“I admit that wizards are a foolish bunch, but their abilities aren’t foolish, right? Don’t you think it would be quite nice to become a wizard? No need for medicine costs, shortened treatment times. There was also a teleportation spell, wasn’t there? Then we could quickly rush to patients far away……”

It was said jokingly in response to Ian’s request to make a wish, but thinking about it, becoming a wizard seemed like quite a cool thing.

What a shame. It would have been nice if a real opportunity to learn magic came up. But I heard that the qualities needed to master magic are predetermined.

Because only a very small number of people possess it, and it takes an astronomical amount of money to cultivate that talent, people who actually became wizards were not common.

Even then, they were mainly concentrated in the Magic Kingdom rather than the Callovanian Empire. It wasn’t a real thought of becoming a wizard. I was just returning Ian’s joke with another joke.

Ian shook his head with a troubled expression at my words.

“That’s beyond my abilities. If there’s no wish I can grant you, how about marrying me instead?”

“……”

I was momentarily at a loss for words. I must have been tired from organizing medicinal herbs late last night. Somehow, it seemed like I had heard nonsense. How tired must I have been to think he just said ‘How about marrying me?’

I rubbed my ear with my finger. There wasn’t anything particularly stuck to it, but I blew on my finger and brushed it off anyway, then said to him.

“Your Highness the Crown Prince, it seems something is wrong with my ears. I think I heard a strange sound. So could you please say it again? That is, if you didn’t just propose to me.”

“Gladly, it seems your hearing is perfectly normal. You heard what I said correctly. But I’ll say it again. Marry me.”

I frowned and stared at him intently.

His straight forehead and deep-looking eyes, clear and transparent blue eyes like a lake, and the long shadows cast by his eyelashes above them.

I wasn’t staring blankly to admire his handsome features. I became curious as to why he was saying such nonsense to me now.

It must be a joke. Although he was maintaining a very serious expression, a proposal? And to a commoner like me. There’s no way this could be serious. What a terrible joke…

‘If those words are sincere, then there must be severe side effects to the medicine I made. He has been taking that potent eye color-changing medicine for too long. It wouldn’t be strange if side effects occurred.’

If I were an ignorant young girl, I might have misunderstood his joke and felt my heart flutter.

But as an adult, I was different from a girl living in a dream. Having lived as the head of the household with my blind grandfather since childhood, I had faced reality more than anyone.

I stroked the tightly tied ends of my hair with my fingers. I could feel the rough, tangled hair. The stiff red hair that tangles so easily it’s difficult to brush always has to be tied up in one bundle.

My face was darkly tanned from going around to patients day and night, and the scar on my left cheek from the nails of a patient who had a seizure remained unhealed even after time had passed.

I was as tall as men. My tall height, sticking out a head above other women, made me self-conscious, so I always walked with hunched shoulders, making my back constantly stooped.

Especially from the bone structure, I had an alien appearance that anyone could tell was foreign. I didn’t particularly have a complex about my appearance, but I didn’t think he would fall for me and propose because of it. It was clearly a joke.

I spoke in a deliberately calm voice.

“You must be experiencing side effects from the medicine, talking nonsense like this.”

“Nonsense? I’m being serious. It’s a good solution, isn’t it? Family members can share secrets with each other.”

His words seemed contradictory. After hiding his red eyes for so long, fearing the Emperor would find out.

“Don’t say things like that, even as a joke. Are you trying to ruin someone’s marriage prospects……”

At my words, his expression turned fierce, as if he had heard something unwanted.

“Did you have thoughts of marrying someone other than me? Did you find someone you want to marry?”

His voice sounded as if he was angry. No, who has the right to be angry now! And did he really think I wouldn’t get married?

I’ve just been too busy to meet anyone. Too rushed to feel lonely. If I met someone compatible, I would consider marriage.

It was lonely living alone in the pharmacy after grandfather passed away. Living with someone would probably be more comforting than now. The question was whether there was someone who would marry me.

