Lewd Courtship - Chapter 50

The Royal Princess’s Palace was bustling since early morning.

Maids and knight escorts were busily coming and going, and a few attendants, recognizing the Emperor from afar, bowed in bewilderment.

Sensing a strange current, Killian stopped in his tracks a fair distance from the palace gates. He gave an order to the attendant standing beside him.

“Go and find out what’s going on.”

The attendant bowed his head and quickly moved forward. As he scanned the people passing by, he grabbed hold of a maid who was flusteredly running about nearby.

“What has happened inside?”

The maid, seeing his uniform, guessed he was of the Empire. Her gaze soon landed on the Emperor beyond, and she hastily bent at the waist in a bow. Then, glancing nervously, she asked in return.

“By any chance… is Her Highness the Princess with His Majesty?”

“What?”

At the unexpected words, the attendant tilted his head. The maid frantically waved her hands, flustered.

“Ah, n-no! The Princess is not in her quarters right now. Nothing has happened… It’s just that… it might be better if you come back later.”

The maid mumbled to herself and then hurriedly left.

The attendant, who had grasped the situation, returned and reported what had just happened.

“They say the Princess is not in her quarters. But the strange thing is… the maid asked if Her Highness was with Your Majesty.”

“With me?”

Killian’s eyebrow rose slightly. The attendant carefully voiced his own conjecture.

“Yes, Your Majesty. It seems the Princess may have slipped out without her attendants.”

At those words, Killian’s expression gradually hardened. For a Princess to leave the palace early in the morning, and that too in secret without her entourage, was no ordinary matter. Even if Porhen’s public order was considered relatively good, it was still difficult to accept.

‘…Surely not.’

Suddenly, a line from her past activity report flashed through his mind.

[Occasionally visits a villa on the outskirts of the capital without notifying attendants. Presumed to be for secret meetings.]

A mere sentence in a report now pressed upon him with vivid realism. Killian narrowed his eyes.

The thought that after spending such an intense night with him, when her injuries had not yet even fully healed she might have gone to meet another man in that condition… scraped at his nerves in a strange, unpleasant way.

He told himself it was probably nothing, but even so, the notion lingered like an ointment that refused to be rubbed away.

Having brought it all this way, he felt ridiculous.
…Why had he even bothered to pack something like this?

He no longer wanted to stay in this spot where the Princess’s Palace was visible. If he returned like this, he would probably end up forcing himself into self-relief before undergoing the scheduled treatment. Killian pressed down the corner of his mouth that was threatening to curl upward crookedly.

“Let’s go back.”

“Yes, Your Majesty…”

He turned his body to head toward his quarters, but after only a few steps he hesitated. On top of his sour mood, a faint sense of worry surfaced.

Perhaps she hadn’t simply gone out to amuse herself. Perhaps she had truly become entangled in some unforeseen incident.

The thought brought Killian to a complete halt. He then turned his gaze to Dars, who had been standing behind him—the escort knight whom Rachel had once flattened during a sword sparring session.

“Dars.”

“Yes, Your Majesty.”

A low, disciplined reply came at once. At the Emperor’s gesture, Dars immediately stepped forward.

Killian parted his lips as if to speak, but hesitated just before uttering the words. The command that had risen to the tip of his tongue suddenly felt unnecessary, as though it would be for nothing.

Yet the welling worry smothered that hesitation. In the end, he leaned in close to Dars’s ear and whispered in a low voice.

“Send out a few spies. Confirm whether there are any issues with the princess’s wellbeing.”

Dars inwardly felt surprised, but not a trace of it showed on his face. He bowed his head, then stepped back, quietly slipping out of the ranks to carry out the order.