s voice or not, Rosebelia, who briefly looked back, continued to walk forward with a straightened back. At the end of Rosebelia’s gaze, there was a man.
‘Wait a moment, who is that man?’
Olivia’s eyes narrowed. The man who was softly smiling at Rosebelia was the man who was with her at the shop, Rosebelia’s lover.
As Rosebelia stopped, the man extended his hand to her as if waiting. With a faint smile, Rosebelia gently placed her hand over his.
‘How did a commoner come to a reception that only nobles can attend, like the Imperial Prince’s Book-Binding Ceremony?’
The gazes of Olivia, who alternated between Rosebelia and the man beside her, became more scrutinizing. It didn’t take her long to grasp the situation.
The man was wearing attire not of common clothing but an embroidered garment made of gold thread. The place where the two stood facing each other was in front of the throne set up for the Book-Binding Ceremony.
“His Highness the Crown Prince and his partner, Lady Rosebelia Winters, will officially enter.”
As the man from the ceremonial team, dressed in ceremonial attire, shouted with a resonant voice, applause poured in. Olivia, gripping her forehead, seemed as if she could crumble at any moment as she stood still.
Male lead is a Divorced Husband
She said to him: “Tell me, what makes you like me? I’ll change it!”
Liu Changning transmigrated into a female cannon fodder character in a female-dominant novel.
After reading the first half of the novel’s plot, the first thing she did upon transmigration was to divorce the Pan Jinlian-style male protagonist she had just married.
She indulged herself, pretending to be ugly and poor.
But as time passed, the way that man looked at her became more and more unusual…
Liu Changning was dumbfounded: Tell me, what makes you like me? I’ll change!
――
This lifetime, Pei Yuanshao was rejected by the same woman twice!
The first time, she drove him away. Forced by the situation, he endured the waves of anger in his heart, yielding and humbling himself.
That person lay slanted on a rocking chair, her sallow face emotionless: “If you don’t want a divorce, go cook!”
Pei Yuanshao’s face was dark and gloomy: “You!”
The second time, after the crisis in Jinling City was resolved, the new emperor sent someone to pick him up. He turned around, stammering: “I… I have to go. If you keep me…”
That person lay on the kang bed, her back to him, as if she had long anticipated this day, crisp and clear: “Goodbye!”
Pei Yuanshao was so angry his fingers trembled: “You… you!”
The mission of family and country made him restrain himself, averting his eyes and turning to leave this broken household.
Two years later, they met again. Seeing her ethereal face, his body shook like a sieve.
“She was originally a ‘she’!”
At the Qionglin Banquet, the top scholar of the imperial examination, a talented person with exceptional speech and conduct, all the unmarried young gentlemen from aristocratic families looked at her with shy and timid eyes.
The peerless imperial official Pei Yuanshao felt the anger in his heart erupt. He pointed at the woman surrounded by the crowd at the Qionglin Banquet, his thin lips slightly curled: “Little sister, I wants that person to be the wife-master of my Mingde Prince Manor.”
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