Chapter 21

* * *

‘What should I buy first?’

I thought while walking down the street.

This was a store street in Breathbridge, a neutral country.

Not only were products from Spinel and Aktoum sold together, but this area also showed a culture unique to neutral countries, creating an interesting and different landscape.

My heart fluttered as I gazed upon the streets filled with colorful colors.

The first thing that caught my eye on the lively street was a boy’s outfit.

I stopped in front of the show window for a while and looked at the coordinated clothes.

The appearance of the boy wearing clothes tattered from falling off the cliff came to mind.

“I can’t let him go back to the palace in a beggar’s outfit.”

I was ignored too. I was a beggar. Thinking of that time made me flare up, but on the other hand, I was worried.

Eventually, I decided to buy the boy’s outfit.

It was a simple white tunic and brown pants, but it was better than the worn out clothes he was wearing now.

Afterwards, I saw a bakery that gave off a fragrant smell and a butcher shop with delicious boiled meat on display.

My steps stopped automatically and my mouth watered.

‘I can’t buy meat… Should I buy soft bread?’

I hesitated, fiddling with some of my remaining coins.

The only kind of meal I had with Rixus was oatmeal or old hardened barley bread. If I wanted to eat it, I would have to soak it in soup.

How could he be tall if I only feed him those things?

The Rixus that I knew and faced off with was a man with a muscular body and a cool, handsome face, and a man close to 189 centimeters tall.

Considering the current Rixus, he had to grow a lot, a lot bigger.

When did he grow so tall?

He’s shorter than me now……

Let’s first feed him something delicious!

I went into the bakery to buy soft bread, and I went to the butcher to buy some thin and salty salami ham.

I only bought a pair of clothes and a little food, but my heart became warm.

I should hurry back home and put it on him and feed him.

It was when I was smiling.

A suspicious voice caught my attention.

“Have you ever seen a boy who looks like this?””

“Hmm. No? I’ve never seen him.”

“If you see him in this neutral country, please report it to us.”

“Who is this child?”

“This is the Crown Prince of Aktoum.”

“!”

As soon as I heard the words ‘the crown prince’, my heart sank. I hurriedly hid myself at the corner and only stuck out my head.

Soldiers were looking for Rixus by showing a montage to merchants.

Even if they encountered Rixus on the street, people in neutral countries were more likely to pass by without realizing.

Not only do few people know exactly what the little prince looked like, and even if they encounter a mysterious blue-purple-eyed boy on the street, they wouldn’t be able to imagine that the crown prince will walk alone in a disastrous way.

The soldiers seemed to know this fact.

Seeing them go around to every person to look for the prince, informing them that he was the crown prince.

‘The Imperial Palace is not the one looking for him. Because if so, the Imperial Knights and Guard would have traveled around.’

The ones here were private soldiers.

Who would look for Rixus in Spinel with private soldiers?

‘Madam Deborah… She’s trying to find and kill him.’

Sensing the ominousness, my heart beat like crazy till it was like under my chin.

The cabin where Rixus and I were staying was deep in the forest of the neutral country.

The poison swamp and cabin forest were rough areas, and thanks to this, the border was not tight, so the boy was brought in relatively easily.

Did the soldiers go all the way to the forest?

‘What if they’ve already found the cabin?’

Then, the one who was left alone…… I instinctively squeezed my small fist.

I turned around and started running at full speed.

Please, please, please! They shouldn’t have found the cabin where Rixus was in yet.….

My breaths were caught up in my jaw. The skin around my ankles was torn by the tough grass.

A young child’s legs were not as fast as her heart’s earnestness. So I became increasingly nervous as my lungs struggled to the brink.

How far had I run? Finally, I saw a cabin far away.

“Rixus…”

My heart rushed ahead, and I called his name as loud as I could, and I ran with my remaining strength through the door.

Clank—

When I opened the door, a small light was shining in the cabin.

It was the lamp I turned on before leaving the cabin. Next to it, a boy with a small face was looking at me with confusion.

The bursting heart sank at a frightening speed.

I had never felt such relief in my life.

“What’s going on?”

I hugged him hard even before his question was over.

“No, nothing happened. Just… I was supposed to come back quickly.…. That’s why I ran here.”

I lied. I was afraid the boy would be anxious.

The boy had a puzzled expression when he was held in my arms, but his face quickly turned red as if he was shy.

At the same time, he seemed to have noticed that I was worried about him.

His hands that were just hanging in the air now carefully wrapped around my back.

It was a thoughtful touch as if taking care of a newborn young herbivore. Full of affection.

Pat, pat.

“It’s okay.”

Rather, he comforted me.

“Everything will be fine, Candy.”

