Royal Coup d'État - Chapter 34

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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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Chapter 34
The Imperial Clan was a rigid institution.
Even rules so ancient they’d been erased from common memory, even customs long forgotten by ordinary citizens—they kept them all. Zongfa was one such thing.
Such archaic rules formed part of Imperial Law. Sun knew this better than anyone, yet it seemed unlikely to her that the Emperor had chosen Prince Eui-jeong as the method.
He was not fit to be Emperor.
If Grandfather died and Father ascended to the Imperial Throne, he would be the type to panic without anyone saying a word and hand over the Imperial Seal to his older brother—there was more than enough room for that. An Emperor-caliber politician would never have failed to make even such a calculation.
“How could we ever divine His Majesty’s true intentions?”
Sun spoke carelessly, scanning her father with her eyes.
She was trying to observe whether he’d heard anything from the Emperor, but from his current bearing alone, it seemed clear he was hearing this for the very first time.
It was quite a wise decision, actually. If he’d known beforehand, Prince Ui-gu would have found out long ago.
“Besides, shouldn’t the Imperial Clan follow His Majesty’s will as a matter of duty?”
“Not if the order is unjust!”
Prince Eui-jeong recoiled, his body trembling violently. Anyone watching would have thought he’d just received an Abdication Edict on the spot.
“It’s absolutely impossible for you to become Emperor. I don’t know why Mother filled your head with such empty hopes, but…….”
So he hated the idea of me inheriting the Imperial Throne that much? Rather than trying to persuade me it was dangerous, or suggesting I pursue other dreams, he rejected it by invoking empty hopes?
Sun sensed something had gone strangely awry in the conversation and steadied her voice.
“I think, Father, that the Empress Dowager has been preparing for this day for a very long time.”
Sun murmured with a faint smile.
“That Uncle died was beyond anyone’s expectations, I suppose. But why do I get the feeling that she desperately wished for me to become Emperor? Or was it, rather, that she wanted to prevent Uncle from taking that place?”
“That’s ridiculous. You really do seem to have some wild notion in your head.”
Prince Eui-jeong glanced toward the door as if afraid someone might overhear. Only after confirming it was firmly shut did he release a breath.
“Do you even know who you’re dealing with?”
Frustration began to swell in her chest again. She found her father’s cowering, trembling state utterly repulsive.
“Father. Does running away and pretending not to know change anything? Will Uncle Ui-gu pity us? Will he give us a free pass because we’re cowards?”
“Sun, you—!”
“I don’t want Uncle Ui-gu’s sympathy. And I don’t want to live the way you have.”
“How could you—, how could you…….”
“I won’t let anyone else die.”
Sun swallowed the rage burning in her throat as she murmured, almost as if brainwashing herself.
“No one left in this family will be toyed with by Uncle’s hands.”
“Please, Sun!”
This statement frightened Prince Eui-jeong more than anything else she’d said. His face drained of what little color remained, and he rushed toward the window.
He checked the window again, which was already shut and even had a lock on it, lowered the blinds, and only then looked back at Sun. His face was filled with desperation and terror.
What on earth was frightening him so much? Fear of Prince Ui-gu? Fear that I might be hurt fighting Prince Ui-gu?
“Father, you seem more afraid of me fighting Uncle Ui-gu than of me becoming Emperor.”
More afraid of Prince Ui-gu—who didn’t yet exist beyond that wall—than of his only child trying to cross the barrier placed before her.
In truth, wasn’t it the same whether Prince Ui-gu or I failed to cross that wall? Uncle was simply a step ahead of both of us.
Something felt strange all of a sudden. He was reacting like an earthworm pinned to the ground, as if he’d been brainwashed by something.
Father had lived his entire life as a coward, yet he had raised his only daughter with love.
Sun had felt her parents’ devotion deeply while growing up. At the very least, it meant they weren’t the sort of people to crush their daughter’s dreams and hopes before she’d even properly begun.
“You don’t know what kind of person your uncle is.”
Prince Eui-jeong checked his surroundings several more times before speaking urgently and quietly. His voice was so hurried and hushed it felt like wind brushing past her ear.
Sun hid her complicated thoughts and answered calmly.
“How could I not know?”
“No. You don’t know.”
Father spoke with absolute certainty.
I don’t know Prince Ui-gu? I, the sole survivor of that incident, who have watched him all my life living in the Imperial Palace?
Sun suddenly wondered. Is there some secret only Father knows and I don’t? Is that what’s made him lose his mind like someone under some kind of spell?
Sun opened her mouth quietly, her eyes searching her father’s face.
“Uncle usually shows a foolishly vacant expression, yet he never does anything that would actually cost him. He always wears the mask of an amiable man, drawing in the surrounding powers, but the moment he judges something has become a liability, he cuts it away with ruthless precision.”
…….
“Is there something more I should know?”
Sun slowly scanned her father’s face.
Beads of cold sweat on his forehead, his eyes wavering. Fragments of emotion he couldn’t hide no matter how hard he tried to seem composed.
Facing off against Prince Ui-gu was enough to make Father panic preemptively. It was such a routine reaction that Sun couldn’t have failed to notice it.