“I’ve always been open to marriage. In fact, Grandpa Gepetto said he would introduce me to a nice person.”

“What? Who? Who to?”

Ian’s voice sounded sharp, but I dismissed it as just my imagination and said,

“There is. Grandpa Gepetto, who runs the tavern in front of our pharmacy, keeps pestering me about why I’m not married every time he sees me.”

“He must be a senile old man.”

He spoke as if grinding the words between his teeth. Anyone who heard would think Grandpa Gepetto was his mortal enemy.

“So I told him if he was going to keep nagging, he should introduce me to a nice person, and he said he actually had someone he wanted to introduce. Anyway, what a meddlesome old man. He could have just said he had someone to introduce from the start, instead of criticizing me for not getting married all this time.”

“What a strange old man indeed. It’s obvious what kind of person he would introduce. You don’t need to be introduced!”

He spoke decisively, as if making a conclusion.

“Grandpa Gepetto may be a strange person, but the person he wants to introduce seems nice.”

He frowned deeply and asked,

“Have you already met him?”

“I haven’t met him formally yet.”

“How do you know he’s a nice person if you haven’t even met him! He’s probably a strange and dirty person. Surely a drunken, pot-bellied, ugly man. There’s always a reason when a man isn’t married at a late age. Meeting him would be a waste of time.”

I waved my hand at those words.

“That’s not true. I saw him in passing. He looked quite decent.”

“You saw him in passing? Just what kind of guy is he?”

I enthusiastically explained what I knew in response to his words.

“He’s a blacksmith. He seems quite skilled too, as there are many customers who want to entrust their swords to him. Even high-ranking nobles have to wait several months to receive a sword from him.”

“If he’s such a decent person, he wouldn’t be single until now.”

“He’s been so busy with work that he hasn’t had time to meet women. I saw him very briefly in passing, but he had a good build and looked dependable. His body was so good……”

I had pretended to pass by his forge by chance and peeked inside, quite satisfactorily observing him powerfully swinging his hammer on red-hot iron.

Perhaps because it was hot inside the forge, he was working shirtless, and the muscles developed from hammering iron looked good. Especially the chest and arms, well-built with firm muscles. Just thinking about it made heat rush to my face.

Embarrassed that my face might turn red, I hurriedly cooled the heat with my cold palms.

Seeing Ian looking at me with an annoyed expression, it seemed my face was already as red as it could be.

“His body was good?”

“I didn’t intentionally look at his naked body, the forge is hot, you know. He was working with his shirt off. So I saw by chance, purely by chance.”

I emphasized the coincidence, worried I might be suspected of being a pervert.

“You’re rejecting my proposal, the Crown Prince’s, for some blacksmith, and a rude one who strips anywhere at that?”

“What are you saying? Stop talking nonsense and come sit here. I need to examine you and get going.”

He still had an angry look on his face as he said to me,

“Can’t you stay a little longer?”

He put down his fan on the table and pulled the chair up close in front of me to sit down.

“I’m a busy person. I have medicinal herbs I need to go back and decoct today.”

At those words, he stopped pestering and deflated. I held his face and moved it this way and that, examining his eyes with the naked eye.

He had a defenseless expression and naturally entrusted his face to my touch.

Faced with his attitude that showed no sense of wariness, mischief welled up in me.

“Ah, do this. Ee, do this.”

At my command, he made an innocent face and opened his mouth in the shapes of “Ah” and “Ee” as instructed.

It wasn’t an action necessary for the examination. It was a method used to check the dental condition of animals.

Ian, who didn’t know anything, silently followed what I told him to do.

That innocent appearance felt so adorably cute that I couldn’t hold back my laughter.

“Pffft!”

At the sudden laughter, he looked at me with round eyes and a puzzled expression.

“It’s just, looking at Your Highness the Crown Prince reminded me of a puppy.”