“Princess!”

“Huh?”

“Oh, my God! You found Titty. How did you…..”

“Stop.”

Hazel raised one hand and covered Mary’s mouth. Despite her sudden reaction, Mary did not take her hand away, but looked at Hazel with her eyes wide open.

“Be quiet. Please stop calling me princess.”

Hazel was farther away from Achilleon, but he still seemed to be nearby.

No matter who Achilleon was, this was the first time he had been to the Royal Palace of Land, so the roads must be unfamiliar to him, and even though Hazel was convinced that Achilleon would not be able to follow her, she was not relieved at all.

“…….”

Mary nodded and Hazel slowly removed her hand. As soon as her hand fell away, Mary immediately asked back.

“Why, why, princess?”

“I told you not to call me!”

“What on earth am I going to call you?” Mary cried.

“Anyway, please don’t call me that, not now.”

Hazel felt a chill run down her spine, as if Achilleon was about to come after her and grab her by the neck.

“What’s wrong with you, by the way? Why are you sweating so much?”

“Oh, it’s nothing.”

“Are you sick? Oh my God, it’s not nothing if…”

“Stop talking. Let’s go.”

“Yes, yes.”

Mary hurriedly walked at Hazel’s urging. She had to move her feet constantly to keep up with Hazel’s almost running stride.

Hazel’s face was still stained white, and she was sweating through her ragged, disheveled hair.

“Did you see a ghost or something?”

“More than that.”

“What? What on earth did you see? Sweating like this…”

Instantly, the cat began to cry long and hard.

“I think Titty is hungry.”

“It must be. It’s been quite a while since it disappeared. Poor thing. I’ll give it a special treat.”

“Oh, that’s good.”

Hazel replied with a dazed look on her face.

When Hazel returned to her room, the attendants and maids who were sent to find the cat returned in turn. The maids tried to call for the court physician, but Hazel hurriedly stop them.

“No. More importantly…”

“Princess?”

“Keep what happened today a secret.”

“What happened today?”

“About me went out to look for Titty. What would people say if they knew the sick Princess couldn’t attend the welcome ceremony but went to look for her cat?”

“It’s…”

“Tell the others to keep their mouths shut.”

“I understand.”

Mary nodded as if to tell Hazel to trust her.

“But you look surprised. Shouldn’t we call the court physician?”

“No. Prepare a bath and take care of Titty.”

“Yes, of course. Oh, someone wrapped its hurt paw.”

Hazel’s panicked gaze reached the cloth tied around the cat’s white paw. The blood stained white cloth must have been torn from someone’s clothes.

“Yeah, looks like it.”

Hazel turned her head away in a panic.

“I’m going to take a bath. Call the court physician.”

Mary stepped forward quickly and hugged the cat. Perhaps tired of wandering alone in the vast garden, Titty quietly slipped out of its master’s arms and into Mary’s arms.

Under her order, a warm bath was prepared, and Hazel went straight into the bath after dismissing all the maids.

‘I met him again.’

Hazel had no idea that just running into Achilleon again would cause such a rush of fear, as if all the blood was drained from her body.

It wasn’t that she didn’t think about running into him again at all, but she didn’t expect to see him so soon.

‘It’s okay. It’s okay now, right?’

Hazel ruminated to herself as if she was casting a spell. There was nothing between them now. She would never make a connection with him in the future. That should be fine.

“I’ll remember your face.”

She was sure that Achilleon said it out of anger. It was understandable because she was being a cheeky maid.

“…….”

No matter how much she soaked in the hot water, her fingers seemed to feel cold.

Hazel clasped her hands together and scooped up the water. The clear water turned red in the blink of an eye. The reflection on it was the dead body of Sisef, thrown on the floor. Hazel closed her eyes tightly and opened them again, then tried to get out of the bathtub.

“Ahh…”

However, she couldn’t get out after much struggle. The maids immediately rushed in at Hazel’s scream.

“Princess! What’s going on?”

Mary wrapped her body with a towel.

“Ah…ah…”

Hazel cried out in pain as she cradled her head, then collapsed.

“Princess!”

Mary’s startled cry became someone else’s voice, bellowing in the distance.

“Did the Princess of Land drown herself?”

***

*This scene is either a flashback or Hazel is having a dream of the past.*

The imperial delegation’s welcome party in the morning was concluded by Hazel’s congratulatory speech.

