TLNTAAM Chapter 9

The King and I

Nina and Lee Hwayun were completely different people.

Nina was an orphan raised in a cathedral, a child who had learned letters solely for transcription work. Lee Hwayun had graduated university and landed a proper job. She'd lived reasonably hard-working life, made real plans. She'd had a car and an apartment in Seoul, good insurance, retirement all sorted out.

But the two had something in common.

Nina and Lee Hwayun were both lonely. Both were orphans with no family. Lee Hwayun had lost hers in her twenties, but alone was still alone.

Lee Hwayun had needed to protect the family's assets. Relatives kept showing up with all sorts of convenient excuses—I'm starting a business, someone's getting married, you don't have anyone anyway.

She'd known before the dirt over the family graves had dried.

Ah. So this is what it means to be alone. This is what it means to really have to take care of yourself. This is what it means to be truly alone in the world.

'That's why it's hard.'

She'd learned to hold onto what she had while wolves circled. The idea that someone might one day give her genuine help—that had never once crossed her mind.

'But the one who helped me is Seraphie.'

What was she supposed to do with that?

If she followed the original plot, it would go like this: The saint healed my heart condition. Nina is a happy little maid. So I'll do whatever the saint wants.

'Absolutely not!'

That path led straight to execution. She couldn't just quietly become morning dew on a scaffold.

'But I can't just wipe my mouth clean and pretend it didn't happen, either.'

She'd received a kindness. She couldn't betray it. What kind of person would do that.

'God, this is maddening.'

I pressed my face into something smooth and let out a low groan. Genuinely suffocating. There was no better phrase for it than caught between advancing and retreating. No way forward, no way back.

'I think I underestimated the original story.'

One wrong step and she'd end up exactly where the plot intended. So what was she supposed to do?

'Does an extra struggling against fate just stay an extra no matter what?'

A fresh wave of resentment washed over her. In a world where the main characters lived happily ever after, why did she have to be Nina? If she was going to be anyone, Seraphie would've been better.

'Oh—wait. Maybe not.'

Spending your whole life eating idol-group rations and devoting yourself to healing the sick. That sounded like its own kind of misery.

I rubbed my forehead against something warm and smooth. After a while, something even warmer began patting my back. It was cold enough that the heat felt genuinely nice. I smiled and shrugged my shoulders.

'But where am I?'

A strange wrongness crept in. I kept my face pressed and slowly raised my head.

Through blurry vision, I saw black hair. I reached out and wound it around my fingers without thinking. It slid between them with a soft sss.

'Whose hair is this?'

Incredibly nice texture. Whoever owned it had definitely spent a fortune on conditioner.

'There's no one around me with hair this long...'

My shoulders twitched. There was exactly one person who qualified.

'N—no way...'

I blinked furiously, trying to bring things into focus.

Then a low voice reached my ears.

"It's still night."

An unreasonably good voice whispered near my ear.

"You can sleep more. Nina Cage."

I couldn't believe what I was seeing.

Through the dim moonlight, a man's face came into view. Dark hair falling naturally loose, a faint smile at the corner of his mouth.

'Is this heaven?'

Extraordinarily handsome. In the pale gold light, his jawline was beautiful. I reached out and carefully traced his face with my fingertips.

My hand was trembling.

"A dream?"

Too vivid for a dream. What my hand touched was a human body's warmth. When I tilted my head, the man smiled more and patted my shoulder.

"You can think of it as a dream."

So I'd lived with at least some conscience and God was guiding me to paradise after all. I smiled drowsily and flopped back down face-first.

'He looks just like the king I saw.'

That's why a person has to only look at beautiful things. See. A ghost who died having seen beautiful things dreams beautifully too.

'Though if I'm being honest, I'd have liked to see a few more things first.'

I smiled broadly and rubbed my forehead against it again. But this pillow—it didn't quite feel like fabric.

'Smooth and warm, almost like...'

I opened my eyes slightly and looked at what I'd been rubbing my face against. Ivory-tinged. Exactly like skin.

My shoulders froze. I raised my head again like a broken doll.

'N—no way...'

Surely what was flashing through my mind right now wasn't real? Impossible, it couldn't be.

I opened my eyes wide and looked around. The first thing I registered was how dark it was. But there was enough light to make things out.

'Curtains?'

Thin fabric embroidered with delicate lace cascaded from the ceiling all the way down.

'No—that's a canopy.'

Layers of pale canopy and darker curtains hung overlapping. I rubbed my eyes, trying to focus harder.

Touch was stronger than sight.

I could feel a breeze against my skin. When my vision finally sharpened, everything became clear at once. The thin canopy swayed in the current. It was so beautiful that I thought yes, this must be heaven.

'Does heaven have beds? And wait—I'm dead. Why am I sleeping?'

Why had she never been interested in the afterlife. All knowledge becomes flesh and blood eventually—she really should have looked into it.

'Well. The angel is handsome. That's fine.'

The angel resembled the best-looking man she could remember. She'd thought she'd never see anything like it again—God is generous after all. I turned my head to get another look at his face.

The angel had his eyes closed.

The moment I looked at the man's face, my mind went blank.

Pale gold light touched his face. A line beginning at his forehead descended to his nose and fell to the philtrum. Appreciating the delicate features, I realized the golden light I was seeing was moonlight.