That alone, calmed me down like magic.

* * *

After calming down to some extent, we had our meal.

“Doesn’t it look delicious?”

“Yes, let’s try it. You go first. Say ah.”

Rixus tore off the soft bread and stuck it out towards me.

“No, it’s okay. You eat first.”

“Ah…”

I bought this for Rixus. I was okay with barley bread.

But I couldn’t resist the temptation of the large piece of soft and fragrant bread, and so I stretched out my head and ate it.

“!”

It was shockingly delicious. The more the soft bread was chewed, the sweeter it was, and the final taste that stuck to the tongue was excellent.

When I finished with milk, it was so savory, sweet, and delicious that I could see stars in front of me.

“Wow, this is baked really well. You should eat it, too.”

“Candy first, ah…”

I took another bite without conscience.

It was fair to have a bite each, but why did he keep giving it to me?

I felt like a pig because I was the only one eating like this.

“Is it good?”

The boy smiled softly like castella.

I got shy for some reason.

“Yes, now you should eat too. Why do you keep feeding me?”

“I ate a lot of these things in the Imperial Palace.”

The words ‘It’s others’ leftovers,’ reached my throat, but I just swallowed it.

He also needed to eat more to grow taller.

In a hurry, I broke the bread and crumpled it into the boy’s mouth.

The boy blinked his eyes blankly, then chewed the bread that had entered his mouth.

When I saw that his eyebrows were raised slightly, I thought he found it delicious.

However, he did not eat actively, after that, he only ripped the bread twice and ate one bite.

‘You can’t do this. I need to feed you, Rixus…’ 

Even thinking about it, the bread was so delicious that I ate the soft bread well, to my embarrassment.

As Rixus tore a large piece of bread, he said,

“I can let you eat a lot of bread like this in the future, Candy.”

“How?”

“You can marry me.””

Pfft—

I spewed the milk right into his face.

“…….”

Rixus rolled his eyes and wiped the milk off with his hands.

Then he spoke in a fairly adult voice, as if he was an adult man.

“I’ll be responsible for you later.” (*)

“What did you say?”

“If you become the wife of the crown prince, you can become the empress later. What do you think? It’s an honor, isn’t it?”

I just stared as he said ‘what do you think, isn’t it an honor?’ because I was embarrassed.

On that subject, he was looking at me quite proudly.

‘……I can see the buds of a crazy man from an early age.’

As expected, crazy people did not sprout from nowhere.

I shook my head and ate bread.

What a proposal for a child.

Well, he was a boy who had been a sword genius since he was five.

He was also a man with the disposition to pull out roots in a short period of time once he decided on anything.

For someone like him, marriage was also decided at the age of a child.

‘Even so, he and I are natural enemies.’

‘Far from getting married…’

‘Don’t come to defeat me later.’

Despite my bland response, the boy actively appealed.

“If I get rid of the curse magician who made my eyes like this and make my place in the Imperial Palace, I will definitely come to propose.”

“Okay.”

I answered roughly as if a fly was rubbing against my ear.

The boy’s eyes sparkled at my answer. His ears turned red, perhaps because he was excited.

“…You’re saying it’s okay, right? I’ll keep my promise, Candy!”

“I don’t care.”

“I promise.”

I carelessly put salami ham on barley bread.

‘You don’t even know who I am.’

He probably wouldn’t know until the end. And I knew when it would be our end.

I planned to send Rixus away when the soldiers disappeared from the neutral country.

It was too risky to send him back  right now, but let’s take Rixus to Spinel…  

The Queen of Spinel, I didn’t know how my mother would turn out.

Anxiety was ingrained in my mind that my mother, who had told me to die, might have released the knights this time to really kill me.

After all, our miserable families left us with nowhere to go.

‘I’ll say, this is our cliff, the whole world wants to kill us and hope for our misfortune.’

But I didn’t speak frankly.

Without expressing it, I dressed him in his new outfit and laughed, saying he looked cool.

I knew it was soon time to break up, but I pushed those thoughts aside.

“Strange. I feel at ease when I see you.”

I suddenly confessed.

“As if I’m home.”

No matter who I met, that person was intimidated because of my odd eye… I felt comfortable standing in front of Rixus.

I felt like I was living alone like an island, but it felt like someone stepped onto my island.

This small hut was our island.

The boy licked his lips as he looked at me.

“Then think of me as home, Candy.”

He hugged me and whispered.

“So wherever you go, come back to me…”

(*) what I originally translated in the summary was “I won’t be responsible for you later” because that’s what MTL gave me + I thought Berylia was the one saying it. My apologies for that, I’ll edit the summary in the TOC and on NU.