57. How to Endure Embarrassing Past Moments

‘She really does look like pudding.’

Darius pulled the blanket up over the sleeping Anette’s body. After visiting the foreigners’ tent, Anette seemed somewhat dazed.

〈If you came here, it means someone went there.〉

〈What do you mean?〉

Was that statement really so shocking?

Foreigners. They never blend into the North.

Their kingdom had been established in the mountains even before Inkheart claimed the northern territory, and they claimed they wandered because they were waiting to return to their homeland someday.

“It’s a vagrant’s lie.”

Though they allowed foreigners to come and go in hopes they would integrate into the North due to population shortages, anyone who had lived in Inkheart territory for a long time knew they were unpleasant beings.

〈Foreigners see things differently from us. That’s why they can survive in the mountains.〉

That’s what the previous Grand Duke of Inkheart had said.

Was it really true? Darius had his own small doubts.

But perhaps Anette might have another secret hidden away.

“That’s okay too.”

If Anette had secrets she wanted to hide, he would protect those secrets as well.

* * *

……ette.

……Anette.

……this…… still power……

Zzzzzzzzzz.

‘I feel like someone kept calling my name in my dream.’

“Did you sleep well?”

I blinked my eyes.

“I kept my promise.”

Darius proudly showed me our hands that he hadn’t let go.

Yes, thank you. But that’s not what’s important right now……

“Owwww!”

“……”

“Aaaah!”

“A-Anette?”

The morning after our wonderful date brought a splitting headache.

“Owwww!”

“Anette, are you okay?”

“No, I’m not okay. It hurts!”

Even the slightest movement made my brain feel like it was shaking.

I was desperate enough to see quack doctor Owen, but unfortunately, our castle had no doctor because I had ruined medieval medicine.

Schmidt, who had been working tirelessly to spread sound medical knowledge in the nearest village to Inkheart Castle, arrived after Darius was forced to go to work despite looking at me with eyes dripping with concern.

“Madam, here’s a willow-based painkiller.”

To think that I, who came from a world where aspirin was commonplace, had to drink willow tea.

Schmidt’s prescription was effective this time too, but it didn’t completely remove my sorrow.

Am I from the Joseon Dynasty? Drinking willow tea and enduring?

“Such a severe headache, what exactly happened yesterday?”

“She ate street food of questionable hygiene, went to places she doesn’t usually go, and also met foreigners.”

“Foreigners? Did you go inside their tent?”

Schmidt nodded knowingly.

“They use hallucinogens without a second thought. They gather them from the mountains, so we don’t even know what they’re made of.”

Then he observed me carefully again.

“Still, this shouldn’t cause such pain…… You must have a particularly sensitive constitution, madam. But will this be enough? I wonder if we need stronger medicine.”

“No, this is fine. It seems to be working. Thank you so much as always.”

After I downed the willow tea in one shot and returned to normal despite complaining about my headache until just moments ago, Schmidt looked dumbfounded.

His expression said, ‘Could it be that I, an ordinary person, have such amazing medical skills?’

As if.

‘It’s just my fake illness.’

It’s true that I had a headache when I woke up, but it’s gone now. Nevertheless, I had to pretend that the headache was still severe.

Because I couldn’t bear to look Darius straight in the face.

When I woke up this morning and Darius waved our joined hands in front of me.

The memory of my shameful behavior last night flashed vividly before my eyes, and my mind went blank.

What.

Have.

I.

Done.

Even if I felt like a rootless, lonely soul dropped into this world, there’s a limit—why did I act so pathetically there?

Why cling to Darius? Is some non-existent connection suddenly going to pop up?

‘You crazy girl!’

When I should be cutting off any growing feelings, I went and watered them instead.

Since when did I love and miss Earth so much!

‘Well, looking at this reality where willow tea is offered as a painkiller does make me miss my original world a bit!’

At this rate, even if Darius gives me lovey-dovey eyes and says, “Why were you so nice to me? Why did you tame me when you had no intention of taking responsibility!” I’d have nothing to say. I’m a player and a tease. Sob sob sob.

“Sniff. When will we hear news of Evangeline.”

It’s been quite a while since I asked the temple priest I met then. If there’s no contact by this week, I should tell Barbarossa to find out more details as soon as he returns.

“Ah, this was supposed to be henna.”

Come to think of it, the pattern drawn at the foreigners’ tent yesterday had completely smeared. What was that about opening the path of the soul and giving wisdom? It didn’t even last a day.

* * *

Tiberius territory. The territorial war broke out as if it had been waiting for Anette to form a mercenary group.

