Chapter 124
“I’ll drink it gratefully. Thank you so much for making the medicine yourself.”
The warmth of the porcelain bowl seeped directly into my palms. The pungent smell of the medicinal herbs made me wrinkle my nose, but perhaps because of his sincerity, a gentle smile spread across my face even in front of the bitter medicine.
“……Yes.”
To my thanks, Jin only replied shortly, without adding anything further. He was always so taciturn, described as someone you’d be better off talking to a brick wall than to him, so I didn’t feel slighted by his brief response.
I recalled the scene where his close knight friend had sighed in frustration, saying half of Jin’s words in a day were just ‘yes’ or ‘no’, and if he ever strung together more than a couple sentences, it was worth recording.
‘For someone so quiet, he actually spoke quite a bit when we first met.’
He’d managed long sentences, asking if I was hurt, if I spoke Dongguk’s language. I found myself a little amused, wondering if I’d been treated as special by him.
To show my gratitude, I sipped the medicine right in front of him.
‘Ugh.’
The bitterness was so shocking, it felt almost poisonous on my tongue. I immediately regretted not just downing it all at once instead of sipping it.
As I glared at the bowl, Jin rummaged in his pocket and pulled something out—a small lump of sugar sat in his large palm.
“Candy?”
He nodded slightly in response. Such a rare and precious thing! I reached for the candy in his hand without hesitation, but my fingers closed on empty air.
“Huh?”
“I’ll give it to you once you finish.”
“……?”
What was this, being bribed with candy like a five-year-old with a runny nose?
He must have thought I wouldn’t finish the medicine because it was too bitter.
Ha. Seriously. If I looked like someone who could be bought off with a single piece of candy…
“…Mm.”
Correct.
Desperate to get rid of the awful taste in my mouth, I downed the rest of the medicine in one go.
Scowling as much as I could, I stuck out my hand, and he calmly opened his palm. I grabbed the candy and popped it in my mouth; the sweetness was so overwhelming it made my brain tingle, gently melting the bitterness away.
“Ahh. I feel alive again.”
As I rolled the candy around in my mouth, extinguishing the taste of the medicine, I could feel Jin’s gaze fixed on me. When I looked at him in confusion, he moved his lips as if he wanted to say something.
“Thank you for the candy. It’s incredibly sweet.”
I smiled brightly at Jin, my lifesaver, who’d rescued me from that poisonous brew. Maybe it was just the sugar talking, but I couldn’t stop grinning like a fool. I must have looked a little slow to him.
Then, it happened.
A single deep dimple appeared on the right cheek illuminated by the lantern’s light.
‘Did he just smile?’
Blinking, I stared at his face again. The man who’d always been stiff, like a robot that didn’t know emotion, had just…
He smiled. Enough to show a deep dimple.
‘Wow. That’s really captivating.’
If he’d been the kind of person who smiled all the time, maybe it wouldn’t have meant anything. But when a man who looks taciturn down to his hair suddenly smiles like that, it’s enough to make anyone’s heart skip a beat.
Still rolling the candy in my mouth, I stared at his small smile in a daze. Even his green eyes, which never once avoided mine, seemed to tickle a corner of my heart.
Maybe it was because it was just the two of us in this warm, small room. Maybe it was the dim atmosphere lit only by the orange glow of a candle. Or maybe it was the way he sat upright, looking only at me with a faint smile.
In that strange atmosphere, I felt a faint tremor.
The candy melted away completely. As the taste disappeared from my tongue, Jin’s low voice softly echoed in my ear. Before I realized it, he had already returned to his usual expressionless face.
“……It’s not something I learned by choice.”
“Huh?”
His words, suddenly breaking the silence, startled me out of my thoughts.
“I mean medicine.”
“Oh.”
“I wanted to become a warrior.”
He spoke calmly, but I knew how deep his longing for the sword was. He was someone who had left behind his family and hometown, followed the female lead, and started from the very bottom in the Empire. He was satisfied with just the chance to learn swordsmanship despite having nothing else.
His desire to learn the sword was beyond what others could even imagine.
Seeing that his passion for the sword hadn’t changed from the original story, I felt relieved. The more he wanted to become a swordsman, the greater the chance that he’d travel back to the Empire with me.
I would make him my third companion and return to the Empire with him. On the journey to the Empire for my coming-of-age at twenty, Jin would be with me.
“Having a dream is a good thing. If you earnestly wish for it, it can come true.”
“……Yes.”
His green eyes looked at me with curiosity. I replied with a smile.
“There was someone I really wanted to meet when I came to Dongguk. And I actually met them.”
I met Jin’s gaze directly.
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