Favored By The Villain

<Episode 174>

I spent quite some time trying to understand what Elizabeth meant. It was because what she was saying felt completely unconnected to me.  

‘but wait, this means….’ 

“Is your highness saying that you will personally help me use my abilities?”  

“Yes. Do you know you’re making me say this a third time?” 

Elizabeth answered in a reproachful tone, but things would have gone similarly if she’d been in my shoes. Since… 

“Is that possible?” 

If someone else can bring out a person’s ability, doesn’t that mean everyone would be able to use theirs? Even if there was a difference in power, I wouldn’t be as helpless as I am in the palace as part of the nameless royals if it was so. 

Elizabeth immediately caught onto what I’d been speculating and crossed her arms. 

“It won’t work if you don’t have the potential in the first place, but it’s not impossible.”  

Elizabeth raised her hand as she spoke. I could see a sharp light splashing from the tips of her fingers. 

“Are you aware that there are cases where even a blessed person can’t manifest their ability at times if they don’t know how to use it properly?”  

There’s nothing to lose when you know nothing at all. I don’t have the slightest clue on how to use my abilities.  

When I nodded, the spark on Elizabeth’s hand grew a little bigger. 

“I’ll show you how. After that, it’s all up to you.”  

“Wait, how…”  

While I was recounting Elizabeth’s words, she told me why she had planned this. 

“Lidan Serger guessed your ability, didn’t he?”  

…that story is already over, isn’t it? It’s not that I’m not aware of what Lidan expects of me, but Aurora has already found the solution to that problem.  

I answered with a suppressed groan. 

“Your highness, do you mean…”  

“Yes, he asked me directly. To help with the manifestation of your powers.”  

The words opened my eyes wide. 

I didn’t know Lidan would ask Elizabeth for such a favor, and that Elizabeth would agree to do him a favor in the first place.  

‘Didn’t you two not get along well?’  

They were two people who sometimes looked at each other as if they hated each other beyond the level of simple squabbling. Mainly Elizabeth.  

Lidan seemed to veil his feelings with a smile, but Elizabeth expressed them openly, making it difficult for me to understand this. 

But Elizabeth claimed that he’d asked her for a  favor; to help me. This was something I couldn’t comprehend.

“It certainly felt nice to make sarcastic remarks at him while he asked me to make some concessions for the help, Hah! Well, even it wasn’t for him, I would’ve helped you with this anyway.”

Elizabeth snorted as if laughing at Lidan and looked straight at me. Her eyes had a more serious glow than they had before. 

“Even if I help you manifest your abilities, it won’t matter if you can’t control them.”  

“…….” 

The wind blew again. Elizabeth’s sparkling blonde hair did not lose its light in the slowly rising sandstorm. 

 As I watched her fluttering hair from far away, Elizabeth continued with a slightly red face. 

“I don’t think you’re unaware of it, but yes. The first time I looked for you, it was because of Siaphyl and Lidan’s strange behaviour. After that, I found something latent in you – something that hadn’t yet developed, but its existence pulled me to you, and I tried to keep you by my side. I don’t deny it.”

Something latent in me. It was something I hadn’t understood too clearly- and yet the other Kraidens had known it all along. 

Elizabeth, too, felt something from me and asked me for help. She’d asked me to stay with Rain.

Unlike what Elizabeth said, I did not know all of this fully.

“That’s the way I am. I thoroughly separate what’s useful to me from what’s not, and leave only pieces of value next to me…and I do not think it’s wrong. I believe it is right, and the best way to move forward.”

Elizabeth is always dignified and supreme. Many people want to follow and serve her.  

But all she has around are, as she says, the very few people she needs. And I hadn’t anticipated I would be one of them.  

“I thought you too, might be included in the blueprint I’ve drafted for the future. Even now, the general idea remains the same. Though I haven’t confirmed your potential yet.”

Elizabeth was speaking calmly, but somehow it felt there was a sense of unease surrounding her. Cassian’s words shook not only me, but also Elizabeth and the others. 