Count Tiberius, who had no idea until the end that war would break out, was caught off guard by Viscount Shire’s rebellion and requested military aid from the neighboring Inkheart Grand Duchy.

However, Inkheart refused to get involved in another territory’s conflict. Officially.

〈Just a hundred mercenaries! What kind of force is this!〉

In the original story, Darius had led thousands of soldiers and participated directly in the Tiberius territorial war, but this time, the mercenary group formed by Anette and led by Barbarossa would participate.

〈The great lord of the North cannot get involved in a mere conflict between a count and a viscount. But don’t worry. Even if the Shire viscounty tries to bring more troops from the rear, the Inkheart Grand Duchy won’t allow passage.〉

Anette, who had aimed to create her own force separate from the Inkheart Grand Duchy, ultimately failed to create a secret mercenary group directly under the Grand Duchess.

〈……I don’t know. If I keep this any more secret, I might really fight with my husband. But now that it’s come to this, since the mercenary group has become a subsidiary of the Grand Duchy, people will gather well.〉

The newly formed mercenary group had no official ties to the Inkheart Grand Duchy.

Yet both the funds that established it and the people within it were closely bound to the duchy.

Its ranks included former soldiers of Inkheart, as well as those who had failed the knight exam but still possessed advanced martial training.

By granting these individuals dual identities, the Inkheart Grand Duchy effectively expanded its forces while escaping outside scrutiny.

‘Did the madam plan this too? If so, she doesn’t need a strategist. But when I first met her, her intention was clearly to make a profit for herself.’

Barbarossa thought as he swirled his bottle of alcohol on the castle wall at night.

After returning to Inkheart Castle, Barbarossa got along quite well with the former knights.

He had the talent to be quite cheerful when he wanted to be.

〈Lady Anette? She’s the one good thing that nasty South ever did for us. Sending someone like Lady Anette to be our madam. She’s definitely an angel descended from heaven.〉

He had much to say about that, but the testimonies that followed were even more ridiculous.

〈The two of them are truly an exemplary couple for everyone. When I see how madam looks at our lord, it’s full of love.〉

〈They have such good harmony. Look at our lord. Since madam arrived, he doesn’t show it, but his face has blossomed. A person really needs a wife.〉

〈Full of love? They were openly bickering in front of me?〉

〈The lord got angry at madam in front of you? That’s impossible!〉

〈You must have seen wrong. Or it was a lovers’ quarrel typical of their age.〉

These sword-wielding fools clearly believed only what they saw before their eyes.

〈You really haven’t seen my husband’s face? If you had, you wouldn’t say that.〉

When Barbarossa had thrown meaningless flirtation at Anette, she had indeed sharply cut him off by bringing up her husband.

But Anette’s attitude when mentioning her ‘handsome husband’ seemed more like stating an objective fact rather than speaking out of love.

‘Madam is tremendously fond of the lord?’

How could that face be the expression of a newlywed bride infatuated with her groom?

〈First it was me, then Daniel and Lucion, and now that man.〉

〈Anette was quite the flirt.〉

Rather.

The one who was infatuated was.

〈Is that person Anette’s true love?〉

The lord.

That brief moment when their eyes met. When he received that gaze, he felt a chill he had never experienced on any battlefield.

Darius Inkheart. The new lord of the North whom he had never properly seen when he was in the knight order.

Although he had disguised it as a joke, his romantic interest in Anette had been somewhat genuine, but the moment he saw Darius’s warning, he realized.

If he didn’t withdraw that interest, he would soon be truly finished.

“They’re an interesting couple to watch.”

Barbarossa shrugged his shoulders. They’re publicly known as an incredibly lovey-dovey couple, but in reality, the woman was drawing a line while the man knew this and was desperate.

‘But you know.’

Is there any reason to push him away?

Barbarossa scratched his cheek.

Just as that woman treated him roughly but gained a reputation as a kind lady among the territory’s people, she could act differently in front and back, being kinder to the lord in front of others than usual. When they’re alone, she might act awkwardly shy. But……

〈What are you talking about! This guy only likes married women!〉

‘Even while going around saying she was the Inkheart Grand Duchess, she didn’t seem to think of herself as the lord’s wife. That woman.’

It was similar to the expression Barbarossa made when looking at an ordinary family.

Envious, knowing it’s good.

But with an attitude of ‘That will never be mine.’

A clear understanding that it would never belong to him.

‘That doesn’t make sense.’

Would it be too much speculation to say she seemed ready to abandon her position as the Inkheart Grand Duchess without any regret whenever the time came?