“Are you sulking?”

Arkan, who asked in disbelief, opened his eyes wide with a “Huh.”

“Me, sulking? At you? No, what…!”

Arkan suddenly grabbed his neck. He was so dumbfounded he couldn’t speak.

Sulking, who on earth? No, there was no need to ask who or what. The word ‘sulking’ itself was absurd.

Just as he was searching for a response, Erdene’s hand struck his back like lightning.

“Gack!”

A harsh scream involuntarily escaped Arkan’s mouth from the shock that felt like it pierced straight through from his spine to his solar plexus.

Sparks flew before his eyes, and for some reason, he thought he saw his late father’s face…

As he waited for the shock to subside, bent forward, a tingling pain like being pricked with tiny needles washed over his entire back like a wave.

The exact spot he was hit was so numb he couldn’t even feel it.

‘Good thing it was my back. If it had been the back of my head, I’d have had quite a time putting my eyes back in.’

Arkan thought.

Even amidst the white flashes before his eyes, the fact that he unconsciously thought ‘Good thing it wasn’t the back of my head’ left him dumbfounded at himself.

Erdene, who quickly lowered her head towards Arkan, asked.

“Are you alright? Did it come out?”

Arkan, who had barely straightened up—the spot he was hit still felt like it was being attacked by bees—stared at Erdene with his mouth wide open like a broken nutcracker doll.

“Did it come out? Did you just ask if it came out?”

“Oh, goodness. What is it? What was stuck?”

For a moment, Arkan was overwhelmed by an urge he had never experienced in his life.

The urge to grab anything in sight and shake it violently…

If he had been even a little, just a tiny bit more impulsive, he would have grabbed Erdene’s desk in front of him and shaken it with a clatter.

“What on earth are you talking about now! Are you trying to kill me? I just saw my late father’s face!”

Erdene, frowning, retorted.

“Is he doing well?”

“Doing… Are you joking with me right now?!”

Arkan, who shouted loud enough to shake the Queen’s Palace, jumped to his feet.

Platt and Sophia, startled by the commotion, tried to come in, but turned back at Erdene’s gesture to leave.

More accurately, it was closer to Sophia dragging away Platt, who was trying to force his way in.

Erdene, looking at Arkan’s reddened face, suddenly touched the tip of his lips with her fingertip.

Then, pressing down on his lower teeth to open his jaw, she stared intently at his tongue. Needless to say, this action nearly made Arkan faint.

“Wha, wha are oo…”

“What are you saying? What on earth was stuck in your throat? There’s nothing there. Don’t tell me you swallowed it back?”

“What are you talking about…”

Suddenly, all the strength drained from Arkan’s shoulders.

His feelings couldn’t be more complicated. The fact that a large part of it was ‘wanting to cry’ was the most baffling and confusing.

For Arkan, who had never met such an unreasonable person before, every day was astonishing.

It was as if he had become a pigeon in the hands of a circus magician.

“You suddenly hit me because you thought something was stuck in my throat?”

Erdene furrowed her brow.

“What else would it be for? When Your Majesty suddenly grabbed your neck, I thought something was stuck and acted out of urgency.”

Arkan’s face moved strangely. His mouth, the corners of his eyes, even the bridge of his nose twitched slightly. It was as if he didn’t know what expression to make, and in the end, a strange expression that was neither frowning, nor crying, nor smiling was born.

One corner of his mouth sagged as if collapsing, while the other was still stiffly cramped, the bridge of his nose was wrinkled, but his eyes were slightly drooping downwards.

Erdene thought he looked ‘foolish’ but knowing he would flare up again if she said so, she expressed her impression indirectly.

“Your face looks like a dog that ate a ten-year-old jerky by mistake, Your Majesty.”

Arkan, who had unknowingly been about to soften his gaze, glared again and clenched his jaw tightly.

He bit down so hard that wrinkles like walnut shells appeared above his jaw.

“Did you just say I have a face like a dog?”

“No, I didn’t mean it like that. Did you even listen to me? I said you look like a ‘dog that ate a ten-year-old jerky by mistake’.”

“What’s the difference? Either way, you’re saying I look like a dog.”

“If you’re overly sensitive about everything, you’ll age quickly, Your Majesty. And what’s wrong with dogs? Do you dislike them?”

