Unbeknownst to Me, I am Secretly Dating the Emperor - Chapter 15

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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 15
Her golden eyes glimmered captivingly beneath the moonlight.
Thump-thump.
Her heart made its presence known, hammering wildly against her ribs.
‘This is just a trick of the brain from visual stimulation.’
I fought against the spell of the moonlight.
‘Get a hold of yourself, Carolina Diaz.’
Thankfully, my heart gradually resumed its normal rhythm.
I asked with feigned composure, desperate to hide the flutter Everett had just stirred in me.
“What brings you all the way out here, Everett?”
Tonight was the night of the Emperor’s Birthday Celebration ball.
There was no logical reason for him to appear at this hour in this place.
“That’s…”
Everett hesitated, choosing his words carefully.
“I didn’t feel like being at the ball.”
Just as Everett was about to explain further, a commotion erupted in the distance.
“I’m sorry—what did you say?”
Everett glanced toward the sound, then bit his lip anxiously and ran a rough hand through his hair.
He muttered a curse under his breath before turning to me with urgency.
“I need a favor.”
* * *
Edwin cursed as the pursuit drew steadily closer.
‘If they catch me, this will be an absolute disaster.’
He’d have staked the Emperor’s crown that standing meekly in the ballroom playing the fool would be a hundred times better than this.
Without meaning to, Edwin cast a desperate look at the young woman before him.
“I need a favor.”
A faint wariness flickered across the violet depths of her eyes.
“It’s not difficult.”
Edwin added quickly.
It truly wasn’t a difficult task.
All he needed was a tiny bit of her help to give the guards the slip.
“Let me hear it first.”
The wariness in her eyes didn’t fade in the slightest, yet permission fell from her lips nonetheless.
Edwin put on his most innocent expression and laid out the situation.
“You know there’s a Masked Ball being held at the Separate Palace tonight, right?”
“I’ve heard.”
She regarded him with the stern look of someone lecturing a troublemaking younger brother.
Edwin avoided her gaze and continued.
“I was supposed to attend it too.”
‘It’s my birthday, after all.’
“But I’m not really the type who enjoys that sort of thing.”
Whenever he made an appearance, the elaborately dressed young ladies would “accidentally” drop handkerchiefs or fans in his path.
The more aggressive ones would even feign dizziness and stumble toward him.
And the most aggressive among them…
Edwin sighed, remembering wine spilled across his dress shirt.
It seemed his weary demeanor had successfully earned her sympathy.
“There are people like that, I suppose.”
She interpreted his plight charitably and nodded with an expression of genuine concern.
She was treating him like a taciturn knight, but Edwin found no fault in that.
“So I showed my face briefly and then slipped away quietly, but something went wrong.”
Edwin explained the situation while conveniently glossing over the most crucial details.
About thirty minutes ago.
He’d escaped a particularly persistent young lady who kept trying to draw him into conversation by claiming his wine-stained clothes needed attention, and had retired to the rest chamber to change.
He’d hoped she’d give up and leave during his prolonged absence, but instead the number of people lurking outside only increased.
‘Next time, it’ll be champagne.’
He felt surrounded by multiple adversaries.
Adversaries who were difficult to engage directly.
Even as Emperor, he couldn’t very well be harsh with young ladies simply for flirting.
Especially not with those barely past their debutante age, many of them a good five or six years his junior.
Edwin ultimately decided to slip away early to avoid the women stationed outside the rest chamber.
He’d changed into servants’ clothes and donned a hastily procured mask.
His own mask he’d passed to his aide, the actual Everett Rohas, who shared his build.
The aide, suddenly thrust into the role of imperial substitute, had tried to dissuade him, warning that this might cause serious problems, but Edwin had dismissed the concern.
“But when I tried to sneak out of the ballroom, the guards spotted me.”
‘Perhaps the aide’s warning was prophetic.’
Edwin sighed and continued his explanation.
“They mistook me for an intruder, and now I’m being hunted.”
In hindsight, he should have simply told the guards he’d stepped out briefly and gone back into the ballroom.
‘But I didn’t want to do that, so I bolted. And here we are.’
Since he knew every inch of the palace’s defenses, losing the guards would have been easy enough.
