I Don’t Want to Be a Lady

It was a cool autumn night. Even the moonlight was still. At the canyon, in front of the thorn bush, a group of figures held their breath under the canyon’s shadow. 5 imperial knights, including Sir Silver, and 5 knights of Duke Krow. It was small, but also a large number to sneak into the enemy’s land.

“There is no time, so let’s go without delay.” Sir Silver said to the knights of the Duke of Krow.

Nod. One of Duke Krow’s five knights nodded and indicated that he would follow his instructions.

Silver’s gaze passed him and moved to one of the men behind him. A man with a strangely vague impression who seemed to have no presence if he existed. He stayed away from the other knights for a few days on the way to the border. The other knights didn’t particularly stop or pay attention to him. They only simply moved together.

Is he a knight? He was an ordinary one. No, he was so ordinary that it bothered him. Silver never missed a single detail, and his senses were telling him to keep an eye on that man.

Silver looked at him carefully again and turned his eyes away. This is a strange one. If I just turn my head, his face disappears from my head. Even he, who had lived as a knight for 35 years, couldn’t remember that man’s features. If he even felt that much, perhaps no one else even remembered seeing that man.

“Our mission is to rescue Duke Kaien and Baroness Devit. Keep that in mind.”

Silver spoke to them as if to warn them, but they were silent.

* * *

“What tu do?~ What tu do?~”

The tent didn’t collapse as the soldiers clung to it. Still, the storage cabinet tipped over as the pillar titled, breaking the bedside table and pottery around it, tossing them to the floor. In addition, Dondon let out a terrifying scream when she saw the armrest of her sofa, which was bent as if the tiger had hit it.

“Kyaa! Dis sofa I’ve bin eagerly waiting for a wole year!”

Behind Dondon, who sobbed while holding the armrest of the sofa, Paku made a strange expression.

“I can’t muv on like this.”

Just in time, as the tiger escaped from the cage and went on a rampage, the person who damaged the sofa wasn’t charged, no, he wasn’t on the list of suspects. Paku glanced at Charter’s face, then smiled in vain. Charter’s gaze, who looked at Dondon with disdain, was incredibly infuriating.

Should I make a scene? Paku couldn’t help but think that if he did it, he could take out that despicable man from here.

“That’s enough. Why don’t you go back to the emperor?” said me, exhausted, as I sat back on the sofa.

It had been an hour already. Dondon was sobbing as if mourning for each of her things that had been broken.  

“How can yu say that when yu see my pretty baby ruined like dis?”

I frowned at her resentful gaze as she looked at me like I was the most heartless human being. “I’ll buy you a sofa like this, so stop doing that and get up.”

Dondon’s bright yellow eyes sparkled. “Lik this? Did yu say lik this?”

There was not a single word spoken about the scars on her older brother’s face, yet she was mourning for the loss of her things, just like a loyal subject mourning the loss of a nation. It was so absurd that it made my blood boil. What on earth did Prince Paku believe in such a person?

I sighed deeply and said, “As soon as I return to Harpion, I will make a more shiny one and send it to you, so please stop crying.”

Immediately after that, the flames in Dondon’s eyes faded, and warm warmth began to circulate. “Something more siny?”

“Yes.”

“Okey then.”

Dondon stood up as if he hadn’t cried before, and Charter looked at her with a tired face.

“So, wu on earth has the most expensiv room?”

Dondon never forgot.

“Why? If I tell you, will you chase after them and steal it?”

“How did yu know.”

“…Let’s not talk.”

If I told her, she would invade the border immediately. If it was Dondon, she would destroy the border with her abnormal greed.

“By the way, what are yu going to do when you meet the emperor?”

Are you curious about that now? I looked at Dondon again with my eyes and replied in a calm tone. “To have a conversation.”

“Umm. Impossible. Dat is impossible.”

“What?”

I jumped up from my seat and shouted, glaring at Dondon. “You! Surely you promised to take me to the emperor if I pulled the Chewin Kingdom army out of the canyon.”

“I did.”

“But what? Impossible? Are you hitting me in the back of the head?”

“What? Back of your head? When did I? I didn’t hit yu. Luk, I’m sitting down here quietly,” said Dondon while raising both hands.

“No! Not that back of the head… You tricked me!”

When I shouted with my face flushed in anger, Dondon blushed and responded.

“I feel insulted! I didn’t trick yu! How dare this impudence try to mok me?”

“What are you saying now? You little shit!”

“I’m not little!”

“You’re little!”

“No!”

“No way!”

Buzz! Buzz!

Charter pressed his temple gently with his fingers, and Paku held his forehead.

“I didn’t trick yu! I said I’d take yu to the emperor. I didn’t say I wuld led yu talk!”

“Huh? Uh… you did.”

Dondon certainly never made such a promise.

“Apologize!”

“What?”

“How dare yu to frame me as a swindler! Apologize! Apologize!”

“Uh… sorry.”

As if lighting a match to a night engulfed in flames, the situation erupted into chaos, as if it would explode at any moment. Overwhelmed by the intensity, I hesitated and quickly apologized.

“Huff, huff. How much I hate swindlers…”

Dondon, the incarnation of greed, had a history of being victimized numerous times by swindlers who seduced her with the words ‘There is only one in the world,’ ‘You can’t get it again,’ and ‘You can’t live without buying it now.’ Of course, those guys were already lying down quietly on the ground somewhere on the continent. Still, thinking about how she was deceived and hurt, she wanted to dig them up again and beat them several times more.

I felt something very wrong when I saw there were tears in Dondon’s eyes. It became ambiguous to ask anything more, so I had to swallow my anger inside.

