(Risking My Life) Proposing to Miss Hazel - Chapter 99

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Team. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Chapter 99

The Mayor of Benu dragged his aide and guard all the way to the alley leading to Golden Goods.

The slender man’s strength was so incredible that even the burly guard was helpless.

“I have somewhere to go briefly. Stay here quietly.”

“Yes!”

“Take your time with your business.”

Overwhelmed by the Mayor’s uncharacteristically wild energy, the aide and guard nodded with tense, focused expressions.

Just as the Mayor’s figure disappeared as he walked toward the village center, the guard spoke first.

“Doesn’t the Mayor seem different somehow?”

“You’re right. Maybe it’s because his dark circles are gone…”

“He doesn’t have that feeling like he’s on his last legs anymore, right?”

“Hey, you. You shouldn’t say things like that carelessly.”

When the aide jabbed the guard’s ribs with his elbow, the guard drooped his eyebrows as if wronged.

“What I mean is he’s full of life. He was like an overworked machine running without oil, but now he seems human.”

“Geez! Calling the Mayor a machine! You’d better just keep your mouth shut.”

Though the aide scolded the guard, he secretly agreed with his words.

Even to his eyes, Lucas Aden seemed human.

Not the Mayor of Benu, but an ordinary young man of that age. A man completely excited by the fever of late love.

‘It’ll work out well… right?’

Surely there couldn’t be a woman who would reject Lucas Aden’s courtship.

Even thinking that, he was secretly anxious.

He knew all too well how hopeless his master was when it came to relationships between men and women. He was confident that as a married man, he was better than his master in that area.

‘He must have at least picked some flowers to offer, right?’

Flowers, jewels, and cake.

The three champions of stealing women’s hearts.

The aide believed that his master must have given Hazel at least one of those three things.

No, he wanted to believe it.

Since there didn’t seem to be any decent jewels or cake in this small village, at least some flowers that were scattered everywhere.

At least flowers, please.

“Oh, flowers.”

The guard muttered absentmindedly while looking across the way.

A bouquet so huge that it hid the face of the person carrying it was approaching toward the alley.

Having selected only the largest and prettiest wildflowers, it was as lush and beautiful as something made by Benu’s finest florist.

The aide’s gaze, which had been overwhelmed by the splendid bouquet, dropped downward. A deep blue uniform caught his eye.

“An Imperial soldier…”

Amazingly straight legs entered the narrow alley. The moment he raised his gaze to identify the owner of the bouquet—

“Gasp!”

“Hup!”

The Mayor’s aide and guard simultaneously gasped in shock.

They were overwhelmed by the man’s brilliant blonde hair and profile more perfect than a sculpture. Compared to that face, even the fresh bouquet seemed to pale.

Step by step—

They watched the man’s retreating figure entering the alley in a daze, and the moment he entered the general store, they simultaneously let out the breath they had been holding.

“Wow.”

“Whoa…”

“Who is that person? Those flowers, that beau, beauty…”

Insane beauty.

“Don’t you know who that is?”

When the aide asked with his eyes ‘don’t you?’, the guard nodded with a dazed face.

“That’s Count Cedric.”

“…?”

“I’m certain. I’m from the Imperial Army, so I’ve seen him several times.”

“What? Why is the Imperial Army’s Commander-in-Chief here? In this small village.”

“Why is the Mayor of Benu here?”

“…”

“…”

They stared at the tightly closed door of the general store, their faces pale.

The Count didn’t come out even after waiting for a long time.

The anxious aide chewed his nails nervously. The guard spoke without filter, as if voicing the uneasy thoughts filling the aide’s head.

“The competition is too formidable.”

“…”

“The Mayor will be okay, right?”

“Of course! A man who doesn’t stay home and just wanders around outside all the time isn’t good husband material.”

“A man who only works all the time even at home also isn’t good husband material…”

“Hey!”

Just as the aide was getting angry and trying to scold the guard.

“What’s this now.”

