I Became My Ex-Boyfriend’s Concubine - Chapter 29

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Episode 29

The trap laid for Dan-bi had proven remarkably effective.
“Your Highness, the Concubine has arrived.”
“Let her in.”
Hyeon kept his gaze fixed on the book, answering without inflection. The door slid open with a soft whisper, and cautious footsteps filtered into the chamber.
He didn’t need to lift his eyes. For days now, there had been only one person breaking the silence of his quarters at dawn.
The footsteps stopped just before him, yet Hyeon’s eyes remained on the page. He knew well how silence, drawn out long enough, could make the other person anxious.
Dan-bi, unable to bear it any longer, finally spoke in a low voice.
“Your Highness, did you rest well last night?”
It was a formal courtesy, but beneath it lay an unmistakable weariness and faint irritation.
The grumbling of someone who had abandoned the morning’s sleep to rush here pleased Hyeon’s ears.
Only then did Hyeon stop turning the page and slowly lift his head.
“Your voice carries the drowsiness of someone not fully awake. I can scarcely tell whether you’ve come to guard me or to steal another hour of sleep in my chambers.”
“I apologize. Worry over your safety made me hurry so, and I fear it showed.”
A shameless answer, delivered without the faintest hesitation.
Hyeon rose from his seat, a faint smile touching his lips. His silk robe draped loosely around his broad shoulders.
“Worry, then. With that anxious heart, assist me with my preparations.”
Hyeon stood with arms lightly spread. Dan-bi approached, familiar with the routine yet each time showing eyes that betrayed how unaccustomed she still was to it.
A peculiar situation—a Concubine performing the duties that only the palace’s most intimate attendants would ordinarily undertake.
Hyeon watched her slender fingers arrange his collar and spoke softly.
“Has no one come to claim my life today either?”
“No, Your Highness. Not even an ant.”
There was a subtle sharpness beneath her courteous words, and Hyeon swallowed a laugh.
Her strange manner of speech had softened somewhat these past days—he’d taken pains to teach her proper decorum more than once—yet she could not hide her displeasure at this situation.
And yet, as if she had no choice in the matter, the sight of her clinging to his side for days now suited him very well.
Ordering her to eliminate the assassins around him under the guise of assisting her mission had been a masterstroke.
By keeping her close, he could prevent any sudden betrayals, and at the same time distance himself from those unnamed figures who had relentlessly hunted him. It was a move that accomplished two things at once.
Of course, it was also an opportunity for her. If her true goal was indeed to receive his affection, then the more time she spent at his side, the greater her advantage.
Perhaps that was why she did not refuse his command to remain inseparable from him from early dawn until late night.
“And how does your mission progress? Well, I hope?”
At those words, Dan-bi’s hands, which had been arranging his collar, suddenly stiffened. She caught her lower lip between her teeth, then tied the knot with rougher movements than before.
“Yes, Your Highness. It proceeds very well indeed.”
“Is that so? Yet I have felt nothing. It seems your task unfolds most smoothly without my notice.”
Dan-bi caught the half-mocking edge in his words and glanced up. A sharp look flashed across her eyes, only to fade as she held back a sigh and stepped away.
“I have finished, Your Highness.”
“Good. Finally some momentum.”
Hyeon passed the pursing-lipped Dan-bi and took his seat at the head of the table.
He gestured with his chin toward the empty place opposite him, and the attendants and court ladies waiting outside cautiously entered.
“Bring the light morning meal. And a table for the Concubine as well.”
The eyes of the court ladies widened in shock.
It was the law of the palace that the king did not share his meal with anyone in those early hours after rising. Yet several days of such unprecedented behavior had left no one with the courage to speak.
Soon two tables appeared side by side, white porridge steaming gently, accompanied by simple, neat side dishes.
Dan-bi widened her eyes as if in genuine surprise. But her movements toward her seat were swifter than anyone’s.
