Unbeknownst to Me, I am Secretly Dating the Emperor - Chapter 87

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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 87
“Why doesn’t it work? You’re both unmarried adults. I’m not even asking you to actually date—just pretend to date.”
Though they’d probably end up actually dating eventually.
‘And if Edgar gets that stern, poor Ibeta will be embarrassed.’
I became Ibeta’s overzealous advocate, squaring off against Everett.
We faced each other with eyes so unyielding they seemed locked in silent combat.
Everett was the first to look away.
For the first time since we’d started dating, the anger that had flickered across his face gave way to something softer, something sad, as he turned his head.
As if looking at me any longer had become unbearable.
“It won’t work.”
But Everett clung stubbornly to his opposition, his voice hollow and defeated.
“Why does Edgar care? The two of you just need to agree. His Majesty could say yes if he wanted.”
I didn’t back down.
“No, he won’t!”
Everett’s eyes, which had been fixed on the corner of the carriage, snapped back to me.
The golden eyes, now restored to their original form after deactivating the Transformation Magic Tool, glistened with moisture.
As if I’d said something terribly cruel.
Everett’s lips parted and closed several times, as though he wanted to argue.
He bit down on them, swallowing whatever he wanted to say.
‘What did I say wrong?’
Everett’s exaggerated reaction was making my own mood sink steadily.
I knew Everett held fierce loyalty to the Emperor.
But he was only a subject, after all.
‘The Emperor’s romantic life is his own business to sort out.’
If I opened my mouth again now, I’d say something sharp enough to regret later.
So I chose silence instead.
Everett stared straight ahead, his expression a mixture of anger and sorrow that I couldn’t quite read.
A heavy silence settled over the carriage.
Just before the quiet became unbearable, Kyle intervened.
“Lord Everett Rohas doesn’t have a direct stake in this matter, does he?”
Kyle had given particular emphasis to Everett’s name.
When even Kyle rebuked his excessive reaction, Everett seemed to shrink further.
But it seemed Kyle’s intervention served a purpose beyond mere reproach.
Now that Everett’s momentum had faltered, it was my turn.
“And Lina, I suspect His Majesty won’t approve of this contract dating scheme.”
At my closest confidant’s assertion, I—who knew from the original work that the Emperor had been the one to suggest contract dating—flinched.
“But there’s no better option than this. Even if Kyle has been His Majesty’s oldest friend, he can’t possibly know everything about His Majesty’s heart. If we just ask him once, perhaps…….”
But even as I spoke, my confidence wavered. Kyle’s interpretation of the Emperor’s character was surely far more accurate than mine.
‘The Emperor I know is from several months in the future, after all.’
Kyle gently caught my trailing words.
“It’s true I can’t claim to know His Majesty’s heart completely, as you say.”
Kyle’s gaze drifted toward the window past Everett before returning.
“But on this matter, I can say with certainty: he absolutely won’t do it.”
Kyle, who typically crafted escape routes like a weasel, used the word “absolutely” in his denial.
“Really? You’re certain?”
Without thinking, I pressed him for an explanation.
The gap between the original work and the present was barely four or five months.
‘Why would he agree then but refuse now?’
People don’t change that easily.
Especially not their values or preferences—not without some significant catalyst.
There had been no major changes in the Emperor’s life circumstances.
“That’s…….”
Kyle, scratching his jaw as though wrestling with something difficult, glanced at the window again past Everett before answering with obvious discomfort.
“His Majesty is quite the pure-hearted romantic. Romance marriage is his goal.”
“His Majesty? A pure-hearted romantic?”
“Yes.”
For a moment, I wondered if I’d misunderstood the meaning of the phrase.
“Ah, well, I suppose that could be true.”
Thinking of the Emperor after meeting Ibeta, the description didn’t seem entirely off the mark.
‘Then what about the original work?’
Had the Emperor’s view of love transformed so drastically in the span of four or five months?
‘Could the Emperor have fallen for Ibeta at first sight at the New Year ceremony?’
I recalled the early parts of the original work.
