The Tyrant Wants To Live Honestly

“Stefan.”

Dorothea, who had been crying profusely, called him, wiping her red swollen eyes.

Stefan nodded, even though Dorothea didn’t say anything.

‘I meant what happened today I wasn’t going to tell anyone.’

“Thank you.”

At Dorothea’s words, Stefan rubbed her hair with a large hand.

“Yes.”

At that, the corners of Stefan’s lips rose softly. It was subtle but sweet.

Dorothea thought.

‘If it wasn’t for Stefan, I might have already quit my life.’

It wasn’t a happy life enough to live twice, and the future I could see was all black.

“Am I lucky?”

After crying for a while, Dorothea asked in a hoarse voice.

Stefan then pointed to the cheek instead of answering. It was the cheek that was slapped by Carnan.

“Is that worse?”

Stefan nodded.

‘It was a total mess. If I go back to this state.’

‘No one will care anyway.’

Clara hasn’t been up to the Lampas yet, probably because there’s more work to be done in the detached palace.

Dorothea thought that she had been worried about nothing, and headed to the palace where she was staying.

And then.

“My Princess…?”

‘Why did such a coincidence happen?’

Dorothea froze on the spot as soon as she met Theon.

Murphy’s Law. When things don’t work out, bad things happen again.

Theon seemed to be on his way to meet Ray. He glanced over Dorothea’s red cheeks and swollen eyes, and the Emperor’s palace where she was coming out in a short time.

“Long time no see.”

“Yes… Long time no see.”

Dorothea’s voice became as small as an ant’s. Her head fell to the ground where there was nothing.

“Are you okay…?”

Theon asked cautiously at Dorothea’s appearance.

Dorothea’s heart was pounding and couldn’t stand the situation.

“Yes. It’s no big deal.”

She tried to smile casually, but her face created a bitter smile.

Theon then rummaged through the inside of his jacket and pulled out a glass bottle of hazy, sticky liquid. He handed the small bottle to Dorothea.

“Apply it to the wound and it will be a little better.”

Theon said that while practicing swordsmanship at Episteme, there are a lot of injuries, so he carries a small amount of medicine.

Dorothea stared at the bottle in his hand, then hesitatingly picked it up. The glass bottle with Theon’s warmth remained warm. It was as if the ointment had already melted and soaked into her hands.

“Thank you.”

“Is there anything I can do to help?” Theon asked.

His eyes were very friendly. The look that Dorothea had long wanted from him.

“It’s enough already,” Dorothea replied.

* * *

“Your majesty.”

“I know, Robert.”

Carnan muttered while resting his forehead. He couldn’t concentrate on his work after Dorothea left.

[‘On that day His Majesty would have wanted me to die and my mother to live.’]

‘I could not forget what Dorothea had said while looking me with her eye.’

What makes those words even more heartbreaking is that Dorothea’s words pierced his heart with precision.

Carnan still wondered what it would have been like if he could save Alice the day Dorothea was born.

And if Alice could be saved, she would have been willing to endure the death of Dorothea.

‘But I didn’t want it to be like this.’

[‘When I was kidnapped many years ago, did you want me to die?’]

‘I want you to die? No way.’

Anyway, there is no father who wants His daughter to die at the hands of the kidnapper.

As soon as Carnan found Dorothy missing, he released the Knights of Brightness and searched through them. At first, Carnan thought that a kidnapping aimed at an imperial woman, and moved with the related parts as the top priority.

‘But I don’t think it’s a kidnapper who knows nothing.’

The coincidence caused confusion and delayed coping. That must have left Dorothea more afraid and hurt.

[‘I can still hear the sighs of His Majesty at that time.’]

Carnan frowned.

‘Did I sigh then?’

‘I’ve only heard that Dorothea woke up late, but was she awake when I visited?’

The kidnapping of the princess was a nationally important matter, so it was quite troublesome to deal with it.

It could escalate into a diplomatic dispute or weakness, so he tried to keep the case as quiet as possible.

‘That could have hurt Dorothea too.’

[‘Dorothea Milanaire.’]

[‘You don’t have to call me that. Because the name Milanaire has never felt like a blessing.’]

Carnan’s heart grew heavier as he pondered over his conversation with Dorothea. As Dorothea said, he has not shown much affection for Dorothea until now.

‘No, even if I tried to give it affection, it didn’t stick.’

When Dorothea was just born, the grief of losing Alice was so great that he couldn’t take good care of her.

‘I didn’t even have the courage to go see her.’

Because he had seen with his own eyes the scene of Alice dying and the child being taken out of her blood.

‘When I saw Dorothea, that scene was the first thing that came to my mind and it was painful.’

‘And naturally, as I turned away from Dorothea for several years, my role as her father faded.’

