Unbeknownst to Me, I am Secretly Dating the Emperor - Chapter 161

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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 161
“Ah.”
The sigh burst out only after the documents touched the floor.
Ed glanced at my expression and gathered the scattered papers from the ground, handing them back to me.
“I’m sorry.”
The apology came swiftly.
I accepted the documents first and carefully laid them back on the desk.
Then Ed tried to pull me into his arms again, his hands empty.
‘This won’t do.’
At first I’d been flustered enough to accept his embrace, but I wasn’t here on vacation.
I dodged Ed and stepped back quickly.
Then I turned to him with a bright smile and spoke in a warning tone.
“From now on, hugging, kissing, and any other form of physical contact are strictly forbidden in this office.”
Ed fidgeted and apologized once more.
“I messed up. Forgive me.”
He seemed to think I was angry because he’d startled me so badly I’d dropped the documents.
I kept a pitiful expression while Ed tried to soften my resolve, but I spoke in a businesslike tone.
“I’m not angry. When it’s time to work, we need to focus on work, Your Majesty.”
I was already aware that I wouldn’t be able to concentrate entirely on work while in the same space as Ed.
But if I didn’t draw this line now, work would inevitably take a back seat.
With nearly ten people working overtime just outside, it would look terrible if the two of us were giggling and fooling around alone.
‘Wow, that would be absolutely ugly to watch.’
I steeled my resolve so that Ed’s enticements wouldn’t sway me.
Yet maintaining this separation between work and personal life wasn’t something my willpower alone could accomplish.
“A kiss or two won’t actually interfere with work.”
Ed seemed deeply unhappy with the physical contact ban and grumbled in a petulant tone.
But I didn’t entertain his objections.
Lately, whenever we were alone, kisses had rarely ended with just a kiss.
“Really, no interference at all?”
Just yesterday, when I told him I needed to wake up early and asked him to go home, he begged for a goodnight kiss.
In that moment when I pressed my lips to his, aware that I’d been rather neglectful of my partner lately…….
So much had happened afterward, and what remained for me was sore muscles and exhaustion.
As I looked at Ed with skeptical eyes, he belatedly avoided my gaze and cleared his throat.
“I’m not like that every time.”
“What do you mean ‘not every time’!”
I planted my hands on my hips and scolded my unscrupulous lover.
If something only happens once or twice, that should be called the exception, not the rule.
“Still…….”
Ed was about to counter again but fell silent.
I deliberately tapped my hip where my hands rested.
Since we hadn’t seen each other often, he’d grown more persistent, so he had nothing to say in his defense.
“Really not at all?”
Ed’s eyes grew dewy with sadness.
Now it was time to offer the carrot.
“Well, maybe sometimes when no one else is around?”
Ed’s expression brightened in an instant, then darkened again.
“Sometimes isn’t enough.”
I cupped his cheek and gave him a light kiss, feeling him grow increasingly adorable.
“But we’re still together, aren’t we?”
Ed nodded, his cheek still pressed in my hand, and replied.
“That part’s good.”
I kissed him several more times, even more endeared by how his cheek squished beneath my palm.
“And if you concentrate and finish work quickly, I won’t have to work late, right?”
My overtime had recently been the biggest obstacle to Ed’s and my time together.
‘Lately, it seems like Ed just drops everything and comes to me the moment he hears I’ve left work.’
When I dangled the hope of returning to seeing each other seven days a week, Ed began to hesitate.
I pressed the point like driving a wedge.
“Or would you rather go back to the Inspection Unit?”
“No.”
I hadn’t even said I’d leave right then, but Ed grabbed my hand urgently.
“So it’s a promise?”
“Yes.”
In any case, a smooth agreement had been reached.
“From now on, whether I leave on time or work late depends entirely on Ed, understand? So let’s work hard together.”
Working in the same place as my lover meant I had to produce better results than before to avoid gossip.
Ed realized there was no room for compromise from me, who consistently maintained a firm stance, and nodded slowly.
Whether from dissatisfaction or because he still hadn’t released the hand cupping his cheek, Ed’s lips gradually protruded like a pout.