A black shadow fell over them. Goosebumps rose at the beast’s breath that chillingly swept across the back of their necks.

A yellow-eyed beast approached right in front of the frightened aide and guard.

He bared his sharp fangs and growled.

“Unfamiliar faces. Don’t tell me you guys also came to see Hazel?”

“Gulp!”

“Gasp!”

Overwhelmed by the gray-furred beast’s presence, they couldn’t say anything, their throats constricted.

The beast pulled up one corner of his mouth in a grin. A menacing dimple appeared deeply in his sharp cheek.

“Right.”

“…”

“…”

“Get lost right now.”

They ran away from the beast, even disobeying their master’s order to stay quietly in place, and thought:

It seemed like the Mayor’s first love was going to be terribly difficult.

***

“Those bite-sized things are getting cocky.”

Hiss, hiss. Felix entered the shop breathing heavily like a beast that had just finished hunting.

I didn’t expect Felix to come this quickly. Troubled sweat trickled down.

I hastily hid what I was holding behind my back.

The problem was it wasn’t small enough to be hidden like this.

“Fe, Felix. You came early today?”

“Work finished quickly. The Imperial Army is returning before sunset today.”

“Is… that so? Then we can have lunch together.”

“That’s why I flipped the sign and came in. I bought bread too.”

As he entered deeper into the shop, he discovered something and immediately frowned.

My eyes rolled around, avoiding his sharp gaze.

“Hazel.”

“Y, yeah.”

“That thing behind your back, what is it?”

“A collection of plants with severed roots…?”

In other words, it might also be called a bouquet.

Despite my witty response, Felix didn’t laugh.

He just hardened his expression as if he was going to kill someone and glared at the already dead plant.

“Who gave you that?”

“…Count Cedric.”

“Why did the Count give you flowers?”

“…”

That’s what I’d like to know.

Why is he doing this to me?

Felix’s sharp question made indignation surge within me. The bewilderment I felt right after receiving the bouquet from the Count seemed to come back to life.

‘Count, what brings you here today?’

‘Today… I came to give you this.’

‘Why are you giving me a bouquet…’

The Count forcibly placed the enormous bouquet in my hands and quietly gazed at my face buried in the flowers.

His summer foliage-like eyes buried beneath long eyelashes were so excessively calm that I couldn’t dare speak to him.

Tap tap. His fingers resting on the counter moved slowly as if selecting an answer.

After a long while, he left an incomprehensible answer and departed from the general store.

‘If I left again this time without giving you even a single flower, I felt like I would regret it.’

What on earth is the correlation between giving flowers and regret?

It’s not like I have absolutely no idea what he might mean…

No, it can’t be.

He’s the Empire’s only Count, the Imperial Army’s commander-in-chief, and an incredible handsome man.

Why would he have that kind of regret about me?

‘Ah, my head hurts.’

I felt like my head was going to explode from all the confusion.

Mr. Felix, who had no idea about his poor younger sister’s state of mind, ran his mouth as he pleased.

“You don’t have something going on with the Count, do you?”

I was horrified and immediately denied it.

“Of course not. What could possibly be going on?”

No matter how much I thought about it, there seemed to be nothing between us except what you’d expect between a general store owner and customer.

But then why.

Why was I holding a bouquet made only of the white, large summer flowers I love, and why was Felix suspicious of what’s between the Count and me?

Just like with Axel.

I wanted to laugh off Felix’s suspicions as groundless, but even I couldn’t do that.

That gaze, voice, atmosphere—everything was too difficult to dismiss as a misunderstanding.

‘Hazel, I like you.’

Suddenly, a gentle voice pierced my ears like a hallucination.

A voice that resembled Count Cedric’s, but was more tender and affectionate than his.

I was briefly spaced out as if my soul had been stolen, when Felix’s urgent cry pulled me back to reality.

“Hazel, Count Cedric won’t do.”

He spoke with certainty in his eyes, as if making a declaration.

“The Count can’t make you happy.”

As if he had seen the future.

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