Fake Cinderella

22. Husband and Father

"Your Highness and your Highness are in a very good mood and delight."

"Not too admirable.... but the Duke went out of his way this time of year to show his face."

(Something, I don't think it's my fault the disturbing air is flowing)

The worship was received in the living room where His Royal Highness met the guests privately. 'Private' is the wrong word to use, people over here.... because in the meantime it does not involve being a hall, although I think it is smaller than the room where I greeted His Majesty on my return.

Its ceiling is full of holes that are high and wide, and it's filled with air that makes me want to escape like some kind of nerve tickles.

(I didn't know the Duke and His Highness were close, Lilia)

With that, I gut Lilia in my heart.

No, maybe I just didn't say it because it's too obvious a fact for Lilia.

I hide my mouth with a fan of lace and take a small sigh.

The chair decorated with sculpture and jewelry is still big for me and has three cushions. I'm comfortable sitting because of it, but I'm not comfortable at all.

"Until recently, Ruthia and I were enjoying our morning tea time."

His Royal Highness joins his legs in an attitude that just says how disturbed he is.

I don't like this. Um, if you're not transforming into a refreshing yet subtle and magnificent version of the Prince, I might have fallen in love with you a bit.

I sigh in the shadow of a fan again.

But the Duke is also a sarcophagus, and he turns to me with a grinning smile, lightly through the overly disgusting words of His Royal Highness.

He looks a lot better than he did when he broke up at Elsevelt.

"Her Royal Highness said she liked sweets while staying at home."

"... Yes"

Oh, maybe your brother told you?

Could you have come all this way?

Wow, great job fast, brother.

It's only been about ten days, hasn't it? If I was bad, I would have used an early horse or something, to tell this story.

I may have done something sorry.

"Thank you for your hospitality… I have taken the craftsman with me so that Her Royal Highness can enjoy it whenever she likes"

(hehe...?

I wasn't sure what you meant when you said it. Why are you bringing in the craftsman? You mean make it on this occasion or something?

"That's an inspiring thing...... good for you, Ruthia"

"... eh, yes"

His Royal Highness said it in a sneer, so I nodded unexpectedly.

I know it's a good thing to say, but I don't know what that means.

I would like to revive the kitchen in Her Royal Highness's palace.

"... that's a tough story"

"I believe it is a story that does not differ from His Royal Highness..."

"Certainly not stingy"

Let's not say it around like that.

Why the kitchen? What the hell are you talking about?

"But the question is, can we sort out every construction person?"

"I'll do that for you. I will never imitate anything that would endanger Her Highness."

"For Elsevelt, we know that Rutia is irreplaceable.... but I don't doubt the words, but Ruthia was targeted because of what happened in the castle."

"With all due respect, Your Highness, it is also due to the impudence of the escort. Until now, we have not been allowed to come near Her Highness. When it comes to our castle, there are clues if we can't get escorts near our sides."

"I still don't intend to forgive you"

Excuse me. I'm not following the story at all.

What the hell are these people talking about?

I have no idea.

"With all due respect, Your Highness, Your Highness does not need to be forgiven. I know that forgiveness and forbearance are all of Her Highness's will."

His Royal Highness ironically distorts his mouth to the duke with a quiet grin in a polite tone until rude.

"Right, right. Rutia, I feel better."

"... how or nothing, I have no idea"

Something's slightly annoying.

You two, leave me. What are you talking about!

You can talk about it if it doesn't matter. But isn't that something that really concerns me?

Though the Duke looks at this one with a surprised look somewhere, I went through without worrying about it. Because there was something more important than considering the Duke's inner psyche.

"Weren't we talking about treats? That's why we're talking about craftsmen, we're talking about the kitchen, we're talking about the meantime."

"The Duke will give you the craftsman who made the confectionery you wanted. Even if you only get artisans, you can't make the key treats, so they're going to build a new kitchen with you."

Says His Highness softly.

Why do you look so flat, Your Highness?

"I said I wanted to eat sweets again, but I didn't say I wanted a craftsman or a kitchen"

I don't even remember that kind of thing, this kind of thing. Not at all.

"Is there a problem?

"Do you even care?

Your Highness and the Duke ask me in wonder.

(No, these people...)

No, you can't if you give up.

I'm not crazy.... maybe.

That's not what you're supposed to mean when you say that sweets want to eat again.

"... Could it be that wanting a treat means please give me that confectioner?

If that's what you mean, I think you've done something sorry.

"No."

"Not at all."

The two denied it completely.

