The Nymph Wants to be Plundered - Chapter 184

To say he had acted in a fit of anger would be inaccurate, as he still held onto that impulse and longing from that time completely intact. If it weren’t for the kind habit ingrained in him of worrying about Evelyn’s physical condition, he would have stormed into the dining room even now and fed each bite to her trembling lips, one by one, as she held food in her mouth. Whether she got indigestion or not.

This terrible stalemate had to come to an end. As quickly as possible. He couldn’t continue walking this precarious parallel line with her that never converged.

Meanwhile, she, who had been frozen for quite some time after Cassis left, finally came to her senses and stood up.

Her toes inside her shoes felt unnecessarily tingly, so she wiggled them several times before pushing back her chair. She was perfectly fine, her physical condition was at its peak. Even knowing that it was all just her imagination, the creaking she felt throughout her body was due to nervousness.

‘…I don’t know why. I can no longer smile carefreely in front of Lord Cassis like I used to.’

Evelyn looked at her reflection in the largest spoon she hadn’t used once today. The eyes of her strangely distorted face looked like those of a lost, crying child.

She believed what he had said. Even if she couldn’t believe it, there was no other alternative, so she had to transform her disbelief into belief.

Cheer up, Evelyn.

Actually, it was two days ago, she thought, when she had accidentally overheard a conversation between Cassis and Lord Laocon. It absolutely wasn’t intentional, but after learning the inside story she hadn’t known, she felt deeply sorry toward him. She hadn’t yet been able to fully convey her heart to him, but there were no more misunderstandings left.

That day, after finishing her bath, she didn’t return to her bedroom right away because she wanted to savor the lingering feeling of her clean body a bit more. Her hair had dried, but she was reluctant to go outside, so instead she entered the drawing room and dozed off without even closing the door.

—Your Majesty, what do you intend to do going forward? Do you plan to just leave things as they are?

—Be quiet.

—Your Majesty!

When she heard Cassis’s low voice, she thought it must be a dream and tried to go back to sleep, but Laocon’s vigorous tone calling out to him was more than enough to chase away her drowsiness completely. When Evelyn rubbed her stinging eyes and sat up, she could hear a voice clicking its tongue through the open doorway.

—How dare they spread false rumors about His Majesty the King—it’s unforgivable. I… I was also momentarily swayed by them, so I have nothing to say…! Shouldn’t we take appropriate measures and severely punish the residents who spoke so carelessly? At the very least, we should hang the healthy ones upside down and teach them a lesson.

—Just leave it be.

—Pardon?!

What on earth were they discussing? Honestly, she was incredibly curious, but Evelyn felt she shouldn’t be listening and brought her fingers together to firmly block both ears.

Then Cassis’s low voice was buried completely as if covered by a cotton blanket, but unfortunately, Laocon had such a booming voice that could make a drum sound by itself even without drumsticks, so it was useless—she could hear everything. Since it was a conversation between the two of them anyway, hearing just one side was enough to understand. In the end, Evelyn gave up on both sleep and conscientious ear-blocking and let her hands drop.

—No, Your Majesty. The one being harmed is Your Majesty!

—It wasn’t something that happened just once or twice anyway.

—Pardon?!

Eventually, Cassis began speaking in a languid tone about the past rumors he had been caught up in. After becoming king, women who had never even met him often tried to fabricate such rumors about him. Of course, there had also been attempts by those with whom he had once had relations.

When she heard his candid confession, Evelyn wasn’t particularly shocked. If it was Cassis of all people, wasn’t it only natural that he would have been overwhelmingly popular with the opposite s*x? Of course, regarding what happened afterward, it must have been truly troublesome for him…. That’s all she could think.

However, she was a little angry, and that was purely a caring emotion meant only for him. No matter how they had once been involved, at that time their feelings for each other must have been sincere. There surely would have been happy memories that belonged only to the two of them, yet to pour ashes over those memories was too much.

Nevertheless, the reason her heart ached was that Cassis hadn’t coldly criticized his former lovers. If she had experienced such a thing, she would have cried and made a fuss for days on end, frantically trying to tear away every trace of the past from herself.

He was truly different. Cassis was in such a high position that he wasn’t even allowed to feel personal loneliness as loneliness—how difficult that must have been for him. Just as her eyes were about to grow hot with pity, Laocon became heated.

—I don’t understand why I was completely unaware of such signs.

—Laocon, back then you were a man of few words, so when you passed by, everyone would shut their mouths. Isn’t that quite different from how things are now?

—Haha, so it was I who had changed?!

—I don’t think that a knight’s duty necessarily requires practicing silence. However, when I deal with the residents, I’d prefer that your name doesn’t pop out of someone’s mouth like in Lya’s case.