Unbeknownst to Me, I am Secretly Dating the Emperor - Chapter 93

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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 93
The Errand Boy probably visited Lina more frequently than anyone else in the entire Inspection Unit Building.
Ever since his first day, he had come by so often that he now made appearances at the Inspection Unit Division 5 Office several times a day, except on those rare occasions when Lina was away on assignment.
Since he always left with an armful of snacks, the Errand Boy seemed delighted each time he delivered a letter to Lina.
The boy held out an envelope to Lina.
“A knight asked me to give this to you.”
Whenever the boy delivered a letter from someone specific, he always said the same thing.
Lina took the envelope and smiled like a spring blossom.
To anyone watching, there was clearly something going on between her and the knight who had sent it.
Even a twelve-year-old errand boy seemed to know it.
“Should I wait in case you want to write a reply?”
The boy asked as he immediately popped the snack Lina had given him into his mouth, apparently famished.
“No, that’s all right.”
The envelope was rather thick today, and Lina seemed to think it would take some time to read and write a response, so she sent the boy on his way first.
“Then I’ll come back when you call for me.”
The boy bowed and disappeared.
As if he already knew Lina would summon him soon to deliver her reply.
Lina seemed to think of him as a conscientious and efficient child, but everyone else could see what was really happening.
The Errand Boy was simply pretending not to notice.
He didn’t want to lose this lucrative errand run by appearing too clever, not when it came with such generous snacks.
Yet despite the boy’s clumsy, cunning performance, both Lina and her knight seemed absolutely convinced that no one knew a thing.
But there was a saying: affairs of the heart and sneezes cannot be hidden.
Long ago, not just the Errand Boy shuttling between the two had noticed—Sophia, who sat right next to Lina, had caught on as well.
‘Lucky them.’
Sophia continued to pretend not to notice, even today.
And she planned to go on pretending for as long as it took.
A few days later, it might never have happened—if only Sophia, carrying a stack of documents, hadn’t collided with Lina’s desk.
“Ow!”
With her view blocked by the pile of papers, Sophia struck her thigh against the desk’s edge.
The pain brought tears to her eyes.
She was going to have a proper bruise.
The impact made her grip weaken, and the documents scattered from her hands.
As she twisted her body at the last moment while hitting the desk, the fallen papers landed in different spots.
Her thigh throbbed, and on top of that, all the documents she’d so carefully organized were now in disarray.
“Sigh—when am I going to get all this sorted?”
Sophia sighed and began gathering the scattered papers.
In doing so, she found several documents that appeared to belong to Lina.
“Looks like some of Lina’s papers fell off her desk when I hit it.”
Sophia carefully sorted through them, making sure not to mix them up.
Then she discovered a single sheet of letter paper among the documents.
‘That must be it.’
It seemed Lina had tucked it between her papers before stepping away hastily, and it had fallen along with everything else in the collision.
Sophia decided simply to pick it up and return it to Lina, worried that she might be upset if the letter got stepped on.
It had fallen open, but she tried not to read the contents with her blurred eyes.
Yet the handwriting was far too familiar—it struck her immediately.
‘Who is this?’
At first, she thought she must be mistaken.
The person Sophia knew was entirely the type to never fill page after page with love poetry praising the sweetness of romance.
‘A declaration of war, perhaps—but not this.’
Love verses about how the world sparkled because of you?
As she hesitated, she found herself forgetting her initial resolve and peering at the letter more carefully.
The more closely she examined it, the more her suspicion hardened into certainty.
‘It really is.’
Sophia was from a noble family serving the Crown Prince, Edwin’s father.
She had some acquaintance with the Crown Princess and was also a friend of Viola Simor, the Prince’s governess.
Through that connection, she had once served as a teacher for young Edwin’s basic Imperial Language.
She had known his handwriting since those early lessons.
From the very beginning, he had a peculiar habit of pressing down especially hard on certain vertical strokes in particular characters—a distinctive mark that remained unmistakably present here.
‘It can’t be.’