I smiled inwardly and kissed his lips several more times.
“Lina.”
With each successive kiss, Ed’s eyes grew sultry as he tried to embrace my waist.
This time too, I quickly stepped back.
“This is serious now!”
Ed looked reluctant but obediently lowered his arms.
* * *
Thanks to these special measures, I adapted quickly to working at the Imperial Palace.
The advisors were favorable toward me, and the work itself wasn’t difficult.
Even Ed, who’d tried various schemes early on whenever he got the chance, eventually focused on his work in pursuit of leaving on time.
‘Though he seems to have developed a habit of glancing at me every time he passes a document.’
Since I had fairly good concentration, that degree of distraction wasn’t particularly bothersome.
And the way he smiled whenever our eyes met, as if melting away…….
‘Actually, I rather like it.’
For me.
“Eek! My apologies. I’ll come back later.”
Except for those occasional moments when advisors came to report and were startled to the point of embarrassment, like today.
‘Should I tell him not to smile?’
I’d noticed it before, but Ed’s default expression toward anyone other than me was coldly blank.
Yet from some point onward, he’d shown me rich emotional expression.
‘The Blue Hawk members said that on the days Ed smiled in their dreams, they came to work with bloodshot eyes from nightmares.’
I couldn’t understand why Ed smiling would amount to a nightmare.
But if that was how the Blue Hawk felt, the advisors were probably not so different.
“Ed, could you try giving me that stern look of yours?”
I demonstrated what I meant by making a rigid expression.
“All of a sudden?”
Puzzled but willing, Ed hardened his expression.
Yet his golden eyes remained sweet as honey, and the corners of his mouth were subtly raised.
‘There’s barely any difference.’
It was a familiar expression to me, but it was clearly not the one others were accustomed to.
“No, not like you’re holding back a laugh. Like when you’re dealing with the other advisors!”
When I gave more specific instructions, his expression grew a bit stiffer.
Yet his eyes remained sweetly soft, as if about to melt.
“It’s hopeless.”
I gave up quickly.
Instead, I decided to step out briefly whenever advisors entered.
Thanks to that, the frequency of advisors being startled plummeted.
Then one day, while I was out briefly, an advisor named Layla came to the office and began reporting on developments in the Temple and the Western Region.
‘I should stay out a bit longer.’
But before I closed the office door, Ed’s cold voice reached my ears first.
“Does it seem to you like the Cardinal—the High Priest’s closest aide—traveling throughout the Empire conducting prayer tours is merely a scheme to win back the people’s hearts?”
Ed flipped through the report Layla had brought with disinterest, raising one eyebrow before closing it again.
At his cold tone, the already small-framed Layla shrank into herself.
“Find out which nobles the Cardinal came into contact with in the Western Region and what they discussed. Then report back.”
“I will quickly reinvestigate and report.”
Layla, who’d stayed up all night to prepare this report, left the office looking utterly deflated.
Based on what I’d observed so far, she’d appear again in a few hours looking even more haggard.
‘Ed doesn’t tolerate mistakes, after all.’
I waited for the door connecting to the advisors’ room to close, then approached Ed.
“Ed.”
Unlike just moments before, his expression brightened instantly.
“What?”
His eyes curved in a smile as he reached out his arms, and I nestled into them willingly.
Because I was about to say something he wouldn’t particularly like.
Soon, cushioned against him, I began to nag.
“Ed, couldn’t you be a little nicer to the advisors?”
“I am being nice.”
Apparently, giving Layla another chance to redo her report in a cold tone counted as ‘nice’ by Ed’s standards.
At his confident assertion, I was momentarily lost for words.
But I couldn’t back down if I wanted to improve the advisors’ working conditions.
“Then, if I treated you the way you treat the advisors and only overlooked your mistakes once, that would be ‘nice’ too, right?”
I deliberately tilted my head in an exaggerated way and held up my index finger in a line, and Ed’s complexion darkened.
“That’s not allowed.”
Having grasped the lesson of walking in another’s shoes, Ed pulled me into an urgent embrace.

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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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