Meriela. Laila silently repeated the girl’s name in her mind. She thought it was a good name. For reasons unclear, the affection and love the parents must have felt when naming this child seemed to be conveyed to Laila as well.
Laila said,
“Meriela, shall we sit down?”
Young Meriela followed Laila, crying even more pitifully. The older boy, who appeared to be her brother, was sobbing with his head buried in his fallen mother’s lap.
After seating Meriela in a chair, Laila smoothed the child’s disheveled hair and readjusted the head covering that had slipped down near her neck.
“Lady Kristrad.”
Tiltil brought over some warm tea. It seemed to be for the child. Laila accepted the cup with a slightly surprised expression and looked at her face anew.
“Thank you, Tiltil.”
Tiltil smiled with a concerned expression.
“It’s nothing.”
Laila placed the warm teacup in Meriela’s trembling hands and waited for the child to drink some tea and calm down a bit. Meriela shivered as she managed to take one or two sips, then coughed and sputtered.
“Drink slowly.”
A tear dropped from Meriela’s eye.
“Pin must be cold and scared right now…”
Laila looked down at the girl with a pained expression. Seeming to feel guilty even over just a cup of tea, Meriela shook her head and put down the cup.
Laila said,
“Is Pin your younger sibling’s name?”
Meriela’s small head nodded up and down.
“Were you with Pin when they disappeared, Meriela?”
“N-no.”
Meriela’s tearful voice trembled.
“I should have been with them… I, I went into the forest alone to get a basket. I should have taken Pin with me. This happened because I told them to go home first. Pin…”
“Meriela, no.”
Laila gently grasped the shoulders of the child who seemed about to choke on her breath. Meriela, who had been gasping and crying, stared at Laila with wide eyes.
“It’s not your fault. I’ll try to find your sibling. But don’t think you lost your sibling because you did something wrong.”
“But still…”
Patting the child’s back, Laila said,
“What did you say earlier? Did you say ‘strange-looking house’? Why did you say that, Meriela?”
Meriela’s face turned pale. Shivering as if chilled, the child spoke in a strained voice.
“The door opened. I saw it! The door opened and closed, and then Pin was gone. That’s why I thought it was a house. But it was such a strange-looking house…”
“Then what happened to that house?”
Meriela shook her head. Laila asked again.
“You didn’t see?”
“No, no… It, it just disappeared. I couldn’t see clearly because it was far away, but it vanished.”
“Did it move?”
This time the child’s head nodded up and down. Laila fell into deep thought with a serious expression.
It moved. Then it was clearly something different from the ‘house’ Meriela had thought. But what did it mean that a door opened and closed? Was it some kind of monster in the shape of a house?
No, that can’t be it. Laila’s expression grew even more serious as she denied the question she had raised herself.
She hadn’t actually seen that many monsters yet. But she now knew enough about the characteristics of monsters.
In particular, the monsters that came out of sinks all had at least one characteristic of living creatures, regardless of their type. Many of them had appearances very similar to beasts that could be seen in mountains or fields.
No monster had taken on the form of an inanimate object. A house, that was even more absurd. It was all the more so because it wasn’t a simple structure.
Just then, Eustar approached Laila and Meriela. Meriela looked up at him with eyes mixed with fear and sadness.
Even in the midst of that, Laila was glad to see a flicker of curiosity towards Eustar in her passing glance. For a life riddled only with anxiety and worry was enough even after becoming an adult.
As Eustar gave his characteristic gentle smile, Meriela slightly lowered her head as if feeling shy.
“Meriela, there’s something you must do when you get home. Listen carefully, alright?”
Meriela nodded with wide eyes, sniffling. Eustar continued in a gentle voice.
“Make a warm cup of tea for your mother with your brother, and drink some together too. And I heard that only your elder sister and grandmother are at home now, is that right?”
Meriela nodded again. “That’s right.” The child hesitated for a moment before adding an explanation. “Elder sister Jenny has trouble with her legs. Grandmother too. So they had to stay at home.”
Eustar smiled again and said,
“I see, that’s how it is. Then, give a warm cup of tea each to elder sister Jenny and grandmother, and then all of you go to bed together. Here, brew tea with this. Make sure to give it to your mother and grandmother.”
He took out something like a small sachet from his jacket’s inner pocket and placed it in Meriela’s small hand. It had a bittersweet scent with a hint of sweetness at the end.
“Is it tea leaves?”
“That’s right. It will help ease some worries. Make sure to brew tea with this. Understand?”
Dark fear filled Meriela’s eyes again.
“What about Pin, my younger sibling… Can you find them?”
After a moment of silence, Eustar gently patted the child’s small head.
“We’ll do our best to try and find Pin.”
Meriela, her brother Paul, and the siblings’ mother left the branch office, staggering and leaning on each other.
Felix sent three members along to escort them home, and gave them two warm blankets for the children to wrap themselves in.
After the commotion had passed, everyone felt drained. As they were just staring at each other’s faces with empty eyes, Laila spoke.
“This is no time to be like this. We need to find out what took Meriela’s sibling. Meriela said that it ‘moved’. If it’s a monster, there should be traces of its movement.”
Felix wanted to point out that no traces had been found in all the disappearance cases so far, but the atmosphere wasn’t right for that.
Moreover, he didn’t want to do so himself. Having seen the mother who had wailed and eventually fainted, he found it difficult to say it was a futile effort.