What he’d failed to anticipate was what would happen if an intruder successfully breached the Imperial Palace’s strict security and escaped.
The highest level alert had been issued, and most of the palace guards were now hunting for the supposed intruder.
‘I trained them too well.’
If the intruder had been someone truly formidable, the guards’ response would have deserved commendation as flawless.
“Why not just explain the misunderstanding?”
She’d listened quietly to his account, and now she posed the obvious question.
“Things have escalated too far for that to work now.”
Edwin buried his face in his hands.
The words he couldn’t bring himself to say seemed to have reached her anyway.
“Oh.”
Her wariness finally began to soften.
“So what do you need me to do?”
Her response was remarkably sympathetic.
“I need to get out of the palace.”
As guards searched the halls, Edwin explained the plan he’d devised.
First, he’d head out to Kyle’s Information Guild.
Then, through Kyle, he’d send orders to the palace to stand down the alert.
‘Someone from the Information Corps was conducting a mission and was mistaken for an intruder.’
The identities of all Information Corps members were classified.
He could claim he’d avoided the guards to keep his identity secret—it was the best excuse he could manage.
Of course, Kyle would mock him relentlessly for it.
“I understand. But it looks like you don’t have an Access Pass?”
She quickly grasped the real problem.
“No.”
Edwin answered quietly.
Heat crept up the nape of his neck.
It was fortunate that Edwin had remembered the Access Pass requirement while heading toward the palace’s outer reaches to reach Kyle’s Cafe.
‘If I’d tried to force my way out and hit the barrier at the palace entrance… I don’t want to imagine what would have happened.’
A chill ran down his spine.
It was another stroke of luck that he happened to be near the Treasury Department wing and that she—someone he knew—had been taking a walk here.
As a palace administrator, she would surely have an Access Pass.
She crossed her arms and fixed him with a steady gaze.
Meanwhile, the footsteps of guards searching for Edwin drew ever closer.
“Carolina?”
Edwin called her name urgently.
Fortunately, her deliberation was brief.
“All right. But give me a moment—I stepped away from work, so I need to go back to my office and close things up properly.”
* * *
The moment I agreed to help, Everett’s face brightened.
‘We work at roughly the same place, so we should help each other.’
I left Everett behind and returned to my office.
‘I wasn’t even finished with my work.’
To get Everett past the barrier without an Access Pass, I had to escort him personally.
‘I really don’t want to have to come back here after this.’
I decided to punt my work to my future self and quickly straightened my desk.
Then I gathered my things and hurried back out to the Garden where Everett was waiting.
Everett stepped forward to greet me, as if to escort me himself.
“Carolina.”
I placed my hand over his outstretched palm the way a haughty noblewoman might accept an escort’s arm.
“Shall we?”
We made our way to one of the least-trafficked exits of the Imperial Palace.
“May I see your Access Pass?”
The guard stationed at the gate held out his hand with tired eyes.
I intervened at the opportune moment.
“This is my colleague, but he left his Access Pass at home.”
Palace administrators were still human, so this happened from time to time, though rarely.
“He came in with me as my escort this morning.”
“Is that so?”
The guard began to check the entry records.
“But there’s no record of coming through this gate in the morning…”
I fumbled as though uncertain how to respond.
“Weren’t you aware that when entering with an unescorted companion without an Access Pass, you must use the same gate to exit as you used to enter?”
The guard pressed me on the matter with a sharp tone.
“Well, it’s a festival today, you see. I wanted to go to the night market, but if I went back out through the gate I came in this morning, it would take forever to get there.”
I lowered my eyes and adopted a pitiful expression.
I went on about how I’d worked overtime for several nights and days just to free up this time for the festival.
“See that it doesn’t happen again. I’m only letting it slide this once.”
Fortunately, the guard was a reasonable man.
Though he gave me quite the lecture, he did allow both Everett and me to pass through.
We walked quickly until the palace gate was no more than a thumbnail on the horizon.
Only then did we exhale in unison.
“I owe you a debt of gratitude.”
Everett smiled at me and offered his thanks.
“But was it really true that you worked overtime to go to the festival?”
“Yes.”
I answered his playful question with all the indignation of someone facing early morning regrets.

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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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