The Mansion Awaits Spring - Chapter 182

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

Chapter 182
* * *
Rasa was saturated with the spirit of festival.
Despite the succession of incidents both large and small, the continuously planned events drew Rasa’s citizens onward without pause.
Heidi, Grand Duchess of House of Dieusz, entered the Regatta Grounds with her entourage.
Every prestigious school in the Rasa Empire maintained a rowing team. The grounds themselves were filled with the emblems and colors of those schools.
“It’s like stepping into another world entirely.”
At her attendant’s murmur of admiration, Heidi found herself silently agreeing.
On a bright summer day, spectators crowded the riverbanks, ringed by verdant green.
While the Grand Duchy lay weighed down by vague dread of war, the Empire’s mood was the opposite. The Emperor was cultivating an atmosphere of such ease that the word “war” could slip from people’s lips as casually as any daily trifle.
Heidi had returned to the Empire, waiting for a day when she could be nothing more than a spectator at rowing matches. That Pejin had invited her today meant this event held genuine significance for him.
The day when every Military Academy in the Rasa Empire competed in rowing.
Pejin’s junior classmates from the Academy, spotting Heidi, came rushing over in a wave.
“Today, Your Highness must become our goddess of victory.”
“Me? Surely not.”
“Yes, truly.”
They presented her with a Picnic Basket they had prepared, dyed in the deep blue that was their Academy’s symbolic color.
A Military Academy student began guiding her party, saying:
“Since this is your first time at the Regatta Grounds, I’ll explain even the trivial details you may already know. I ask your patience with such tedious talk.”
After speaking so politely, Pejin’s junior set off through the grounds, beginning his explanations.
The “trivial details she may already know” were merely a courtesy to spare Heidi, who in fact knew nothing of rowing. In reality, everything he described was entirely new to her.
Listening to his account, Heidi realized anew that Pejin had never shared anything meaningful about his Academy with her and her husband.
Most striking was learning for the first time that Pejin might have been selected as the Academy’s representative rower—a revelation that made all the junior classmates’ eyes widen.
“You mean you never told them something so important? I would have bragged to my entire family.”
“Is it truly that important?”
“Of course it is! Rowing means a great deal to the people of Rasa. Back then, our senior was truly an exceptional athlete. If only he hadn’t caught a cold at the preliminary trials….”
Even as Heidi watched the students lament, she was certain Pejin had never actually caught a cold.
Heidi speculated on various reasons why he might have feigned illness, then settled into the seat the juniors had arranged for her.
The view from here was indeed breathtaking. Heidi waited for the races to begin, sipping tea and wine from the Picnic Basket, sampling various outdoor fare.
The people gathered at this Regatta were interested in the sport itself, but they equally valued its role as a social occasion. It functioned much like the cafés of the Grand Duchy, with conversations on diverse topics flowing freely.
Pejin had asked Heidi to voice her opposition to the war through this social gathering. Yet in this cheerful atmosphere, it was nearly impossible to speak such words.
Then Pejin appeared at their location.
He gestured silently for the juniors who recognized him from a distance and cheered to quiet down, then borrowed a cup of tea from Heidi and asked:
“Are you enjoying yourself?”
“Yes, very much. April would love this if she could see it.”
Though Heidi knew that the Rasa nobility had forbidden April from even setting foot on Left Island due to the Factory explosion, she still sighed wistfully.
Pejin merely shrugged in response and turned his gaze away.
“With so many people here, accidents have been frequent. I should make my rounds.”
“Wait, before you go. Why didn’t you compete in the preliminary trials? A person from the Grand Duchy coming down with a cold from the Empire’s weather doesn’t make sense.”
“Well.”
Pejin answered with an involuntary smile.
“A person from Right Island competing in rowing skills against people from here would be unfair, wouldn’t it? When I think about competing, it feels like an adult joining in children’s games.”
With that, he left once more to maintain order.
Pejin took his place on one of the bridges spanning the river above the Regatta Grounds, watching the athletes warming up at the starting line.