"Then why, is that what you're talking about?

The two replied in the surround.

"What's the problem with the Elzevelt humans being yours?"

"It is only natural that our people should serve Her Highness."

Wow, you look the same, these people. Similar?

What's so unfriendly about you, fellow haters? Could be.

"So I wanted sweets and I didn't say I wanted that craftsman!

I just wanted to eat again, how could this happen?

"… if His Highness has not yet believed in our sincerity"

(Wow... so cut back. Oh no, the flow of this story)

The Duke lays down his eyes and shapes the look of a renunciation. I know you say it's a pose. Even if I know, I can't cut it off lightly that it's just a pose.

"Sincerely. I didn't know those words would come out of your mouth..."

I laugh so that His Highness can mock me.

Your Highness, you look like a tremendous bad guy when you do. No, because it's too cheap for a bad guy... as an atmosphere, I guess, Demon King, yeah.

Everyone will retreat, I'm sure.

"At least I want to be more honest with Her Highness than anyone else. … Your Highness has asked about your interest in making confectionery these days, about all the obstacles you are having, and I wanted to do everything I could."

So did you dedicate the craftsman and the kitchen?

I don't know what the lord of the great nobility thinks.

I don't know, but I don't think I can if they round up here.

"But if Her Royal Highness says she can't believe the confectioners she serves, we can't do that. That is also the result of the immorality of the minister..."

"That's not what I meant."

I believe you. I don't believe you. Because the problem is uneven.

"Your Highness..."

"That is not what I would say to Rutia without memory, Lord Dong"

His Highness opens his mouth quietly where the Duke is about to say something.

He has a chilling grin on his mouth.

(Wow, you look in a bad mood...)

Pathetic...... I have no idea His Highness said that just to help me.

(If you don't shelter the Duke in a good place...)

Until just now I was in the mood to just say a little disgust to the Duke, but now I'm in a genuine mood for something I don't know why.

"Ruthia doesn't remember it as a criterion for judgment. I don't want you to imitate that."

"I don't mean to be hairy"

"... Then why choose 'present'? We would have had as many opportunities as we ever had. Did you think you'd be allowed to do your job if you didn't remember? Think with your hands on your chest about what you did to Ruthia."

I didn't know what touched His Highness's anger, but His Highness was quiet...... but definitely angry.

Being calm without exaggeration is more reminiscent of the depth of that anger.

"Can't you remember? Remember the night Ruthia was born, when you said," What's your daughter? "When my three-year-old daughter wanted to see her father on the sick floor, did she ever refuse because that woman's birth was withheld? What happened when Mrs. Maraine died and Ruthia was alone?... Whether you forget it or Ruthia, I'll never forget it."

"Your Highness..."

I became worried about Your Highness. Because that word, which is blaming the Duke, seemed to be hurting His Highness.

"Sincerely... that's what I said when I married Effinia"

I say it out cold.

Effinia... that's my mother's name who died at the age of seventeen.

"... Your Highness, that's enough"

"Lutia."

With a face that looks unexpected, Your Highness and... and the Duke looks at me.

I gently touch His Highness's arm, which was placed on the elbow of the chair next door, and laugh at His Highness.

"I would be delighted if the treats from that time were here now. Because it was delicious... because I want you to be with Your Highness."

I think it would taste better if I ate it with someone I like.

"Do you forgive him?"

"It's not about forgiving or not forgiving.... Your Highness, I don't remember. I know because I heard that the Duke is my father. … but I don't really feel it"

I don't know him.

I knew him, because I forgot it.

"They say forgetting is worse than dying..."

Someone said that true death is not to be visited by the death of the flesh, but when forgotten from the memory of all.

"As long as I can remember, the person lives in my heart.... They say that's what memory is all about. I lost it. I wonder if that means that I died once."

His Highness stares seriously at my face.

(Oh well...)

I was saying it myself, and I thought I figured it out somehow.

"Listening to my mother, I almost cried. I didn't think my mother would float if I pardoned the Duke. But you didn't have to think that way. Because I don't remember..."

There was a passage in someone's poem that said it was more pitiful to be forgotten than to die.

You're absolutely right.

"My lord, my duke and I have blood connected. They say you're a parent and a child, and you don't doubt that.... but even if I ever called the Duke" father "in the future, it's just a way to call him, and there's no loving smell to call his family there.... we'll never be a family again."

I don't have the memory of him as a child.

Can you see how terrible that is for the Duke?

"Why?"