Eustar said,
“Branch Manager Felix, gather the members. I and Lady Kristrad will accompany them to conduct a primary search around where the child disappeared, to see if there’s anything worth examining.”
“Understood, sir Eustar.”
The deputy commanders all rushed out at once. Laila sighed, looking out the dark window. The moonlight obscured by dark clouds seemed to make visibility even worse.
“It looks like it’s going to rain, Eustar. We should hurry.”
[This is the timeline separator]Meanwhile, around the time Laila and Eustar arrived at the Chiron branch and were listening to Glok’s story, Marchioness Himierd was waiting outside King Ord’s bedroom to have an audience with him.
The servants guarding the door were more restless seeing Marchioness Himierd standing stiffly for over an hour. When they said the king was asleep and couldn’t be met right away, she insisted on waiting until he woke up.
“Um, Marchioness. It seems today…”
The highest-ranking servant among them carefully tried to speak, but Himierd raised one hand, gesturing them not to say any more.
As the servant reluctantly retreated, an uncomfortable silence seemed to continue for a while. However, fortunately for all of them, the outermost door opened and Baso appeared.
“Marchioness Himierd, please come in.”
Himierd took a deep breath and exhaled.
Although her calves were stiff from standing in the same position for over an hour, she walked past Baso into the bedroom with an unwavering posture. She felt Baso’s gaze looking down at her but paid no mind to it.
It had been a very long time since she had entered Ord’s bedroom. The strong smell of medicine and the unique stench underneath it, which never seemed to become familiar no matter how many times she came.
While thinking that it was natural for sick people to have a stench, Himierd always felt a strange feeling. The smell emanating from Ord’s bedroom seemed different from what one would expect from someone who had been ill for a long time.
‘As if it’s not of this world…’
“It’s been a while, Marchioness Himierd.”
Himierd, who had been sinking into ominous thoughts, startled at the sudden sound of Ord’s voice and bowed her head.
The canopy curtains were still drawn, so his figure was only visible as a silhouette, but somehow he looked even more emaciated and shrunken than when she had last seen him.
“I am here to see Your Majesty.”
Originally, she should have added the greeting ‘wishing you health and peace’ at the end, but Himierd deliberately omitted those words.
She knew that the last time someone thoughtlessly wished for health and peace in front of Ord, they were permanently banned from entering the capital.
Of course, not giving the greeting might also be picked on. Himierd rolled her eyes while keeping her head bowed.
Ord let out a low, eerie laugh.
“I can clearly see what you’re thinking in my eyes.”
Himierd slowly straightened her bowed back and looked at him. Though there had been no sound, Baso was seen tying a knot at the corner of the canopy, having already drawn the curtains.
The sight of Ord revealed before her eyes looked miserable. He looked like a dead tree wrapped in a pale sack rather than wearing clothes. Perhaps noticing the bewilderment on Himierd’s face, Ord coughed a few times and then grinned.
“I’m always in poor condition when I wake up. You’ll have to excuse me.”
“I pray to Sercita and all the gods that Your Majesty will recover as soon as possible.”
Ord’s eyes, round like sunken pits, blinked.
His lips twitched, and suddenly laughter burst out as if he was about to choke. Himierd detested hearing him laugh, but she lowered her gaze calmly without showing it.
The laughter that had continued for a while stopped abruptly as if it had been a lie. Ord’s breathing became slightly rough, but the bedroom sank into silence as if it had never been noisy.
“What brings you to see me?”
His voice was filled with undisguisable hostility. Himierd exhaled slowly with her lips closed, then handed the document folder she had been holding neatly in her arms to Baso.
“The palace officials’ meeting regarding Your Majesty’s birthday celebration has concluded. Therefore, I requested an audience to report the contents.”
After Being Cheated On, She Picked Up a Treasure (Female-dominant)
One-line summary: The husband I married on a whim had been secretly in love with me for a long time.
On the day when Jun Shao finally obtained the imperial decree for her marriage, Lan Qu, the person she had admired for six years, defied the decree and ran away.
Her gentleness and devotion, her promise of a lifetime together, were all disregarded by him. Instead, he dreamed of entering the palace to serve the Emperor’s sister as a sixth-rank attendant.
News of this incident spread throughout the capital, and the alleys in front of and behind the Lan mansion were crowded with people who came to watch the commotion.
Jun Shao should have been embarrassed and angry.
But someone stepped in to protect her dignity.
The figure was in a miserable state, yet still possessed an undeniable elegance and handsomeness.
The young lord struggled to climb the wall of the Lan mansion and shouted to her, “If he won’t marry you, I will!”
So, Jun Shao took advantage of the situation and married the person.
She thought the young lord did it to save the Lan family from the crime of defying the imperial decree, but never imagined that from beginning to end, what he coveted was her.
*
After the wedding, Jun Shao felt like she was living in a dream.
Her Wife-master was as beautiful as a fairy in a painting, skilled in the six arts, well-versed in poetry and literature, capable of being gentle and attentive, and also grand and dignified. Most importantly, she was the only one in his heart and eyes.
Jun Shao didn’t know how Lan Shiwu, as a illegitimate son without a father and blessed with beauty, had managed to preserve his purity, recklessly escape, and use his last ounce of strength to ruin his own reputation, all because of his love for her, just to stand before her.
She could only see him gazing at her with eyes full of love, and when she bestowed a name upon him, his eyes shone like stars.
“You have come to me like a weary bird perching on a branch. I shall call you A Qi.”
