Unbeknownst to Me, I am Secretly Dating the Emperor - Chapter 134

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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 134
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‘I should have sent Ed a letter saying I was going home.’
The thought came to me only after I’d boarded the shared carriage.
A shared carriage was much faster than the freight wagon that carried my luggage and letter, stopping here and there to drop off and pick up cargo—yet my wagon had left considerably earlier.
My mind had been too hurried to think clearly.
But soon I found myself rationalizing: there’s no real need to announce it, is there?
‘I’ll be back within a week anyway.’
I wanted this whole mishap to remain my secret, known to me alone.
Honestly, it was a bit embarrassing.
I could understand wanting to flee to another continent after misunderstanding my partner for cheating.
I could understand forgetting important matters because of his face and muscles.
Though Ed had certainly given me cause, the combination of the two had resulted in a spectacularly grand disaster born of sheer panic.
‘Let’s bury it.’
It was better for both Ed and me if this stayed hidden.
Once I sorted out my thoughts, I would keep my promise to Ed—no matter what.
I gazed out the carriage window.
It would take about nine hours by carriage to reach Lanheldin.
Since I wasn’t the one driving, I had plenty of time to organize my thoughts.
Beyond the Capital, the carriage rolled along a quiet country road.
The temperature was high, but the humidity low and the sky cloudless, giving the air a crisp clarity.
The fierce summer sun was blocked by the trees that crowded thickly along the path.
When I opened the window slightly, the breeze from the carriage’s motion swept softly through my hair.
My damp heart—heavy with worry and doubt—began to feel dry and light again.
‘…He’s way too handsome for a minor character.’
I laughed hollowly.
It was almost a bitter laugh, but I told myself a laugh was a laugh no matter what.
Then even my serious troubles seemed trivial.
The answer was already decided, after all.
‘If I marry Ed, I’ll have to become Empress.’
Such a spectacular promotion terrified me.
But the Empire had no royal bloodline except Ed.
I couldn’t let him set down the Emperor’s crown.
It wasn’t just because of some tender reason about not wanting him to sacrifice anything for me.
‘The Empire would collapse.’
The reality that the Empire was now creaking along on the sheer personal charisma of its Emperor accounted for half my reasoning.
I had no desire to become the architect of the realm’s ruin by blocking his path.
‘And I don’t plan to live forever as a secret lover either.’
I’d realized only recently that I had quite the possessive streak.
I had no thoughts of breaking up with him, of course.
‘From the start, there was only one answer, really.’
It was only a matter of will—my will.
Empress.
Even after accepting that there was only one path, the position felt daunting.
‘Let me build up my courage slowly.’
…The Emperor’s hidden lover.
For now, that seemed manageable.
At least until my small liver had grown.
* * *
The day after Lina departed for Lanheldin, an envelope arrived at Kyle’s hands in the afternoon.
It was Lina’s one-year Leave of Absence Request—the one with the earliest dispatch date, which had slipped through and failed to be discarded.
Kyle glanced at the name and duration on the form, then rushed straight to Edwin.
“Your Majesty! Your Majesty!”
Edwin, who had been wilting like scalded vegetables ever since Lina had left asking for time, turned to look at Kyle.
“What?”
His tone was somewhat curt.
Kyle approached with a grave expression and held out Lina’s Leave of Absence Request.
“What is this?”
Edwin took it with indifference, reading the contents cursorily with his eyes.
There were only a few lines, yet Edwin read them again and again.
He couldn’t believe it.
“Wasn’t it supposed to be a week’s leave?”
Kyle asked cautiously.
Since many officials who held fiefs also took leave, and the process was quite straightforward, there was nothing particularly unusual about it.
Lina might simply want some rest.
But Edwin felt uneasy.
“Let’s love each other maturely—wishing for each other’s happiness even if we part.”
“I don’t want to be Empress.”
Lina’s voice echoed ceaselessly in his mind.
Edwin’s heart tightened.
“But she said…she said she’d think things through and come back…”
Lina had asked him to wait, but he felt he needed to at least see her face to put his mind at ease.
