TLNTAAM Chapter 20

You Are Always the Strange One to Me

I'd been more or less happy.

Even with overwork, even exhausted, the world had felt worth living in. Even alone, even when relatives showed up wanting money, even when a relationship ended—I genuinely loved being alive. I have a home and a car. Being an heiress is pretty great. Free money, the best! But then—they all come running because none of it was earned by my own hands. You were free when you arrived, but you're not free once you're in my life. That money was my parents'. Did you really think I was going to hand it over?

I loved too many things to want to die.

I loved coffee with a good aroma. Cake with cream cheese in it was genuinely delicious. On days off I'd sometimes sprawl on the sofa in a patch of sunlight and take a nap.

The memory of those sweet, fully-stretched-out moments surfaced, and I smiled a little. Watching dust drift through sunlight while bringing a mug of cold coffee to my lips. In moments like those, doing nothing at all was fine. Just breathing through time was enough.

'I really didn't want to die.'

And yet I died.

A laugh broke through. The small escaped laugh grew, until I was laughing with tears at the corners of my eyes. I knew I should stop, but I couldn't hold back the sound.

"Why are you laughing?"

"Because I can't obey Your Majesty's command."

I didn't know why the king was saying this. But Your Majesty—that genuinely isn't something in my control. Even in a place with good public order, a comfortable life, I died that easily. Here there's nothing to even compare.

"I might get swept up in something strange and die..."

Or simply fail to watch my step and that would be that.

"Someone might just decide to kill me, mightn't they?"

Above all else, you might be the one who kills me.

I wiped the tears that had slipped down from laughing and looked at him. Dear King was wearing an expression of clear displeasure.

"Who would kill you?"

I couldn't say you. Setting aside the Grand Duke business, setting aside the original story, I was still under suspicion as a spy.

"One never knows."

"I see."

The king accepted this without argument. I was glad the reasoning worked—but that ready agreement was its own kind of sting.

Excuse me. Are you just... confirming that you could be the one to kill me? That's a little hurtful. The day my touch stops feeling cool is the day I become a dispensable loose end, and that's just a fact I have to live with.

"So you're saying you intend to die on your own terms."

No, that's not—

"Then I'll make certain you can't die."

For a moment I was so completely thrown that I went blank.

"Even if you're swept up in something strange, I'll make certain you can't die."

The king repurposed my own words with economical precision.

"If anyone tries to kill the rabbit, I'll kill them first."

He looked at my bewildered expression with evident satisfaction. And then, without warning, he pressed his own forehead against my bandaged one.

The king's hair brushed against my ear. I stared at him, dazed. With his eyes lowered just slightly, his long lashes were unusually visible.

"Do you know how startled I was when I received a report that you might suddenly die, rabbit?"

The red jewel of his eyes gleamed.

"Take care of your body. You're a child who has my attention. I'll be fond of you—so stay by my side for a long, long time."

His low voice whispered at my ear.

I'd been dazed, a little bewitched by the king's face, when I snapped back to myself. I tried to smile but somehow my mouth wouldn't quite cooperate.

Something felt distant about him, all of a sudden.

'Strange. I should be happy about all of this...'

I wasn't. Where my heart should have been jumping, it only sank, like something heavy had been attached to it and it just kept dropping.

How good it would be if I could believe it.

'But I can't.'

He says exactly the sort of things designed to be misunderstood, by the dozen. I want to forgive him for being handsome, but I'm not even in the mood for that. What my feelings matter to you I can't imagine, but still—

'It sounds like a lie.'

Don't pretend to cherish me.

Don't deceive a child when you could dispose of her whenever you chose. I can see through it because I'm Lee Hwayun and can track the context—but the fifteen-year-old Nina couldn't have survived this.

The memory of that lonely child's life came to me. A child who was desperately hungry for warmth. To a child like that, the king's words would have been poison.

'A handsome man saying he'll cherish a small child—on the surface, it's not the worst thing in the world.'

It was pet-treatment, but given the age gap, it wasn't something entirely impossible to say. And on top of that, this man held the power of an entire nation in one hand.

Still. Those words were no different from poison.

Lucky thing, Nina. That Lee Hwayun's memories got tangled up in you. You're not expecting anything. You're calm.

I smiled, a little bitter. Still—the king had shown me a form of grace, and I needed to respond like a reasonable adult.

"Thank you."

"You don't look particularly pleased."

"I am pleased. I'll be as careful as I can. I'll treat this body as precious. So that Your Majesty need never have cause to extend your grace—I'll do my very best to cherish this body myself."

That was the truth. I clenched and unclenched my hand, the way I had when I first came into Nina's body. The hand was a little softer now, at least—less rough, from not having done heavy labor all this time. How good it would be if Nina's situation could improve the same way.

"The rabbit is strange sometimes."

'You are always the strange one to me.'

I looked at the king with calm eyes. He flicked my nose lightly with one finger.

"You talk about yourself like it's someone else's business."

My shoulders flinched slightly. That one actually surprised me.

"I genuinely can't tell what you're thinking in that small head of yours."

His insight was remarkable. He really was sharply perceptive.

Fond of His Majesty he certainly is, being a capable ruler. I suppose if you're going to rise above everyone else, that kind of acuity must be standard—but he was genuinely sharp.

"I'm curious—shall I give you a truth serum the way Dio did?"

My face contorted on its own. That was a genuinely alarming thing to say. What do you want with whatever's inside my head? And beyond that—what sort of disaster would unfold if I took truth serum in front of the king?

I imagined babbling about the original story in front of the king. A cold sweat prickled at the thought.

"You've gone pale."

The king pinched my nose lightly and released it.

"Don't worry. I won't. Truth serum is what We give to spies. I know the side effects—there's no reason to give it to the rabbit."