Without ceremony, he moved the hand resting on my shoulder to my cheek. A slightly elevated warmth pressed against my skin and I hunched my shoulders involuntarily.

"You're awake."

The angel spoke too. I watched almond-shaped eyes slowly open.

'His voice even sounds like the king's...'

No.

A terrible thought arrived. I wanted it to be wrong, but it felt like it was right.

"I, I..."

"The saint had you sleeping in her bed."

"Oh—even so..."

"People who receive miracles sometimes lose consciousness, apparently. Since you were already in the bed, I told them to leave you."

What had I done, again?

I tried to recall where my memory had gone dark.

'I experienced the saint's miracle, was utterly floored by how remarkable the original story was, and then passed out.'

Cold sweat ran down her back.

'But then I should be in my quarters—why am I waking up in Seraphie's bed!'

The king made no sense either. If a maid was sprawled across his bed, any reasonable person would move her and go to sleep—why leave her there!

'And shouldn't nighttime be just the two of them?'

The room tilted. I pressed my face back into the pillow and raised my head again. This situation was beyond comprehension.

That's when it happened.

The king's fingers resting on my cheek moved. I startled violently, and he laughed softly.

"You really are like a rabbit."

The king's touch was uninhibited. The hand that had been stroking my cheek swept around to my ear.

"As I thought. Cool."

"May—may I ask what that means?"

"When I touch you, I feel something refreshing."

Come to think of it, he'd said something like this before. At the time she'd brushed it off because she was too occupied with his face, but now she had some idea of what he meant. The king's hand moving across her face was firm, but not harsh.

'Like touching a pet...'

After her cheek, his hand moved to her ear again.

"Hick!"

She curled in on herself involuntarily, and he laughed softly.

"When the weather gets warmer, I'll have to hold you while I sleep."

A perfect sentence for misunderstanding. Surely he didn't intend it that way? What on earth was he saying.

She worked her brain frantically.

'So. I'm a human bamboo pillow?'

The king suffered endless burning agony whenever he used his magical power. What relieved it was Seraphie's miracle-like divine power. It was right there in Bound Bird.

'He paid the price for using his power with neuralgia and insomnia.'

Sabina's words came back to her. He could command pillars of fire and cloud, scatter manna so people wouldn't starve—but he was not a god. Because he felt unbearable pain, the king was human.

'So what does it mean that he feels something cool from Nina?'

Not just cool—refreshing. And on top of that, he was someone whose entire body burned with pain.

'That... has to be a good thing?'

Human ice pillow? Then he won't kill me? Human mineral soda, right here. Use at will.

'If I'm useful, maybe some scraps will fall my way?'

I looked at the king's eyes. Curiosity swirled in those red irises beneath handsome brows.

'G—good. Stay strong.'

This might not be entirely bad. The person who would have me executed at least thinks well of me for now.

'Of course, the moment I help Seraphie escape, morning dew on a scaffold...'

Ah, the irresistible compulsive force of the magnificent original story.

Thinking of her made my chest ache. I pressed one hand against my sternum. This heart beating properly now—Seraphie had healed it.

A heart I hadn't even known was sick.

"The saint's miracles seem extraordinary."

The king glanced at Seraphie sleeping beside him. Only then did I notice that the king and Seraphie's hands were bound together.

'He set it up so they'd stay in contact?'

White cord tying both their hands firmly together. She'd seen it in the novel, but he really was using the saint as a human painkiller.

"She is a miracle."

"How do you think I could repay the saint's kindness?"

I said it and immediately regretted it. What was I saying to this dear king of mine. Had the physical contact made me unconsciously familiar with him?

I was opening and closing my mouth in flustered silence when, in the dim moonlight, I felt the king smile.

The smile of the most beautiful man she'd ever seen in her life was blinding. He really seemed to find it genuinely funny—his whole body shaking with it.

"She bestows miracles as a matter of course. She's fulfilling her role in a position that receives praise."

The king stroked her ear and continued.

"For her, a miracle is no different than a meal."

Well, a meal she ate like bird seed specifically to maintain her divine power. A lifetime of naturally restricted eating, an idol-group diet on a good day. Wasn't that also remarkable.

"There's nothing for you to do."

Then she understood what he was saying.

'This miracle is nothing special to the saint.'

To me it was a miracle, but to the saint it was ordinary. So don't waste your time thinking about repaying the debt.

A laugh escaped her.

'To think I'd hear something like this from the king...'

This man was also in a position that received praise. Kings, those in power—they required absolute loyalty. The world here ran on fixed class. And yet someone near the very top was saying that sort of thing wasn't necessary.

'What a strange feeling.'

When she laughed, he lightly pressed his fingertip against the tip of her nose.

"I still want to do something kind for her."

She couldn't let Seraphie escape. But within what Nina could do—she wanted to give her anything she asked.

"Because to me, it was a miracle."

That's right. That's simply right. That's not how you live your life. If you don't keep your heart clean, good fortune won't come. Of course, that only applies when you can afford to.

This man had led her to a clean conclusion. I smiled and looked at Seraphie sleeping like an angel beside me. She lay with platinum hair fanned out, shimmering in the moonlight.

That's when it happened.

A large hand forced my face to turn.