“I’m going out.”
Edwin spoke only those words before heading straight for Lina’s residence.
As he made his way to the front of her house, his heart pounded with the anxious rhythm of a war drum.
He had a bad feeling, but Edwin tried to ignore it.
He took the stairs nearly at a run, and the door to Lina’s house stood wide open.
“Lina?”
As he approached the doorway and called out her name, a young man he’d never seen before emerged from inside, regarding Edwin warily.
“Who are you?”
“Where’s Lina?”
They exchanged only unanswered questions back and forth.
Edwin had rarely experienced a situation where his question went unanswered.
Especially not now, when his mood was far from good.
Edwin’s expression turned icy cold.
“Who are you?”
Intimidated by Edwin’s bearing, the man found himself answering despite his hesitation.
“I just moved in today. That woman named Lina seems to have lived here before…”
Seeing Edwin’s expression darken progressively, the man added words he hadn’t been asked.
“She urgently put the place up for rent, saying she was heading to the Western Continent…”
“The Western Continent?”
Edwin’s voice turned glacially cold.
Lina’s voice—which had only just faded—began to sound again.
“Let’s love each other maturely—wishing for each other’s happiness even if we part.”
“I don’t want to be Empress.”
That hesitant, evasive tone she’d had.
It felt as though all the blood in his body had frozen solid.
The heart that had always raced with excitement since he’d come to love Lina now thundered with a different meaning entirely.
Kyle, who had arrived a moment too late and swiftly grasped the situation, took action in Edwin’s stead as the Emperor seemed to lose focus.
“The route to the Western Continent is fixed. I’ll immediately check with the shipping companies to see if Lina purchased passage.”
As Edwin watched Kyle move about briskly, reality settled over him—slowly, disturbingly slowly.
And that reality was cruel.
‘Why are you leaving me?’
He couldn’t believe it.
‘You said you loved me. You asked me to wait.’
He had even thought, at worst, he might not be forgiven.
But not like this.
It felt as though the sincerity he’d treasured had been cast into mud.
Edwin had grown gentle as a tamed beast since meeting Lina.
But now that she was gone, the golden eyes that had brimmed with the warmth of love turned cold and lifeless.
The soft atmosphere sharpened into something piercing.
Lina should have raged at him and blamed him while standing at his side.
For her own sake.
She had only put on an act to look good to her lover, but Edwin was not naturally a soft man at all.
Half of the stories that had earned him the title of Tyrant were true.
* * *
I had never been this frightened to go home.
I was a timid, conscientious person who had grown up without causing a single incident.
But now, past twenty, having finally done something foolish, the weight of it was unbearable.
‘Carolina Diaz, get a grip. Imagine your twins reading the letter you wrote while crying your eyes out.’
The twins played rough and never missed an opportunity to tease.
They might recite that letter, sobbing, at my funeral.
It was summer, yet chills ran down my spine.
I squeezed my eyes shut, opened them again, and headed toward the house.
At the sound of the door, my family gathered in the living room turned their attention to me.
My luggage had apparently just arrived.
“Lina?”
My father, who had been about to open the letter I’d just sent, called out to me in surprise.
“What’s going on? You didn’t even contact us?”
My mother asked, worried.
“I took a leave of absence.”
I didn’t want to tell my family about my love life.
Especially not something this embarrassing.
I approached my father with a bright smile and quietly snatched the letter away from him.
Then I crumpled it up and stuffed it into my pocket.
My father, robbed of the letter, looked bewildered, but I kept smiling.
I deliberately ignored how my mother raised one corner of her mouth with that sharp, knowing look.
Still, I was genuinely relieved to have arrived before the letter was opened.
“Aren’t you happy to see me?”
I pouted sadly, and my father quickly forgot about the letter.
“Of course I’m happy. We barely saw each other last time.”
My father gave my shoulder a gentle pat.
He was a man who could only think one thing at a time, so he moved on easily.
“But what are all these bags?”
However, the true power in our household was my mother.

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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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