Scenes of the Emperor carelessly accruing bad karma flashed past like a panorama.
‘But since the novel is told from Ibeta’s perspective, it’s not impossible.’
If that were the case, there’d be no reason for me to be making such a strong argument here.
When Ibeta and the Emperor met, it would resolve naturally.
‘Put it aside for now.’
Noticing I’d given up on the contract dating scheme, both Everett and Kyle exhaled in relief.
“Let’s think of another approach.”
Kyle drove the point home with those words.
To keep the saintess Ibeta at the Imperial Palace, we needed to manufacture some justification, whatever it took.
‘I do have another idea in mind, though.’
I thought of something I’d brought with me just before departing the Temple.
‘But that requires Ibeta’s permission first.’
Ibeta chose that moment to rejoin us in the carriage, her composure restored.
With Ibeta aboard, the carriage set off directly for the Imperial Palace.
Not a word was spoken inside the carriage the entire way.
Lost in thought, I hardly noticed when we arrived at the Imperial Palace.
I caught Ibeta’s hand as she prepared to step out of the carriage, stopping her.
“Wait, Ibeta.”
At my words, Ibeta settled back into her seat.
“There’s something I need to tell you, just us.”
* * *
After Kyle and Everett stepped out to give us privacy, I faced Ibeta across the carriage.
‘Where should I even start?’
My heart felt heavy knowing this wouldn’t be good news for her.
‘But it’s better she knows in advance.’
I steeled myself and opened my mouth carefully.
“Ibeta, would you look at this for me?”
I handed her the button I’d taken from the Temple just before we left.
The gilt button, engraved with a badger emblem, was intricately crafted, though its lustre had faded with age.
“What is this?”
Ibeta lifted the button to examine it more closely as she asked.
“It’s a button bearing the emblem of House of Robertus—a noble house that was extinguished.”
This button had been sewn into the garment Ibeta was wearing the day she was abandoned.
‘Ibeta’s mother must have placed it there as insurance—so her daughter could find her family someday if she ever wanted to.’
Because of this button, the priests suspected Ibeta was an illegitimate child of House of Robertus, but the head priest, prepared for any contingency, had simply kept the button and all but forgotten the matter.
The late Marquis of House of Robertus was notorious for his debauchery, and being the bastard child of a high nobleman held little cachet.
In the head priest’s reckoning—desperate as he was to return to the Central Region—it seemed information that would profit him nothing.
‘Thinking back on Ibeta’s childhood, it’s possible he buried the truth hoping she’d awaken to High Priest rank.’
The head priest had recalled that button when Ibeta was around ten years old.
Seeing no signs of an Awakening, he’d decided to leverage the information about her being the Marquis’s illegitimate daughter.
At that time, the Marquis of House of Robertus still enjoyed power as the prior Emperor’s closest confidant.
The head priest informed the High Priest of his temple that it possessed an illegitimate child of House of Robertus.
The High Priest, keen to cultivate ties with House of Robertus, had shown some interest.
‘But then, soon after, the Emperor succeeded in his coup d’état, and House of Robertus was extinguished.’
The head priest’s chance to advance to the Central Region crumbled once more.
‘Which is why the High Priest knows about Ibeta’s secret past—the biggest plot twist in the original work.’
‘The High Priest surely still knows that Ibeta is an illegitimate child of House of Robertus.’
It was a past that had already been fixed.
There was no guarantee the Temple wouldn’t exploit this card in some way.
“I found this while searching the Temple earlier.”
It was a prepared excuse I’d worked out beforehand when I decided to give her the button.
“I thought hard about it, but I felt you deserved to know…….”
Sensing that what I was about to say was grave, Ibeta’s shoulders tensed.
I held her blue gaze steady.
“I believe you’re the illegitimate daughter of the late Marquis of House of Robertus.”
Ibeta’s face went ashen at the revelation.
Suddenly learning about family she’d never known in her entire life would be a shock, but it was far gentler than letting the Temple spring it on her later.
I steadied my resolve.

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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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