But today he was reacting differently. As if there were a reason I shouldn’t become Heir Apparent.
It was then that Sun’s expression hardened completely. The moment her father desperately shifted his gaze to avoid meeting her eyes, she finally found the answer. Like her father, Sun had always been quick to read the unspoken.
“You’ve been compromised.”
“No!”
Bang!
His father’s fist came down on the window frame. It was far too violent a reaction to be anything else.
The rough, ragged breathing and the tremor in his voice left no room for denial. The more Prince Eui-jeong shook his head, the more certain she became.
“Absolutely not. What are you even talking about?”
His hand remained at the window, trembling visibly. Whatever force he’d used, his fist was flushed crimson—nearly the same color as his face.
Before Sun could even open her mouth, he spilled out excuses like rapid gunfire, yet he never once met his daughter’s eyes properly.
The father who had lectured her moments ago that she could never become emperor now seemed to have shut his ears and eyes to everything.
“Father.”
Sun called to him slowly, as if to soothe a child.
But Prince Eui-jeong did not answer. Shaking his head, muttering denials under his breath, he left the room in haste without even saying goodbye to his daughter.
Bang!
The door slammed shut with a thunderous crash. Sun flinched at the piercing sound, her eyes squeezed shut.
‘This is going to get complicated.’
Her mind felt like it had turned white. She needed to uncover her father’s weakness as quickly as possible. Before Prince Ui-gu could use it as leverage.
* * *
Tae-o’s days had become monotonous. The life he’d had as a detective in the field had completely fallen apart.
Even now, scattered across the guest table were Case Files, which he reviewed while sighs leaked between his teeth.
Since his reassignment to standby status in the Detective Division, he no longer had a proper desk of his own.
The Task Force Team, hardly worthy of being called a proper investigation unit, had no assigned office or desk. As a result, Tae-o had become a nomad, drifting between empty spaces in the Conference Room and the Detective Division.
No one had expected Tae-o to hold out like this. Assigning a detective only to the Task Force Team was tantamount to a career death sentence.
Especially someone like Tae-o, born with pride and a keen sense of his own worth—everyone assumed he would bend at this point, give up the investigation, accept reality, and return to his former position.
In truth, even Tae-o himself had thought that would be the right choice. He never wanted to be such a fool as to deliberately choose an unpaved road when success lay just ahead.
Yet Chungyang Hyeonju’s eyes, her voice, her expression—everything had ensnared him.
He found himself swayed by a single word from her, spoken in that dim tone. Here he was, clinging to some trivial sense of justice and truth, when he could have a life where success was guaranteed if he simply played his cards right.
He knew this wasn’t like him at all, yet he couldn’t find his way back.
Once tasted, that sense of justice intoxicated him. Was that why he moved at her will, taking the small scraps of attention she tossed to him like a lapdog? Where this inefficient choice would lead, he couldn’t say.
“Damn it.”
Left alone in the empty office after everyone had been dispatched, Tae-o irritably shuffled the photographs.
What would become of him once the truth about the Crown Prince’s accident came to light? If, as she predicted, the culprit was a close member of the Imperial Clan? If he finally made that arrest?
The mere thought left him hollow. Of course, he’d receive some commendation for solving a case involving someone as significant as the Crown Prince. But commendation meant nothing. How was it different from getting another gold star?
There was no guarantee he could return to his original position just for apprehending one member of the Imperial Clan, and the mainstream forces would never accept someone who’d once betrayed power.
And besides…….
‘I’ll never see her again.’
Tae-o clenched his teeth.
He and Sun had never had reason to cross paths in the first place.
A detective named Tae-o, powerless and unremarkable, could only see Chungyang Hyeonju on a small screen.
‘Why am I even thinking like this?’
Tae-o exhaled heavily while staring at the ceiling. Yet once begun, the thought spiraled beyond his control.
However unfair and unjust the disparity felt, it was reality—inescapable. They’d bound themselves together on the flimsy pretext of heads bent together in conversation, comfort, and collaborative solutions, but eventually, they would unwind limply, forgotten as if they’d never met at all. He knew this, and yet he couldn’t hide the small sting of resentment.
‘I can’t let myself be used and discarded.’
He admitted that Sun was different from other members of the Imperial Clan. She was the most worthy Imperial Clan member he’d ever encountered. If she’d been the sort of reckless hooligan as the others, she wouldn’t have fit at all.
But that didn’t make it right for him to be used by her. This was the twenty-first century, after all, and Tae-o was, fundamentally, a citizen with free will.
Tae-o needed one decisive blow to overturn this inferiority. That one stroke that would comfort him for following her around like a man under a spell.
Ding-ling—
The sudden ringtone tore through the silence. The cell phone in his back pocket began to ring loudly. It wasn’t even nine in the morning—too early for a call.
Tae-o fumbled in his pocket and pulled out his phone. An unfamiliar eleven-digit number met his eyes. A number not even saved in his contacts. He swallowed hard and pressed the green call button.
“Hello?”
Nothing came through the quiet receiver. Instead, only the faintest trace of breathing seeped out.

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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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