The sinister implication made Sophia shudder.
* * *
The atmosphere in the Inspection Unit Division 5 Office had been poor lately.
Part of it, if only slightly, was that Bess, the youngest, was away at the Separate Palace helping the Saint adjust to her new surroundings.
But most of it stemmed from a problem that Lucy, Derek, and Sophia had discovered in that order.
When Lucy lay down to sleep, she dreamed of Edwin endlessly rolling up his sleeves to show off his forearms.
Derek couldn’t open his windows even in the height of summer, and Sophia’s leg trembled whenever the Errand Boy appeared in the office.
The fact that Lina was dating the Emperor was something they could not forget, no matter how hard they tried.
Though the blue hawk was taciturn and mentally strong, this revelation was shocking enough to haunt even her dreams.
The three of them, robbed of restful sleep, bore darker and darker circles under their eyes.
They noticed their faces growing progressively more irritable and wondered if perhaps someone else knew, but ultimately everyone kept silent, suspecting as much.
Then Nathan, the last member of their team, entered the office with the same troubled expression they all wore.
Bess had been staying at the Separate Palace and hadn’t come in recently, and Lina had stepped out for a moment.
Only four of them sat in the office, each wearing similarly troubled expressions.
Their eyes met in the air.
‘Wait, you too?’
An unspoken understanding passed between them.
If they all knew, then it was no longer a secret.
And it was far too heavy a burden to bear alone.
Lucy was the first to speak—she had known the longest.
“You all saw it, didn’t you?”
As Lucy opened with grave urgency, Sophia nodded with a cautious expression.
“I did.”
Once he confirmed Sophia’s response to Lucy’s words, Derek’s silence broke like a dam.
“Dear gods. Lina and His Majesty are dating? Do you have any idea how shocked I was? I’ve been working here and never once saw His Majesty smile before!”
Sophia responded to Derek’s outburst with a heavy expression.
“I only suspected at first, but it seems I was right.”
It felt like they were taking turns, each saying their piece.
But Nathan, whose turn came next, remained silent.
As if struck by something profound.
All three pairs of eyes turned toward him.
Nathan, who had been standing with his mind somewhat elsewhere, finally stammered out a question.
“What are you saying? His Majesty and Lina are dating?”
As he spoke, reality seemed to sink in bit by bit, and his voice grew louder.
By the end, he was nearly shouting.
His eyes trembled visibly from genuine shock.
“Wait—why?”
Derek also jumped, startled, and asked the same question.
“You didn’t know?”
Lucy and Sophia tried to soften their words, but Derek’s summary was blunt.
Sophia and Lucy turned away from Derek.
As if they knew nothing at all.
“Lucy, you brought it up first.”
“I was asking if you’d seen the morning newspaper.”
“Same here.”
Derek, thrown under the bus by Sophia and Lucy, scratched the back of his head irritably and took out his frustration on Nathan for no reason.
“So why did you come in looking all distressed?”
Nathan spoke quietly, his expression gloomy.
“I proposed to Cecil, but she said she needs to think about marriage for a bit.”
The reason for Nathan’s troubled appearance had been revealed.
No one had deceived anyone—there was only the deceived and those keeping the secret.
“Oh no.”
“At least she didn’t say she wants to break up.”
But the consolation was brief.
They all had darker clouds hanging over their own paths.
The other three might have figured it out on their own, but Nathan hadn’t.
The realization that they had blundered made the three of them grimace.
Derek’s expression was by far the worst.
Derek clasped his hands together and asked Nathan respectfully.
“Nathan, I know you’re upset too, and I’m sorry to ask this of you while you’re like this, but could you forget that I, Lucy, and Sophia know that His Majesty and Lina are in a romantic relationship?”
The tone was polite, but it was half a demand.
Just as Nathan, bewildered, was about to nod in agreement, the office door, which had been firmly shut, swung open.
“What did you just say?”
It was Kyle.
Derek’s voice had carried through the door.
And Kyle had happened to be arriving at the Inspection Unit Office at precisely that moment.

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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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