But it was necessary – just like a strong wind is required to strike the fruit for it to ripen.  

Even if it’s confusing right now, everything will be in order after this wind passes. 

I became even more convinced of this when I saw Elizabeth regaining her rhythm as she spoke.

“But even if the potential I saw from you turns out to be vain, it doesn’t matter now. Of course, I value useful people, but you don’t have to…”

“…….”   

“Oh well, I mean something like that or whatever.”

Elizabeth, who’d up till now been talking without avoiding my eyes, somehow turned away. Her tied up hair shook, revealing her blushing neck.

She’s usually straightforward and confident, but when she’s not like that, it’s easy to notice things. Especially when she’s not being honest with herself. 

I opened my mouth when I saw the back of Elizabeth’s hand fanning her burning neck.

“So, you wish to tell me ‘You are the exception.’”  

Elizabeth turned her head back and looked at me with wide eyes. It seemed to ask whether it was necessary for me to point it out like that, but she didn’t deny it.

“At first, you were interested in me because of my potential, but now it doesn’t matter to you whether I have the abilities you thought I did or not.”

“Well, yes!” 

It made me laugh a little when I saw Elizabeth strongly affirming my words. I didn’t hide my chuckle as I said, 

  “Then, why do you want to help me express my ability? It wouldn’t matter to you anyway.” 

I didn’t ask this because I doubted Elizabeth’s sincerity. I just wanted to be clear about all this. 

Elizabeth narrowed her eyes and raised her chin proudly, perhaps because she’d notice this factor as well.

“Oh, isn’t it better than nothing?” 

“What?” 

“As I said earlier, I like competent people. If you do end up having a special ability, then…”  

“Then you’ll have a reason for liking me?”

“……!” 

Phang! If like in cartoons, where there was a sound effect for someone’s face exploding due to the heat of embarrassment, existed here, it would definitely ring about now for Elizabeth.

I watched Elizabeth, who was red and bubbling. She didn’t say anything, though she looked as if she was about to yell.   

In other words, it meant that she did not deny it again this time. 

I measured the line that I could cross so Elizabeth wouldn’t actually explode.

‘Is it okay to go a little further?’  

Then it was time to ask Elizabeth questions that would make her even more shy.

“Then, why do you like me so much that it doesn’t matter to you whether I have special abilities or not?”

Elizabeth flinched every time I said the word ‘like’. She is always confident, but she seems shy about what she favors.  

However, despite her shyness, she doesn’t lie.

I tilted my head, waiting for an answer to return. Then, Elizabeth murmured,. 

“You…are quite brazen today.”  

“Yes.” 

“….” 

Elizabeth mumbled as if she had lost the words to answer, then lowered her gaze and said quickly. 

“I don’t know.”

“What?” 

“I don’t know either! How do you end up looking cute when you’re so dull and obtuse?”  

“Woah- that’s…”

I was the one who asked, but why did it become difficult to meet Elizabeth’s eyes after hearing the answer?

The sandstorm that blew again filled the silence between us. 

I thought the awkward silence would never end, but Elizabeth surprisingly shouted from the other side.

“Hah, so will you accept help from me or not?”

Oh, yeah, that’s the beginning of this conversation. 

I answered without thinking long. 

“I’d be happy to receive it.”

Is it because the answer was too fast? Elizabeth stared me in the face. 

So I turned my eyes to the side and gave her an answer.

“As your highness said, there will be no harm in an ability being there. Even if I don’t end up having such a thing, I’ve lived well without it from the start anyway, so I wouldn’t mind it.”  

And what Lidan said before bothered me still. It is no good to reach a conclusion before I even try.

As he said, I think we can think about it after we see if it works or not. 

“Sigh, you really are…”  

“……?” 

“All right, focus from now on.” 

Elizabeth quickly transformed into a strict teacher. In front of her, having become a lamb-like student, I had no choice but to nod. 

And on the day I was being taught in Sparta by my good teacher, the dead land sprouted.