44. Everything Melted Away (2)
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Kingdom of Adolevit, capital city Tehalan.
This was not a city one could honestly describe as bright in atmosphere.
It had developed into a tourist destination, yes, but the weather was so gloomy and cold that it always left the city feeling dull and gray.
And yet, when Hong Biyeon returned after everything at the Levian Coast had come to an end,
Tehalan had changed.
‘……It’s beautiful.’
For the first time, Hong Biyeon looked upon Tehalan and thought of it as beautiful.
It had always felt like nothing more than chains wrapped around her.
And yet simply because the clouds had cleared away and warm sunlight was pouring down, it had become a city this lovely.
Or perhaps……
perhaps it only felt that way because she was being treated differently now than she had been before.
“It’s the princess’s carriage procession!”
“Move aside!”
“Princess!! Please look this way!”
“Just one photo, please!”
The rumor that the Third Princess of Adolevit had returned to the capital in a royal carriage had spread faster than wildfire, and now the streets were packed with citizens.
The clicking of camera shutters overlapped so densely that it no longer even sounded like noise.
And the cheers……
she had already heard enough of them in the cities she had passed through on the way here that they had become familiar.
Every main avenue leading toward Frost Palace was lined with citizens cheering Hong Biyeon’s name.
Levian Coast was not all that far from the capital, Tehalan, to begin with, so when the calamities had erupted there, the aftereffects had reached this city too.
In the middle of summer, the temperature had suddenly plunged below freezing.
The entire sky had turned crimson with ominous clouds, crackling with red sparks.
Having experienced something so horrific firsthand, people had no choice but to understand exactly what Hong Biyeon had accomplished.
Her carriage made a wide circuit through the capital before finally entering Frost Palace.
At the front gates of the palace, some five hundred members of the military band and ceremonial guard stood lined up in formation.
And this treatment was truly, utterly different from before.
In the past, there had been no welcome of any kind at all—not even enough for anyone to notice whether she had returned to the palace or not.
Of course, no matter how remarkable her achievements were, such a reception did not happen unless the queen herself ordered it.
That was why this spectacle held a very special meaning for Hong Biyeon.
It meant that Queen Hong Seryu had acknowledged her.
“The Third Princess now enters the palace!!”
A roar amplified by mana shook the heavens.
Pwoooooo—!
The grand blare of trumpets rang out, and then the military band began to play, stirring Hong Biyeon’s heart despite herself.
Even so, she did her best to maintain a calm, almost bored expression as she gazed quietly out the carriage window.
One day, all of this would become natural for her.
She must not get excited over it.
“Her Majesty is waiting for you.”
The moment she arrived, the queen’s royal guard stepped forward to receive her.
“I know.”
Hong Biyeon responded with a small tilt of the chin, silently ordering them to lead the way.
The guards bowed and guided her into the queen’s audience chamber.
“You’ve come.”
There, Hong Seryu greeted her.
She looked utterly worn down by exhaustion.
The dark circles beneath her eyes showed through even the makeup on her face, and the mountain of papers piled beside her made it clear just how much she had gone through.
Could it even be called fortunate, perhaps, that her punishment had stopped at only this after the scale of the blunder she had caused?
“Sit.”
If this had been the Hong Seryu of the past, she would not even have lifted her gaze from the paperwork.
But when Hong Biyeon arrived, the queen set aside the stack of documents, laced her fingers together, and met her eyes directly.
“Coffee?”
“You do know I don’t like coffee, don’t you?”
“……Apparently I didn’t. My apologies.”
After that, Hong Seryu said nothing for a long while.
Hong Biyeon simply waited.
With neither of them even touching coffee, the silence became unbearably awkward.
In the end, it was Hong Seryu who gave in first.
She let out a sigh and said:
“Regarding the previous matter…… I will offer you my sincere thanks.”
At those words—
Hong Biyeon felt her heart jolt.
She had never imagined it, not even in her dreams.
That Hong Seryu, of all people, would be the one to lower her head first.
Who could ever have expected that she would hear an apology from the queen so easily?
“I was wrong. And you corrected that wrong.”
“You controlled the Fire Spirit Flower for the first time in a thousand years. You melted away the curse of eternal winter at the Levian Coast. And……”
Hong Seryu spoke firmly.