” …With today’s meeting, the two countries have established a friendly relationship … . “

Hazel calmly read the congratulatory speech. It was not once or twice that she had met foreign envoys on behalf of the Queen and read congratulatory speeches, so she could memorize them with her eyes closed.

It was a job so familiar to her that even if she didn’t have the speech paper, she could make up one on the spot.

“…I assure you of the trust between our two countries…”

She averted the danger of stammering if she was not good enough by looking around at the people in the banquet hall and smiling graciously. The people wouldn’t have noticed, but she had already been in that situation many times.

It wasn’t that it was cold in the hall, or that she was extraordinarily nervous.

It was all because of that damn Crown Prince that she narrowly escaped failure today, despite the fact that it was a job she was soul-crushingly familiar with.

‘Why is he looking at me like that?’

Hazel’s head seemed to twitch the entire time she was reading the speech. It was for the man who sat in the center of the Demophos Imperial Mission, and stared at her with sharp eyes as if he was devouring her with a knife.

In his cross-legged, slanted posture, he stared at Hazel, not moving an inch.

She had never seen eyes that blue before. The same with his silvery blond hair. Lorette and her father, the king, had blond hair, but it was a warm brownish color, and Prince Achilleon’s was different.

He looked extremely beautiful for a Crown Prince living on the battlefield, and during the welcoming ceremony, the attendees’ eyes were fixed on him.

However, when Hazel began to read her speech, the Crown Prince did not even blink, and for a while she thought he was a puppet.

‘Did I do something to offend him?’

He was a prince who was famous for mercilessly beheading his enemies. Hazel suddenly felt a chill on her neck.

Achilleon’s gaze that followed her didn’t change when she stepped off the stage after finally finishing her speech. She could clearly feel the dark blue eyes following her every movement.

Officially, Achilleon was the man who would become the next emperor, but those who knew the affairs of the empire well believed that he had merely donned the veneer of the crown prince’s uniform, and that in reality the throne should belong to his half-brother, Prince Sisef, who was the son of the empress.

When Achilleon was crowned Crown Prince, the entire continent was in the throes of war.

The Demophos Empire was engaged in a series of wars every day in order to acquire a significant amount of territory.

With far-reaching dreams of continental unification, the emperor needed someone who could lead the imperial army, and he hoped it would be his son.

However, the Empress did not wish for her son, Sisef, to die in battle or be crippled on the battlefield, so instead, she pushed Achilleon, the son of a concubine, to the forefront.

With the plausible argument that since Achilleon was the emperor’s eldest son, he should go to war and make a contribution.

And with the belief that Achilleon would die on the battlefield, her son Sisef would inherit the throne.

However, the Crown Prince, who expected to return as a corpse soon, won great victories and increased the fame of the Demophos Empire.

It was said that enemy troops would flee in fear at the mere sight of the Crown Prince’s flag fluttering in the distance. By the time he had swallowed up half of the continent, there was no one who did not know his name.

The successor of Emperor Demophos in name and reality was already Achilleon. Under such circumstances, even the Empress could not overturn the decision. This was because the war could have discouraged morale at a sensitive time.

However, with the Empress still holding eminent power in the empire and the Emperor’s great fondness for Prince Sisef, Achilleon’s position could be overturned at any time.

So, even during this delegation’s visit, the one who put more effort into the ceremonies than Crown Prince Achilleon was Prince Sisef.

This was because he had been close to the Land kingdom through tireless artistic exchanges, and was also very popular thanks to his soft and gentle personality and appearance that one could not help but like.

On the other hand, people’s thoughts about the Crown Prince, who had the heinous nickname of the war messenger, were closer to fear than hope. When he actually showed up at the welcoming ceremony, though, the fearfulness ended in amazement.

However, whatever the Crown Prince looked like, it was not a matter of much importance to Hazel.

As she walked down the platform, she surreptitiously turned to where Prince Sisef was sitting. When his eyes met hers, he smiled and applauded quietly.

His gaze filled Hazel with pride. On the seat where she was sitting was a bouquet of roses that Sisef had brought her.

It was the bouquet he had brought to her in person before the welcome party began, saying he was sorry he couldn’t be there the last time they had a field trip.

Hazel, who had been cold towards him, instantly softened her heart and smiled. And after putting the bouquet in place where everyone could see, she began walking to her seat.

‘He was sorry.’

The bouquet of flowers that was presented to her with those words made her heart melt.

However, Sisef’s gaze immediately went to Lorette, where the Land royalty were seated.