That reckless attitude, as though propriety and rank were of no consequence to her, made Hyeon shake his head with a bitter smile each time he saw it.
“Your Highness, I am overwhelmed by the honor of sharing your morning meal.”
“Speak sense. Watching you consume my entire portion as an excuse for your feminine appetite would be far worse for my digestion than simply preparing two tables from the start.”
His initial suspicions of her—tested through this very arrangement—had long since lost their meaning.
Hyeon had always held an invisible blade before her, a precaution born from the thought that she might strike back at any unforeseen moment.
Yet Dan-bi acted with a recklessness that rendered his caution pointless.
She devoured her meal without hesitation, arranged his collar with casual familiarity, and irreverently intruded upon his hellish routine.
That unsuspecting demeanor troubled him more than he cared to admit.
She was a woman whose heart could not be fathomed.
Even in those moments when death loomed before her, he had to discern whether her hunger was genuine or merely a meticulous performance designed to lower his guard.
“To carry out your duty, you must have strength. Eat well. Then today too you can ensure not a single ant slips past while you tend my lifeline.”
“I am so moved by Your Highness’s consideration that tears nearly come.”
Dan-bi answered while lifting a large spoonful of porridge to her mouth immediately after.
The way she wielded her spoon without hesitation, as though poison itself would not concern her, was hardly befitting a woman of noble birth.
‘So that’s what she meant—a stranger from another world.’
The odd manner of speech she’d used before, the behavior that defied protocol—when he thought about it, that explanation held the most credibility of all.
In truth, Hyun had long suspected that the mission she spoke of might be nothing but a lie.
Her claim of coming from an unfamiliar place, the strange phenomena he had never witnessed—all of it was information he could never verify, even if she were to confess her deception.
Perhaps she had counted on that very fact when spinning him such a plausible falsehood.
But that wasn’t all.
When they had met at Uisanggo in the past, the killing intent that had blazed from her eyes—it was unmistakably aimed at him with every intention to harm.
Keeping her close was not merely about confining her within his watch. It was born of the calculation that, if he kept her under his thumb, he might one day discover her hidden agenda.
Yet lately, Hyun had begun to wonder if all his suspicions were nothing more than his own misunderstanding.
He set down his spoon and lifted his gaze. Her head bobbed gently, already drowsy, her bowl scraped clean to the bottom.
The sight of her bowing her head in peace and quiet, as though this were her own private chamber, had made him almost embarrassed of the vigilance he’d mounted against her.
Hyun exhaled softly, turning away from Eunuch Yun’s dumbfounded face. Then he spoke in a low voice to the drowsy Dan-bi.
“Concubine Yeo.”
……
“Concubine Yeo!”
“Oh, yes!”
Dan-bi startled awake, lifting her head. She wiped the traces of food from her lips with the back of her hand, glanced at her empty bowl, and spoke in a voice still half-drowsy.
“Have you finished eating, Your Highness?”
Hyun rose from his seat without answering. Dan-bi scrambled to her feet in confusion, following his lead.
“Come with me.”
“Yes? Where are we—”
Hyun did not answer, moving toward the door. It opened at once, and his gaze met that of Rang, who stood guard just outside.
“Your Highness.”
“To the Yeonmujang.”
“It is still quite early, Your Highness.”
“Do not worry. I am not the one who will be riding.”
Hyun turned sharply, and Dan-bi, who had been right at his heels, crashed into his solid back, letting out a yelp as she touched her nose.
Rang’s gaze fixed upon her with a sharp glint.
“Your Highness. Surely you do not intend—”
“Teach Concubine Yeo Horseback Riding.”
“Are you planning to bring her along on the hunt as well?”
Before Hyun could choose his words, a firm voice cut through from behind him.
“That will not do, Your Highness.”
Hyun turned to look.
The Queen consort had somehow reached this spot, standing before him with an immaculate bearing and steady gaze.
Instead of her usual warm smile, her eyes met his with a chill of unmistakable hostility.

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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