Besides, he didn’t even become a loving father by nature.

As an emperor, he prioritized being faithful to the state, and he gave Raymond a strict education. It has become routine and normal not to care so much about Dorothea.

The only thing he checked was the budget execution of Converta Palace, where Dorothea was staying, and there were no major problems with the details.

So she’ll be taken care of by her nanny and servants. Because she’s a princess, she’s only supposed to eat good things and wear good things in a good palace.

And as Dorothea grew a little, Alice began to appear in Dorothea’s face.

When Dorothea was six years old, Carnan met her in Alice’s garden and was surprised as if he was looking back at Alice’s childhood.

‘If Alice had played in her garden as a child, would it have been like that?’

But it wasn’t Alice, it was Dorothea.

Carnan was overcome with strange emotions at the sight.

‘I was happy but at the same time displeased.’

The fake Alice barely messed up his feelings.

And he felt guilty when he realized later that he had never gone to see this child who looked like Alice.

If he had faced the guilt at that time and had been kind to Dorothy, the relationship might have been different.

But he avoided that guilt and justified it.

‘I used to be that kind of person, I was a busy person.’

Besides, Dorothea was growing up well on her own, even though Carnan didn’t care.

Very smart enough to memorize the genealogy of Milanaire.

So he was a bit interested in it. Until Dorothea finds out that she can’t summon the spirits.

‘You still can’t summon the spirit?’

It’s been about a hundred years since Fried couldn’t control spirits, but this is the first time that a child who can’t control spirits has appeared in the Milanaire imperial family.

It was a major problem for Milanaire, who had been afraid of becoming like Fried for several generations.

A sign that Milanaire will fall.

The first defective product that shows the justification that the imperial family must be Milanaire is disappearing.

He couldn’t believe that he and Alice had brought the end of Milanaire. The child that Alice gave birth to when she died can’t control a single spirit!

‘It would be cool if she could handle the spirits better.’

So, Carnan turned away from Dorothea even more.

‘But today I heard Dorothea’s voice for the first time.’

What did she think of her life and what she thought of him.

And the reality she faced was more miserable than Carnan had expected.

“As Dorothea said, it would be better to be a stranger.”

Carnan muttered.

“Your majesty.”

“I know, Robert. It’s all my business.”

“How about paying a little more attention to Princess Dorothea?”

“….”

‘Does it make any sense to come and pay attention now?’

Carnan was doubtful of Robert’s suggestions.

“But you can’t be like this forever, right? The fact that Princess Dorothea is Milanaire will not change until she dies.”

Carnan’s sigh deepened at that.

* * *

After meeting Dorothea, Theon headed to Ray’s room. The Emperor’s Palace was in the direction Dorothea was coming from.

It wasn’t long before Carnan brought Dorothea to the Lampas.

‘But why…?’

Theon, who was walking in thought, arrived at Ray’s room.

When Theon opened the door after knocking, Ray, who was walking around the room nervously, stopped when he saw Theon.

“Theon! Dorothea failed the episteme exam!”

Ray’s voice was clearly upset.

From the moment Dorothea said that she was going to take the episteme exam, Ray firmly believed that she would surely pass.

He was excited at the thought of showing Dorothea what to show her first when she came in, the playground of Episteme, the dining room, the top of the tower, the library that Dorothea will like.

“Dorothy got 0 points. This is the lowest score among all the applicants!”

Rey’s words reminded Theon of the Dorothea he had just met.

‘Now I slowly understood why Dorothea had such a face.’

However, it was hard to understand that Carnan slapped Dorothea in the face.

“I can’t believe she got 0 points… Surely the princess must be smart.”

“Getting 0 points was smart?”

“To pick the wrong answer to every question means that you understand all the questions and options.”

Episteme’s exams were famous for having a lot of content that was difficult to understand from the beginning.

That is why it is difficult for the passers to score 700 out of 1,000. This is because there were a lot of problems that were too difficult for the age of the students taking the exam.

In addition, the test time was tight compared to the number of items.

It was such a difficult exam, but we had to solve 100 questions in 120 minutes. The time distribution was also very difficult, so there were many people who took the last 50 questions.

If they succeeded in concentrating for two hours, the next test was conducted immediately after a 15-minute break.

Because of this, around the last test, concentration was blurred and the rate of incorrect answers increased. Especially in the particularly difficult test of Episteme, there were times when even the wrong option was the correct answer.

But Dorothea picked out ‘wrong answers’ for all of those trap problems.

“I see…!”

“Maybe the princess is smarter than the Chief of Episteme.”

“Yes! How did she pick all the wrong answers? Awesome, Dorothea!”

Ray’s expression, which had been showing a lot of disappointment, brightened in an instant.