“I must also acknowledge that, until now, I have acted unjustly toward you. In that regard as well, I wish to offer you my sincere apology. Can you accept it?”
One might have been tempted to say, How can she still sound so dignified when she was the one in the wrong?
But a queen had to be like that.
No matter what mistake she had made, it would have been beneath the dignity of the Queen of Adolevit to bow her head too low before someone else.
And in that sense……
Hong Seryu was, without question, the exact kind of queen Hong Biyeon herself wanted to become.
“Yes. I will accept it.”
And so Hong Biyeon also lifted her chin and accepted Hong Seryu’s apology in a flat, unruffled tone.
“I see…… thank you.”
The queen extended a book and a stack of documents toward her.
“From now on, you will receive the proper royal education that you were denied because of my personal feelings. I will draw no more distinctions in anything. Not in your education, nor your meals, nor your sleeping quarters—not even in the spoon you use. You will compete on equal footing with the First Princess.”
At last.
The suffocating, loathsome discrimination she had endured would finally end.
Hong Biyeon was just about to reach out for the papers when Hong Seryu added:
“However.”
“……”
“Before you take them, there is something I want to say.”
Hong Biyeon straightened her posture again.
The compensation was already hers.
Rushing for it now would only make her look cheap.
“Yes. Speak.”
“I owe you a debt that can never be repaid. And perhaps that is why I am belatedly doing something as embarrassing and pathetic as this.”
But then, Hong Seryu continued.
“I…… still hate you. That feeling was carved into my heart the moment my daughter died, and it seems I can no longer erase it.”
Hong Biyeon met the queen’s gaze without flinching.
Strangely enough……
even hearing once again that Hong Seryu hated her, she felt nothing now.
Whether Hong Seryu hated her or liked her, acknowledged her or not—
none of it mattered anymore.
“However, I no longer wish to let emotion rule me and drive me into irrational mistakes. So I will tell you something I have kept hidden from you until now.”
“A secret?”
As though she were saying something completely ordinary, Hong Seryu let the words fall in a flat, almost lifeless tone.
“All direct descendants of Adolevit die before reaching the age of thirty.”
“……Ah.”
“And children like you, born with talent for flame…… may struggle even to make it to twenty.”
It was like being struck in the chest with a hammer.
A heavy shock rippled through Hong Biyeon’s entire body.
And yet not even her fingertips trembled.
Was it because she couldn’t believe it?
No.
It was because, although she had never known for certain, she had already half suspected it.
“There is only one way to overcome that curse. Become the monarch, and receive the crown. That is why every Adolevit throughout history fought so fiercely. To become sovereign. To survive.”
Hong Seryu touched the crown on her head and murmured bitterly.
“In cases where the bloodline is inherited only faintly, as with your mother, it is possible to extend one’s lifespan slightly by renouncing all flame and magic. But that is both painful and dishonorable.”
What reason would a mage have to keep living after abandoning magic itself?
Who knew?
And yet Hong Biyeon’s mother had chosen exactly that.
The reason why, even after losing all chance of becoming queen, she had still chosen to live.
‘……No way.’
Something in Hong Biyeon’s chest sank sharply.
Her mother had always been harsh with her.
Not once had she looked at her warmly.
Every moment had been filled with brutal lessons and punishment.
Her mother, Hong Iyel.
She must have known.
About the terrible curse carved into the bloodline of Adolevit.
And that was why, the moment she understood that she herself could never become queen, she had begun to feel sorry for her child.
Because she had opposed the current queen, she had believed that neither she nor her child would have any place left within Adolevit, and that proper royal education would never be granted.
So instead……
she abandoned all royal duties and all magic, and became a professor at Stella.
“Ugh.”
Hong Biyeon grabbed a fistful of her own hair and said nothing.
Hong Seryu watched her, then said something else she should never have said.
“That is why, personally, I would rather you did not become queen.”
“……Are you really saying that again?”
“No. I am no longer foolish enough to let personal feelings make my judgments for me.”
Hong Seryu’s eyes were clearer than they had ever been.
“You…… could likely overcome the curse without the crown. If you succeeded in controlling the Fire Spirit Flower, then removing the curse engraved directly into your bloodline by the Incarnation of Fire should not be wholly impossible either.”