“No, it has nothing to do with whether I like dogs or not. And ten-year-old jerky? Why would you feed that to a dog?”

“Did I feed it? I said that because Your Majesty picked up something strange somewhere and made a weird face.”

Arkan closed his eyes tightly. He felt the need to organize the situation again…

Why did he come here? Whenever he faced Erdene, he always, without fail, had to ask himself the same questions.

What was I doing just now?

What were we talking about?

“Let’s sort this out.”

Erdene narrowed her eyes as if to say ‘here we go again,’ but she let him continue speaking.

“First, about the sparring.”

“Are we going back that far?”

“That’s the reason I came here in the first place. You, I mean the Queen, don’t need to report your entire daily schedule to me, the King, of course. But if it’s an important matter, that’s different.”

“Impor…”

Arkan stretched out his hand to stop Erdene’s words.

If he had been a little closer, his palm would have touched Erdene’s lips.

The moment he felt the ticklish breath, he flinched, withdrew his hand, and said simultaneously,

“You might want to ask what the standard for important matters is, but let’s figure that out as we go. I don’t know what standards to set for you either. Ah, plans to kill people should be told in advance.”

Erdene stared at Arkan with eyes that seemed to ask if he was serious.

But thinking again, there was no guarantee that she wouldn’t kill anyone.

As she quietly indicated her agreement by blinking, Arkan continued, feeling a slight headache.

“Anyway, there’s no need for it, but when I heard about it from Platt, I felt… not great. I wasn’t displeased or angry. I wasn’t irritated either. It’s just that something… felt off, like a thorn was stuck somewhere but I couldn’t pinpoint exactly where. Anyway, I couldn’t say it was particularly good or that I didn’t care. So I came to hear about it from you, and you were writing something that you said you could never show me.”

Arkan’s gaze turned to the tightly closed drawer.

Even knowing that he wasn’t the type to suddenly rush over and yank the drawer open, Erdene instinctively leaned her upper body slightly towards the desk.

After letting out a brief sigh, Erdene said,

“It’s my problem. As Your Majesty said, it’s not about a mistress or anything like that, so don’t worry. It’s not a letter cursing Your Majesty either. Since we’re on the topic, do you think I would bother writing such things down?”

Arkan, who had been tightly pressing his lips together, suddenly nodded as if realizing something.

“Come to think of it, you’re right.”

This time, it was Erdene’s brow that furrowed.

‘It’s annoying that he agrees so readily…’

Arkan thought it was a bit satisfying to see Erdene’s furrowed forehead—since it was usually him making such expressions—and continued speaking.

“But then you suddenly hit me and blatantly insulted me, saying I had a face like a dog.”

“Don’t omit things to your advantage, Your Majesty. Tell it as it is. I struck Your Majesty’s back because I thought something was stuck in your throat and you were on the brink of life and death, and saying you had a face like a dog wasn’t meant to imply that Your Majesty’s face was a mess.”

“But my back that was hit hurts, and being told I have a face like a dog doesn’t make me feel good.”

“So what do you want me to do about it?”

“I’m not saying to do anything about it, I’m just systematically recapping the situation up to now. I’m reviewing why things have come to this point.”

This too only warranted a ‘So what do you want me to do about it?’ response.

Erdene chose to just keep her mouth shut.

But Arkan’s expression suddenly turned serious.

“What I’ve been curious about all along was… the reason I felt uneasy when I heard you sparred with the soldiers today, and the nature of that uneasiness. I still don’t quite understand it.”

A chuckle escaped Erdene’s lips.

“Do you think you’ll get an answer even if you tell me?”

“Probably not. I know. I’m not asking you to ponder over it together… No, never mind. Let’s drop it all. Just tell me how the sparring went. That’s what I’m curious about.”

Arkan let out a short, rough sigh as he leaned his arm on one side of the desk.

It doesn’t seem like this is what I wanted to say. He thought.

It was true that he was curious, but looking at Erdene’s face, there was something he wanted to express.

Yet he still didn’t know what that emotion was…

Then Erdene suddenly said,

“Are you saying you were sulk… hurt because I didn’t tell you?”

“What? Hurt? Me?”

“From what you’re saying now, it seems that way.”

Blink, blink. Arkan’s eyelids moved up and down. His long eyelashes could be seen trembling slightly.