Unlike Right Island, Left Island saw little mingling between nobles and ordinary citizens. Here, the Regatta Grounds—filled with influential families and the wealthy—was like a symbol of class itself.
These people were ready to support anything, even war, if it helped preserve what was theirs.
Gossip journalists had set up cameras throughout the grounds, prowling for stories. This year, at the Emperor’s invitation, popular theater actors and musicians had secured prominent spots.
Heidi was among the celebrities who could grace the cover of gossip magazines, and her articles inevitably featured Pejin’s name alongside hers.
Pejin felt no interest in anything here.
It was hot. The world was loud, and even the sound of water felt oppressive. There was nothing entertaining, nothing beautiful.
From April through August, he had sent April three love letters, but received no reply. He didn’t even know if they had arrived.
“Does she miss me alone like this? It’s so unfair.”
He had said she would write back, yet perhaps she had been lying all along, intending only to torment him.
If she were deliberately keeping him in anguish, that would be better. But if she had truly forgotten….
The anxiety came without warning. It passed through him like a sudden piercing pain, and he closed his eyes briefly to let it pass. Afterward, his insides felt hollow.
Late one night, after finishing his duties and finally returning to his own house on Left Island, Pejin bathed and collapsed onto his bed.
He wanted to fall asleep immediately, but sleep would not come.
On nights like these, when sleep eluded him, April grew all the more vivid in his longing. He desperately needed that deep sleep he could only find at her side.
Even imagining her beside him brought no comfort—only deepened the ache.
He finally rose and opened the drawer containing letters he had written but never sent to her.
He had so much to tell her, but fearing she would grow weary if he sent everything, the unsent letters had piled up.
Only recently had he discovered how verbose he could be, how much he loved writing.
One letter a month. That was the limit he had set for himself.
He imposed this restraint so as not to bore her, though it meant nothing to her and everything to him—a desperate measure.
Just as he was closing the drawer, Pascal, the butler who had come with him from Right Island, knocked on the door.
“Forgive the late hour. But it seems a letter has arrived from April, and I thought it best to deliver it to you at once.”
At the word “April”—recognizing that Pascal, who had raised him from childhood, was among the few in the world who acknowledged his marriage—Pejin only afterward understood the weight of the word “letter.”
Pejin rushed to the door and yanked it open.
“A letter arrived? From April? Are you certain?”
Knowing Pejin would be pleased, Pascal smiled warmly.
“Yes, unmistakably. A letter from the Head of the Lunos Family.”
Her first reply.
After Pascal handed him the letter with a satisfied expression and departed, Pejin carefully placed it on the table and sat down.
“How strange. She’s actually written back. Good news, perhaps?”
He thought himself rather excitable even as he said it aloud. Yet compared to this uncontrollable joy, he was managing to remain quite composed.
He opened the letter.
[How have you been?]
The entire letter was trivial. Was he keeping well? Eating properly? Sleeping enough?….
[I miss you.]
Pejin puzzled over whether these sentences and words must hold some deeper meaning.
Especially “I miss you”—surely that carried significant weight. Yet no matter how hard he thought, he could not decipher any hidden meaning.
“This is a problem. Why can’t I understand it?”
As he grew anxious and muttered to himself, the letter came to an end.
Only one page remained, and it was nothing but a brief postscript.
Fortunately, the moment he read it, his lips curved upward involuntarily.
[P.S. Your letter reached the Grand Duchy safely.
—April Lunos]
It was clear.
This was her quoting the very sentence he had written about the trading ship reaching Polana.
He understood now—the trading ship had returned safely. And there was one more line.
[P.P.S. By the way, the letter is sincere. Eat well, sleep well. And I miss you.]
“…What?”
He froze. Then, desperately, he began reading the letter from the beginning again.
Only then did he understand—there had been no hidden meaning at all. Every word was sincere.
In the hollow that had been his chest, he saw now a meadow instead. Like the summer of Right Island, white wildflowers danced across an open sky.

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