It was the first time Hong Biyeon had ever heard such a thing.
She sat there without responding.
Hong Seryu sighed and shook her head.
“Though I suppose saying any of this is pointless. You want to become queen, while the Second Princess shows no desire whatsoever to become queen……”
“Excuse me? Wait—what do you mean by that?”
The Second Princess, Hong Si-hwa, had no intention of becoming queen?
Impossible.
That woman had obstructed Hong Biyeon every step of the way as she pursued the throne.
She had even tried to kill her.
But Hong Seryu merely shook her head, as though she regretted saying something unnecessary, and rose from her seat.
“Take those documents and go. Summer vacation is nearly over, but I will make sure you receive the proper education you were meant to have.”
“……Understood.”
That brought the conversation to an end.
And so Hong Biyeon was forced to leave the audience chamber carrying a head full of unresolved questions.
“Princess. Shall we return directly to Cheongryeong Palace?”
The royal guards fell into step beside her as they spoke.
Since Yae Taerin had still not returned, Hong Biyeon had been moving around with them, but it still felt awkward beyond words.
“No. Let’s stop by the inner palace first. There’s someone I want to see.”
Since going back to Cheongryeong Palace right away would give her nothing to do, Hong Biyeon found herself thinking of Baek Yuseol, who should still have been staying in the inner palace.
She passed by the royal library and headed toward the private quarters where palace attendants stayed—
only to find that he had already finished preparing to leave.
“What is this?”
There was hardly any luggage.
The room had already been completely cleared out, and the only thing left was a single large travel bag standing neatly by itself.
And yet how had the atmosphere become this cold so suddenly?
Baek Yuseol gave an awkward laugh.
“Ah, I was going to tell you earlier, but you looked really busy…… My side of things is done too, so I should probably go. I still have things I need to take care of during the rest of summer vacation.”
“I see……”
The ‘things he needed to take care of’ were surely not the sort of simple errands any ordinary teenage boy could handle.
After all, even after going through an overwhelming catastrophe that she herself never wanted to experience again—
the moment he woke up, he was already preparing to leave for yet another dangerous task.
‘Don’t go.’
The words rose all the way to the tip of her tongue.
But she could not force them out.
Because she still……
was too lacking.
Far too lacking to walk beside Baek Yuseol and shoulder the burdens he carried.
‘Endure it.’
For now, she had to wait.
The day she became queen—
on that day, she would stand beside him in everything.
And yet……
Hong Biyeon disliked the thought of doing nothing but waiting in silence until then, so she spoke to him carefully.
“……Later. After you graduate from school, where are you planning to go?”
“Huh? I don’t know…… I haven’t really thought about it.”
“Then come back to Frost Palace.”
Those words had cost her an immense amount of courage.
She had thought and thought and thought about them before finally saying them aloud.
“This time, you won’t come back as some temporary palace servant. I’ll hire you as an official knight. You’ll become a direct royal guard knight serving the queen.”
“Queen Hong Seryu’s?”
“No! Queen Hong Biyeon’s!”
……Silence.
The moment the words left her mouth, Hong Biyeon herself realized just how unbelievably embarrassing they sounded.
Even she—bold as she always was—could do nothing but stare blankly ahead, as if her mind had stopped working entirely.
“Haha.”
Baek Yuseol broke that awkward silence with a bright, easy laugh.
Then, slinging his backpack firmly over his shoulder, he said:
“A queen’s knight, huh. That’d be way more honor than I deserve, but it’d definitely be a glorious position.”
“That……”
Hong Biyeon opened her mouth to say something, but Baek Yuseol finished first.
“But it’s not time yet. There are still too many things I have to deal with while I’m alive, and honestly, I don’t know whether I’ll be able to shoulder all of them or not. So when all those worries and burdens are gone……”
He passed by Hong Biyeon.
Then, in a small voice tinged with just a hint of a smile, he whispered:
“When that time comes, ask me again. As queen.”
And just like that, Baek Yuseol disappeared from view.
Hong Biyeon remained standing where she was, as if nailed to the spot, for a very long time.
Read only on MugenCodex.
It was an evening where the sunset falling across the girl’s face was exceptionally beautiful.