That drug has side effects? Diomede gave me something that dangerous? I really should have headbutted that monocle off his face.

"The side effect of truth serum is madness. You lose your mind permanently and never come back."

I made a tight fist. In that moment, I decided to break Diomede's glasses. Using people as litmus paper is one thing, but this crosses a line.

"Dio is an excellent physician, so he would have prescribed an antidote alongside it for you."

The king offered the excuse, but my irritation didn't settle. I bit my lip lightly.

"Nina Cage."

He pinched my cheek with mild displeasure and stretched it out.

"That's not what you need to know."

The pinch grew more pointed. I could feel the pressure increasing in his hand.

"Remember only this: I'm not giving it to you out of concern, because of the potential side effects."

Should I be overcome with royal gratitude. I looked at the king pinching my cheek. He went on pulling at it with a slight furrow between his brows.

"Displeasing."

He held and tugged for a long moment, then let go. I pressed my cool hand to the stinging cheek and watched him sideways.

'Did I react too coldly?'

Should I have been grateful even for pet-treatment? Stay calm. Think. Would it have been more productive to joke about it—laugh and ask him to at least leave me a house if he's ever going to throw me out?

'But that feels like it costs me something.'

Even having become a lowest-ranking servant in a country with minimal human rights—there was a resistance to the idea of clinging pitifully.

'Is this just stubbornness. I can't read my own feelings.'

Keeping my dignity costs me nothing but it's far worse for my survival, and yet the aversion was real.

"What are you thinking so hard about?"

I looked at the king. Still a man terrifyingly handsome.

"Nothing important enough to say to Your Majesty."

He set me down on the ground. When the warmth that had been against me disappeared, a strangely cool feeling came in its place.

"Tell me."

"May I say anything?"

The king smiled and answered.

"Permitted."

I couldn't say what I actually felt. I didn't fully understand it myself—how could I put it into words for him?

But there was one thing I was genuinely curious about.

"Why do you show me this kind of grace, Your Majesty?"

The king gave a short, lopsided smile and folded his arms. His expression said: why are you asking something this obvious? I tried to guess at his answer.

'Because touching me feels cool?'

Is that really so much like a drug? One touch and then regular craving symptoms? I thought it was like soda, but maybe it's closer to mint-flavored tobacco?

But his answer went somewhere else.

"A birthday gift."

"Pardon?"

"You already know yourself it's more than you deserve."

No, this is another thing I don't understand at all. What self-congratulation, and what birthday gift? Wasn't Nina's birthday five days ago? And setting that aside—can you just explain what it means?

'I'm hitting the ceiling of what my brain can process.'

No matter how hard I turned it over, I couldn't work out what the king was saying.

"You look like you don't understand."

I nodded. Please just explain.

"Keep thinking on it. Any other questions?"

Now he was assigning me homework. I narrowed my eyes at him. His face carried clear satisfaction. Like a child who'd successfully pulled off a prank.

'Is he playing with me?'

When I thought about it, that was what pets were for. Somehow being called a rabbit while feeling like I was being put through obedience training—a sigh came out on its own.

In truth, I had no more questions for the king.

Then a good thought struck me.

"Ah—Your Majesty. Might I ask something?"

I smiled and pointed to my bandaged forehead.

"I'd like to apply for compensation. How does one go about that?"

The king looked at me with the expression of someone asked a thoroughly unnecessary question, but I kept smiling. You know your brother caused this, right? So tell me how to get what I'm owed.

"I was told I could receive it."

"You ask about trivial things."

It may be trivial to Your Majesty, but I'm trying to build up a small fund with this. Isn't it about time Nina had some emergency savings? I nearly died. That deserves some equivalent return.

He turned away and answered.

"I'll send someone."

The figure walking away with black cloak trailing behind him was striking. The back of someone who leaves at the right moment is always satisfying to watch—a laugh came out on its own. Landing a small hit felt viscerally satisfying.

'What is wrong with me. Did dying once make me bolder?'

Why was I suddenly running my mouth in front of the king? I'd resolved just yesterday to look before I leaped and check the bridge twice before crossing it, and here I was already changed.

'Are you losing your mind.'

I was about to knock myself on the head—then remembered Nina's forehead was injured and quietly lowered my hand.

"Pull yourself together!"

I muttered while straightening my clothes.

"Don't be fooled by his face."

Don't forget: that man killed kind-hearted Nina and let his worse-behaved brother live. And above all—how am I supposed to trust his goodwill? Are relationships between people ever really free?

I was briskly patting down my apron when white fabric moved toward me. I realized then that I'd forgotten someone entirely.

'Right. Seraphie!'

Obviously she'd been in this room all along. I'd gotten so caught up in the conversation with the king that I'd lost track of the most basic thing.

'Am I actually losing my mind.'

"Nina."

The voice was like jade beads on a silver tray, but the tone was very, very stiff. I scratched my cheek and looked at the saint.

"What were you two talking about? Why was he acting like that? And what is this about almost dying?"

Our angelic saint had watched the whole exchange between the king and me, and it appeared she'd retained every word of it. This was exactly why brushing things off carelessly earlier had been a mistake.

Seraphie grabbed my hands tight. A firm, unmistakable stance: I won't let go until you explain.

I smiled awkwardly and dropped my head. I didn't know about anything else, but this much was genuinely my own fault. So I had to handle it quickly.

'I'm going to die, really.'

I'd cracked my forehead and injured my head, and I'd woken up to nothing but things requiring mental gymnastics. I raised my head, then dropped it again.

'Terrifying.'

She was the kind of beautiful that made fear worse. The guilty party had no choice but to explain.

"Your Grace. So, about that..."

Where on earth to begin. I let out a long, deep breath.