If the emperor didn’t visit his residence, he wouldn’t hesitate to even put his life in line just to see the emperor. Yeon-bin’s behavior and temperament were so terrible that it was hard to tolerate. However, such a thing led to a saying that there was no one in this palace who could rival his love for the emperor.

Of course, the emperor didn’t think of it as love, but a horrific obsession and mental illness. Anyway, having his nameplate taken out did not differ from sky collapsing for Yeon-bin. 

Therefore, the old Yeon-bin would never accept this. He would definitely visit the emperor with his hair loosened up and wearing white clothes, making the emperor fed up with him by kneeling, didn’t eating and drinking until the emperor forgave him.

If the emperor felt like it, he could imitate Yeon-bin’s crying voice, ‘Your Majesty… I’ve done something bad…! Please forgive me…!’

That was why the emperor assumed. Because Yeon-bin might have held himself back yesterday, he clearly wouldn’t today. There was no doubt he would burst into Anjeong Palace as soon as the sun rose and began his clever self-reflection play again.

“… Yes. He didn’t come.”

Said Eunuch Oh, feeling the same odd feeling like the emperor. Yihan once again looked at the quiet courtyard with his lips closed straight, and soon climbed up the kiln. 

He remembered Yeon-bin’s thin back, trembling pitifully in front of him. Back then he was angry that he didn’t think about it, but looking back at it now, Yeon-bin had never bowed down in fear to him even once. Every time he remembered that back, he felt a strange emotion. 

The original Yeon-bin was someone who had to say what he wanted even when he was facing death. Even when he wailed, apologizing, he wasn’t the one who would seriously give in.

“Even so, how long will this be going on?”

Yihan muttered. The tricks done by Yeon-bin were always the same. Even if these few days he had been staying low, avoiding the emperor’s wrath, Yihan knew Hwawoon too well. 

In the end, he didn’t change because he was wary of the emperor’s wits, and a few days later-no-tomorrow, he couldn’t win against his nature and started a fuss.

“That wicked person…”

Therefore, the emperor found his action this morning to gather the court ladies and promising, or whatever that was to be very detestable. While he made a hardened expression, the kiln he was sitting in passed through the road of the palace in this springtime.

***

“Your Highness, how about drinking the tea while reading that?”

Ahjin said in a worried voice, putting a cup of tea next to Yeon-bin, who had already been focusing on the book for hours.

She was already surprised enough—‘book…?’—when Yeon-bin asked for a book he read in the past, but she was even more surprised with her master reading that book for real and didn’t take his eyes off it.

The book Hwawoon was reading was a book about women’s manners. A book which the emperor had ordered him to read in the past, a request for him to behave well as a concubine, but he never read it until now.

“Ah… thank you, Ahjin.”

Ahjin was at a loss whether she should be more surprised with her master reading a book or saying thanks to her while flashing a soft smile just a moment ago. 

Whether Hwawoon knew of Ahjin’s feeling or not, he took a sip of the prepared tea, then closed his eyes tightly before opening it back. He didn’t realize it while he was concentrating, but once he turned his gaze, it seemed like it had been a long time since his eyes and neck stiffened. 

Hwawoon originally liked to read popular novels. He wasn’t really interested in love stories between men and women, but he really liked the stories of heroes adventuring and saving the world. For Hwawoon, who had nothing else to do except work and training, reading novels was his only hobby. So he wondered if he could spend the boring time by reading books here, but he was a bit flustered when Ahjin suddenly brought him a book about women’s manners.

However, he thought understanding women’s manners would be a help to him as he would live in Hwawoon’s body and as the emperor’s concubine, so he concentrated on reading it this whole time. Hwawoon vowed to read a lot of books to learn the laws and rules as a concubine for the time being.