"I also forgot about Your Highness at that time… Your Highness and I have had new and many memories, albeit for a short time"

Different? Gently tilt your neck in the wind that

"... no, it's not"

"Because that's what I remember...... I think my Highness and I are family because we overlap important times together.... I don't think blood is family just because it's connected"

Asae lost her family early, but was never alone.

There were many acquaintances, and they were friends. I think he wasn't just a thin one, he had a proper relationship.

Though I sometimes thought it was dreary, it was not a drizzle where no one was, it was a drizzle I had lost, and it was a drizzle because I remember it.

(Because I know that my father and mother loved Maye...)

So, in a way, I can see now that even on my body like celestial loneliness was not really lonely.

"Me and the Duke, unfortunately, won't be spending any more time in the form of 'family'. I don't remember the Duke who was my father and now my family is His Highness...... To the Duke, I am very sorry for that."

I'm sorry. I retain the desire to say so. As long as I am me, he has no way of getting his daughter back again.

The Duke of Elsevelt looks straight at me.

I'll take it straight.

Strangely enough, my heart was quiet.

"... I didn't even have memories to forget if I wasn't my father"

Your Highness tells you in a grumpy voice.

Are you still in a bad mood after this?

I think you're the one who can't help it, and I also feel kind of weird.

I wonder what this mood even seems adorable.

"I don't know that. Because it was lost in that winter lake... I am here now, and I have no particular interest in the Duke. So it's all coming up. … now I am delighted with the Duke's favor"

"… Your Highness"

I know I'm saying something a little sloppy right now.

With this argument, the Duke must continue to show favor with me.

"Please do as Your Highness sends you."

I'm not sure what the details are, so I'll take care of it. I told him.

I'm not willing to take it personally. But I also feel that it won't. Probably because there's some kind of thought in those two, and that seems to be a reason I don't know.

No, I'd be glad to have the kitchen, and skilled artisans are welcome.

But...... Seems like I've said it many times, because all I wanted was a treat!

(... Next time, be careful what you say)

I never dreamed a word of sweets would develop like this.

Where the hell did I go wrong?

I want someone to tell me.

"... rutia"

The Duke and His Royal Highness again paid for their disgust, and in the end, the kitchen meant renovation, not new architecture.

It wouldn't take so much to renovate the room that was the kitchen before, and the number of craftsmen would be small. The craftsmen were carefully selected by the Duke, and during the period of the work they settled by lodging in the servant's room at His Highness's Palace and ending it in the shortest possible time.

They'll have more escorts in the meantime. I thought I'd do more escorts, but I didn't tell you because it would make it easier.

As for the craftsman, he confirmed his intention again, and if he wished, he would work.

Working for my palace means that my daily life is exposed to strict surveillance. I can't do it unless I'm ready.

Her Highness was finally convinced that if anything happened to her, the Duke would take responsibility.

"Lutia."

(Totally......)

I'm a little mentally tired.

Again, I thought that one thing about my mother was that she was deeply shadowed even where she didn't know it.

In time, I want to ask someone right.... to those who are not royal palace people or elsevelt people, if possible.

"Yes?"

It makes me nervous to realize they're calling me by my first name.

"... are you mad?

"Am I?

It was His Highness who was angry, wasn't it? and tilt his neck small.

"I... I'm not mad at anything"

Lie.

"But I wasn't in the mood."

"That's... because I hate that guy"

"... is that all?

"Oh."

Well, that's fine.

"... a little angry though"

Your Highness takes me seriously.

"Because you two are so close"

chuckled and I laughed. Sora already has a full smile.

"... we're not close"

"You say you're close enough to fight, Your Highness."

"Not good!

"You don't have to hide it"

"Hide it, etc. No!

Ah, rare. His Royal Highness is mucky.

"I was jealous because you had a conversation or a belly show where I don't know"

"There's nothing that makes you jealous. Never, and never will be! There!!!

His Royal Highness declares full of power.

"I'll leave you to that,"

His Royal Highness will cease.

If we hunt him down too much, His Highness is going to run out the other way. In that case, I laughed even more because I thought it would be terrible.

"When we have a new kitchen, we'll have as much breakfast as we can."

I guess we'll start with breakfast. By the way, breakfast at that time, with my decision to prepare! That can could come out again if His Royal Highness prepares it.

I don't want to start having that conversation with His Royal Highness about "Today's breakfast is portable food for the Northern Division" or "The southern ones taste sweet with jerky".

His Royal Highness said a lot, but all he said was one word in his mouth.

"... no problem"

I was very pleased with the results achieved today.