I took a risk without hesitation because you could help me to meet the emperor. The only thing you have to do is do as I said, right? Ugh. I’m frustrated.

Unexpectedly, only the prince of the Chewin Kingdom was spared. I, who didn’t want to see others doing well for no reason, felt sick.

Damn it. It’s my fault for not making a specific request. No one else could have thought I would make this mistake…

I stared blankly at the ceiling in a rush of remorse. Huh. Look at this woman. Where on earth could you find a gold leaf on the tent ceiling? Somehow, it was more dazzling than the outside. I couldn’t help but admire Dondon’s excessively obsessed material greed.

But wait! It makes no sense. If you take us to the emperor, how could the emperor not even try to talk with the enemy’s commander-in-chief and a noble in command? This little shit… What do you mean you’re not a swindler? You were even very good at it.

I asked, staring at Dondon with cold eyes. “Why is it impossible?”

Right. Let’s hear some excuses. Depending on her words’ validity, the pocket knife’s purpose under my insole would change. I felt the string that connected to the insole with my toes.

Dondon glanced at Paku at my question, lifted her shoulders, and said, “Our emperor doesn’t talk. He jus kill them. He kills when dey makes eye contact. He kills dhem, if he feels bad. Even if he feels good, he kills dhem. He jus kill dhem all.”

“What bullshit.” I thought that Dondon was making fun of me. My toes, gripping the string, were full of strength.  And at that moment.

“It’s true.”

It was Paku.

“What?”

“It will be difficult to have a conversation with the emperor. Unless he’s moody or bored.”

“What if he’s not moody or bored?”

Charter and I stared still at Paku.

“You’re going to die. Before you could even see his face.’

“…”

An awkward silence fell.

“…Why are you bringing it up about it only now?”

“…”

Huh. These brother and sister swindlers!

“Ha. I didn’t see it that way, but did you really intend to turn us over as pawns?”

“No.”

Paku felt wronged. And my guts crumbled.

“I’m crazy! I knew no one in the world could be trusted, but I stupidly believed in the prince of the enemy empire. I did that? I couldn’t do that unless I was crazy, right?”

Arianne asked Charter as if asking for consent, and Charter thought. If I say yes, she’ll say I’m treating her like a crazy person, and if I say no, I’ll be scolded for not answering. Charter was a wise man who knew when to keep his mouth shut.

The answer came from another man’s mouth. “I will help you meet the emperor somehow.”

“I will help you somehow meet the Emperor.”

“Took you a long time.”

“With the risk of my life—”

“Just be honest!”

I cut off Paku’s words. “You two aren’t close, right? The person who stabbed you in Harpion, he was from the Kelteman Empire, right?”

I could infer that he was a Kelteman from the man’s accent, which sprang from the alley where Paku had been attacked last time. And I realized. Until now, I hadn’t cared about it because I didn’t have any reason to bring it up, but now that things have turned like this, it was a very important matter. That proved that Prince Paku’s position in the Kelteman wasn’t very good.

At the same time, Paku’s face hardened. It was because he remembered Tarik, whom he had been trying so hard to forget.

“What does dat mean? Stabbed? By Kelteman too?”

When Dondon asked Paku for an explanation, Paku bit the soft flesh in his mouth. “Yes.”

“Wow! Who on earth is he! Who did dat! I’m going to catch bastard right away—”

  Dondon recalled her half-brothers one by one. Yollo? No. He’s busy playing and eating. So, is it Kangkar? No, he’s just a guy who only does what the emperor tells him to do. Then, by any chance, is that an idiot?

(It’s already taken care of. By the emperor.)

Dondon’s eyes grew bigger at Paku’s words.

(What? Shit. Why is that shit here? No way! You mean the emperor ordered it?)

Dondon’s face soon changed from astonishment to acceptance.

(I knew it. That crazy shit is nothing but a brute… But what are you doing now? Are you going to go even though you know the emperor is after you? Are you taking those scoundrels with you?)

(I promised. To take them to the emperor.)

(Do you want to die?)

(…)

When Paku didn’t say anything, Dondon’s bright yellow eyes revealed her anger again.

(You said you would think about ascending to the throne. You don’t care about me? Don’t you know what will happen to me if you die like that?)

Paku still looked at his feet without saying a word. What could he say? Just like she said, he was about to let go of the expectation of his younger sister, who believed in him.

But now, Paku wanted to end all this. A cruel and harsh life. How many people must die for the emperor to be satisfied?  He probably would continue to kill and destroy without ever knowing the satisfaction. That’s what the emperor was like.

The emperor intended to put Paku on the bloody throne. But Paku refused to do so. And the price of rejecting him is, of course, death. He wasn’t afraid of death. Rather, he was more afraid to stay alive. As long as he was alive, he had to constantly kill someone.

“I don’t know what you two are talking about, but it’s noisy. If you don’t want to die at my hands right now, why don’t you bring us to the emperor right away?”

Arianne’s clear and refreshing purple eyes overflowed with cold air. It was a clear warning. No, a murder notice?

Paku swallowed his dry saliva. To be honest, he wasn’t afraid of death. However, he was afraid of the woman in front of him. It would be better to die at the hands of the emperor. He thought his whole shape wouldn’t remain in that woman’s hand.

“We will set off right away. Dondon, I don’t force you. Give me some soldiers.”

Dondon, who was biting her nails nervously, lowered her hand and said as if she had made up her mind. (I’m going with you. You do as you please, and I will do my own thing.) Her eyes shone brightly.

And there was Charter, who was lost in thought with an unknown expression on his face